Al-Sanusi and Qadhafi: Continuity of Thought?

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Periodical article

Title:	Al-Sanusi and Qadhafi: Continuity of Thought?
Author:	Vikør, Knut S.
Year:	1987
Periodical:	Maghreb Review
Volume:	12
Issue:	1-2
Period:	January-April
Pages:	25-28
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Libya
Subjects:	Islam politicians Politics and Government Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) History and Exploration Religion and Witchcraft
About person:	Mu'ammar al-Qaddafi (ca. 1942-2011)
Abstract:	Most of those who write about the ideology of Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi comment on the similarity of his ideas and those of the Sanusiya Sufi brotherhood in nineteenth-century Libya. A connection is seen, both in a rejection of Western influences and a reversion to a pristine and austere Islam, and in the independent way the Sanusiya and Qadhafi interpret the tenets of Islam. The present article argues that it is not the similarities but rather the divergence of their ideas that is striking. The reforms suggested by al-Sanusi were concerned with bringing Sufism more in line with the accepted sciences of the Shari'a, while Qadhafi's reforms lie in moving the body of law away from the Shari'a. Notes, ref.