Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradaw, (September 9, 1926 – September 26, 2022) (Photo: Orhan Akkanat/Anadolu Agency)
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradaw, one of the world’s most influential contemporary Islamic scholars has died in Qatar. The 96-year-old’s passing was announced by the International Union of Muslim Scholars, which he chaired.
Al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian by birth, was a spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. Born to poor devout Muslim villagers in the Nile Delta, Al-Qaradawi lost his father, aged just 2, and was subsequently raised by his mum and uncle. He read and memorised the Qur’an before he was 10.
He then joined the Institute of Religious Studies at Tanta and graduated 9 years later.
While in Tanta, Al-Qaradawi first encountered Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, when al-Banna gave a lecture at his school. Al-Qaradawi wrote of the lasting impact of this encounter, describing al-Banna as “brilliantly radiating as if his words were revelation or live coals from the light of prophecy.”
He moved on to study Islamic Theology at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, from which he graduated in 1953.
He earned a diploma in Arabic language and literature in 1958 at the Advanced Arabic Studies Institute.
He enrolled in the Department of Qur’an and Sunnah Sciences of the Faculty of Religion’s Fundamentals and graduated with a master’s degree in Qur’an Studies in 1960. Two years later he was sent by Al-Azhar University to Qatar to head the Qatari Secondary Institute of Religious Studies.
He completed his PhD thesis titled Zakah, and its Effect on Solving Social Problems in 1973 with First Merit, and was awarded his PhD degree from Al-Azhar.
A connection to the Muslim Brotherhood led to his imprisonment under King Farouk in 1949, and then thrice under President Gamal Abdul Nasser. He travelled to Qatar in 1961 and did not return until the overthrow of the military regime in the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. He repeatedly stated that he was no longer a member and turned down official positions in the organisation twice.
In 1977, he laid the foundation for the Faculty of Shari’ah and Islamic Studies at the University of Qatar. In the same year, he founded the Centre of Seerah and Sunna Research. He also served at Egypt’s Institute of Imams under the Ministry of Religious Endowments as supervisor before moving back to Doha as Dean of the Islamic Department at the Faculties of Shariah and Education in Qatar, where he continued until 1990.
His next appointment was in Algeria as chair of the Scientific Council of Islamic Universities and Higher Institutions in 1990–91. He returned to Qatar once more as director of the Seerah and Sunnah Centre at Qatar University.
While in Qatar, he rose to fame and wrote dozens of books. His weekly show, Islamic Law and Life aired on Al Jazeera TV made him a household name across the Arab world, with an estimated audience of 60 million.
He served as the chief religious scholar for IslamOnline, a website he helped to found in 1997. In the same year, he helped found the European Council for Fatwa and Research, a council of influential Muslim scholars dedicated to researching and writing fatwas to support Western Muslim minority communities based in Ireland, and he served as its head.
Al-Qaradawi finished third in a 2008 poll on who was the world’s leading public intellectual. The poll, Top 100 Public Intellectuals, was conducted among readers of Prospect Magazine (UK) and Foreign Policy (US). Al-Qaradawi wrote over 120 books, including The Lawful and the Prohibited in Islam and Islam: The Future Civilization.
He also received eight international prizes for his contributions to Islamic scholarship and was one of the most influential Islamic scholars living.
However, in the West, his defence of Palestinian suicide bombings in the Second Intifada won his infamy.
He was refused an entry visa to the UK in 2008 and barred from entering France in 2012. He was also the subject of an Interpol wanted notice – subsequently rescinded because it was assessed to be politically motivated.
During the early days of the Arab Spring in 2011, his sermon in Cairo’s Tahrir Square proved to be a false dawn. By 2013, the Egyptian counter-revolution was underway, with President Morsi imprisoned and replaced by Sisi.
In its most democratic election ever, Egypt elected a Muslim Brotherhood leader, Mohamed Morsi, as president in 2012. But the dream was short-lived. Morsi was ousted by the military a year later. However, Al-Qaradawi’s support for the uprisings and his vocal criticism of Egypt’s military-led government angered Egypt and its allies.
The Brotherhood was outlawed once more, and in 2018, Egypt’s government designated Al-Qaradawi and his seven children terrorists, and an Egyptian court sentenced him to death in absentia in 2015.
In 2017, Egypt, the UAE and Saudi Arabia launched a blockade of Qatar, citing its’ giving a platform to Islamists like al-Qaradawi as one of the reasons. Egyptian authorities arrested his daughter Ola al-Qaradawi along with her husband. She was held without charge in abysmal conditions and locked in solitary confinement for months at a time.
In his last days, Al-Qaradawi spent time with Ola, who was released from prison in late 2021. In addition to Ola and Abdel-Rahman, Al-Qaradawi is survived by his third wife, Aicha; three other daughters, Siham, Ilham and Asmaa; two other sons, Mohamed and Osama; and 12 grandchildren.
Nadine Osman
