United States, Muslim Religious Leaders in the

Abstract

Muslim religious leaders—that is, those religious functionaries who were recognized as authoritative figures by other Muslims—were rare in the United States before the twentieth century. Although some religious leaders existed among both enslaved and free Muslims before then, it was not until the period between World War I and World War II that Islamic leadership flowered into a diverse and formalized institution dominated by local congregational and national movement leaders. These leaders, most of whom were male, reflected the ethnic, racial, and religious diversity of the Muslim American community itself. The period from World War II until the end of the twentieth century saw a dramatic increase in the number and types of religious leaders in Muslim America: in addition to male leaders, women took formal and sometimes high-profile roles in various organizations; public intellectuals and Islamic-studies scholars emerged alongside national organization and congregational leaders; and the institutional growth of Sufism witnessed the emergence of Ṣūfī teachers and masters as another form of religious leadership in the United States. Such trends continued in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, a period during which Muslim religious leaders also sought to emphasize Islam’s compatibility with American values and Muslims’ loyalty to the U.S. nation-state.