The famous Salafi scholar Abu-Ishaq Hegazy of Huwain has passed away in Qatar after a decades-long career in Islamic studies and proselytization. Abu-Ishaq’s major impact both at home and abroad had stirred the unease of Egypt’s military regime, and he spent the last years of his life in Qatar whose state mosque held his funeral yesterday.

PC: Theislamicinformation.com

Abu-Ishaq Hegazy Mohamed Youssef Sharif Huwainy came from a farming family in Huwain, a village in the Kafrel-Sheikh countryside of the Nile Delta. Having learned the Spanish language he briefly studied in Spain before returning home. In the mid-1970s he was influenced by the prominent scholars Abdel-Hamid Kishk and the Albanian Muhammad Nasiruddin to study hadith, to which he would devote his years. Abu-Ishaq was not an actual patronymic nickname; he adopted it as his name in respect for the Sahabi Saad b. Abi Waqqas and the scholar Ibrahim b. Musa Shatibi, both of whom had the patronymic Abu Ishaq. Abu-Ishaq adopted Nasiruddin’s Salafi school of Sunni Islam in his studies. He studied under Naguib Mutiey and Sabiq Tihami, and later moved to the Arabian Peninsula where he studied under Abdullah Qaud and the Saudi mufti Abdul-Aziz Baz. He also met his role model Nasiruddin, who showed great appreciation for his work.

Like much of his generation, Abu-Ishaq was involved in public proselytization and was not shy in commenting on public affairs: he was a staunch proponent of a public role for Islam and of support for Palestine. When added to a dictatorship in Cairo and a securitized international atmosphere in the twenty-first century, this made him a prime target of considerable misinformation by anti-Islamic outlets, which have freely and frequently twisted his words in league with Arab rivals. Abu-Ishaq’s widespread popularity prompted Cairo to crack down on his work after a military coup in the mid-2010s. Like other sociopolitically active preachers, Abu-Ishaq relocated to Qatar where he passed away. His village at home mourned him while the Qatari state mosque in Doha held his funeral. The smear campaign against Abu-Ishaq as a “khariji” or extremist by both his local rivals, as well as by anti-Islamic media abroad was belied by the considerable regard for his works by Muslims well beyond his Salafi school.

by Ibrahim Moiz

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