Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab Declared Takfir on All Muslims in His Time

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab wrote an essay called Kashf ash-Shubuhat ‘an Khaliq al-‘Ardhi wa as-Samawat, “The Clarification of Unclarity Concerning the Creator of Heaven and Earth”, for ‘Abdullah ibn Sa’ud, the bandit leader of the first Saudi state. 

In this work, he declared that all present-day Muslims are disbelievers and have been so for the last six hundred years.  He applied the verses in the Qur’an meant to refer to disbelievers among the tribe of the Quraysh to most God-fearing and pious individuals of the Muslim community.  ibn Sa’ud naturally took this work as a pretext and device for extending his political sovereignty by subjecting the Arabs to his dominance.  ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab began to call people to his religion and instilled in their hearts the idea that everyone under the sun was an idolater.  What is more, he said anyone who slew an “idolater”, when he died, would go immediately to Paradise.