Since its founding in the tenth century, al-Azhar has been a focal point for religious life in Egypt, connected to both ruling dynasties and the broader society and shaped by the social and political circumstances of the country. Al-Azhar's long history, unique among contemporary Islamic institutions, informs its current function and the construction of its religious authority, which is inseparably linked with its past. At the heart of al-Azhar are its ‘ulamā’, the scholars whose knowledge and expertise of the Islamic scholarly tradition underpins their role as religious interpreters and guides from its origins until today. The continuity of its ‘ulamā’ is connected with, and supported by, the continuity of al-Azhar as an institution, which provides a long-standing foundation for the exercise of religious authority.

The Early Period

The history of al-Azhar begins in 970. The Fatimids, an Ismā’īlī Shi’i dynasty from North Africa, had (peacefully) taken control of Egypt in 969 from the short-lived Ikhshid dynasty and set about establishing a new, “victorious” capital, Cairo (al-Qāhirah, literally “the victorious”), separate from the older capital of Muslim Egypt, Fustat, which was founded after the Islamic conquest of the seventh century. Al-Azhar was intended as the royal mosque, built for the caliph al-Mu’izz (r. 953–75) and his family near a similarly new palace.

Al-Mu’izz had decided to transfer the entire Fatimid court to Cairo from its previous capital in Tunis, and al-Azhar was part of the effort to establish Fatimid rule in Egypt. By this point the Fatimids had gained control of the whole of North Africa, which was extended to Syria and the Hijaz within a few decades of the conquest of Egypt, and spreading Ismā’īlism was a significant aspect in reinforcing Fatimid authority. Concurrent with the conquest of Egypt and establishment of a new capital, the administrative character of the Fatimid caliphate also underwent a shift, as its earlier incarnation as a tribal military dynasty gave way to a more bureaucratized political structure. Religion was made an important component of the Fatimid bureaucracy (largely adopted from the existing bureaucratic frameworks in the newly conquered territories), which was set on promoting Ismā’īlism through the da’wah, the missionary message that the Fatimids linked with allegiance to the caliphate.