This chapter introduces Albānī’s life and his relationship with other Muslim groups. It begins with an introduction to Albānī’s formative years and his sour relationship with his father and Ḥanafīs in Syria. Albānī took his iconoclasm with him everywhere he went, even to relatively conservative countries like Saudi Arabia. While in Medina, Albānī and his students engaged in particular practices that distinguished them in the social arena. Most of these practices were based on his fatwas, which contradicted the Wahhabi-Ḥanbalī consensus. Saudi Wahhabis could not tolerate Albānī’s iconoclasm and chose to not renew his teaching appointment. Albānī then moved to Jordan where he clashed with the very powerful Muslim Brotherhood. Finally, the chapter introduces the most prominent Traditionalist figures in the modern Muslim world who viewed Salafism as a threat to Islam.

This chapter begins with a discussion of the different reactions toward criticism of ḥadīth found in the Ṣaḥīḥayn. Is there a consensus on the authenticity of the Ṣaḥīḥayn or have they always been open to re-examination? Next, I analyze Albānī’s ḥadīth methodology and the criticism he attracted. One would imagine that Albānī was a very strict and cautious ḥadīth scholar, but much of the criticism he received was due to leniency in his methodology. In particular, he was often criticized for using abridged versions of ḥadīth manuals to make decisions. Finally, the chapter ends by looking at the impact Albānī had on modern ḥadīth studies. In the 1960s it was not common practice for scholars to cite the ḥadīth they quoted or even note their level of authenticity. However, after Albānī we find that many authors, even his critics, started grading each ḥadīth. The most important result was that a generation of university students tried to evaluate any ḥadīth they would use in their dissertations.

Eliminating the use of weak ḥadīth has been a common call of Salafism. Salafis rejected the use of weak ḥadīth because they were incompatible with their core commitment to textual authenticity. Salafis believed weak ḥadīth to be the source of many superstitions, fictitious beliefs, and many erroneous legal verdicts found in the madhhabs. They hold that the use of weak ḥadīth betrays the scholarly responsibility to preserve Islamic teachings in their pure form. On the other hand, Traditionalists allowed the limited use of weak ḥadīth and insisted that they play an important role in Islamic interpretation. The different stances reflect the various priorities of both groups as well as their contrasting conceptions of truth. Their differences also stem from their different perceptions of the social and ideological consequences of using weak ḥadīth. This chapter ends with an analysis of Albānī’s controversial project of dividing the Sunan and the responses it garnered from Traditionalists.

This chapter locates the place of Salafism among other vying movements at the time, particularly Islamic Modernism and Traditionalism. By the end of the thirteenth century, Traditionalism had reached its mature, institutional form. At the core of Traditionalism were the four madhhabs that provided systematic interpretations of Islamic law and to which Muslim scholars and their educational systems held guild-like loyalty. Islamic Modernists largely viewed and interpreted the principal Islamic texts, and called for ijtihād, through the prism of modernity. For Modernists, it was essential to reform Islamic teachings in light of modern advancements. They were concerned with making Islam relevant and meaningful to the present. I end this chapter with a discussion of the different types of Salafis.