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Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 October 2020

Simon Stjernholm
Affiliation:
University of Copenhagen
Elisabeth Özdalga
Affiliation:
The Swedish Research Institute
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Summary

On 4 July 2014, about a month after Islamic State had conquered the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the jihadist group's leader Abu Bakr al- Baghdadi (1971–2019), now declaring himself caliph, led the Friday sermon – the khuṭbat al-jumʿa – from the city's famous al-Nuri mosque. The fact that this khuṭba (pl. khuṭab) was widely used in a political propaganda war may have hidden from the public gaze its ritual and religious significance. Muslims around the world would have known about it, but for vast audiences of non-Muslims it may not have been so obvious that al-Baghdadi's performance was joining the chorus of Friday noon sermons, rolling like a wave over the global time zones from Indonesia in the east to California in the west. What knits these hundreds of thousands of khuṭab together is a common ritual, with long historical roots. Thus, al-Baghdadi's khuṭba, in spite of his and Islamic State's extremist agendas, did not only resonate with Friday sermons held elsewhere in the world that same day, it also resonated with a liturgical tradition going back to the days of the Prophet Muhammad. The choice al-Baghdadi made to use the ritual of the Friday sermon in order to claim his caliphate and announce himself as an aspiring leader for Muslims globally was not random. The form of the khuṭba itself, echoing the classical Islamic oratorical tradition in the way it was performed (Qutbuddin 2019: 477), is a communicative act with distinct connotations to its audience.

Preaching is among those Islamic practices that appears to have been continuous since the days of Muhammad until today (Qutbuddin 2008, 2019). Every Friday, millions of Muslims around the world listen to the liturgical Friday sermon being delivered from the pulpit (minbar) of a mosque. It is a pillar of stability in Muslim religious life. Khuṭba preaching also accompanies both calendrical religious festivals like ʿīd al-fiṭr and ʿīd al-aḍḥā and family festivities such as weddings and circumcisions (Millie 2017). In addition, there are many other forms of Muslim religiously instructive speech – or preaching – than the khuṭba.

Type
Chapter
Information
Muslim Preaching in the Middle East and Beyond
Historical and Contemporary Case Studies
, pp. 1 - 16
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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