The People of Monotheism may translate several Arabic terms:
- Ahl al-Tawḥīd (Arabic: أهل التوحيد), a name the Druze use for themselves. Literally, "The People of the Unity" or "The Unitarians", from tawḥid, unity (of God).
- al-Muwaḥḥidun (Arabic: الموحدون) is an Arabic term meaning "the monotheists". It has currency as:
- the Arabic name of the Almohads.
- the term used by the early followers of the 18th-century Arabian Muwahhidun movement of the reformer Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab to describe themselves
- a term that adherents of Salafism use to describe themselves.
- a term that the Druze use to describe themselves.[1]
- a term that the Alawites use to describe themselves.[2]
- Ahl al-ʿAdl wa t-Tawḥīd, "The People of Justice and Monotheism", a term used by the Mu'tazilis to describe themselves.
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ Friedman, Yaron (2010). The Nuṣayrī-ʿAlawīs. Leiden: Brill. p. 44.
Both Nuṣayrīs and Druzes were Shīʿī sects deeply influenced by Neoplatonism and Gnosticism. Both called themselves muwaḥḥidūn, and considered the study of esoteric knowledge as the true path to monotheism.
- ^ Friedman, Yaron (2010). The Nuṣayrī-ʿAlawīs. Leiden: Brill. p. 11.
According to Nuṣayrī sources, the members of this group called themselves muwaḥḥidūn or ahl al-tawḥīd (monotheists), because they believed that only by combining exoteric (zāhir) and esoteric (bāṭin) knowledge, can complete monotheism be achieved.