Section 2: On How to Apply the Seven Principles of the Islamic Sharia in Egypt

Chapter 1: The theoretical corruption of the Sunnite sharia

Firstly:  The roots

True Islamic sharia, found exclusively in the Quran, is based on justice, equality, mercy, political freedoms, religious freedom, the right to live, and alleviation of burdens. In contrast, the Sunnite sharia is based on injustice, corruption, fanaticism, extremism, bigotry, violence, cruelty, aggression, and tyranny. The Sunnite sharia was applied for many years during the Arab conquests of countries around Arabia, before it has been written down in the Abbasid era. Such conquests ran contrary to the self-defensive fighting stressed in the Quran. Chief among the consequences of such conquests was the establishment of the Umayyad tyrannical empire that followed the example of the usual pattern dominant in the Middle Ages. This pattern contradicts, of course, the principles of Islamic (Quranic) sharia, especially justice and freedom. The Abbasid Empire succeeded the Umayyad one. Such empires used to ascribe themselves forcibly to the name of Islam, and thus, their men felt the urge to formulate religious legislations to justify the existence of injustice and tyranny. Hence, the Sunnite sharia has come into being; written down for the first time in the Abbasid Era, it has struck the Quran with fatal blows to manipulate it to serve the purposes and whims of tyrants. Scholars and theologians at the time never could have managed to distort the wording and phrasing of the Quranic text; this would have been violently opposed. Instead, theologians distorted its meanings and interpretations and the concepts and notions inherent in it. Among the theologians' falsehoods, they annulled many Quranic rules and legislations under the pretext of their being replaced with hadiths! We have refuted this falsehood in our book published on our website titled "No Replacements or Interpolations in the Quran". Such theologians, imams, and scholars began the fabrication and making up of hadiths, sayings they attributed falsely to Muhammad two centuries after his death! The accumulation of millions of the so-called hadiths led to the emergence of the Sunnite creed as a full-fledged religion that has nothing to do with real Islam: the Quran. Simultaneously, countless books of theology and interpretations emerged with the passage of years, forming what the Sunnites call now ''sciences of the Quran'', which in fact refute and deny the Quran totally and distorting its meanings, recitation methods, and sometimes, writing techniques. We have written before, for 30 years, prolifically hundreds of articles and books to detail such grave crime against Islam, and about showing true facts of Islam based on the Quran alone. We have written a lot about how the Quran contradicts the falsehoods of the Sunnite, Shiite, and Sunnite creeds. Here, we give an overview of how Sunnite scholars and theologians formulated their Sunnite sharia by manipulating and distorting the divine sharia in the Quranic text and how they turned the illicit and prohibited into religious duties and the legal and allowed into prohibited things, as they have destroyed all rules and legislations in the Quran. We give examples of this below.

Secondly:  Manipulation and distortion of degrees of legislation in the Quran:

 Quranic legislations consist of three degrees; 1) commands, duties, and orders, 2) prohibitions: illegal or illicit things, and 3) the lawful, legal, and allowed. The methodology of the Quran specifies the orders and the prohibitions, while leavings the third degree unspecified to mark it as things allowed as long as they are not mentioned. Sadly, Sunnite fiqh (theology and jurisprudence) meddled and distorted such degrees; it added two degrees to the third one: the disliked (lawful but preferably avoided) and the liked (that should be done but not a full-fledged duty or divine order). These additions resulted in two things; 1) adding terminology foreign and contrary to the Quran and to its sharia, and 2) restricting the circle of allowed and legal things for no reason by adding needless details. Sometimes, the Sunnites theologians and scholars made things strictly prohibited in the Quran as legal and lawful! See 17:38 and 49:7 to ascertain that the disliked in Quranic terms refers to strict prohibition, as opposed to Sunnite meanings and interpretations.

 Thirdly: Manipulation of comprehensive and ascertained Quranic legislation rules:

1- There are comprehensive and ascertained Quranic legislation rules that give clear limits or frames to delineate prohibited things in a way that prevents one from adding to them. For instance, the categories of women one cannot possibly marry; see 4:24. One can marry women outside such circle. Yet, the Sunnite theology added two items needlessly: women related to one's nursing woman and one's wife's maternal and paternal aunts. Sunnite deities/gods fabricated hadiths ascribed falsely to Muhammad to consolidate their erroneous views! Such effrontery is akin to self-deification; no one is allowed to ad legislations to the Quran!

  2 : The example is adding more prohibited food items in an unnecessary manner. Prohibited food items in the Quran, dead animals, their blood, flesh of pigs, and food given as oblation, offering, and sacrifice to gods, deities, saints, and tombs, are found in 2:173, 5:3, 6:145, and 27:115. The Sunnite added in their fiqh books of theology so many prohibited food items despite the Quranic warning against such additions; see 5:87, 10:59-60, 16:116:117, and 66:1. Hence, the Sunnites prohibited lawful food items for no reason but to deify themselves!

  3 - There are Quranic legislative rules ascertained by the style of prohibition with exceptions. For instance, in these verses: "…And do not kill the soul which God has made sacred, except in the course of justice…" (17:33 and 6:151) and "…and do not kill the soul which God has made sacred-except in the pursuit of justice…" (25:68), we see that killing is not allowed in Quranic legislations except in retaliation against killers who are of course criminals (see 2:178) or in wars and battles of elf-defense (see 2:194). In contrast to this, the Sunnite creed deities added the permission to kill the so-called apostates or renegades who forsook Islam, atheists, those who deny prayers and do not perform them, and fornicators/adulterers who are married, not to mention the right of caliph/sultan to kill one third of the population to reform conditions of the remaining two thirds!

  4- Other Quranic legislative rules are affirmed with the style of ascertainment; for instance, the written will: "It is decreed for you: when death approaches one of you, and he leaves wealth, to make a testament in favor of the parents and the relatives, fairly and correctly-a duty upon the righteous." (2:180), followed by details of written wills, and in 4:11-12, we see that written wills are to be done before giving shares of inheritance, as rules that cannot be overlooked; see 4:13-14. Yet, the Sunnite fiqh, again, interfered to add a rule foreign to the Quran: no written will is needed if one has inheritors, under the claim that any hadiths could replace and annul Quranic verses!

Fourthly: Manipulation of Quranic legislative rules and their higher aims:

 In general, all rules within Quranic sharia within legislative framework have higher general aims and purposes. The Quranic legislation begins with orders/commands linked to certain rules, with the purpose or aim mentioned within the same verse or within other Quranic contexts of other verses or in isolation. Details of this will be tackled in another book. We give here examples to illustrate this as follows.

1- As for the topic of chastity, Quranic legislative commands prohibit lustful leering to both men and women as well as stopping any actions leading to fornication, with the order of decency in dress codes; see 24:30-31 and 17:32. In contrast, Sunnite Salafist theology and fiqh exceed all limits in an extremist manner: they Salafist scholars invented hijab (veil) and niqab (face-covering veil) foreign to the Quran that orders the covering of women's cleavage and legs, NOT hair, neck, arms, and face. To engulf women with black gowns from tip to toe is grave injustice that has nothing to do with the Quran. Covering women's hair has nothing to do with the Quran as well; this is patriarchal oppression to females is deep rooted in other cultures and creeds, unlinked to Islam at all. In addition, this Salafist extremism has led to loss of the higher aim of chastity; niqab plays now a role in immorality and crimes in the West and in the Arab world; women use it to commit several crimes without being noticed. What a shame! Salafism has nothing to do with Islam at all!

2- Acts of worship are commands in the Quranic text to reach a higher aim or purpose: piety and riotousness; see 2:21, 2:183, and 2:196-197, and to avoid immorality and sinning; see 29:45. This is the real meaning of all acts of worship: prayers, pilgrimage, fasting, zakat, alms, etc. Zakat literally means to recommend oneself to God and to elevate ones' moral standard and character to attain piety. The Sunnite creed caused all such elevated meanings to be lost totally; the Sunnite imams turned acts of worship into goals and targets in themselves, not leading to anything higher at all. This stance has led to the notion that one is free to sin and disobey Quranic commands as long as one performs all acts of worship! The Sunnites stick to false notions such as the idea that performing pilgrimage to Mecca wipes out all ones; sins of a lifetime, to return like a new-born baby! This leads to more sinning before and after the journey of pilgrimage! Piety, righteousness, and fear of God are certainly lost in that manner. Another example of such false notions is the idea that if one builds a mosque, one is sure to reside in Paradise in a palace. This erroneous notion has led to more sinning, thinking that one is assured to enter Paradise whatever one does of sins! Examples of that type are countless in the Sunnite falsehoods: the worst of them all is the bad notion that since one is saying (There is not God but Allah), one is sure to avoid Hell, whether one sins/corrupts or not! Such devilish notions deny the Quran totally. Such Sunnite, Salafist, and Wahabi concepts have led to immorality, corruption, overt religiosity hypocrisy, spread of falsehoods, and lack of conscience and ethics. Arabs are infamous for moral bankruptcy, fraud, and swindling among all nations due to this terrible state of affairs.

3- Self-defense fighting ordained in the Quran in cases of persecution has turned by Sunnites into gratuitous violence, aggression, and invasions for looting! The Quranic legislations show clearly that fighting ought to be for deterring enemies and to defend oneself against aggressors who begin their evil violence against us. Such self-defense is for the sake of God, when one is persecuted religiously and fights back. Hence, the higher aim of self-defensive wars mentioned in the Quran is to impose religious freedom for all and to end religious persecution, so as one chooses one's creed freely and lives in peace, while being held responsible for one's choice in the Last Day. In this verse, "And fight in the cause of God those who fight you, but do not commit aggression; God does not love the aggressors." (2:190), we see the command to fight is linked to being attacked first by aggressors; this is repeated and affirmed in 2:194 "…Whoever commits aggression against you, retaliate against him in the same measure as he has committed against you. And be conscious of God, and know that God is with the righteous." The legislative aim or purpose is to prevent religious persecution and compulsion in religion: "And fight them until there is no persecution, and worship becomes devoted to God alone. But if they cease, then let there be no hostility except against the oppressors." (2:193). Polytheists used to persecute believers among early Muslims in Mecca: "…persecution is more serious than killing. They will not cease to fight you until they turn you back from your religion, if they can.…" (2:217). By stopping persecution and compulsion and coercion, religion would be a matter concerning God alone, not mortals, to judge; this is the meaning expressed in: "Fight them until there is no more persecution, and religion becomes exclusively for God…" (8:39). It is a sin that one plays God and judges other people's faith by means of inquisition-like persecution and coercion and terror. The Sunnite creed of terrorizing others focuses on the command to fight while overlooking the legislative higher aim of self-defense and prevention of persecution and compulsion in religious affairs. Hence, fighting by Sunnites is not for God's sake; rather, for looting, thefts, robbery, enslavement, rape, invasions, occupations, wealth, etc. falsely in the name of Islam to justify their crimes under the term 'jihad' as if their crimes are religious duties! Shame on them!

Fifthly: The corruption of the Sunnite sharia in terms of application:

1 - Many Wahabi Egyptians call for application of sharia in their countries. They do not know that the Sunnite sharia they stick to has nothing to do with Islamic one in the Quran. In fact, the Sunnite sharia was applied in the Middle Ages: from the Umayyads till the Ottomans, until Egypt was modernized in many aspects, and systems of laws and courts were modernized in the 19^th century. In the KSA, the Sunnite/Wahabi sharia is applied actually, spreading grave injustices and countless violations under the name of Islam, the religion of peace, justice, and mercy. In the KSA, injustices and tyranny of the Middle Ages are perpetuated under the banner of sharia. It was impossible to find clearly written laws used by judges in the Middle Ages in the caliphate history; every legislation was vague enough and with several contradictory views and edicts used by judges in all issues and topics. This state of affairs led to spread of injustice as everyone used to follow any whims and caprices especially the worship of money and wealth. Judges of the Middle Ages caliphate used to be sharia-inventors within a theocratic ecclesiastical judicial system that punished anyone who opposed their edicts as if it were divine and related to God! That was self-deification. The source of wrongs and unfairness was that judges used to be representatives of judicial system and legislative power at the same time. Thus, fairness and neutrality were impossible. Complications resulting from compilations and accumulations of countless contradictory views within theology and fiqh jurisprudence in the Mameluke Era in Egypt, for instance, led to countless obstacles before fair judges to apply justice as they saw fit. Every judge followed his own theological doctrine, but submitted to the will of rulers and tyrant caliphs or sultans eventually! Judges followed their own preferences and took bribes, with no one to accuse them of anything in case they were wrong. Justice was never applied within the Sunnite sharia in caliphate history. As long as the tyrant ruler liked the judge and expressed satisfaction with him, nothing else was deemed important! In several cases, fair, knowledgeable, just, and ethical judges were fired out of their posts; corrupt ones were usually appointed by means of bribe to sultans and their cronies and retinue. Hence, judges used to demand and accept bribes from people in the Mameluke and the Ottoman Eras in Egypt. Injustice prevailed via the post called muhtasib (supervisor of trade in medieval Arab countries); a muhtasib was akin to an inspector/arbiter of victuals, provisions, and any goods in trade, giving a price-label for them, in the Mameluke Era in Egypt, and he used to supervise souqs and bazaars (markets) and usage of balances and weighing tools, and lastly, he used to punish cheaters anyway he liked. Hence, a muhtasib was a sort of a policeman, judge, inspector, and a jailer simultaneously. Hence, muhtasibs used to demand bribes and tributes for themselves, as we read in the history of the Mameluke sultan Qaitbay and his muhtasib: the Mameluke prince Yashbak Al-Jamaly, in 873 A.H. Yashbak Al-Jamaly used to be the epitome of cruelty and injustice; his cronies used to accept bribes and tributes to leave tradesmen manipulate prices as they liked. Those who refused to pay tributes and bribes were punished severely by Yashbak Al-Jamaly. The judge Ibn Al-Siraffy, the historian of that period, describes such punishments: severe beatings on the feet and the shoulders and a severe spanking, followed by placing the tradesman turban-less on a donkey to roam Cairo streets! Yashbak Al-Jamaly is described by Al-Siraffy as a furious type who got mad easily against anyone, even those who made him a prince, and kept his prayers and observed his fasting times; yet, his punishments were random and cruel. At one time, after applying the above-mentioned punishment to a poor tradesman, Yashbak Al-Jamaly ordered the poor man to be hung naked under the sun by one arm at the gate of his shop while the other arm is tied to his back, then his naked body was covered with honey, to incite flying insects to bite him! The reason for his punishment was that he refused to offer tributes and bribes, and the cronies of Yashbak Al-Jamaly accused him falsely of selling goods at exorbitant prices. They claimed that they applied sharia of Islam to this poor tradesman! We read in history countless incidents that justify injustices via sharia! Several Quranic verses urge justice and the prevention of injustice. This repetition in the Quran means that injustice was to prevail and we are warned beforehand in the Quran to face and obliterate it; the Quranic verses are witnesses that show human transgressions against God's sharia in the Quran by making injustice dominant in daily life, under the name of Islam. We are to remember sadly and furiously that this Middle-Ages type of injustice is perpetuated via Wahabism (called Salafism in Egypt), the extremist type of Sunnite creed, that tarnishes Islam. After modernizing laws and legislations in Egypt in the 19^th century, and formulation of the first Constitution in 1923,  judges' mission was confined to apply such precise laws. Yet, Salafists consider this a rejection of sharia of God, because they deem the myths, falsehoods, and lies of the Sunnite fiqh as sharia of God! Salafists then and now declare others as apostates or rejecters of faith if they refuse to apply the Sunnite sharia laws; they tend to forget that the Salafist imams/deities from Malik, Al-Shafei, Al-Bokhary, Ibn Hanbal, until Ibn Abdul-Wahab, and the MB member Sayed Sabek, among others, reject God's true sharia in the Quran revealed to Muhammad and ascribe in their books countless falsehoods to God and His religion: Islam.

2 - Lastly:

The above-mentioned facts are parts and excerpts of previous articles and books we have published in the 1990s in Cairo, about judicial systems in history of Arabs and Muhammadans in contrast to Quranic legislations, about Qaitbay history, and about interpreting the Quran. We write this now while on 25^th of July, 2013, Egyptian Minister of Defense, Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi, calls all Egyptians to demonstrate to give permission to policemen and military men to face and crush the terrorist MB  group members in Egypt and to stop their terrorism and corruption in Cairo and Sinai. The terrorist MB group members believe they can terrorize Egyptians to force them to restore their failure of a president, who is accused of high-treason, M. Morsi, to power. This is the real MB sharia: terrorism, violence, crimes, and vandalism. The MB-imposed constitution in Egypt interpolated the term "doctrine of Sunnites imams" to legislate and justify their terror and violence, as theoretically entirely opposed to real Islamic sharia in the Quran. The MB sharia entails terror to be applied and imposed. We are never to forget that the Egyptian people took to the streets in 30^th of June 2013 in the biggest demonstration in human history to reject the rule of MB terrorists. Yet, the MB terrorist group would not acknowledge this along with admitting to their failure to rule. That is why the terrorist MB tries to destroy Egypt in revenge; they will never succeed in their endeavor.  As a Quranist Muslim and a specialized researcher in Islam and Arabs' history, we think that the terrorist MB group members deserve justly the punishment which is mentioned in the Quran: "The punishment for those who fight God and His Messenger, and strive to spread corruption on earth, is that they be killed, or crucified, or have their hands and feet cut off on opposite sides, or be banished from the land. That is to disgrace them in this life; and in the Hereafter they will have a terrible punishment. Except for those who repent before you apprehend them. So know that God is Forgiving and Merciful." (5:33-34). The reason: the terrorist MB group members spread violence, terror, and corruption in Egypt by killing people, invading and occupying streets, committing the sin of fornication (i.e., the so-called sex jihad), and trying to impose the Sunnite blood-thirsty sharia that oppose and insult Islam (Quranism) and God, yet ascribed by them to God and Muhammad. They are to repent and surrender if they want to avoid  the Quranic punishment. The terrorist MB group members are like cancerous cells that should be removed from the body of Egypt forever. They are to be eliminated, eradicated, and annihilated. Egypt must get rid of all terrorist MB group members once and for all. We bear the responsibility of this view before God; 5:33-34 must be applied to the terrorist MB group members, and we respect the right of others to hold different views on that subject.

Chapter 2: An overview of how to apply Islamic sharia in the Quran

Rules and legislations of Islam are of two types: 1) the type mentioned in the Quran briefly or in detail, and 2) the ones left for people to regulate and organize matters for the sake of welfare of society within the permissible within the Quran. The second type of human legislations must be in accordance with, not to be contradictory with, the seven principles of the Islamic sharia in the Quran detailed in Chapter One of this research. The seventh principle is manifested clearly and significantly by leaving a spacious margin to apply human legislations under all of the seven principles. In contrast, the Sunnite fiqh legislations and rules contradict one another and interfere and meddle in all minute details of daily life. The Quranic verses of sharia rules do not exceed 200, and some of them are repeated for affirmation and to give further brief details, and this fact requires and urges the room for human legislation as per change in conditions and developments with the passage of time. We conclude then that eh Quranic sharia fits and suits all eras and locations for that reason. We cannot possibly, within the scope of this research, give all details of how to apply the 200 verses of Quranic legislations and locations of possible human thought in them. Rather, we are to be content with this overview and quick points, taken from a previous research of ours about judicial systems in the history of Arabs/Muhammadans as opposed and contrasted to real Islam: the Quran.

* There are certain special Quranic legislations linked ONLY to its time and locality during revelation of certain verses; there is no room for applying them in our modern age. To exemplify this, we refer readers to verses concerning Muhammad and his rooms/chambers, his wives, and his relation with his contemporaries/companions.

* There are certain Quranic legislations that cannot be applied unless certain conditions are met; otherwise, they are non-applicable. To exemplify this, we refer readers to Quranic verses that mention freeing slaves; it is OK for such verses to exist, but they are non-applicable now as slavery has been abolished. Another example to make this point clear is that a single man who never got married cannot apply the Quranic rule about giving money for his divorced wife, because he did not marry in the first place. When such a man gets married and then divorces his wife, his new conditions will make him apply the Quranic rule about giving money for his divorcée. Likewise, Quranic rules about slavery cannot be applied unless in eras when slavery was common in human societies. However, we do believe that enslavement is not totally nonexistent now in modern times, and that the Quranic legislations aim at freeing slaves in the first place, but this is another issue for another research or article.

* There are certain Quranic legislations that do not require human laws to impose them; because there should be no role for any State authority to force their application, as it is left for individuals within their relation directly with God within the moral framework in the Quran about how a person is dealing with oneself, one's family members, and one's people around him. To exemplify this, we refer readers to verses containing ethical and moralistic advice such as the following: 17:22-39, 25:63, 6:151-153, 16:90-95, 2:44-46, 2:83, 2:109, 2:153, 2:177, 2:261-274, and 4:36.

* There are variable and stable elements in self-defensive jihad rules and legislations, but this is a long topic for which there is no room here; we mean here to say that gradual legislation process exists in relation to dealings of peaceful believers with all types of aggressive disbelievers/polytheists, and this gradual process of legislation is to be taken into careful consideration when applied. We have tackled that topic in detail in our book published here online titled "Copying in the Quran Means to ascertain and Write and Not to Delete and Annul"

* There are Quranic legislations that are comprehensive and exhaustive; we must apply them without any addition or deletion, like the females one is prohibited to marry in 4:22-24. It is noteworthy that ancient scholars and imams never confined themselves to such comprehensive and exhaustive Quranic legislations; they had added more and more to them! They had, for instance, said that a man cannot marry female relatives of his foster sister! They had said that one cannot marry, simultaneously, one's wife's maternal or paternal aunt! These additions contradict the Quran, of course. Ancient scholars prohibited what is legal in the Quran; it is legal because it is NOT mentioned as otherwise. Another flagrant example is additions of ancient scholars to prohibited food; the Quran tells us most precisely that the forbidden foods are: dead animals, animal blood, flesh of pigs, and animals sacrificed to deities, gods, and idols. The Quran warns us most distinctively that it is never allowed to prohibit what God allows as lawful and legal; yet, ancient scholars had prohibited various food items, in contrast to Quranic rules concerning this matter. Another flagrant example is that while the Quran allows killing only in cases of retribution to punish killers and put them to death, ancient scholars commanded the putting to death those for rejected Islam as a creed, adulterers and fornicators who are married, and other various cases. This means that they had allowed what is prohibited strictly by Our Lord in the Quran. This is the root of corruption in the Sunnite creed whose clergymen had ignored the Quran totally.

* There are other Quranic legislations that urge the application of norms that achieve what is deemed justice within a given society; here, we need laws and legislations issued by human beings within what is deemed acceptable and fair within conditions of the era. For instance, let us reflect upon the following verse: "Mothers may nurse their infants for two whole years, for those who desire to complete the nursing-period. It is the duty of the father to provide for them and clothe them in a proper manner. No soul shall be burdened beyond its capacity. No mother shall be harmed on account of her child, and no father shall be harmed on account of his child…" (2:233). Human legislations here can interfere to legalize and impose the duty of money given by the father for the sake of raising his child as per customs and norms within a given time and location, and judges are to specify the amount of money as per the father's financial status. The same applies to how to deal justly and charitably with one's divorcee: "Allow them to reside where you reside, according to your means, and do not harass them in order to make things difficult for them. If they are pregnant, spend on them until they give birth. And if they nurse your infant, give them their payment. And conduct your relation in amity. But if you disagree, then let another woman nurse him." (65:6). Here, a judge in court within the judiciary system must force a woman's ex-husband to care for his ex-wife and his children from her, with justice and customs within a given society. Muhammad himself is ordered in the Quran to follow conventions of society: "Be tolerant, and command conventions, and avoid the ignorant." (7:199).  Consequently, to apply social customs and conventions means the following two aspects: issuing laws concerning things made legal and lawful in the Quran by NOT prohibiting them, and issuing other laws to impose and enforce the application of Quranic mandatory legislative commands.

* There are Quranic legislations concerning caring for families, human rights, and nurturing for ethical and moralistic values, with a focus on detailing what is prohibited, while leaving a huge space for allowed, lawful, and legal things by NOT mentioning them, because it is the ordinary state of affairs that all things are essentially allowed, with few exceptions mentioned clearly and lucidly in the Quran. The allowed items require human laws to regulate and organize it within the framework of Islamic sharia principles of justice, equality, political and religious freedom, protection of the right to live, and mitigation and alleviation in law formulation, so as to realize welfare, care for human interests, charity, prevention of harm, and preserving rights of people. Hence, all laws formulated by humans within such conditions are deemed Islamic legislations, as per God's revelation in the Quran and the divine command to give a room for human endeavor to regulate and organize matters by experts and resorting to conventions and customs deemed just and fair. Hence, all human modern laws in aspects like circulation of vehicles, administration, management, education, healthcare, services, etc. are deemed the allowed space for human legislations in Islam, in relation to what is NOT mentioned in the Quran, leaving them to customs and conventions.

* As for duties due to God in faith tents and acts of worship, no human being is to interfere in them, as God will judge them in the Day of the Resurrection; hence, civil punishments are restricted only within the field of rights of people once violated: their rights to live, to possess things and money, to feel safe against any violation or rape or physical attack, and so on and so forth. Punishments here are to be exacted in cases of crimes such as adultery, slander, murder, stealing, robbing, looting, and terrorizing of others. There is no room here to detail objective conditions to apply such punishments, but we note here that ancient scholars of the Sunnite creed had changed the meaning of the Quranic term (hudood) when they made it to mean punishments, whereas its original meaning is the rights and sharia laws in the Quran. Their meaning, which is certainly wrong, led them to invent new punishments never commanded in the Quran like stoning adulterers, flogging wine drinkers, and killing those who reject Islam as a faith to convert into atheism or into another faith. This is the core of contradiction between Quranic sharia legislations and that of the ancient scholars/imams. Again, we insist on the fact that legislations made by humans and allowed in the Quran are NOT to interfere in or meddle with faith tenets and acts of worship of people that include imposed duties/acts and prohibited actions. Again, human legislations are only to organize and regulate the lawful in the Quran, which is not mentioned, under the umbrella of the higher values of Islam mentioned above, and taking into consideration what is deemed as fair and just social conventions and norms.      

Chapter 3:  Reform legislation                                                                                  

Application of the seven principles of Islamic sharia in the Quran entails a real legislative reformation

Firstly: Egyptians are victimized by Wahhabism

1- We have detailed the seven principles of the Quranic sharia in Islam in Chapter One; we assert here that real application of them requires several legislative reforms in Egypt to free it from the Wahabi religious culture and its terrorism manifested in thousands of the terrorist MB members gathered in two armed sit-ins in Cairo in 2013; their supporters joining them have been brainwashed via Wahabism-controlled education, mosques, and media in Egypt. They are victims of an earthly, man-made, and fabricated violent creed they think of falsely as Islam, under the impression that they are doing good deeds by terrorizing others; in fact, they destroy themselves and their country.

2- The terrorist MB members who were removed from power in Egypt within the Revolution of 30^th June 2013 could never have applied the seven principles of the Islamic sharia discussed in Chapter One, as they have grown up and been raised on false notions such as that Islam is theirs alone, as if they were the chosen ones to impose their version of Islam by force and terror. Thus, they coerce and compel others in creed and restricted religious freedom given to all people in the Quran, and consequently, they persecute and accuse any oppositional figures as heretics and apostates. Hence, they justify their crimes as justice applied within the Sunnite creed! As if they had the right to live and others – non-MB members – must die and suffer! This is sheer terrorism! The terrorist MB members love very much – like all Wahabis – to apply and propagate restrictive rules that prohibit all things (especially arts in all forms), despite their being allowed in the Quran, by virtue of the fact that they are NOT mentioned in the Quran as prohibited. Among the worst crimes of Wahabi MB members is to cover women in veils (hijab) and full-veils (niqab) to remove women from social spheres and confine them to houses, in order to serve men. For the sake of their myths and the retaining of wealth, power, and authority, the terrorist MB group members are ready whole-heartedly to kill themselves and others and to destroy Egypt.

3- The terrorist MB group members have imbibed the terrorist Wahabism, which is based on the extremist Middle-Ages Sunnite doctrine of Ibn Hanbal, and propagated it as if it were the 'true' form of Islam. This is utter falsehood, of course, for Quranists, as Islam is the Quran alone. This falsehood of showing Wahabism as if it were Islam is the illusion propagated via State institutions in Egypt for decades since the 1970s; through Al-Azhar institution, all education programs, systems, and curricula in schools and universities and institutes, especially curricula of Arabic language, history, and religion, in all mosques, ministries, State TV channels, private satellite TV channels, shows and programs of religious nature in audiovisual media, and TV series of period dramas filled with false notions concerning history and Islam, as such dramas deify the ancient scholars and the historical figures to brainwash viewers to imprint the notion that caliphate was a good ruling system among other bad notions. All such bad notions of shallow and sham religiosity have returned in Egypt in terms of the daily language used in Egypt now, growing beards, certain dress codes for women and men, overt false piety to deceive others by it to gain illicit money, and the manipulation of creeds to make wealth by any possible means within society and media. All such negative elements make Egyptians incompatible with modernizing and culture of modernism in general. They refuse to allow any reform in thought, and religious thought in particular, insisting on confining Islam to Middle Ages! Islam, the Quran alone, is adaptable to all ages and suits our modern times; yet, the Sunnites insist nostalgically to re-live in the 'sanctified' past of Middle-Ages tyranny, theocracies, corruption, and self-deified rulers with their corrupt retinue and cronies that were allowed to kill anyone, even up to one third of the subjects!

4- Sadly, the vast majority of Egyptians are victims – at varying degrees – to this Wahabi Sunnite creed. The worst falsehood is to call Wahabis as Islamists in Egyptian media and elsewhere; we, Quranists, believe that there is no such thing called Islamism or Islamic/Islamist movements, political or otherwise. This is giving a false impression that such and such group represents Islam and other outsiders are not Muslims! Such fabricated terms perpetuate the falsehood that Wahabism is synonymous with Islam; we, Quranists, propagate the fact that the Sunnite Wahabi creed is contrary to Islam (the Quran alone). In many instances, what Quranists discuss such facts with foes and political adversaries of Wahabis (the Wahabis include both terrorist MB and Salafists in Egypt), to prove that the great deity of Salafism and Wahabism is Al-Bokhary and his books that insult God, Muhammad, and the Quran, such political adversaries feel terrified and deny the fact! If Quranists made them read books of Al-Bokhary and his hadiths, they get mad at us! As if these adversaries have turned suddenly into an extremist Salafist who will accuse Quranists of denying the so-called Sunna and hadiths! In sum, sadly, most Egyptians are Wahabis, even those who claim to be secular! This is shown when we, Quranists, prove logically the contradiction between the Quran and hadiths. Quranists endeavor to spread the fact that Wahabism is NOT Islam at all. The creeds of Egyptians have encountered such serious problems since the era of president Sadat (1971-1981) until now! All Egyptians under the age of 40 now suffer from the dire consequences of the same illusion and danger!            

5- Hence, we understand now why political civil and secular movements and trends in Egypt never support Quranists and their call, and why they let them down in the era of Mubarak, when some Quranists were tortured, persecuted, threatened, and incarcerated. This was done because inwardly, Egyptian seculars share the same Wahabi creed like Salafists and the MB members: all of them see that Quranists are non-Muslim renegades, apostates, and heretics because Quranism means to deny ad reject hadiths, Sunna, traditions, fiqh (the so-called theological jurisprudence and edicts), and theology! All of the latter items are NOT divine: they are human thought, not part of Islam divinely inspired in the Quran. That is why all parties concerned in Egypt accuse Quranists falsely of being enemies of Prophet Muhammad! Even in case when some secular people are convinced with Quranism call, they are not courageous enough to stand for the truth; unlike the great late Egyptian writer and thinker Dr. Farag Fouda who helped us, Dr. Ahmed Subhy Mansour, a lot in many instances until his assassination. If it had not been for his assassination by Wahabis under the auspices of Mubarak, he and Quranists would have changed the path of history in Egypt and creeds of Egyptians for the better.

6- Now, as Egypt is being threatened with Wahabi terrorism of the MB, Quranism is proven right as the only form of peaceful and modern Islam fit for our age and that calls for reform on all levels. What we, Dr. Mansour, have predicted and warned against has occurred. We maintain now the view that the problem of Wahabi terror and violence in Egypt would aggravate and worsen after the political defeat of the terrorist MB; reformation on all levels is direly required and sourly missed. Disasters and catastrophes are bound to occur if radical reform does not happen to make all Egyptians understand the seven principles of Islamic sharia in the Quran and how they contradict the sharia of the Sunnite Wahabi creed, linked to Dark Ages of theocratic tyranny, enslavement, and corruption.

Secondly: Legislative reform is a must:

1- When all laws restricting absolute freedom of thought and creed are annulled and abolished so that no one is punished for freedom expression (with the exception of those who are slandering women by accusing them of fornication and adultery with no proof), along with issuing good laws protecting freedom of expression in media and spread of information of all types, reform will be possible. One ought to have the right to express one's opinion of any State responsible civil servants in any positions and ministers, with their right to respond and defend themselves with documents and proofs; no one should be immune against impeachment, questioning, and being punished when proved to be corrupt.   This absolute freedom of expression and thought requires absolute religious freedom as well in the first place, as ordained by God in the Quran. Once this absolute religious freedom is established, other types of liberties and freedoms will follow suit. Hence, one is free to express one's opinion in State persons, who must accept this freedom of expression; otherwise, they would place themselves above God.

2-All of the above entails legislative reform to allow room for absolute freedom of thought, expression, and religion; the fall of the terrorist MB from rule in Egypt does Not mean that their danger and threat are over. Real danger of Wahabism and all groups linked to it is still looming over Egypt; Wahabism has to be refuted and faced from within real Islam: the Quran. Reform of constitution is required as well beside the legislative one to protect freedoms mentioned above. Other laws of ill-reputation in Egypt that should be annulled and abolished from the Criminal Code are those concerning insulting the President of Egypt, the Military of Egypt, and judges and the judicial system and institution as well as the so-called law against contempt of religion that is akin to inquisition rummaging inside hearts and minds of free thinkers. Other laws to be annulled are the ones concerning persecution of any person or group due to self-expression under the pretext of inciting violence, overthrow of rulers, or disturbing of general peace. Such laws are tools of tyrannical rulers to quell people and incarcerate and persecute them anytime rulers feel like it! Even the ousted MB president shouted and vowed in court to use Egyptian laws to make Egyptian suffer! This means that there are so many laws of ill-reputation in the Criminal Code in Egypt.  

3- Such corrupt laws are against human rights, and they are tools at the hands of tyrants and all their cronies and institutions in a self-deification action to stop any type of criticism and to take revenge from political oppositional figures and adversaries. Such crippling laws prevent any sort of productivity in the Egyptian society and hinder any real progress and any real reform of all types, resulting in the absence of justice and fairness and draining of power and energy of citizens. A free peaceful Quranist thinker like us might be imprisoned in Egypt due to such corrupt crippling laws.     

Chapter 4: Reform Al-Azhar                                                                             

 The application of the seven principles of Islamic sharia requires the reform of Al-Azhar institution in Cairo

Introduction:

1- Before approaching the topic of reform of Al-Azhar, we re-publish here an interview in which we were interviewed by a journalist in (independent, left-wing, Cairo-based) Al-Ahaly newspaper when its editor-in-chief was the late Philip Gallad, on 5^th Feb. 1992, under the title "An Interview with a Muslim Scholar, Confiscated by Al-Azhar". It is noteworthy that the journalist who interviewed us never mentioned his name, for fear of being persecuted, terrorized, or killed by Al-Azhar extremists and other terrorist Wahabi group members, as terrorists were at their peak of terrorist actions at the time, with hidden support of Al-Azhar clergymen!

2- We re-publish the entire interview with not editing of any type, to bemoan the current conditions of Egypt after about 21 years of this interview. We hope this interview would whet the appetites of Al-Azhar critics who call for its immediate reform. Lastly, this interview is an introduction to the coming articles here, in Chapter Two, about reform of Al-Azhar.

Firstly: Interview

 The unknown journalist has written this about us before the interview: (He describes himself as being an Azharite even before his birth; his family members in Al-Sharqiya Governorate are known for their excellence in Azharite education stages from 1940s until the 1980s. he graduated with honors from the History Department, Al-Azhar University, in 1977, worked as a teacher there until he got fired from his post when he was about to be promoted to be an Assistant Professor). They fired him due to his hard work and diligent labor in writing several books within scientific research, and that was why he was persecuted in every possible means, with his books confiscated after his being framed to be imprisoned later on. He is Dr. Ahmed Subhy Mansour, described by some of the Egyptian cultural elite members as the jewel of Al-Azhar).

Secondly: This is the complete text of the interview with no editing or expurgations whatsoever:

- What are the titles of your books confiscated by Azharite authorities?

- There are two types of confiscation: that of books, a type which is in limelight of media, and the confiscation of thought, which is often ignored by people despite its being the most cruel and dangerous.  In our opinion, we are the only thinker so far whose thought and books are confiscated together simultaneously.

- How did that happen?

- Let us first explain and clarify our school of thought that we embrace and which has been restricted and confiscated by our adversaries the sheikhs and clergymen. Our school of thought represents the real nature and soul of the role of Al-Azhar as per Egyptian Al-Azhar Law; the role in clarifying and showing the true facts and tenets of Islam. There are several unknown facts of Islam that Al-Azhar has to show but it does not. In the past, religious culture in Egypt did not permit that. Yet, today, this is must especially for political reasons; after the spread of terrorist religious fanatical armed groups. If authorities at Al-Azhar had played their role properly imposed by duty, law, and honor for the sake of Islam and Egypt, such terrorist groups would never have existed in the first place. Such terrorists depend on inherited books of traditions, old notions, and obsolete concepts that should have been removed from fiqh volumes by Azharite sheikhs to clear the name of Islam, Muhammad, and faith tenets in general from notions that contradict the Quran. When we, ourselves singlehandedly, have played that role, imposed by professional duty, Al-Azhar Law, and conscience, we have been persecuted inside Al-Azhar University. Our 'crime' has been to show real faith tenets of Islam as per the Quran alone. The Azharite sheikhs not only fired us from our post, but also framed us with an accusation to have us imprisoned: we have been accused with denying the so-called Sunna. In fact, we have been defending the real Sunna or traditions of Muhammad, found ONLY in the Quran, and we defend Muhammad against sayings (the so-called hadiths) ascribed to him falsely after his death and that contradict the Quran. Of course, he never uttered such hadiths. Their persecution of us is in fact directed against the school of thought based on Quranic proofs and evidence, as well as evidence from traditions and history, aiming at showing the truth peacefully and wisely. In sum, it is a persecution to an original unprecedented line of thought that reveals the true nature of Al-Azhar, or rather how it should operate as an institution, an endeavor that has begun by the pioneer Muhammad Abdou the head of Al-Azhar who died in 1905 in Cairo. The line of reformist thought of M. Abdou was ignored on purpose by Azharite supporters of mental stagnation who oppose religious reform, just like extremist and fanatical bigots of terrorist groups now

- Does this mean that your intellectual adversaries woo the so-called 'Islamic' political trends, in the belief that the so-called 'Islamists' will rule Egypt one day?

- Some of them certainly are affiliated with such trends, but in general, most of them are persons in authority and higher posts and positions; i.e., they are not men of thought and theorizing or scientific thinking of research. They have no ability or time for research, reading, innovation, or even deep reflection, and that is why they deem any new innovation in religious thought as a threat posed to endanger and undermine their high stature and positions. It is as if Truth, Islam, Al-Azhar, and Egypt do not count much for them! Our school of thought exposes them as lazy scholars with mental inertia. They defend themselves by confiscating any new books and thought, as what happened with us.

-  Give us examples of incidents of confiscation done to your thought and books.

- When we have submitted our Ph.D. thesis for discussion in 1977, titled "The Influence of Sufism in Egypt during the Mameluke Era", Azharite sheikhs pressurized us for three years to condense the thesis to its third and to remove two thirds of it! We did that, and they granted us the Ph.D. degree with honors. Thus, they have confiscated the two thirds of the thesis. This was the very first occurrence of confiscation of our thought, with other occurrences that followed later on. Data confiscated and removed from our thesis has been re-published in the form of ten books of ours. We still keep the original manuscript of our thesis; it might be confiscated if published in its entirety one day. This is what we mean by restriction and confiscation of our thought. Another occurrence was in the last year we taught at Al-Azhar University, in 1985, when we have written and published five books simultaneously, to be taught at Al-Azhar, among them the one titled "Prophets in the Quran", when all of such books were confiscated. We have been interrogated and persecuted for two years until we got fired. Persecution never allowed us to publish such books in print for general readership. This is the second stage of persecution: to confiscate the thought before trying to publish it in a book form. Later on, we have written a series of Quranist researches; the very first one, titled "Will Muslim Sinners Get out of Hell to Enter Paradise?", was published by Al-Ahram Publishing and distributed by Al-Akhbar Publishing. Yet, this research/booklet was confiscated from newspaper stands and kiosks and made them imprison us. The rest of the series remains manuscripts that might be committed to our closed chest of drawers, like intellectual corpses in a coffin, lest they might be confiscated as well. When Al-Akhbar Publishing published our book titled ''Egypt in the Quran'', in Ramadan before the last one, some Azharite sheikhs interfered to withdraw it from kiosks and newspapers stands. Al-Ahaly newspaper and Al-Hilal newspaper have mentioned this fact at that time and condemned this confiscation. This means that our thought is restricted so as to never allow it to be known to the public. Our Azharite adversaries and foes have submitted a complaint against us at National Security Police Bureau, because of a couple of articles we have written in Al-Akhbar newspaper to warn against the frauds of the so-called 'Islamic' investment companies, and asserting that banks interests are not against the Quranic teachings about usury. This has been intended to terrorize us of course, so as not to publish our line o thought in any possible manner, regardless of the public interest. The interests, positions, and stature of Azharite clergymen are more important! The result: tens of our books remain unpublished manuscripts until this moment, despite their importance in facing and refuting the religious extremism and its dangers and threats.

- What is the solution, then?

- The role of Al-Azhar is to be confined to elucidating and showing facts and tenets of Islam and to respond intellectually to any line of thought and try to discuss or refute it instead of confiscating it. The State must stop Azharite bodies, and any other authority from meddling with and interfering in any line of thought with terror, confiscation, and incarceration. If this is applied, the true spirit of Al-Azhar and the true nature of Islam would emerge. This entails the abrogation of so many laws in Egypt that restrict freedom of thought. Egyptians will remain regressive and backward as long as such laws exist to incriminate self-expression. Freedom of expression is the means to solve the dilemma of extremism and bigotry that lead to terror, among other problems in society. To annul certain laws is a simple sacrifice in order to secure and protect our present and future; otherwise, the deluge is coming to the detriment of all! We liked very much the speech by Egyptian actor Adel Imam, published in Al-Ahaly, about confiscation; he seems to understand Islam more than the Azharite inquisition members.

Lastly:

1- Thus ended the 21-year-old interview, but the problem exacerbated and aggravated when several generations learned the backward, regressive, extremist line of thought in Azharite curricula.

2- As we write this, we have just heard the news (on 1^st Aug. 2013) about the fact that Egyptian authorities sent army troops and police anti-riot forces to disperse armed men in the two sit-in locations of the terrorist MB members (who demand the return of the ousted MB president to office) in Cairo. The criminal MB used women and children as human shields! Shame on them! They are merciless murderers, indeed!

3- Very few people know that such base, mean act of such criminals like the terrorist MB members to use human shields to defeat and deceive enemies in battle is a Sunnite-creed practice approved by Al-Azhar curricula! This practice has been repeatedly used by terrorists of Hamas Movement, affiliated with the MB, when they launch missiles into Israeli houses, hospitals, and schools, and then to hide within the densely populated Gaza, to make Israel choose between remaining silent or to kill civilians! This same practice is the basis of random suicide bombings committed by Wahabi terrorists in Egypt, Israel, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Algeria, etc. while knowing quite well that victims will include Sunnites as well, especially women and children, a practice endorsed by Sunnite fiqh and sharia! The deluded and deceived youths and women in the two MB armed sit-in locations never knew beforehand about this, whereas leaders of Salafists, MB, and Hamas live in luxury and in pomp, heavily guarded!

4- Do all Azharite clergymen, imams, and sheikhs know about the existence of this practice of using human shields in their curricula of fiqh?! If they do not know, this is a disaster; if they know and ignore the fact on purpose, the disaster is more enormous!

5- Anyway, Al-Azhar institution and university are in bad need for reform immediately in their laws, curricula, and managements; otherwise, Egypt will suffer Al-Azhar as a thorn in the side that will eventually lead to its downfall and collapse.

6- Until when would we call in the wilderness, with no one listening to us?! Would someone read our books and articles after 21 years to regret the loss of Egypt?! We implore the Almighty to bear witness that we have warned and written a lot on that subject!

A historical overview about reform of Al-Azhar institution

Introduction:

1- Reform of Al-Azhar institution is one of the major goals of our life-long career; we have intellectually struggled for it inside Al-Azhar University and after leaving it, until this very moment. We have undergone ordeals while working at Al-Azhar University due to our peaceful reform endeavors. We have declared twice before our Azharite adversaries and foes the following proclamation: "This Al-Azhar institution, either I will reform or destroy it!" this proclamation is hard, but it expresses our concern for the enormity of danger if Al-Azhar remains without real reform; it might be the tool to destroy our beloved Egypt! It must be either destroyed and closed down to save Egypt from imminent collapse, or reformed to make it useful for Egyptians. By reforming Al-Azhar, reform in all levels in Egypt will be possible, and by reforming Egypt, it is possible and at hand that reformation will be applied to the whole Arab world, the Middle East, and all Muslims all over the globe: about 1.5 billion persons. This is not an exaggeration or an overstatement; Egypt is a pioneer and influential country in many fields and Al-Azhar is pioneer because of its location in the Egyptian capital and its educational and cultural activities overseas in the Islamic world. Hence, the modernization and renaissance of Egypt and its Al-Azhar institution will make all Arabs and Muslims rise in stature in the international scene; otherwise, the fall of Egypt will bring about the collapse and downfall of all Arabs and Muslims, a process being slowly going on since Wahabism gained control of Al-Azhar and Egypt since the 1980s! What shame and what disgrace!

2- Our intellectual jihad for reform is part of reformatory endeavors that began earlier by the pioneer head of Al-Azhar, M. Abdou, but he could not apply reform as he tried in his later days during his full fame and authority in an age of liberalism; he died while he was cursing the Azharite sheikhs, scholars, and clergymen. As for us, we have begun to walk the route for reform in our youth as a teacher at Al-Azhar University, studying for our Ph.D. thesis while bearing with the tight grip of sheikhs; we felt no fear of the Sufi head of Al-Azhar at the time, Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud, and no terror of Wahabis that gained full control of Al-Azhar since the 1980s, when we uttered our proclamation. We give below an overview about the history of Al-Azhar. 

Firstly: a historical overview:

 Al-Makrizi, the ancient historian, writes the following about Al-Azhar in his famous historical account titled "Al-Khetat": (…Al-Azhar was the very first mosque to be established in Cairo after building the city, by the command of the very first Fatimid caliph Gohar Al-Sequilly, and the mosque was completed in the ninth day of Ramadan, 361 A.H. …). This indicates that the Fatimids built Cairo as their capital and built Al-Azhar in 972 A.D. to spread the Shiite creed or doctrine. After Saladin caused the downfall and collapse of the Fatimid caliphate, he closed down Al-Azhar and stopped studies in it, and he established his own fiqh school or madrassa called "Khanqah Saeed Al-Suadaa" to face Shiite Sufism with a Sunnite type of Sufism. When Sufism became the official creed of the Mameluke era in Egypt, after the downfall of the Ayyubid caliphate in Egypt and the Levant, Al-Azhar was opened again and revived once more, but it was never prominent during the Mameluke era; it remained marginalized and inert and played no big role in anything. Azharite scholars and students at the time were mostly Sufis who claimed to confine and dedicate their time to worship, but in fact, most of them indulged in homosexual acts and practices and Sufi dances while studying some fiqh and theological books. This atmosphere was aided by the little waqfs (religious endowments) dedicated for the institution, unlike the other institutions linked to and under the auspices of Mamelukes among sultans, princes, men of the State, governors, and government supervisors. Such were the privately owned waqfs controlled by their owners for their own benefit and advantages to ensure their property would not be confiscate by sultans and emirs, as they would like to leave them to proprietors' inheritors, with some left for spending on religious institutions. Such private waqfs dominant during the Mameluke Era in Egypt was the cause of the existence of several religious institutions competing with Al-Azhar, along with few waqfs granted for free by pious charitable philanthropists to spend on some other religious institutions, among them was Al-Azhar. During the Ottoman Era, privately owned Mameluke waqfs were so poor and spent up that the religious institutions depending on them vanished, despite their flourish in the Mameluke Era (1250 – 1517 A.D.), with little waqfs still standing to provide for Al-Azhar, along with donations from charitable persons, which helped Al-Azhar to go on weakly and slowly but steadily in the Dark Ages of the Ottomans who hated science and education and preferred ignorance to dominate among their subjects. Al-Azhar had played its very first important role in political life during the resistance movement of Egyptians against the French occupation (aka the French Expedition), and the subsequent events such as making Muhammad Ali Pacha the governor of Egypt later on.

Secondly: reform beginnings at Al-Azhar

1- Muhammad Ali Pacha modernized Egypt to make it a center for the empire he intended to establish. He destroyed all traces of any ancient items related to the Ottomans and any predecessors, such as the Ottoman battalion that used to defend Egyptian borders, and instead, he established the first exclusively Egyptian army in the 19^th century, complete with trained persons, fleet, military factories, and a social stratum of Egyptians who were properly educated in France. He killed all the remnants of Mamelukes in a massacre, and he destroyed completely the very first Saudi kingdom in the 19^th century. He crushed the popular leaders among the Azharite sheikhs; yet, he could never manage to reform Al-Azhar fully. Instead, he established several schools and educational institutes to create a social stratum of white-collar employees to help him manage the government instead of Azharite clergymen who clung to the old obsolete ways that used to govern matters and affairs previously in the Mameluke and Ottoman eras. Finally, he established a system of feudal monopoly over all agricultural lands in Egypt.

2- Modernizing Egypt in that manner resulted in marginalizing Al-Azhar and in creating civil education away from it; previously, religious education was the only type of education. However, modernization reached Al-Azhar later on, slowly but steadily.                      

Thirdly: the role of M. Abdou (1849 - 1905):

 Dr. Saad Eddine Ibrahim, the American-Egyptian sociologist, has written in 2005 an article titled "Imam Muhammad Abdou and the Deferred Reform of Al-Azhar" in an Egyptian independent and private oppositional newspaper. We quote here part of it: (…this is the centenary of the death of M. Abdou, the greatest Muslim reformist in modern times. In the first half of his life, he struggled politically against political tyranny and foreign occupation. In the second half of his life, he dedicated his time to reforming Al-Azhar; as such endeavor was for him the only way to reform Muslims and Egyptians. He managed to convince Khedive Abbas II to issue a law to establish Al-Azhar Board in 1895 A.D. / 1312 A.H., with Abdou as a member of it, plus a law to regulate salaries of Azharite scholars and a system of teaching and tests that would prevent students from reading ancient volumes and tomes, and another law to organize locations of teaching and healthcare for students. Yet, Azharite scholars, theologians, and sheikhs revolted against M. Abdou to protect themselves and their 'holy' tomes. Khedive Abbas II seized the chance to renege on his promises and for other political reasons, and M. Abdou who was the head of Al-Azhar tendered his resignation and died in the same year. He was opposed because he sought intellectual reform explained in detail in his books, rejected until this very moment by Al-Azhar. M. Abdou, for instance, refused to believe in hadiths, especially in faith tenets, and refused to so-called intercession of Prophet Muhammad in the Last Day; he used to assert the Quranic truth that Muhammad never knew the unknown which was not revealed to him in the Quran, and that Muhammad never talked about predictions and future events, in this life and the next, thus rejecting millions of hadiths in that category. He criticized all volumes and tomes of ancient traditions inherited by the forefathers, and that was why his reformation endeavors were rejected by Al-Azhar. The late sheikh Rasheed Reda, one of the students-cum-disciples of Abdou, writes in one of his books a debate between M. Abdou and one of his sharp-minded adversaries: sheikh M. Al-Beheiry. He argued with Abdou that they were teaching students things and ways they have learned previously and that type of education led Abdou to his position and to his being a renowned scholar. Abdou replied that he feared that students would learn the same erroneous notions and teachings, and that he remained for ten years trying to cleanse his brain from falsehoods and rubbish of Al-Azhar teachings until the present moment. Rasheed Reda insisted that Al-Azhar reform was the very thing needed badly for the sake of Islam and all Muslims, and such endeavors were a gift of Abdou to Egypt; corrupt institution of Al-Azhar cause more corruption on other levels, but Abdou was opposed by fossilized clergymen who sanctify their 'holy' tomes and traditions, and that is why they hindered Abdou with endless obstacles. When M. Abdou was dying, he expressed his lamentation and fear for the loss of true Islam, manifested in the Quran, at the hands of turbaned man of Al-Azhar …)

Thirdly: the school of thought of M. Abdou:

 Reform endeavors of Abdou never faded away; his disciples continues to convey and preserve his line of reformatory thought, especially the two sheikhs competing for leadership and political ambition but united in the necessity of reform: sheikh Al-Dhawahiry and sheikh Al-Maraghy.  The latter became the head of Al-Azhar for two years (1928-1929), insisting on applying reforms of Abdou by placing traditions in the background and free innovative thinking in the foreground to cope with modern age by inserting new sciences in the curricula. Such endeavors and reformatory projects failed to be realized because they were rejected by the King of Egypt and the rest of Azharite scholars and theologians, resulting in Al-Maraghy tendering his resignation. His successor, Al-Dhawahiry, headed Al-Azhar (1929-1935), but the only overt reform he made was to establish new departments in Al-Azhar University: departments of Arabic language, Sunnite sharia, and religious studies and sciences of fiqh. Later on, trying to introduce more radical reform, Azharite clergymen and scholars revolted against him, and political conditions led him to tender my resignation. Al-Maraghy returned to assume his former post as the head of Al-Azhar (1935-1945), but he rejected his reformatory intention in curricula; instead, he made marginal reforms like establishing a fatwa committee and employing Azharite teachers in public schools. Other reforms included giving stipends for Azharite students instead of bread rations as before. When sheikh Moustapha Abdul-Razik became the head of Al-Azhar, he cared for sending postgraduate studies students to Europe to get their Ph.D. there in several fields of science. These reforms were in form and not in ancient contents of Azharite curricula and methods of teaching; no one dared at the time to modulate and change them, as if they were holy of holies!

Fourth: Al-Azhar reform during the Nasser era (1954-1970)

 President Gamal Abdul-Nasser introduced a great development in Al-Azhar by formulating Al-Azhar Law No. 103 in 1961. He introduced natural sciences and foreign languages to be taught in Azharite schools and Al-Azhar University, which had new departments to teach medicine, engineering, agriculture, and other branches of science. Nasser called publicly many times in a frank manner for defining and confining the task or mission of Al-Azhar to show and elucidate facts and tenets of Islam and to study traditions and inherited notion critically. This means that there are Islamic facts that are absent and need to come to the foreground by Azharite men and that there are lies and falsehoods spread in the garments of facts that need to be exposed and refuted. It was a frank and clear call for innovation and reform by changing centuries-old Azharite curricula, some of which were authored in the Ottoman Era.

Fifth: Al-Azhar reform during the Sadat era (1971-1981)

  Dr. Saad Eddine Ibrahim mentions in the above-mentioned article in 2005 that Al-Azhar during the Sadat era that the whole institution propagated and sponsored the flourish of Salafism/Wahabism, and simultaneously, Azharite schools and institutes, covering the primary, preparatory, and secondary stages of education, mushroomed all over Egyptian cities and villages in an unprecedented manner, to parallel the number of public schools. Al-Azhar University opened new branches for itself in several Egyptian governorates, teaching girls and young men separately. Sadly, such branches taught only branches of the so-called fiqh and theology fields, with no innovation or reform of curricula at all. This provided the atmosphere to the rise of the so-called Islamism (i.e., the falsehood called political Islam trends) to allow it to control the cultural, mental, intellectual, and religious life in Egypt, causing political crises and countless obstacles in the route for political and religious reform, the latter being a must now to avoid collapse and downfall.

 Dr. Saad Eddine Ibrahim goes on in his article to mention our name at the end of his article: (… the one who paid dearly the price for the call for religious reform is the contemporary Muslim thinker and former Azharite man Dr. Ahmed Subhy Mansour, who was a teacher at History Department, Al-Azhar University, and who calls for a revival of the school of thought of M. Abdou to reform Azharite curricula radically. Mansour has criticized Sufi notion in ancient books, tomes, and volumes, which caused the delay of the discussion and partial deletion of his Ph.D. thesis about Sufism in the Mameluke era. Once he obtained his Ph.D. degree in 1980, he has written five books to criticize Sunnite and Salafist notions, following the footsteps of M. Abdou, to obtain the title of Assistant Professor in 1985, but he was tried and fired from his post in 1987 and later on imprisoned when accused of denying the so-called Sunna and hadiths. Later on, Mansour has become independent caller for reformation of Al-Azhar and religious reform in general, and I heard him in a speech he gave about "Al-Azhar and Enlightenment", and I made him work in my Cairo-based Ibn Khaldoun Center to organize weekly forums, since Jan. 1996, and we both have become friends on the way to reform on all levels, and to discuss all conditions of Egypt in these forums, along with a group of the best Egyptian thinkers, who worked with me and Mansour on a project to reform education in Egypt to make it assert Islamic tolerance. Yet, this project was opposed and fought against by Azharite leaders and the Salafist trend in Egypt. Egypt needs badly this type of projects now after 9/11 events … it is so sad that the reform call of M. Abdou to reform Al-Azhar cannot be applied even after 100 years after his death. Would Egypt have to wait for another 100 years to make Azharite sheikhs give their consent for reformation? Are we going to die, out of grief like M. Abdou, during such an endless waiting?!)

 - The reform done to Al-Azhar institution never touched upon Azharite curricula

First: a personal experience:

1- We have entered the Azharite education as the youngest student at the time in 1960. Primary stage in Azharite schools at the time consisted of four years, secondary stage five years, and then Al-Azhar University, which had only four faculties at the time to teach Arabic language, fiqh and theology, sharia, and history. Al-Azhar Law No. 103 was applied when we were a child in the primary stage at school, renamed the preparatory stage, with added new subjects in the curricula to include English, French, history, geography, science, etc. in both the preparatory and secondary stages. The secondary stage had two branches (scientific and literary) like the public education system, to allow Azharite students to learn in the newly opened faculties at the time: medicine, pharmacy, sciences, agriculture…etc. we spent 9 years in the Azharite preparatory and secondary stages. In 1969, the secondary stage was lessened to four years instead of five. We were among the last promotion of students who spent five-year secondary stage in Azharite schools. We studies both Azharite traditional curricula unchanged plus curricula similar to the ones in the public schools.

2- Azharite curricula at the time were two main branches: Arabic language subjects (grammar, prosody, poetry, etc.) and the so-called theological subjects (fiqh, hadiths, Quranic interpretations, Quranic reciting rules, faith and sharia tenets, and historical accounts ascribed to Prophet Muhammad). The former branch was within advanced levels, whereas the latter was so regressive, backward, and mythological in nature and filled with ignorance and falsehoods in subject matter, authored in the Ottoman Era. We used to study them and learn them by heart to succeed with high grades, but never found the theological branch curricula to be convincing to the mind. Our late father used to have a home library filled with a great number of books of literature and history; we used to peruse them at holidays, noticing the difference between such pleasure and the tedium of Azharite curricula unconvincing to our mind. We also loved curricula of public education, noticing their contradiction with mythological Azharite curricula as well, especially the myths of the so-called hadiths, interpretation, and falsehoods of fiqh. Some theological books contained hilarious ideas: Iblis (Satan) copulated with himself to beget his progeny! Angels guard tombs of saints to help those who seek the aid of the saints! The sun rotates around the earth, and planets are only six ones! The earth is carried on top of the back of a giant whale named ''Bahmoot"! Among the theological fiqh notions, there were countless sexual ideas (acts, positions, scenes, etc.) and personal cleanliness ideas (about how to wash one's private parts and about farting, urinating, defecating, for both genders) that enflamed the passions and fantasies of adolescent students in the secondary stage! We used to call such type of fiqh as the one concerned with the lower body parts, because it is based on imagining endless illogical sexual situations (orgies, adultery, incest, fornication, sodomy, sex during women's period, sex inside Kaabah,…etc.) to issue fatwas (edicts) about them! Such subject matter filled countless volumes and tomes authored in the Ottoman Era. Such subject matter used to be so shocking for male and female students at Al-Azhar secondary stage of education! We remember quite well that such shocking passages were removed from the Azharite curricula in the 1990s due to articles we have written at the time, but we were later on rewarded for such articles by being declared among Azharite scholars and imams as an apostate who has forsaken Islam!  We have showed such shocking curricula contents before to the late Dr. Farag Fouda and the Egyptian Marxist thinker Dr. Rifaat Al-Saeed, and both have written articles, in Al-Ahrar independent newspaper, on the matter, calling for reforming Azharite education. The head of Al-Azhar at the time, sheikh Jad Al-Haq, felt annoyed and called Mubarak, who sent in turn a warning with severe words to Fouda, who had to stop his series of articles on the subject, telling his readers that he was hindered by force to go on writing on that topic! We have written several separate articles on the subject, showing how such bad curricula contradict the Quranic teachings, in Egyptian newspapers like Al-Akhbar, Al-Ahram, Al-Ahrar, and Al-Goumhouriyya and in magazines like Rose Al-Youssef, Hawaa, Al-Qahira, Sotoor, Al-Hilal, among others. The new head of Al-Azhar at the time, sheikh Tantawi, had to omit the shocking parts in the curricula, retaining the same subjects, however. This sheikh was criticized by the MB group members who were also members in the parliament, and Tantawi had to swear at the parliament that what he had done was for the sake and benefit of Islam.

Secondly: Reform endeavors before Nasser never changed Azharite curricula

1- Process of modernization led by Muhammad Ali Pacha has led to the marginalization of Al-Azhar and the establishment of civil modern education away from it. Yet, the role of Al-Azhar grew more important for three reasons: 1) Al-Azhar was at the time the fortress and stronghold of Sunnite Sufism embraced by most Egyptians in the 19^th century, 2) Al-Azhar was alone with no competing institutions in religious fields of calling, preaching, spiritual guidance, and teaching theology, and 3) All waqfs of citizens financed Al-Azhar. Reform endeavors of Al-Azhar began with Khedive Ismail, who issued the first law concerning Al-Azhar in 1872, to regulate getting certificates of what was similar to Ph.D. degrees after postgraduate studies that included 11 subjects among ancient traditional theological branches and methodological schools of thought. Azharite institutes were established on several locations, leading Khedive Abbas II to issue a law to develop Al-Azhar in 1896, setting the age of 15 to accept new students into Al-Azhar, provided they were literate and had memorized the entire Quran by heart. This law had defined the new subjects to be taught at Al-Azhar, and renamed the degree if Al-Azhar University, that entailed 8 years of study to allow graduates to become preachers at mosques, and the one equivalent for the Ph.D. degree, which entailed 12 years of study, after which postgraduate studies students can teach at the university. The royal decree No. 26 in 1936 ordered the reorganization of Al-Azhar and its bodies and schools and university departments, to spread 'Islamic' sharia, theological studies, and the Arabic language, and to enable the graduation of teachers of Arabic and religion in public schools. Al-Azhar University at the time had but three departments or faculties: Sharia, theological studies, and Arabic language. Azharite institutes/schools provided general culture to students in Arabic language and religious studies to allow them to be qualified only to enter into Al-Azhar University.

2- It is noteworthy that during that stage in history, Al-Azhar retained all traditional curricula that hark back to the Ottoman Dark-Age in Egypt, and in that manner, Al-Azhar institution and university were strategic points for the terrorist MB group members who stifled any reform endeavors, as they were loyal to the KSA and its first king, Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud, and Rasheed Reda betrayed his teacher, M. Abdou, and became the primary agent for Al-Saud family to spread Wahabism, re-christened Salafism, in Egypt, as he established several Wahabi/Salafist societies and groups in Egyptian cities, especially the terrorist MB in 1928. It is said, with no sufficient proofs, that some MB members managed to infiltrate into the Egyptian army at the time and participated in the 1952 coup headed by Nasser.

Thirdly: Nasser's failure in reforming Azharite curricula:

1- Nasser became an absolute ruler of Egypt, as its President, and he persecuted the terrorist MB group members that many of them fled Egypt, and the remaining members kept a low profile. Nasser tried to reform Al-Azhar by including it in the government as a ministry, and he nationalized waqfs among his project of agricultural reform. He abolished the Azharite ''sharia courts'' to make all courts in Egypt civil and related to the State. In general, internal policies of Nasser consisted of reformation endeavors that never succeeded. He built the High Dam, but never heeded the side effects of it; he crushed the terrorist MB group members using security forces and police, but left their Wahabi Sunnite thought to grow in all mosques and Al-Azhar schools and University. Nasserite reforms in Al-Azhar were outward and overt: by adding new curricula and methodology of teaching and new departments and faculties; yet, all regressive and backward Ottoman curricula were retained in the schools and Azharite university departments.    

2- Nasser issued Al-Azhar Law No. 103 in 1961 to reorganize Al-Azhar institution and its affiliated bodies and university. In this law, we read rhetorical phrases with empty content, such as the following one: Al-Azhar is the major scientific body of Islam that preserves Islamic heritage and traditions and its mission is to elucidate facts and tenets of Islam and spread its teachings for the welfare of people. Another phrase that regrettably created an ecclesiastical nature to Al-Azhar is as follows: the head sheikh of Al-Azhar is the Grand Imam, who is to be consulted in all affairs related to religious affairs and the Quranic studies and theological ones and all Al-Azhar bodies. Yet, this phrase contradicts the explanatory memo within the Law No. 103 that describes the head of Al-Azhar as the grand teacher, not the Grand Imam. Hence, the contradiction between enlightened phrases aiming at reform endeavors and ecclesiastical phrases resulted in intellectual confiscation and oppression of different religious views.   Instead of Azharite men doing their duty in clarifying and elucidating facts of Islam and its tenets and show how Islam helped in civilization and the progress of humanity in arts and sciences and literature, the religious persecution of different views occurred ever since. Article No. 15 of this Law urges the renovation and scrutiny of Islamic culture to remove and omit any erroneous notions that lead to political and doctrinal fanaticism, to reach for the essence of Islam. Article No. 33 defines mission of Al-Azhar as to preserve heritage of Islam and spread it in a lucid manner to achieve progress within the use of the Quran and heritage traditional books. This shows that it was an acknowledged fact that curricula need expurgations to avoid fanaticism and bigotry and wrong understanding of Islam.  Hence, innovations in thinking and new teaching methodology were imposed in that law, but nothing of it took place! Innovation means to get out of the old, trodden ways and to think out of the box to gain new insights within Islamic sources itself, to generate new ideas that differ from those of our forefathers. One can hardly wonder why such reform endeavors failed: because of Wahabism agents in Egypt and Al-Azhar, including the terrorist MB members, and the Azharite men's sticking to ancient volumes and tomes.  

3- as far as Al-Azhar is concerned, innovation, reform, and expurgation should begin first in Azharite backward and regressive curricula. A committee of Azharite reformist scholars should be formed to examine and scrutinize all curricula books to remove and omit what is improper, illogical, and obsolete. Thus, internal reform of Al-Azhar would be achieved, apart from inserting new curricula of sciences in all branches and foreign languages in Al-Azhar University Departments. Such endeavors were stifled due to vague phrases of other laws that abort any reformatory efforts, like laws that imprison free thinkers under the pretext of being accused of denying facts of Islam or contempt of religion. Article No. 30 of Al-Azhar Law stipulates that membership in the Islamic Researches Center is annulled when a member denies Islam and its facts, or when any member commits any immoral or unethical act that detracts his stature as an Azharite scholar. Article No. 72 stipulates that in case of Article No. 30 applies to any Azharite scholar he is to be fired from his post. When we innovatively applies reasoning to elucidate facts of Islam from the Quran, we have been accused of apostasy and denying facts of Islam, despite the fact that during the two years of our being persecuted (1985-1987), the reason of such persecution had been a Quranic verse or a commentary on it using another Quranic verse. Despite the fact that our writings have been done to show long-forgotten facts of Islam, to clear its name and remove its tarnished image, as per Al-Azhar Law, we have been persecuted by scholars who never used innovative or creative thinking, and they have used Al-Azhar Law, along with their authority and power, against us. They have punished us for applying the Law! Al-Azhar Law No. 103 contains several contradictory and vague articles that allow such punishment; it has been used in our restriction and persecution. We have been punished severely by those who have aimed to protect their stature, wealth, and positions via retaining the retrograde, mythological Azharite curricula. Yet, Al-Azhar Law has but one merit: it never mentions the so-called Sunna and hadiths; rather, it mentions the Quran, branches of theology, and Islamic culture, with the latter meaning human heritage and thought, that requires expurgations and omissions to remove fanaticism, bigotry, and illogical notions as well. Al-Azhar Law has been formulated under the head of Al-Azhar Mahmoud Shaltout (1958-1963), who was an enlightened imam who was inclined to reformation and innovative thinking, and whose writings show traces of the influence of the school of thought of M. Abdou. Later on, in the Sadat era, the grave mistake of considering the Sunnite thought and fiqh as part of Islam has been committed: this is the crime of Sadat committed against Islam and Egypt.

Fourth: Sadat corrupted Al-Azhar by spreading its retrograde and regressive curricula as if it were Islam and traditions of Muhammad

1- Sadat's corruption of Al-Azhar was focused in the executive regulation of Al-Azhar Law and in spreading several preparatory and secondary Azharite schools and branches of Al-Azhar University all over Egyptian governorates in an unprecedented manner and on purpose.

2- The executive regulation of Al-Azhar Law was issued by Sadat to annul any positive aspects in Law No. 103; for instance, this regulation has turned the Islamic Researches Center into an inquisition-like body that confiscates books and restricts freedom of thought. Article No. 17 in this regulation stipulates that among the  tasks of this Azharite body is to monitor and watch all written articles, researches, studies, and books about Islam and Islamic cultural heritage inside and outside Egypt to ratify or refute them. This crime is confining and monopolizing religious thought to this body of scholars alone! Thus, any new or different opinions would be deemed utterly heretic notion! This is akin to ecclesiastical authority that seeks to become infallible and irrefutable! This is sheer self-deification! Consequently, such high authority would deem those who hold different views as heretics, apostates, and disbelievers in Islam! It is as if those Azharite body members were monopolizing or confine to themselves the absolute truth! Article No. 25 of the same regulation makes the so-called Islamic Researches Center as the boy overseeing all publishing, authoring, and translation tasks of anything related to Islamic culture; thus, no other State institution can interfere! This turned that Azharite body into an inquisition authority like the one that used to be in the once-Catholic Europe. As per Article No. 40, this Azharite body is the only authority to examine all publications (from articles to books!) related to Islam to formulate a view concerning their publishing or circulation; hence, this body is allowed to confiscate books inside Egypt certainly, but how come they would have power and time to examine all writings in all languages all over the world?! This is absurd! How could they prevent any writings outside Egypt from being spread inside Egypt?!

3- Expanding Azharite education all over Egyptian cities and villages to make it parallel to public education:

 During the Sadat era (1971-1981), heads of Al-Azhar institution were as follows: Muhammad Al-Fahham (1969-1973), Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud (1973-1978), and Abdel-Rahman Beisar (1979-1982). The most fanatical of them was Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud, despite the fact that he was a Sufi, and Sufism is known for its tolerance. Egyptian Orthodox Pope Shenouda III had once proposed to have united religious books authored to be studied by both Sunnite and Christian students in public schools to deepen national unity; many people hailed the suggestion, but Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud threatened to tender his resignation in case the idea was ever applied. Once Egyptian courts condemned some terrorists-cum-murderers who belonged to an 'Islamic' religious extremist group called Al-Takfir-Wa-Al-Hijra, some Azharite sheikhs expressed sympathy with the condemned persons when the court asked for their opinion. The court ruling  rebuked such sheikhs because it denounced their negligence and reluctance to show people real facts of Islam, ignoring their mission, and urged their leaving their posts as they never conveyed the message of Islam  successfully, resulting in delusional youths who resorted to religion-based terrorism due to erroneous notions. Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud hastily issued a statement to attack such rebuke, never published except in the independent Al-Ahrar newspaper. He urged in his statement a return to Azharite judges who apply Sunnite sharia, as before 1952, and he called for the application of this Sunnite sharia despite his specialization in Sufism, unlike Shaltout who specialized in Sunnite sharia. Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud had written to the head of the parliament at the time, Sayed Marei, and to the Prime Minister at the time, Mamdouh Salem, to urge them both to promptly apply Islamic sharia, but he meant of course the Sunnite one, and he formed a committee in the Islamic Researches Center to formulate laws based on Sunnite sharia in accordance with its main four doctrines. We understand now the urge of Sadat and Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud to speedily spread all Azharite curricula and schools in all Egyptian cities and villages. Previously, Azharite primary, preparatory, and secondary schools were not great in number and had few students. Soon enough, such schools mushroomed all over Egypt in an unprecedented manner within the 1000 years of Al-Azhar via huge donations coming from Egyptians and non-Egyptians. Azharite schools enrolled students who failed in primary and preparatory public schools, resulting on overstuffing school rooms. Al-Azhar University at the time opened its doors for graduates of secondary public schools whose grades were too low to enter Egyptian universities, provided that they study a one-year period of regressive and backward Azharite curricula to prepare them, then study ONLY theological studies and Arabic at Al-Azhar University, NOT of  course medicine, pharmaceutical studies, engineering, etc. Al-Azhar University opened branches in several governorates, especial in Asyut, where its branch was financed by the KSA king Faisal himself, and later on, this branch in Upper Egypt has become the center of Wahabism and fanaticism in this mostly Copt-populated governorate. Asyut later on became the center of terrorism for years, and the location from which fanatical fatwas (edicts) were issued to persecute and kill Copts and to kill Sadat himself, who was indeed assassinated in Oct. 1981. In fact, the Sadat era in Egypt had planted dangerous mines in the Egyptian intellect, added to previous ones planted in the Nasser era; yet, Sadat mines were covered with erroneous religious flavor, a framework that allowed room for terrorist Salafist trend to emerge in the political arena, overambitious to rule Egypt one day, using dishonest methods especially declaring its adversaries as apostates who oppose Islam and oppose application of Sunnite sharia! Some of these dangerous mines exploded: Sadat was assassinated, some other mines exploded in the era of Mubarak and terrorism crimes committed in it, and recently, some of these mines explode now after the ouster of the terrorist MB-affiliated president Morsi, as a result of the 30^th June 2013 Revolution.

  Immediate reforming of Al-Azhar is a must

First: the retaining of Azharite curricula unchanged prevents creative and innovative thinking and makes the institution of Al-Azhar a time-bomb threatening Egypt:

1- Despite overt and ostentatious reform endeavors, Azharite curricula barely changed in the last centuries. Such centuries-old volumes and tomes are still being taught in special faculties established for that purpose at Al-Azhar University: Faculty of Sharia, Faculty of Theological Sciences, and Faculty of Islamic Studies. This has resulted in retaining such retrograde and backward curricula that have turned Azharite men into ignoramuses, with an enlightened minority of them that try to use their reason to apply reform or call for it at least, and such persons are usually rewarded with persecution.

2- This enlightened minority is influenced by the school of thought of M. Abdou, whose ideas faded and lost their strength upon his death, with few persons trying in vain to revive them now. Revival of the notion of Al-Azhar reform could not emerge in the royal epoch before 1952, when the popular leader Saad Zaghloul was immersed in political life in Egypt, and competition between sheikh Al-Dhawahiry and sheikh Al-Maraghy, who had full authority at the time to introduce reform, led only to managerial overt reform, with little effect. Intellectual reform was neglected and ignored, especially related to Azharite curricula. Some Egyptian thinkers who had been greatly influenced by ideas of M. Abdou actually left Al-Azhar and took courage in intellectual liberalism at the time outside walls of Al-Azhar, with good results of authoring important books with innovative ideas: such as Taha Hussein, Amin Al-Khouly, and Muhammad Abou Zahra, who taught at Cairo University. Another thinker was Ahmed Amin who authored great books that influenced several generations, when he left Al-Azhar to join the sharia courts that were banned later after 1952. Another thinker, Mahmoud Abou Rayya, left Al-Azhar and refuted and criticized many hadiths under the pretext of defending the so-called 'real' Sunna. Another Azharite man who left both Al-Azhar and his membership in the terrorist MB was Khalid Muhammad Khalid, and he was prominent during royal epoch as a caller for freedom and democracy. Some non-Azharite literary figures and researchers before and after royal epoch in Egypt were greatly influenced in their writings by ideas of M. Abdou, such as Quassim Amin, Muhammad Hussein Heikal, Moustapha Sadiq Al-Rafei, Abbas Mahmoud Al-Akkad, Abdel-Rahman Al-Sharqawi, Hussein Mo'nis, and Muhammad Ahmed Khalafalla.

3- Innovative thinking disappeared inside Al-Azhar institution with the death of M. Abdou in 1905. Analyzing the known information about heads of Al-Azhar after M. Abdou to the present time, none of them applied innovative thinking in theology and the Sunnite creed, despite the fact that some of them, for instance sheikh Abdel-Haleem Mahmoud, sheikh Abdel-Rahman Beisar, and the current sheikh Dr. Ahmed Al-Tayyib, have been graduated from European universities. Yet, some faint traces of innovative thinking are found only in books authored and fatwas issued by sheikh Shaltout. Sheikh Jad-Al-Haq was unique as an ignoramus; he never could deliver a speech à l'improviste,  always reading from a piece of paper, with countless faults in grammar and in reciting the Quranic verses written for him in a paper! Some innovative thinking in the religious life and culture in Egypt has been applied mostly by non-Azharite Egyptian thinkers. As for the terrorist MB group members and Salafist group members, they never done any intellectual endeavors of any type, except to propagate and spread Wahabism (dubbed or re-christened as Salafism, in Egypt), as we read in books of MB members like Sayed Qotb and Muhammad Qotb, and in those of the Wahabi agent M. Metwalli Al-Shaarawi.

4- Quranism, as a trend and a school of innovative thought, has emerged to face and refute Wahabism, as Quranists are building and drawing on the school of thought of M. Abdou, and surpassing it by using the Quran as a measure/yard stick and a criterion to judge the history, heritage, traditions, tomes, books, and volumes of the Muhammadans and their earthly, man-made creeds. Quranists and their line of thought have faced, until this very moment, all types of restrictions and persecutions. Some intellectual foes and adversaries of Quranists, like the late (MB-affiliated?) sheikh Muhammad Al-Ghazaly in his last authored books about Sunna between people of fiqh and people of hadiths, when he compared both stances to the stance of Quranists and their writings. Another example is the late head of Al-Azhar, died in 2010, M. Sayed Tantawi, in some of his fatwas against Quranism and Quranists, and lastly some writings of the thinker Abdel-Mo'ty Bayoumi. Some late laic secular thinkers were influenced by Quranism: such as Gamal Al-Banna, Farag Fouda, and Moustapha Mahmoud. We have said in a press interview that we have re-published here online on our website the following: (…Quranists have succeeded, despite their modest means, in creating an unprecedented change in the pattern of thinking of Muslims; not only by encouraging the hesitant ones to discuss, question, and refute some previously-deemed-taboo items, issues, and topics, but also to urge others to untie themselves from the shackles and notions of Wahabism. Moreover, some Sunnite clergymen themselves have begun to change the nature of their religious discourse to face and adapt to new variables that Quranists  have introduced. After the emergence of Quranism and Quranists, ordinary Muslims (or Muhammadans) no longer are able to accept anything without questioning and discussion. Such ordinary believers were previously aiming to up the ante to limited extent; to refute hadiths of Al-Bokhary about flies' wings or the Jewish sorcerer that some claimed that he bewitched Prophet Muhammad to harm him, without rejecting Al-Bokhary books. Now, the sky is the limit for discussing and putting to question every single notion. Deification and sanctification of Al-Bokhary have come to an end within the cultural elite in Egypt, ending in refuting the authenticity of the so-called Sunna and hadiths, ascribed falsely to Muhammad decades after his death, and if Sunnite sharia compatible with the Quran or contradicts it. Other untouched-upon-before topics that are questioned in cyberspace include if believers would sanctify and revere the so-called prophet's companions or not, if Arab conquests against Islam or not, and if well-known historical figures called 'companions' of Muhammad were enemies of the Quran or not. This is a phenomenal change or a breakthrough in mind sets or mentalities of today's believers, caused by Quranists, whose foes and enemies are unable to refute, and thus, they continue to persecute and restrict them. Such restrictions and persecution have helped Quranists to be more known and heard of; Quranism as a trend is known all over the world within  cyberspace in Arabic, English, French, Italian, Persian, and Urdu. The International Quranic Center (IQC) in the USA, which we have the honor to be its president and head, is leading this Quranism trend on the international level. Of course, there are other centers and communities of Quranism that emerged on the same vein or route paved by us to make it easy for them to follow. Hence, Quranists' achievements have created a success story, with tens of thousands cultured persons from all over the world converted to Quranism, true Islam. Most of them are impecunious, because wealth is rarely combined with being deeply cultured and intellectual independence among the countries of the Muhammadans. We have nothing but our website, in Arabic and in English, with another new website in Italian launched recently. Countless others contribute articles/translation into other languages. We hope to have one day our own satellite channel for Quranist enlightenment, along with an artistic production company for TV period-drama series tackling history of the Muhammadans. We hope one day that a TV satellite channel might cooperate with us to produce programs and shows similar to our own "Salafism Exposed", which consists of episodes of videos uploaded via our website and YouTube. All these wishes require potential and capital that we lack; if some of these wishes come true one day, we would be able to save Arabs and Muhammadans the upcoming evils…).

5- In contrast the Quranist trend of religious reform and innovative religious thinking, the vast majority of Azharite men are weirdly silent as far as reform is concerned. They do their best elsewhere: in flattering rulers in the Middle East and issuing fatwas to please them, as they are their partners in corruption and tyranny, and in opposing, persecuting, and suppressing any types of reform endeavors. Their main mission is to spread and propagate regressive, backward, and dangerous lines of thought in Egyptian media, mosques, and schools. Retrograde curricula of Azharite schools and university have been spreading since the 1970s until now in all Egyptian cities and villages. Al-Azhar University, with its branches inside Egypt, includes now 62 departments and faculties with over 500.000 male and female students: about 25% of Egyptian university-level students. Most of these departments and faculties teach the regressive theological studies and Sunnite sharia curricula we warn against for the sake of Islam and Egypt. We remember the time when we used to teach at Al-Azhar University that most students never memorized the Quran; many of them used to cheat by copying its verses from the book itself in written exams, after hiding a small copy of the Quran inside their shoes or socks! We mean here those who joined Al-Azhar University after getting so low grades in the secondary level (i.e. high school) within public schools that they could not enter public universities in Cairo or elsewhere. Such ignoramuses graduated from Al-Azhar University by cheating, to work later on as teachers or preachers in Egyptian villages, cities, and slum districts of Cairo. People used to obey them because they deem them to be 'respectable' and 'honorable' as clergymen and as graduates of the deemed 'prestigious' Al-Azhar University! Later on, matters aggravated as even non-Azharite men among the common ignoramuses would issue fatwas and talk falsely in the name of Islam just because they have tattooed their foreheads grown beards! This brainwash of Egyptians for four decades, since 1971, has created the perfect atmosphere for such ignoramuses to hold top posts in Al-Azhar institution bodies and university, to root and inculcate the notions of the Wahabi culture of fanaticism and bigotry ingrained in the common ignorant Egyptians (before 2011, at least), filling them with hostility and animosity toward Copts, Baha'is, other religious minorities, tourism, Pharaonic monuments, human rights, rights of women, and feminism. Due to such atmosphere, Egyptians were on the brink of civil strife in 2013, if it had not been for the #0^th June Revolution. We write this in Aug. 2013, with Egyptians threatened by the terrorist acts of the terrorist MB members who seek revenge against Egypt.

6- To make things worse, Azharite clergymen, sheikhs, and imams love it very much to restrict and confiscate once the Egyptian State relegate power to them! Examples of this are countless during the era of Mubarak; at the time, Azharite censorship power and confiscation authority reached its apogee, with normalization of relations between Mubarak's Egypt and the KSA, with the latter as the sponsor of terrorist fanatical extremist Salafist/Wahabi thought. The so-called Islamic Researches Center, an Azharite body, had at the time the legal right to arrest and censor and confiscate whatever and whoever deemed to pose a threat for the forthcoming theocracy Wahabi Azharite men seek! This means that such Azharite men had direct contact with security forces and Egyptian police forces to use against free enlightened thinkers deemed as the intellectual adversaries and foes of Al-Azhar institution! This has been manifested in their persecution of us – the writer of these lines – in the 1990s to have us arrested. Such unjust authority helped Azharite men to confiscate books authored by the enlightened court judiciary consultant Saeed Al-Ashmawi, and to collect them from Cairo International Book Fair. This late thinker has been known for his enlightened stances and steadfast position against backward line of thought called Salafism/Wahabism. Al-Azhar tried several times to oversee the activities of the Ministry of Culture that is located outside the reach of Azharite influence. The Azharite (and terrorist MB member) Tariq Al-Bishry sponsored the campaign to give Al-Azhar the 'legal' right to protest against, censor, and confiscate any artistic items to examine if they contain ideas that attack or are against faith, based on the notion that Al-Azhar is concerned in all things deemed to be under the umbrella term "Islamic affairs", whereas the ministry of Culture has the right to authorize and give permission for artistic material to appear to the public! The struggle of the civil trend – which included our participation – managed to refute the Azharite-MB endeavor to issue such a fatwa. On Aug. 2006, MB-affiliated press had published a weird news item about the imminent campaign that would be led by the Egyptian Minister of Justice under the auspices of head of Al-Azhar at the time, sheikh M. Sayed Tantawi, to inspect bookshops and newsstands to hunt and confiscate 'controversial' books that contained 'deviant' notions about faith (including books about witchcraft, the Anti-Christ, Doomsday apocalyptic visions, authored and published by unknown non-Azharite men) by a committee of 'religious' police troops that will consist of Azharite scholars from the Islamic Researches Center, granted the legal right to censor, confiscate and arrest. It is ironic that no one mentioned that fact that Azharite curricula form the sources and references for such banned books! The Azharite men of such committees (which were never formed, by the way) had better confiscated and restricted the distribution of such ancient Azharite curricula, and NOT use their power and authority to confiscate anything according to their wishes as both foes and judges in the same matter, with no higher body to oversee their actions and decisions!

7- It is rather ironic that simultaneous to such campaign and the intellectual battle between those who oppose such a project and those who support its execution, the 'civil' wing of terrorist extremist Wahabi agents in Egypt (i.e., most Azharite sheikhs and imams) began to declare the oppositional figures (against theocracy) and intellectual adversaries and foes as apostates who rejected Islam. This resulted in the assassination of Dr. Farag Fouda and the assassination attempt of Nobel Laureate Naguib Mahfouz and other writers and thinkers. Such gory episodes have made the notion of a possible link and harmonious relation between Al-Azhar figures and Wahabi extremist groups (which included the terrorist MB group members and Salafists) to be deep-seated and rooted among the cultural elite members of Egypt (the literati and thinkers and theoreticians in all scientific fields), who have written to warn against this collaboration of obscurantist forces to neutralize and absent the Egyptian collective mind. Sadly, most oppositional and public newspapers (and of course MB-affiliated and Wahabism-linked press) in Egypt at the time supported in unison the Salafist obscurantist trend in cases like the imprisonment of an Egyptian novelist, Alaa Hamid, accused of contempt of religion and of God, declaring Naguib Mahfouz an apostate because of his novel titled "Children of our Alley", judicial attempt in Egyptian courts to separate Dr. Nasr Hamid Abou-Zeid and his wife, in spite of themselves, under the claim that he was a non-Muslim married to Muslim  woman, the persecution and imprisonment of Egyptian Quranists, hailing the assassination of Theo Van Gogh, film-maker of the movie titled Submission (2004), deemed by many as insulting to Islam, and protest marches that demanded the death of cartoonists of (Danish newspaper) Jyllands-Posten caricatures deemed insulting to prophet Muhammad. 

8- Azharite men are always reluctant to use reasoning intellectual capabilities and innovative, creative thinking to elucidate facts of the Islamic faith from the Quran to face the dangerous quasi-religious culture of the Wahabi terrorist MB group members. Moreover, Azharite men remain silent vis-à-vis persecution of Egyptian Copts, Baha'is, Quranists, and Shiites. Azharite clergymen flatter and meet with Coptic Orthodox Church ecclesiastics in sham hypocritical gatherings, when both parties exchange kisses and hugs and overlook grievances of Copts. This is sheer madness and utter scandal, in our opinion. Curricula of Al-Azhar paved the way for violations, violence acts, killings, and murders; in the one-year-term of the terrorist MB rule of Egypt, three deluded youths killed a youth in the city of Suez, to imitate the Saudi so-called 'The Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice'' they have admired! Meanwhile, we have written about refuting false hadiths that urge prevention of vice or immorality by force and imposition of virtue by squads, as such hadiths reinforce violence, bigotry, and extremism and, of course, atrocious crimes in streets in open air and at broad day light! Such are the atrocities urged by Azharite curricula hadiths, not omitted until now, like imposing tribute to be paid by Copts, killing those who forsook Islam to another creed or to atheism, killing adulterous married men and women, killing immoral persons, killing those who stopped performing prayers,  etc. let us not forget that during the one-year-period of terrorist MB rule in Egypt, a Shiite sheikh, named Hassan Shehata, was murdered inside his house along with some of his Shiite followers, and his body was dragged in the streets in the district where he lived!   

Lastly:                

1-  Since Al-Azhar institution has been dominated decades ago by the terrorist MB members and Salafists, both groups of Wahabis retained and preserved backward, regressive curricula and opposed any change in them. This was affirmed in the MB constitution of Egypt, annulled later on, that urged Sunnite sharia as dominant feature in all constitution articles and gave Al-Azhar more hegemony over laws and legislation. Such Morsi constitution has been criticized in detail by us in a series of articles published on our website, showing how it opposed real Islam: the Quran alone.

2- The reason why that the terrorist MB members and Salafists maintained backward, regressive curricula unchanged and that Al-Azhar is to be the only religious authority in the MB constitution is to pave the way for their long-waited-for dream of establishing a  Wahabi Sunnite theocracy in Egypt, and the whole Arab world later on. They have realized that Al-Azhar must be a tool for their manipulation. This means that Al-Azhar in its present state is a time-bomb posing a threat to Egypt, because it is an institution run by self-deified ignoramuses with unlimited ambition for more wealth and power and authority. Egyptians must reform Al-Azhar radically, or else, the deluge is coming to destroy all Egypt! 

 A proposal of a new law to reform Al-Azhar

Firstly: general rules

1- Al-Azhar is an Egyptian civil institution whose mission is to care for reforming Muslims from within Islam in fields of call, preaching, research, and education. It is to be affirmed that its role does NOT exceed preaching and calling, without obligation, coercion, or compulsion, as per Quranic teachings.  

2- Reformatory missions of Al-Azhar:

2/1: To clear the name of Islam from accusations of urging terrorism, fanaticism, bigotry, extremism, and backwardness. There must be a clear boundary between Islam as a celestial creed (the Quran alone) and Muslims as human beings with human history, civilization, shortcomings, mistakes, tradition, and heritage that might agree or disagree in some cases with teachings of Islam in the Quran.

2/2: To spread facts and tenets of Islam (i.e., the seven principles in explained Chapter ONE) as well as its higher values that defend and support freedom of expression and opinion, livelihood-seeking, human rights, rights of women, and rights of minorities and that stand against tyranny, injustice, compulsion in religious matters and practices, and manipulation of creeds in economic and political ambitions.

3- To open the doors of Al-Azhar to have students and employees among all Egyptians (non-Muslims included) on equal footing based on qualifications and efficiency within measures that ensure full transparency.

4- To appoint the post of the head of Al-Azhar in the stature equal to a minister or even vice prime minister; this head is to be chosen as a candidate from the Supreme Council of Al-Azhar, while President of Egypt would endorse the appointment. The head of Al-Azhar oversees and supervises all Azharite bodies, and he will be held responsible before the Egyptian Parliament for his management of Al-Azhar institution.  

5- Employees of Al-Azhar are to be on equal footing with other public employees in all State governmental institutions.

Secondly: Azharite bodies to work on the field of reform of religious discourse, thinking, and culture within Islam:

1- The Supreme Council of Al-Azhar is a body to aid the head of Al-Azhar, who will be its president, with a board consisting of heads of departments of Al-Azhar University, Azharite schools sectors of all stages, Islamic Researches Center, External Relations Council, as well as the Mufti, and it is possible to include Muslim thinkers as well.  

2- To incorporate the Fatwas-Issuing Body to Al-Azhar, not as a separate body, by unifying the locations of issuing fatwas (religious edicts), while asserting that fatwas are NOT obligatory in terms of execution; they are for consultation only.

3- The External Relations Council is concerned with providing employment for Azharite graduate outside Egypt and with overseas students coming to Egypt to study at Al-Azhar University. Its missions include reinforcing the relations between Al-Azhar and other religious institutions all over the globe, active participation in all international events to show true facts and tenets of Islam (the Quran), contribution to interreligious dialogue sessions or conferences outside Egypt to show real nature of Islam, and to reinforce scientific relations with all thinkers and researchers in the field of Islamic studies from all over the world, including all nationalities and backgrounds with no exceptions.

4- : Missions of the Islamic Research Center include the following items:

4/1: To create new Azharite education curricula in all stages and levels that assert the compatibility of Islam in all eras and localities, while focusing on deducing new ideas and notions from the Quran exclusively to create an Islamic vision that confirm all higher Islamic values, while coping with the scientific spirit of the age to qualify students to enroll into the faculties that teach natural sciences within Al-Azhar University.

4/2: To hold research forums and to publish researches that tackle the contradictions between Islam (the Quran alone) and sharia of Muslims in all historical eras with all their doctrines and minorities, while offering modern innovative interpretation of Islamic sharia that assert true Quranic facts and tenets of faith.

4/3: To supervise and oversee printing of copies of the Quran, with the authority to confiscate any copies that contain intentional or unintentional errors, especially in translations of the Quran in all world languages.

5- Supervision of all Azharite primary, preparatory, and secondary stages schools and Al-Azhar University departments and faculties.

Thirdly: Steps of reforming of Azharite curricula:

1- To omit all the existing ancient traditional curricula from all stages of Azharite education; subjects that must be removed totally include textbooks of fiqh (Sunnite jurisprudence), hadiths (sayings), interpretations of the Quran, Sunnite tenets and theology, reciting rules imposed on how to read the Quran as if it were poems or songs, among other related school subjects.

2- Departments and faculties that teach ancient tomes of sharia, interpretation, and Islamic studies and Sunnite theology should be turned into Azharite institutes to teach IT and specialized technical jobs.

3- Establishment of a faculty specializing in history of Muslims to cover religious, intellectual, social, political, and sociological aspects as well as historical accounts and narration methodology of ancient Arab historians, schools of thought in history as a branch of knowledge, and research methodology concerning history.

4- Establishment of a faculty specializing in studies of all creeds of humanity, past and present, and the difference between them and Islam.

5- Modernizing faculties of Arabic literature and language and languages and translation departments with new curricula of modern literary and linguistic studies, with special focus on modernizing translations of the Quranic texts to show Quranism and Quranic true meanings of terminology used exclusively in the Quran and showing the gap between Arabic stylistics and grammar and the Quranic terminology and special language.

6- Establishment of faculties and departments to teach the following branches of knowledge: sociology, psychology, geography, logic, and philosophy, with special focus on comparative studies of ancient Arab schools of thought and modern ones in all of these branches. 

7- Modernizing and updating Azharite pre-university education stages by replacing all previous curricula with public schools curricula while adding Quranic (Quranist) subjects as detailed below:

7/1: Within the primary stage, the focus should revolve around the basic tenet of (There is no God but Allah), alongside with the moralistic and ethical values and how to perform acts of worship, within piety and seeking righteousness and keeping up one's conscience and moral standards, while memorizing and explaining verses linked to all such items in Quranic chapters 2, 3, 6, 16, 17, 25, 31, and 112.

7/2: Within the preparatory stage, the focus ought to be on memorizing and explaining verses linked to concepts, notions, and topics such as Quranic facts and tenets as well as its seven principles of sharia, Quranic stories that show faith notions and the belief in God and the Last Day, assertion of the human nature of all prophets and the fact that they NEVER intercede or act as mediators between believers and God, and they never knew anything but what was revealed to them by God, and finally that all prophets are equal in stature to us, humans, with no one better or greater than the rest of them, while showing of course the huge gap between such Quranic facts of Islam and Muslims in all aspects of life, past and present, as far as such topics are concerned.

7/3: Within the secondary stage, the focus ought to be on Quranic studies done with certain methodology and comparative research that tackle topics such as Quranic narration methodology in legislation and storytelling of ancient events and how the Quranic text contain scientific and historical facts as well as predictions of future events, in comparison to heritage and traditional erroneous notions of ancient Muslims, showing how ancient scholars were in the wrong, how to apply Islamic sharia and the scope given for humans to legislate and make laws within it, and how to reflect and contemplate Quranic verses to elucidate Quranic notions and concepts and see how they differ from Sunnite, Shiite, and Sufi notions of ancient scholars in all eras. 

8- Such Quranic subjects are sufficient enough; no other subjects are needed to replace, as alternatives, the traditional heritage subjects and ancient textbooks. As for scientific and literary subjects, they follow curricula of public schools.

Lastly:

1- Our writings published here online contains all what is required to update and modernize Azharite curricula.

2- Sooner or later, Al-Azhar MUST be reformed. It MUST be reformed the sooner the better, or else, the deluge of unthinkable destruction of Egypt is imminent!

Chapter 5: Reform Mosques                                                                             

The application of the seven principles of Islamic sharia requires the reform of all Egyptian mosques:

Harmful mosques in Egypt require immediate reform

Firstly: on how mosques of God should look like:

 Mosques are to be dedicated to God alone; prayers, call to prayers, and acts of worship are to mention God alone with no other name, with no partners and associates among either prophets or the so-called saints. Qorayish tribesmen used to build mosques dedicated to the worship of God alongside with the worship of the holy men, or saints, while imploring, invoking, and sanctifying tombs/shrines annexed to such mosques. God tells them in the Quran the following verse: "The places of worship are for God. So do not call, besides God, upon anyone else." (72:18). God has sent Muhammad to preach, advice, and admonish them to worship God alone in true faith with no mortal deities alongside with Him, but they rejected Muhammad and tried to attack him physically: "And when the servant of God got up calling on Him, they almost fell on him in a mass." (72:19). But God commands Muhammad to declare the basic one among the faith tenets: "Say, "I pray only to my Lord, and I never associate anyone with Him."" (72:20) and to declare his being a mortal human being that cannot guide them; his mission was to convey God's message to avoid Hell, not to compel and coerce people to be guided, as they are responsible for their choices: "Say, "It is not in my power to harm you, nor to bring you to right conduct." Say, "No one can protect me from God, and I will not find any refuge except with Him.Except for a proclamation from God and His messages; he who defies God and His Messenger-for him is the Fire of Hell, in which they will dwell forever."" (72:21-23).

Secondly: mosques of God

 Actually, there are two types of mosques: mosques dedicated to God alone, and mosques that cause harm. The previous verses show these two types; mosques should be for God alone, but Qorayish employed mosques to serve other purposes and their interests. When Muhammad called for justice and truth, Qorayish tribesmen tried to harm him physically. Hence, mosques of God does not mention, invoke, implore, offer prayers, and worship any mortal deities beside God, and people learn inside mosques of God meanings of justice, the main purpose or aim of divine, celestial messages: "We sent Our messengers with the clear proofs, and We sent down with them the Book and the Balance, that humanity may uphold justice. And We sent down iron, in which is violent force, and benefits for humanity. That God may know who supports Him and His messengers invisibly. God is Strong and Powerful." (57:25). God links justice and faithfulness to Him and His religion and the role of mosques in that respect in the following verse: "Say, "My Lord commands justice, and to stand devoted at every place of worship. So call upon Him, and dedicate your faith to Him alone. Just as He originated you, so you will return."" (7:29).

Thirdly: God's mosques differ a great deal from harmful mosques

1- In fact, powerful filthily rich people who control and dominate a given society are the ones who establish mosques that cause harm, in accordance with their whims and interests, not for the sake of obeying God, as done by the end of the story of the Cave Dwellers in the Quranic Chapter 18. "…Those who prevailed over their case said, "We will set up over them a place of worship" (18:21). We do believe that this shows that it is a bad habit to build mosques over tombs of the dead persons.

2- Actually, visiting or entering mosques of God is NEVER by building them extravagantly with expensive interior and outer decorations as happens now in Egypt and elsewhere, but by piety and dedicating faith, religion, good deeds, charity, and acts of worship to God alone in one's heart. Hence, we can say that God never cares for decorations of mosques; such extravagance may be a sign of disbelief and the lack of piety, because it is based on hypocrisy and showing off, ill-gotten money, and/or to deceive people in the name of God by supporting injustice and tyranny. God does NOT specify locales and eras and persons in the verse describing the two types of mosques (harmful ones and the ones dedicated to God alone), to show the generality that applies anytime anywhere when an unjust, wealthy, tyrannical minority uses ill-gotten money to establish mosques aiming at controlling the oppressed, impoverished, and suppressed majority through these houses of worship: ''It is not for the polytheists to attend God's places of worship while professing their disbelief. These-their works are in vain, and in the Fire they will abide.'' (9:17). Hence, those who ascribe falsehoods and lies to God and His religion in such mosques, and falsify and manipulate creeds and abuse god's name seeking worldly transient ambitions, are testifying that they are disbelievers in accordance with their sinful and criminal behavior and speech of myths that deviate and misguide people and reinforce tyranny and injustice. As we write this, we have just read news that Wahabis (terrorist MB members and Salafists) in Egypt had desecrated a mosque (Aug. 2013) and brought weapons and arms inside it to terrorize people in Cairo and tried to deceive people by claiming of receiving visions/dreams during sleep about Prophet Muhammad being subservient under the leadership of their ousted MB president. They are inveterate liars, indeed! They insult God by claiming He is on their side; as if He were a local deity serving their ire and fury! Such events have been videotaped, testifying their being disbelievers in God. Their Wahabi/Salafist/MB-affiliated mosques were built extravagantly, but they will be of no avail to them in the Last Day, when they will suffer in Eternal Hell. The following verse shows the real mosques filled with real pious believers who worship faithfully and do good deeds and charity: "The only people to attend God's places of worship are those who believe in God and the Last Day, and pray regularly, and practice regular charity, and fear none but God. These are most likely to be guided." (9:18).    

3- Actually, extravagant building of mosques with expensive decorations as done before and now is a kind of destruction of souls and creeds, NOT attending houses of worship to achieve righteousness and build piety and conscience into souls that aim to avoid sins. Likewise, Qorayish tribe spend a lot of money to build extravagant harmful mosques with expensive decorations and at the same time persecuted believers who stayed in Mecca by preventing them to ender mosques dedicated to God alone. Hence, disbelievers' mosques of harm were created in Mecca at the time based on religious persecution and restriction: "Who is more unjust than him who forbids the remembrance of God's name in places of worship, and contributes to their ruin? These ought not to enter them except in fear. For them is disgrace in this world, and for them is a terrible punishment in the Hereafter." (2:114). It is noteworthy that this verse is number 114, which is also the complete number of Quranic chapters. the expression "who is more unjust than…" is repeated in several Quranic contexts; see 6:21, 6:93, 6:144, 6:157, 7:37, 10:17, 11:18, 18:15, 18:57, 29:69, 32:22, 39:32, 61:7, which means that this expression refers in all instances to those who ascribe falsehoods and lies to God and thus deny Quranic verses: those are the most unjust among all human beings.    

4- Actually, those inveterate liars who deny the Quran prevents the name of God to be mentioned alone in mosques; they insist on mentioning the names of Muhammad, his so-called companions and contemporaries, imams, and so-called saints beside the name of God. Those deniers and liars hate very much mentioning God's name alone without mortal deities among deified dead people: "…And when you mention your Lord alone in the Quran, they turn their backs in aversion." (17:46). Evidence that support our views here is that Muslims of today, or rather Muhammadans, rarely glorify the name of God when mentioned to them, though glorification of His name is a religious duty often forgotten nowadays. In contrast, once Muhammad's name is mentioned, they sanctify, worship, and revere his name by saying phrases like "peace be upon him!''; this is an act of deification of Muhammad: they revere his name with piety and faithfulness more than those due to God! This is utter polytheism and disbelief! Thus, when Quranist mention God's name, glorifying Him alone, without mentioning the name of Muhammad, the Muhammadans feel appalled and furious: "When God alone is mentioned, the hearts of those who do not believe in the Hereafter shrink with resentment. But when those other than Him are mentioned, they become filled with joy." (39:45). This verse applies to Qorayish and others similar in attitude in all eras and locations. Such polytheists commit grave injustice toward God by preventing people in mosques to worship and mention God alone; they turn mosques into loudspeakers that spread lies and falsehoods in the name of God's religion  and deny God's book: the Quran. Hence, 2:114 refers to the number of Quranic chapters and links the disbelievers'' injustice to denial of the Quran  by establishing mosques to misguide and mislead people and to cause harm, destruction, and ruin; see again 9:17-18.

Fourthly: All mosques in Egypt are harmful ones

1- Actually, all mosques in Egypt are harmful ones that causes disbelief to spread among people. Quranists bear witness to this fact. When the Mubarak regime controlled all Egyptian mosques, he employed in them all Salafists and obsequious Azharite bodies men. Mubarak prevented us from building a Quranist mosque in Cairo, forcing Quranists to attend Friday congregational prayers in Sunnite Wahabi mosques to hear falsehoods and lies that insult God and Muhammad as well as to hear Quranists being condemned and damned as apostates who aim to destroy Islam! When Quranists among our relatives and friends  in Cairo at the time stopped praying in mosques and performed all prayers, including Friday noon congregational one, at our house, they were arrested alongside with ourselves to be put to prison! We have written an article about the disgrace felt by Mubarak as a punishment in this transient life due to persecuting Quranists, among other crimes against Egypt and Islam, quoting 2:114; see the link below that contains this article in Arabic:

http://www.ahl-alquran.com/arabic/document.php?main_id=1385

2- Actually, some harmful mosques might exceed their roles in harm and corruption by being turned into bellicose centers of conspiring, plotting, conniving, spying, and terrorizing while such disbelievers feign piety, as done by hypocrites in Yathreb during the lifetime of Muhammad: "Then there are those who establish a mosque to cause harm, and disbelief, and disunity among the believers, and as an outpost for those who fight God and His Messenger. They will swear: "Our intentions are nothing but good." But God bears witness that they are liars." (9:107). It is noteworthy that God here does not mention hypocrites or any other persons by names: this makes the topic refers to any similar occurrence that might take place in all eras and locations within any given society. Hence 9:107 apply now to the terrorist MB group members and Salafists/Wahabis in Egypt now in our modern times.   

3- Some harmful mosques are owned by those who confine the harm to themselves, by practicing worship of tombs, shrines, and  mausoleums inside them, where the so-called saints and imams are buried and deified after their death, as done by Sufis and Shiites when not in positions of power and authority. In contrast, some harmful mosques are actually owned by aggressive transgressors who practice compulsion and coercion in religion when its owners are in full control, power, and authority, as in the KSA, Iran, and the Gulf monarchies. There are harmful mosques that are used as tools to reach power and rule in a certain country, as the ones run by Sunnite Wahabis in Egypt. Some of such Wahabi mosques cause terrorism, vandalism, and ruin later on as we see now in Egypt, Tunisia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq.      

4- some Egyptian mosques now are harmful ones that are used to worship and sanctify tombs and shrines, and some others are Wahabi, Salafist, transgressing, aggressive ones that are used to spread terrorism and vandalism. Salafism has provided for decades the atmosphere that suits religious terrorism in Egypt, as killers and murderers commit their atrocities while shouting "Allahu Akbar!" (God is the Greatest!). Their terrorist crimes include murdering Copts, killing some Egyptian Shiites by the Salafist savage mob, forcing some Egyptian Baha'is to leave their homes, and finally organizing armed sit-in of terrorists in Cairo to practice in it killings, torture, and fornication in 2013 by turning a mosque their into a plotting center for planning more terrorist crimes. If Egyptians would have not stopped them by force, civil religious strife might have ensued, causing mosques to be military centers and targets, as happens now in Syria and Iraq.

5- This catastrophe requires real, decisive, once-and-for-all reform to turn harmful mosques of ruin, terror, and misguidance into mosques dedicated to the worship of God alone.

  Our intellectual jihad against Sufi harmful mosques

Introduction:

1- All people have the right to establish all types of establishments, governmental and otherwise, to serve their needs, like hospitals, schools, institutes, houses, apartments…etc. and call such buildings any names they like. Even a ruling family might give its name to its State and people, like Al-Saud royal family in the KSA, where citizens are called 'Saudis'. This is OK and readily done by the powerful, wealthy, and mighty persons, despite the fact that citizens might or might not be content and satisfied. What is not OK and never could be deemed a human right is when persons control and manipulate houses of worship, i.e., mosques dedicated to God, as if they were private property in the way such persons own schools, apartments…etc.

2- Originally, mosques are house of worship dedicated to God and built by believers to perform acts of worship and to glorify, implore, supplicate, sanctify, and kneel to God alone, with no associates and partners alongside with Him. Believers ought to enter mosques with such reverence and feelings toward God inside their hearts and minds. Hence, believers should NEVER kneel and worship other deities and mortals inside mosques.

3- Accordingly, harmful mosques lead believers to do exactly the opposite; such mosques bear names of mortals instead of one of the Holy Names or Divine Epithets of God. Hence, we find in Egypt mosques named after deified mortals: Amr Ibn Al-'As Mosque, Rabia Al-Adaweyyia Mosque, Moustapha Mahmoud Mosque, Omar Makram Mosque, Abou Al-Abbas Mosque, Shazliyya Mosque, Omar Ibn Al-Khattab Mosque… etc. In such harmful mosques that contradict Islam, call to prayers is NEVER deemed acceptable to Muhammadans who embrace earthly, man-made, fabricated creeds unless they mention the name of Muhammad beside God! Even during prayers, the prophet's name is mentioned in testimonies! The Muhammadans ignore the true testimony to be mentioned in prayers, found in 3:18. There are even special prayers dedicated to Muhammad, as a deified mortal to Muhammadans, called Sunna prayers, performed daily before or after the five daily prayers ordained by and dedicated to God! This is deification of Muhammad! Other evidence of this deification is to revere his name, once mentioned orally to them, by glorifying and sanctifying him and by imploring and supplicating him to seek his aid and help, as polytheists do with their so-called saints! Prophet Muhammad had no power to give aid, guidance, or even harm to anyone; not to mention the fact that he is now dead! See 72:18-23.

4- Harm done by harmful mosques is of two types; the first type of harm is in distortion of faith/belief, leading misguided ones to Hell for eternity if they die as polytheists without repentance: "…Whoever associates others with God, God has forbidden him Paradise, and his dwelling is the Hell-Fire…" (5:72), "It was revealed to you, and to those before you, that if you worship other deities alongside with God, your good works will be in vain, and you will be of the losers." (39:65). Hence, it is funny and tragic at the same time when deluded 'believers' enter a mausoleum/shrine, thinking it contain magical power, blessing or 'Baraka'! in fact such deluded ones cause grave harm to themselves and death to their souls, like male spiders when eaten by the female spiders after copulating; this is the meaning, in our opinion, of the Quranic verse by which God describes those who worship at tombs, seeking the aid of a mortal that cannot help them and cannot even move! "The likeness of those who take to themselves protectors other than God is that of the spider when she builds a house. But the most fragile of houses is the spider's house, if they only knew." (29:41). The second type of harm done by harmful mosques is the worst of all: when Wahabi/Salafist mosques urge violence and evil deeds to seek political control and power.     

5- Harm done to faith/belief extends after deification of Muhammad to deify other mortals: such as Sunnite caliphs and imams, Shiite imams, and Sufi saints.  Hence, earthly man-made creeds dominate mosques and manipulate it for venal gains to bring ill-gotten money to clergymen of these fabricated creeds and political gain to tyrant rulers who make use of the spread of such man-made creeds to subdue and control citizens. Some leaders and clergymen of such man-made creeds seek to establish a theocracy at any cost, and they call for it and propagate the notion in mosques and sermons, aggravating harm in faith/beliefs to harm in life because of terrorism, aggression, and bloodshed that follow Wahabi sermons. Countless incidents to exemplify this can be found in news items in Egypt, Iraq, and Syria. Accordingly, we maintain that all mosques on earth now of the Muhammadans are harmful ones, because God is not worshipped alone in them but alongside with mortal deities, and because such houses of worship are being used to deceive people, steal their money, and control and manipulate them in the name of religion.   Owners of Sufi mosques aim in the first place at stealing people's money by fraud and cunning ways, such as Sufi vows, but without coercion, whereas Sunnite Wahabi mosques cause aggression and coercion and compulsion in creed and aim at manipulating mosques for venal and political ends. We have the honor to intellectually struggle against both types of harmful mosques: Sufi mosques and Wahabi mosques. Let us begin with narrating such struggle against Sufi mosques.

Firstly: the start in our native village "Abou Herez":

 We have started our intellectual struggle against harmful Sufi mosques since we were 14 years old, when we protested against the Sufi mosque of our native village, named Abou Herez, in Kafr Saqr hamlet, Al-Sharqiya Governorate in the north of Lower Egypt, near Nile Delta. This Sufi mosque has been standing for the interests of Sufis, and it contains a tomb deemed holy by some simpletons among the villagers, who come to this tomb as a form of 'pilgrimage' to implore its 'saint', whose progeny among his great-great-grandchildren gain a lot of money by controlling this mosque! We were at the time an Azharite student in the preparatory stage, when we raised our voice loud to preach to villagers that this tomb/shrine is devilish work of polytheism. Many villagers feared our words and spread them among other villagers, resulting in warnings directed to us from leading Azharite men in the village, who were students of our late father, against refuting anything related to the Sufi mosque. We went on preaching to people against this Sufi fraud, swindling, and manipulation. Because we were brought up in such environment of worshipping mortals, things, and locales and use mosques to spread falsehoods and myths, our Ph.D. thesis has been on the influence of Sufism in Egypt during the Mameluke Era, when Sufi saints controlled people and have been deified until now in the 20^th century. At the time, we were a moderate Sunnite, seeking to reform Sunnites in general including ourselves, and we have participated in building a new mosque in Abou Herez for those who refuse to pray at mosques containing tombs. Later on, we have written an article in a Sunnite/Wahabi magazine to narrate the story of the Sufi mosque or our village, a village that had no mosque dedicated to God alone at the time. An Azharite Sunnite man read the article and built the new mosque we mention above in Abou Herez, using collected money added to his own savings as he used to work in a Gulf State. Yet, he did not manage to build it unless after years of struggle and waging intellectual wars against those who oppose the new mosque! By the time this new mosque was built, we began to declare and proclaim our rejection of the so-called Sunna and to attack and refute the so-called hadiths, after it turned out to us that Sunna and hadiths contradict the Quran: the real and only source/book of Islam. Thus, this new Sunnite mosque and its people became our adversaries, and they appeared later on to be members of the terrorist MB group.          

Secondly: against Sufi mosques:

 We have written a lot of articles on how Sufis manipulate their mosques to gain others' money. Among such articles is a dramatic scenario based on governmental health-awareness ads to warn against Bilharzia. In such ads, a reasonable knowledgeable peasant, played by the Egyptian actor Muhammad Reda, gives pieces of advice to the ill peasant, played by the Egyptian actor Abdel-Salam Muhammad, to keep away from the dirty-water canals so as to avoid Bilharzia. In our comic and realist scenario, the peasant suffers mental and religious Bilharzia, which is more fatal and dangerous, and the focus is on Sufi harmful mosques that destroy the lives of Egyptian peasants. When no one offered to buy and produce our scenario to raise awareness against Sufism, we have summarized it into an article form, titled ''Mental Bilharzia'', published on 20^th of May, 1991, by Al-Ahrar newspaper. We republish it below.

Mental Bilharzia:

1- The poor ill peasant, Abdel-Salam, has been advised more often to turn away from agricultural canals so as Bilharzia would not enter his weak frail body and make him lose the remaining vitality and health; yet, despite the advice that he feigned to be attentive to it, he never ceased to wash up and bathe in canals! In such awareness ads, they tell Abdel-Salam to beware and be cautious against Bilharzia, but they forgot that he is a victim of mental Bilharzia that sap his energy, money, dignity, and lifetime and will make him lose his Afterlife. As most simple Egyptian peasants, Abdel-Salam deserves to receive zakat alms, as per all doctrines and denominations; yet, he give away from the little he had, which is barely enough for his livelihood to feed his poor often-hungry family and children, to money-box placed at the mausoleum/shrine of sheikh Mahroosh located in the borders village.

2- The story began ten years ago with sheikh Sarhan who used to visit the village; he was known for his Baraka, i.e., assumed holiness, as a quack doctor and a charlatan.  Sheikh Sarhan used to 'treat' barren women whose husbands quarrel with them; once such women come to his lodge, each of them 'alone', each return happy, satisfied, and impregnated! The renown of sheikh Sarhan reached other neighboring villages he used to visit. At one time, he stayed at the mansion of the village mayor, in the village where Abdel-Salam resides, to hold Sufi celebration nights for men and Zaar celebrations for women. When sheikh Sarhan at one night was giving Sufi vows for men and women, he writhed on the ground, murmuring strange words in what seemed like epileptic seizure, then shouted aloud other meaningless words, and then fainted. Those present felt frightened. When sheikh Sarhan regained his consciousness, he hugged and kissed and shook hands with everyone, claiming he had a vision that saints of Sudan agreed to move the remains of a saint called sheikh Mahroosh from Sudan to a location under a yew tree at the border of the village. People kneeled and prostrated in awe, thanking the Almighty for this unexpected gift, hugged one another, and shouted in joy. All of them moved to the direction of the yew tree, led by sheikh Sarhan, and prostrated their heads to the dust under the yew tree, invoking the aid of sheikh Mahroosh! Others cried and wept in awe and reverence! Next morning, an apparently 'pious' young man claimed that he was ordered by the saint sheikh Mahroosh, in a vision he saw while sleeping, to buy all things that will be donated by all villagers to contribute to the building of a mausoleum for sheikh Mahroosh, who gave the young man, in the dream, a bread loaf filled with thousand pounds in new bank-notes, and he woke up to find under his billow – guess what – a bread loaf containing the same sum of money! All villagers congratulated the young man for receiving the very first miracles of sheikh Mahroosh, while weeping in awe and reverence! All villagers – men and women – contributed money, cattle, crops, jewelry…etc. to the young man who will undertake the building of the shrine, and each received in return a piece of the 'holy' loaf of bread to as an amulet of protection, as sheikh Sarhan said! The mausoleum/shrine was portly built, and sheikh Sarhan and the young man lived in a specially built hut beside it, as its guardians, while smokes of mercy and serenity hovered over the shrine!   

3- As for Abdel-Salam, he had but one cow which he cared very much for it, more than his own wife and daughter! This cow cost him LE 2000 to buy, but he sold it for the young man in return for a piece of the 'holy' loaf of bread and the total sum of LE 10, and he felt happy to hang the piece of bread in a sack in the barn, until he can buy another cow! He believed every miracle narrated by the young man and sheikh Sarhan, even the wife of Abdel-Salam used to be controlled by a demon or jinn, and never felt happy and content unless she would visit, alone, the hut of the young man and sheikh Sarhan! Thus, from time to time, Abdel-Salam used to offer as an oblation any crops or money he would get to the box of the shrine to obtain blessings or Baraka! Abdel-Salam felt overjoyed when his wife told him that the young man and sheikh Sarhan told her that the saints invoked the female saint, Sayeda Zeinab, in Cairo to interfere and prevent Bilharzia from entering his weak, frail body! Abdel-Salam took the pills against Bilharzia in the village hospital unit, but he was convinced totally that this was to no avail; he was protected by saints and holy shrines only, as they intercede on his behalf!  

4- What Abdel-Salam did not know was that he should turn away not only from dirty-water canals, but also to many things like saints and their shrines, as the canals and its Bilharzia are better than the shrine of sheikh Mahroosh and fornication happening inside it! What Abdel-Salam did not know was that he would lose his life on this world and his eternal life in the next world if he would go on believing that such falsehoods are part of Islam! What Abdel-Salam did not know was that he was a victim of swindlers and fraudulent thieves!  He never understood that the best ways of fraud is the way of manipulating corrupt religiosity and mythological creeds, when falsehoods dominate, like Catholic indulgences of the Dark Ages, and dreams and fantasies spread to deceive the simpletons and the impoverished to deceive them out of their little money! Ibrahim told his people, as we know from the Quran, the following: "You worship idols besides God, and you fabricate falsehoods. Those you worship, instead of God, cannot provide you with livelihood. So seek your livelihood from God, and worship Him, and thank Him. To Him you will be returned."" (29:17).

5- Our problem in Egypt as citizens is that some of the followers and disciples of sheikh Mahroosh want to rule us in the name of Islam! They imagine us as if all of people are like Abdel-Salam! What a shame!). The article ends here, but the problem still persists!

Our intellectual jihad against Wahabi harmful mosques

Firstly: the relentless ferocity of the struggle against Sunnite harmful mosques:

1- Within several articles concerning this intellectual struggle, combined with field struggle as we have preached Quranism in mosques sermons, we have opposed Sunnite harmful mosques when we have written about the episodes of conflict between Egyptian Quranists on one side and Mubarak regime, the terrorist MB members, and Salafists on the other side, about the struggle and conflicts between Sunnites and Sufis, and about harmful mosques in history of the Muhammadans, in a series of articles that formed a book titled "Warning Muslims against Mixing Religion and Politics'', not to mention tackling the same topic in several fatwas about NOT to perform Friday congregational prayers in Sunnite Wahabi harmful mosques, on our website fatwas section.    

2- Wahabi mosques are the worst type of harmful mosques; let us remember that the terrorist MB members, who are subservient to Wahabism of course, in their armed sit-in in Cairo in 2013 used a Cairene mosque as a center for fornication named 'sex jihad', torture of innocent victims, and military planning to kill Egyptians and to take others, especially orphans, as hostages and human shields! If they were to go on ruling Egypt, they would wage wars from their harmful mosques against Sufi mosques and Coptic Orthodox churches.

3- Such atrocities and worst conditions created by the terrorist MB group members are the direct result of expanding of building hundreds of thousands of Wahabi mosques since 1971 until now all over Egyptian cities and villages, annexed usually to schools, hospitals, children nurseries, plus a hall for holding funerals and another hall for weeing ceremonies. Yet, wherever the location and the various social and service activities of such mosques, they have but one unholy mission: to propagate Wahabism among Egyptians.

4- Actually, what was deemed and called in the mid-1970s as a religious awakening in Egypt was in fact a regression toward Sunnite Wahabism instead of the moderate previously dominant Sufi-Sunnite creed. Such Wahabi trend stole Egyptian money and wealth in several ways; chief among them was the so-called Islamic investment companies that promised profits deemed legal in Islam instead of bank interests deemed illegal and unlawful usury in Islam by extremists. We struggled intellectually against such falsehoods ascribed to Islam by a series of articles that annoyed extremely and vexed greatly the head of Al-Azhar at the time sheikh Jad-Al-Haq, who reported us to the Egyptian State Security Apparatus, eventually managing to stop our articles from being published in Al-Akhbar newspaper. Details are found in our article titled "The Usury Battle", published here on our website. Another way by which Wahabis stole Egyptian citizens' money was to collect donations of charitable people to build more terrorist Wahabi mosques, at the time when Egyptian male and female youths suffer impecuniousness and could not marry and buy apartments for the purpose of marriage. We have written that giving money for the youth to help them get married is more important than building more mosques; the same applies to other charity acts toward the poor, the homeless, poor travelers…etc. instead of tacking social problems, Egyptian Wahabis have built hundreds of thousands of mosques that Egyptian do not need as they lack no houses of worship, while manipulating the poor to be fodder or fuel for religious civil strife and terrorist acts; the impecunious deluded youth are victims of the power-hungry Wahabis in Egypt, whose ascendancy to power in 2012 done by fraud, manipulation, and corpses of such youths.    

5- From the very beginning, we have warned in separate articles and within lines as part of other articles and books against squandering zakat money on useless things/projects and not giving them to the poor and against neglecting poor travellers who come to Cairo from Egyptian villages to be entrapped in the nets and snares of Wahabis (i.e., both the terrorist MB group members and Salafists in Egypt). For instance, we have written in mid-1990s in one of our books published online here the following: (…do not let off your guard and stop using your mind and reasoning faculties; the falsehood of a hadith ascribed to Muhammad after his death meaning that whoever builds a mosque for God's sake will get a palace in Paradise is unbelievable. The reason: it is illogical that this would apply to even evil, bad persons, disbelievers, and those with ill-gotten money. Would Hitler have a palace in Paradise if he had built some mosques in Germany?! … This false notion runs contrary to Islamic justice manifested in the Quran. This false hadith says that even donators who contribute to the building of a foot in the space of a mosque would be rewarded with a palace in Paradise! This is utter nonsense! We can hardly imagine Muhammad to have uttered such illogical words! This false hadith is the reason why 38.000 mosques, small and grand, have been built in Cairo in the last two decades, and all of them spread and propagate the culture of extremism by spreading false sayings and deeds ascribed to Muhammad that he never uttered or did and that contradicts the Quran. Zakat, alms, and charity money ought to be directed toward building houses for the youth to enable them to get married and for the homeless who reside in Cairo necropolises, instead of building new mosques. Let us remember that Muslims can pray anywhere on earth and that poor travelers have the right to receive charity by giving them shelter, food, and money, after meeting the needs of all Cairene impoverished residents first… what about the grave, serious problem of spinsterhood and the growing number of bachelors aggravated by not helping them financially?! Let us not forget the crime of directing charity and zakat money to establish hundreds of thousands of ideological mosques to propagate the theocracy of Wahabi caliphate that Wahabis seek to realize one day! Such theocratic State would be based on Middle-ages books, tomes, and volumes of traditional heritage notions that are erroneous, obsolete, and against the Quran, but deemed 'holy' culture or literature by Salafists because of the myth of ascribing the so-called hadiths to Muhammad centuries after his death, even as they contradict mind, logic, and the Quran…)

6- We have written a movie scenario titled "", revolving around a sheikh rising from rags-to-riches in Cairo after a long journey of stealing money via both secular and Wahabi routes of collecting donations. As usual, we could not find anyone to buy or produce this movie scenario, and we have summarized it into an article form, published in Al-Ahrar newspaper on 15^th June, 1996, titled "O Brothers! Donate for Building a Mosque in Shoubra Tunnel!", and we re-publish it below.

Secondly: the article titled: "O Brothers! Donate for Building a Mosque in Shoubra Tunnel!"

1- We used to know him since we were a secondary student, taking the bus to our village. He used to mount the bus to sell peppermint-flavored sweets, chanting a special tune: "Refresher of the heart, O peppermint!", and people would sympathize with him once they perceive his being a poor, blind youth wearing rags and tatters, holding a staff to feel his steps and mount the bus. We were not the only one to care for him and for his conditions; many adolescent like ourselves at the time sympathized with him as he was nearly our age, this peddler blind youth used to sleep in any bus in the bus-station after working hours. To help him without injuring his dignity, we and our adolescent friends and fellow students addicted to peppermint-flavored sweets to buy from him a lot!

2- With the passage of time, this blind peddler youth was committed to the memory of the adolescent days, soon forgotten within problems of villagers studying in Cairo. Years later, this memory of him sprang into life again suddenly! In the early 1980s, we were sitting in a bus, and we heard a voice calling others to donate money for a mosque-building project. Seeing the man, we realized he was wearing a short white Djellaba with white trousers underneath. His voice reminded me of the blind peddler chanting the special familiar tune: "Refresher of the heart, O peppermint!", and we made eye-contact with him, as he drew nearer to us. Once he saw us, he turned away from our seat, despite the fact that we showed him money to donate, but he ignored us on purpose. We called him to take our donation, and we aimed at getting to know him and to understand why he had avoided us. He felt compelled to come to us to take the money, and we suddenly realized in a flash that he was the peddler of peppermint-flavored sweets! He can see and he wears clean clothes. We smiled at him as he flashed a toothy smile at us. We told him in a whisper: "Refresher of the heart, O peppermint!", and he burst out laughing, and dismounted from the bus hastily.

3- Many years have passed, and at one time, we were invited to deliver a speech/sermon in a 'grand' Cairene mosque. The youth who invited us took great care to urge us to get acquainted with Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty, the owner of the mosque and head of its annexed charity society that managed the hospital unit, pharmacy, and laboratory. This youth spoke a lot about the projects of charity of Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty; yet, we told him to talk to us about his cultural and knowledge level. He told us that he established the mosque and needs us to undertake the knowledge part. Convinced, we accompanied this youth to the 'grand' mosque which turned out to be a mere humble ground floor with five floors above it to house clinics of the hospital unit and labs. Even some of the space of the humble ground floor mosque was given to the pharmacy and a shop. This resulted in a mosque gate barely noticeable! We told the youth who accompanied us that this is no 'grand' mosque; rather, an investment projects that annexed a small corner for prayers! He felt mortified to hear us say this, and he told us that to make room for 'charity' activities and activities, Friday congregational prayers were performed along the street! We told him that this is fraud; they use a small mosque corner as a pretext and a veneer for investment projects, and asked him about profits of such projects, the youth remained coldly silent and went inside the gate. We knew we perplexed him with our candor and outspokenness, and we asked ourselves if we are to remain and see what would happen or to return home. Yet, curiosity prevailed over us, and we entered the gate. We found a gathering of people waiting for our sermon/lecture, eying us in fury; the youth had told them about our bold questions, we supposed. We were about to leave, but they welcomed us cautiously, and one of them begged us tactfully to stick to the subject of the lecture. We asked him if they did not know the lecturer and if we would accept to stop talking about corruption or not! This stranger told us that there are others who are more knowledgeable than us who came here to preach hand feel happy to meet with Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty and receive the gift of money in return for the sermon! We felt furious and shouted at him: "Who told you we are one of those who take money for preaching the truth in a lecture or a sermon?! God says in the Quran: "Follow those who ask you of no wage, and are themselves guided." (36:21)" clamor ensued among the attendees, and some tried to calm us down and to offer apologies. Suddenly, an important-looking man entered and they left us to greet him in respect, and we thought that this was Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty, only to discover that he was merely his assistant-secretary! He took us to the elevator to ascend to the last floor, where Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty lived and managed his investment empire. Once we entered his office, we found, to our surprise, that he was the same peddler who sold peppermint-flavored sweets and collected mosque-building donations in buses!)        

Lastly:

1- The article ends here, but the problem still persists! Hundreds of thousands of mosques similar to that of Hajji Abdel-Mo'ty spread all over Egyptian lands as centers for fraud, swindling, and propagating Wahabi terrorism culture, and later on in 2013, have become by the terrorist MB group members and Salafists centers to direct guerilla warfare and to incite violence against Egyptians to create the atmosphere of a possibly coming civil strife in Egypt!

2- Does all of the above require radical and real reform of all Egyptian mosques, or not? They are to be dedicated to the worship of God alone to spread serenity, internal peace, mercy, spirituality, and charity, instead of Wahabi culture of hatred, hostility, animosity, fanaticism, bigotry, extremism, and terrorism.

A proposal for the reform of all Egyptian mosques

Firstly: A historical overview about harmful mosques

1- During the lifetime of Muhammad, Friday sermon was reading the Quran; no sermons were written or registered at all due to this ignored fact, despite 500 Friday congregational prayers performed by Muhammad in Yathreb. The Umayyads used to perform prayers later than their specified timings; a topic we will explain in detail in another book later on, but their worst act was manipulating prayers and mosques to reinforce their political authority, as done before by the Qorayish tribe before Islam. Hence, Friday sermons during the Umayyad caliphate had turned into political propaganda to curse Ali Ibn Abou Talib, the Shiite supreme deity, and to glorify the first Umayyad caliph Mu'aweiya. Umayyad falsehoods include that Mu'aweiya used to write the Quranic verses once revealed! This falsehood is refuted by the historical fact that Mu'aweiya is said to had converted to Islam in Mecca after its being conquered by early Muslims led by Muhammad, remaining in Mecca with his father away from Muhammad, who returned to Yathreb, until Muhammad died shortly in Yathreb. Abbasids destroyed the Umayyad Dynasty and caliphate to establish the Abbasid Dynasty and caliphate as a full-fledged dictatorial and tyrannical theocracy, when mosques emerged as ideological centers to propagate and spread either the Sunnite creed, the Shiite creed, or the Sufi creed. Hence, they were harmful mosques that spread polytheism and disbelief. In Baghdad, the Abbasid Empire capital, Sunnite-Shiite conflict metamorphosed into unprecedented strife in the Second Abbasid Era, when mosques of harm played a destructive role, a topic we will explore in detail in our book on pilgrimage history and civil strife. In Egypt, simultaneously, the Fatimids established harmful mosques to spread the Shiite creed; chief among them was Al-Azhar Mosque that still stands today, but is used now to spread Sunnite Wahabism!       

2- Eventually, it became a bad habit or tradition to use mosques for pragmatic political ends and purposes, and often they were used as centers for military terrorist aims to spread massacres, ruin, and vandalism. State-owned and –controlled mosques traditionally prayed for victory for the sake of rulers and sultans, while mosques owned by secret political and religious oppositional figures were used as plotting, conspiring, and conniving centers against rulers and to secretly spread a certain creed, like the Shiite one, as opposed to mainstream man-made creed. Shiites especially were experts in doing this throughout their history: to spread their notions secretly and feign being Sunnites and deny the Shiite creed in public! To some extent, Sufis imitated Shiites in their ways for fearing persecution when adherents of the extremist fanatical Ibn Hanbal Sunnite doctrine dominated the Second Abbasid Era. It is funny that mosques preachers and imams used for centuries to pray and supplicate and implore God to grant victory to sultans and rulers against the 'infidels' by saying, among other phrases, "O God, help us to turn the enemies' women and money to be spoils of Muslims!" in the time when European colonization spread all over the Arab world. Hence, their prayers and supplications were in vain in such harmful mosques, even until now: millions of harmful mosques in the Arab world and in non-Arab countries of the Muhammadans supplicate to God for centuries during Friday prayers; yet, they are the worst type of believers as their harmful mosques defy and resist God's religion in the Quran and tarnish the image of Muhammad.       

3- When Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud conquered the oil-rich Shiite-populated eastern region of Ihsa in Arabia, Wahabi sheikhs issued a fatwa urging Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud to prevent Ihsa Shiite community from praying at their Shiite mosques and from performing any Shiite rituals and compelling them to perform prayers at Wahabi mosques. Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud, the founder of the current KSA, established military camps in desert areas to teach Wahabism to all Bedouins and nomads of Arabia while being trained in arts of war. The Wahabi mosques, filled with arms and weapons, used to be in the center of such camps, to turn such mosques into military centers to plan, plot, prepare, guide, and mobilize. Prayers used to be performed in such location as a military duty, just as killing all non-Wahabis, including women and children, was deemed a religious duty! Those 'brothers' of Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud were known for their unprecedented atrocities and savagery in comparison to history of the Muhammadans, as they aimed at annihilating oppositional figures and leaders who rejected and resisted Wahabism at the time; such 'brothers' used to murder innocent villagers in the Levant and Iraq during raids of 'jihad' for looting, when the Saudi Wahabi brothers murdered about half a million persons within two decades (1914-1930). This untold and often neglected and overlooked history includes savage mass-killings of innocent peasants, men, women, and children, during attempts to establish the KSA, the third one after the first and the second ones collapsed and fell. Such atrocities repeat the ones committed, in which Wahabi historians take pride, during attempts to establish the first KSA in the 19^th century. Such atrocities of murdering the innocent under the pretext of jihad originated in Wahabi teachings in harmful mosques. Such erroneous teachings urged the Wahabis to commit the worst crime, murder, thinking they did good deeds!    

4- Years ago, Pakistani police forces forced their entry into a Wahabi mosque that was discovered to spread an extremist and more violent variety of Wahabism in comparison to Wahabism variety dominant in the rest of Pakistan. This proves the fact that Wahabis fight one another and disagree with one another once they reach power in a given country, and their Wahabi mosques turn into military centers. This occurred to Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud; after the above-mentioned Najd Brothers aided him in establishing the current third KSA, they disagreed with him and revolted against him, led by three of their leaders. They fought Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud for a time, but he defeated and crushed them in the battles of Al-Sablaa (1929-1930). It is noteworthy that oppositional leaders among the Najd Brothers used mosques to turn people against Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud, declaring him as an apostate, and he used the mosques he controlled to declare them as apostate renegades. In 1979, an extremist Wahabi, Juheiman Al-'Eteiby, managed to control and occupy the Kaabah shrine in Mecca, taking all pilgrims inside it as hostages, but he was crushed and defeated after the Saudi forces committed a massacre in the vicinity of the Kaabah, a massacre overlooked by the international community at the time. Details of this will be tackled in a coming book of ours on our website.

5- Accordingly, if Wahabis ever managed to rule Egypt, rifts and dissidences will be bound to occur among them, leading to civil strife and wars that would spread bloodbaths in Egypt, while using mosques as military centers for inciting violence and massacres. The spread of Wahabism in the Middle East has led to flourishing of the trade of establishing harmful mosques to serve Wahabis, and such harmful mosques play their bloody role effectively now in Iraq and the Levant. It is now the turn of Egypt to discover that the Wahabi terrorist MB group and Salafists managed for the last four decades to establish hundreds of thousands of harmful mosques and to control the ones build before 1971 and turned all Egyptian mosques into centers for propagating Wahabism; it is easy for them to use such mosques in terrorist armed sit-in and to mobilize their armed supporters and followers to plot for more murders, killings, torture, military aggression, and political conspiracies. All such threats and dangers shock ordinary Egyptians who used to be living in epochs of peace and non-violence before 1971. Yet, Wahabism caused a radical change in many Egyptians who now commit unprecedented acts of violence, as some of them play the role of thugs who are paid to commit violence, vandalism, and terrorist actions, while others play the role of thugs who commit atrocities covered with Wahabi religiosity under the name of 'jihad'. Sometimes, it is enough to spend some months living in mosques for anyone to become among the sons of Bin Laden. We are horrified to imagine what might have occurred in Egypt if the terrorist Wahabi MB rule would go on for a whole presidential terms of four years in Egypt. We shudder at the thought of imagining that if the 30^th June 2013 revolution had failed to oust the MB president, massacres, bloodshed, and civil wars would have ensued. This Egyptian Revolution requires an immediate revolutionary reform of all Egyptian mosques.     

Secondly: revolutionary reform of Egyptian mosques:

1- Stopping citizens from establishing any new mosques; the existing number is more than enough; what is required urgently now is to reform existing ones to turn them from harmful mosques into reformative ones. This must be done via full supervision of the Ministry of Waqfs (religious endowments) over all public and privately owned mosques, especially as far as donations and financial aids are concerned as well as economic and social activities of all mosques. Ministry of Waqfs should be in full power to supervise, inspect, appoint, and fire preachers and imams of mosques. 

2- Preachers and imams of mosques are to enter into training courses to have their qualifications reassessed and enhanced; those who succeed tests by the end of training courses would go on with his job; otherwise, they must get fired. Those who refuse to get trained must get fired as well. 

3- Preachers and imams of mosques must be compelled to use a pre-planned scheme of sermons that have certain features supervised and imposed by the Ministry of Waqfs that will fire those who go off the mark. Reform sermons must revolve around the Quranic verses only, with its stories, commands, prohibitions, legislations, tenets, and ethic and moralistic values, within 52 weekly sermons a year.

4- Fields of reform include the following:

4/1: Defining Islamic testimony of faith (There is no God but Allah) within devotion to God alone by sanctifying, imploring, supplicating, worshipping, and glorifying Him alone with no other deities beside Him. It is to be asserted in sermons that it is absolutely against the Quran to sanctify and worship mortals like prophets, messengers, the so-called companions of Muhammad, and the so-called saints, as such reverence place them as mortal gods, creating polytheism in Islam. God alone is the Saintly, Holy One, Supporter, Guardian, and the Sole Sustainer of humans. The testimony of Islam cannot be extended to include names of mortals of any type; it is prohibited to prefer, differentiate, and distinguish among prophets of God, as they must be equal and the same in our minds as per Quranic command, and we are to believe in all the divine books/messages with no differentiation as repeated in several Quranic verses.

4/2: Defining the meaning of the belief in the Last Day in terms of faith tenets as God is the Sole Owner of the Last Day, with no mortals to change His judgments. The Last Day is the one of absolute justice, with no intercession of mediators to save sinners from Hell. In terms of behavior and demeanor, the belief in the Last Day should makes us lean piety and righteousness to prepare ourselves, with good faith and good deeds, to the inevitable Last Day; we are to avoid sins (e.g., injustice, fornication, adultery, theft, murder, hypocrisy…etc.) and we are never to manipulate religion for venal and political ends for the sake of transient worldly matters and possessions, if we really want to avoid eternity in Hell.

4/3: Defining Islamic piety: in terms of faith and belief, to dedicate and consecrated religion to God alone and directly with no mediators of any type, and in terms of demeanor by good, moral, ethical, and peaceful behavior with others.

4/4: Spreading and inculcating the moralistic aspect of the Quran to all people and how they are to deal with one another in good faith and within higher values of justice, charity, goodness, tolerance, mercy, peace, courage, generosity, and care for orphans, parents, relatives, the poor, the needy, the neighbors, and poor travellers. In addition, other values include defending the oppressed who suffer injustice, insisting on saying the word of truth, honesty, integrity, keeping one's promises and vows solemnly, preserving and protecting rights, resisting injustice, tyranny, oppression, persecution, compulsion in religious matters, and manipulation of faith to gain worldly benefits of any type. We are to state clearly in sermons that those who kill innocents in the name of Islam are enemies of God and Islam, the religion of peace, justice, and freedom.

4/5: Defining original Quranic concepts, such as the following: the meaning of faith in terms of belief tenets to submit one's heart and mind to God. This type of faith is to be judged by God alone in the Afterlife, and not by humans in this life. All persons are 'Muslims' if their demeanor is peaceful, regardless of their faiths and denominations. We are to judge behaviors as peaceful or otherwise. Peaceful demeanor is faith in terms of behavior. Faith in terms of belief is to worship no other deities and mortal gods alongside with God the Almighty; see Quranic Chapter 112. God will judge all faiths and acts of worship in the Last Day, and human beings are not to interfere in them in this worldly life. Peaceful behavior in terms of demeanor in Islam means that no one is allowed to be aggressive and commit violations and transgressions against others. We can judge the outer, external behavior of others. In contrast of the above comes the meaning of disbelief and polytheism; in terms of faith beliefs, ascribing associates and partners to God among mortal deities is deemed polytheism, as per the Quran. Yet, we are not to meddle in such choices of people, leaving their judgment to God in the Last Day. What we must interfere into and stop is disbelief in terms of behavior: that is, committing aggression, especially aggression using false religious sentiments or notions. Such aggressive behavior includes murder, killing, looting, fornication, adultery, injustice, corruption, tyranny, and manipulating religion to gain venal and political victories and conquests. Hence, all peaceful people are 'Muslims' or believers, regardless of their faiths and denominations, or lack of creed. Thus, those who make use of creeds to commit injustices are infidels and disbelievers, and are deemed polytheist aggressors that must be resisted by all possible means. Sermons must explain the real meaning of the term 'Sunna' in the Quran; it means divine laws and legislations in the Quran in how to deal with polytheists and disbelievers within justice and means how to obey the Quranic divine teachings. Muhammad never left us anything, after his death, but the Quran; he left no other books, hadiths, and narratives of any type. Several Quranic terminologies need to be redefined in the same vein and manner, within the aim of removing ancient interpretations of them. 

4/6: It is to be well-known that the role of preachers in mosques is to offer sermons and advice, within the Quran alone, and NOT to coerce or compel others in religious matters; preachers' mission stop at telling and speaking what is deemed right within the Quran, as guiding oneself is a personal and individual responsibility.

4/7: We are to assert the Quranic fact that religious faith and beliefs are God's alone to judge in the Last Day, while countries or homelands are for all citizens within a given nation on equal footing.

Lastly: The best discourse: "It is not for the polytheists to attend God's places of worship while professing their disbelief. These-their works are in vain, and in the Fire they will abide.The only people to attend God's places of worship are those who believe in God and the Last Day, and pray regularly, and practice regular charity, and fear none but God. These are most likely to be guided." (9:17-18). God says nothing but the Truth.

Chapter 6: Reform education                                                                          

The application of the seven principles of Islamic sharia requires the reform of all Egyptian education systems

Firstly:

1- The education process is the art of nurturing human minds; each of us was born as a blank sheet (tabula rasa, in Latin) that is filled later on with what we learn within family, society, and school. Of course, we make choice among what to accept and refuse. Some persons become later on either criminal, terrorist, peacemaking, religious, irreligious, passive, active, or law-abiding citizens, and so on and so forth. Anyway, one's school, from KG to secondary stage, plays a major role in forming the mentality and attitudes of a person within the most critical of age-groups.  

2- Education is of two types; one type is true and real that offers useful knowledge, and the other type is inculcating myths and ignorance. The former type is dominant in the West, and partially in Egypt in scientific subjects' textbooks of mathematics, natural science, philosophy, and geography. Yet, the latter type of education of myths and falsehoods exists in Egypt in subjects' textbooks of religion, Arabic, and history. Erroneous religious notions, pertaining to the Sunnite Wahabi creed, are found in such textbooks. History textbooks at all schools overlook the Coptic Era in Egyptian history, whereas Arab Era is taught in falsehoods that distort history in a way that helps in spreading ignorance and overlooking reasoning minds. 

3- The danger of teaching ignorance lies in the fact that this ignorance is controlled by a dominant earthly, man-man, fabricated creed like Sunnite Wahabism in Egypt and Shiite Twelver doctrine in Iran, for example. Such man-made creeds deny the right to use one's mind and urge submission to persons (clergymen) while prohibiting discussion and critical thinking. This allows room for the use of rote learning methods with students without understanding, making them graduate as ignoramuses who spread more ignorance and obscurantism in society, thinking they are doing the right thing in terms of creed! Hence, we have in Egypt a great number of ignoramuses who obtained Ph.D. degrees. In some cases, we have met illiterate men who never read the Quran and knew little religious facts and Quranic verses; yet, they are more pious and intelligent enough as to refuse the trash of TV religious shows and programs and mosques sermons. We admire their attitude immensely; Egypt would have been a better country if such illiterate men get educated properly.   

4- Hence, the grave danger of teaching ignorance and falsehoods is manifested in the fact that the Egyptian State spends billions on education to produce millions of public-education and Azharite graduates who are in fact ignoramuses. The reason why they are ignorant persons is that they are influenced by Azharite ancient, regressive, and obscurantist curricula; such curricula influence the religion textbooks in public schools as well. Such Azharite curricula influence period drama TV series, TV programs and shows on religion, and all Egyptian public and private media in general. This is a catastrophe; eventually, after four decades, since 1971, of hard work that has been profitless and useless, Egypt might be on the brink of civil war, for the very first time in Egyptian long history, if the terrorist MB group members and Salafists, who are tens o thousands, go on killing Egyptians in the streets and Egyptian citizens would defend themselves, as they see the government cannot fully protect them! Such terrorists kill Egyptian indiscriminately; regardless of the fact that the murdered ones are Sunnites, Shiites, Coptic orthodox Christian, etc. because they want to avenge the ouster of their MB president in 2013 by killing the 'enemies': all Egyptians! This is sheer madness! The culture of the terrorist MB group members is as follows: (we either rule or destroy you, Egyptians!). This is utter craziness! Egyptian State spends billions on public and Azharite education for 40 years to spread ignorance and the culture of bloodshed, terror, massacres, fanaticism, bigotry, and extremism that aim at committing murders to defend religious myths and to impose them by force on society.

Our intellectual jihad to reform Egyptian education:

1- We have published an article in the 1990s in the Cairo-based Rose Al-Youssef magazine to call for reform of Egyptian public-education religion textbooks in particular. Dr. Saad Eddine Ibrahim was encouraged to launch within his Cairo-based foundation, Ibn Khaldoun Center for Development Studies, a project for reform of education in Egypt, using a European fund. We have submitted to the project a critical study of all religion textbooks curricula in public education in Egypt. We have proposed in this study a vision for the new curricula of religion textbooks for the primary, preparatory, and secondary stages of public schools. We have written as well a dramatic scenario about Egyptian tolerance during the Abbasid Era, and a documentary scenario about participation of Sunnite Egyptians in the celebrations of Virgin Mary Day in the Church of Mustorod District, in Qalyoubiyya Governorate, near Cairo, and both movies were produced and viewed by Dr. Ibrahim in his center in the presence of some cultural-elite members among Egyptian thinkers, who admired both movies immensely. Some education experts present proposed several suggestions to reform and renovate curricula of history and Arabic school textbooks, discussed in forums and conferences attended by Egyptian university professors, educational experts, thinkers, politicians, and journalists. Discussions seemed endless about the importance and ways of reforming Egyptian education. Suggestions were sent to the Coptic Orthodox Church, Al-Azhar institution, the Parliament, Ministry of education, State media men, and President Mubarak.  This resulted in virulent attacks on us from all political parties, the press, and the bodies we addressed and from leaders of the Salafist groups and the leaders among the MB terrorists, along with their hidden agents in all State institutions. This did not prevent Ibn Khaldoun center from developing the project properly by holding sessions to apply it in 1999; copies of new proposed curricula covering all stages of education were submitted to Egyptian school teachers to open discussion about them. The press stopped suddenly its attack on the project, as some journalists began to understand and to defend the project, discussing it in several articles. 

2- Yet, Mubarak begrudged the whole project, seeing its danger as it contained a program to teach Egyptians their political and electoral rights. This 'dangerous' project was tested with individuals in direct interaction with people; it did not remain in papers enclosed in a drawer. This was deemed a challenge for State Security Apparatus, controlled by Mubarak's cronies. Ibn Khaldoun Center men held pen conferences in villages, cities, clubs, and schools to discuss electoral and political rights of citizens, and they were threatened by State Security Apparatus men. Yet, attendees grew in number, to the consternation of State Security Apparatus men, to aggravate matters for Mubarak, Quranists were part and parcel of both projects; we were the major speaker in most conferences and forums in villages and cities to teach citizens electoral and political rights. We were the major figure in the project of reforming educational process in Egypt. Eventually, Mubarak decided to arrest some Quranists, along with Dr. Saad Eddine Ibrahim, and to close down Ibn Khaldoun Center. We personally had to seek political asylum in the USA to save our life, because if we would have been imprisoned this time, while the terrorist MB group members and Salafists have unrestricted authority and unlimited power and dominance in all aspects of Egyptian life, this would have meant our being murdered mercilessly and without hesitation. 

Lastly:

1- Documents of the Education Reform Project (especially the subject of "religion" in schools curricula) and the media attack and the State formal attack on us are still in our possession; we might publish it on our website one day. We assert here that what is going on in Egypt now is sufficient proof of our good judgment and the strength of our views about reform on all levels. Bovine stupidity of the State formal institutions must cease immediately to launch real educational reform in public formal schools, with curricula devoid of any fanaticism, bigotry, and extremism and the call/proselytization for any religion.    

2- The current religion textbooks curricula in public schools should be omitted totally, to be replaced by a subject textbook about moralistic and ethical higher values and behavior as well as the Egyptian Constitution (in case it is rewritten to assert human rights, citizenship rights, freedom, civil liberties, etc.). As for the history subject textbooks, they should focus on and include all eras of Egyptian history, discussing objectively Arab conquest of Egypt and how Orthodox Christian Copts were persecuted at the time and after this conquest. Coptic Era must be taught properly and in detail, and the same goes for the Pharaonic Era. It is a shame and a disgrace that West countries students study more textbooks on Egyptology and Pharaonic civilization as well as the Coptic Era more than information found in Egyptian education curricula. It is a shame and a disgrace that the religion textbooks at schools (written by Egyptian Wahabis, of course, who do not belong sincerely to our beloved Egypt) do NOT reflect how the Quran mentions and talks about Egypt and Egyptians, with great figures and examples of good models in the Quranic stories of Moses and Joseph.

3- Simultaneous with all of the above, reform of Al-Azhar is a MSUT to make it defend absolute religious freedom. Dominance and full-control of Egyptian Coptic Orthodox Church over Copts must be curbed and limited. Only then, Egyptians can comprehend and apply the seven principles of Islamic sharia found in the Quran.

4- We hope bovine stupidity would end one day soon enough to allow room for applying all types of reforms!