Islam in Libya

The urban centers soon became substantially Islamic, but widespread conversion of the nomads of the Sahara did not come until after large-scale invasions in the eleventh century by Bedouin tribes from Arabia and Egypt.

Hence, Islam in Libya became an overlay of Quranic ritual and principles upon the vestiges of earlier beliefs -- prevalent throughout North Africa -- in jinns (spirits), the evil eye, rites to ensure good fortune, and cult veneration of local saints.

[4] Soon after taking office, the Gaddafi government began closing bars and nightclubs, banning entertainment deemed provocative or immodest, and making use of the Islamic calendar mandatory.

Among the laws enacted by the Gaddafi government were a series of legal penalties prescribed during 1973 which included the punishment of armed robbery by amputation of a hand and a foot.

Another act prescribed flogging for individuals breaking the fast of Ramadan, and yet another called for eighty lashes to be administered to both men and women guilty of fornication.

Finally, he called for a revision of the Islamic calendar, saying it should date from Muhammad's death in 632, an event he felt was more momentous than the hijra ten years earlier.

Those whose claim to possess Barakah can be substantiated—through performance of apparent Miracles, exemplary human insight, or genealogical connection with a recognized possessor—are viewed as saints.

These persons are known in the West as marabouts, a French transliteration of al murabitun (those who have made a religious retreat), and the benefits of their Baraka are believed to accrue to those ordinary people who come in contact with them.

Sufi brotherhoods exercised great influence and ultimately played an important part in the religious revival that swept through North Africa during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

In Libya, when the Ottoman Empire proved unable to mount effective resistance to the encroachment of Christian missionaries, the work was taken over by Sufi-inspired revivalist movements.

A promised restoration never fully took place, and the Idrisid regime used the Senussi heritage as a means of legitimizing political authority rather than to provide religious leadership.