Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiyya - Beliefs

Beliefs

One scholar studying the group (Gilles Kepel) found that the group repeatedly used the name of radical Islamist theorist Sayyid Qutb, and often quoted from his manifesto, Ma'alim fi al-Tariq (Milestones), in their leaflets and newsletters. They emphasized the right to legislate belongs to God alone; and that divine unity (tawhid) in Islam signifies liberation (tahrir) from all that is corrupt in thought—including the liberation of all that is inherited or conventional, like customs and traditions.

There was a scant supply of any writing by the groups members, but some issues leading writer(s) of the gama'at thought worth mentioning included:

• Youth must be taught that Islam was nizam kamil wa shamil (a complete and perfect system) and must regulate government and war, the judicial system and the economy.
• Egypt's disastrous 1967 War was the result of following Arab nationalism rather than Islam.
• Signs of the growth of an Islamic movement were the wearing of the veil by women and the white gallabieh and untrimmed beard by men, early marriage, and attendance at public prayers on the major Muslim festivals, Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-adha.

While secularist social analyses of Egypt's socioeconomic problems maintained that poverty was caused by overpopulation or high defense expenditures, Al-Gama'at saw the cause in the populace's spiritual failures—laxness, secularism, and corruption. The solution was a return to the simplicity, hard work, and self-reliance of earlier Muslim life.