AfriPulse
Saudi Arabia’s highest religious authority, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdulaziz al-Sheikh, has died at the age of 82, marking the close of a significant chapter in the Kingdom’s religious leadership.
The Royal Court announced his passing on Tuesday, describing him as a prominent scholar whose decades-long service deeply influenced Islamic scholarship and the religious landscape both within the Kingdom and across the Muslim world.
> “The Kingdom and the Muslim world have lost a distinguished scholar, who made significant contributions in the service of science, Islam, and Muslims,” the official statement read.
Funeral prayers were scheduled to take place in Riyadh, with additional services in mosques across the country.
Appointed Grand Mufti in 1999, Al-Sheikh served through a period of both religious continuity and national transformation.
As the Kingdom’s top religious figure, he was responsible for issuing fatwas (Islamic legal rulings) and interpreting Sharia law in line with the conservative Wahhabi doctrine, long influential in Saudi Arabia.
Throughout his tenure, Al-Sheikh maintained traditionalist views even as the country began opening up socially and economically under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s reform agenda, which aims to promote a more “moderate Islam” and reduce the authority of the religious establishment.
Despite his conservative stances—such as opposing the employment of women in retail in 2011, and declaring chess forbidden in Islam in 2016—he also endorsed reforms at times.
He supported the late King Abdullah’s decision to allow women to participate in municipal elections and serve in parliament.
His 2017 remarks warning against cinemas and concerts as “harmful” came shortly before Saudi Arabia lifted a decades-long ban on movie theaters and began hosting entertainment events, symbolizing the nation’s shifting cultural direction.
The passing of Sheikh Abdulaziz al-Sheikh is expected to prompt significant discussion about the future of religious authority in Saudi Arabia, especially as the Kingdom continues its path of modernization while balancing its deeply rooted Islamic traditions.
Source: NationalAccordNewspaper | Read the Full Story…
