"We buy weapons to kill each other, we buy death with our money,” Shaykh al-Azhar, Ahmad al-Tayyib, said, as he came to the end of his intervention during a very public conference in Cairo, entitled “Al-Azhar International Conference on the Rejuvenation of Islamic Thought". And then, presumably referencing the recent “Deal of the Century” announced by US President Donald Trump, he openly declared: “I was embarrassed while watching (US President Donald) Trump and (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu, who plan, say, and govern (the problems of the region), and there is no Arab or Muslim present”. At that point, though there had been much applause in the hall previously, following al-Tayyib’s comments, there was silence. And that, perhaps, says it all.
This intervention was unexpected – partly because of what was said – but also, who said it and this is why it gained some attention across the Arab media landscape. Ahmed al-Tayyib, the head of the Azhar establishment, which has a large symbolic value for Sunni Muslims worldwide, spoke rather bitingly about the current political moment for Arabs and Muslims. But his comments were relevant far beyond that: Arab political autonomy, particularly normative Muslim scholastic intellectual independence – vis-à-vis not only external challenges, but internal ones too. His intellectual comments, however, need to be contextualised against the establishment he represents – and where it finds itself in the current moment.
Since 2015, Egypt’s officialdom has been pushing a ‘renewal of religious discourse’ project, which has met with a rather divided reaction from within the religious establishment. Azhari scholars generally appear uninterested in a specifically religious initiative by a non-religious figure, as they typically regard such activities to be their domain, rather than from external actors. It’s hardly a secret that al-Tayyib and others in the Azhari establishment hold that view – indeed, it’s quite public in Egypt on that score. Nevertheless, they’ve participated in the discourse – if only to continue to make their point that such activities should be rightfully placed under their aegis. And that’s what al-Tayyib reinforced.
