I can understand how those who know next to nothing about Islam might fall for the view that the racist right (& of course the Salafis themselves) put forward that the Salafis represent true Islam, but it surprises me that anyone here on this forum could take that view, seeing as it is has been discussed so many times.
I would suggest that those who think IS do represent "True Islam" go and study a bit more about Islamic History.
But I'll attempt to at least put it as simply as I can:
IS/ISIL/ISIS is a product of Jihadist ideology which in turn is a product of Salafi ideology which in turn owes it's rise mostly to Wahhabi movement started in the 18th century by Abdul Wahhab in what is today Saudi Arabia.
Their views differ from the main traditional schools of Sunni Islam in many ways for example they do not consider it necessary to consult religious rulings of scholars of the main Sunni Mathhabs down the course of 1400 years of scholarship. They instead place emphasis on going back to original sources of Qur'an and Sunna and making rulings direct from that. (As if the scholars down the ages were unaware of Qur'an & Sunna.)
To the simple-minded and uneducated modern day young Muslim this is very attractive.
But it has created a very militant, puritanical and literalist & Jihad-driven version of Islam that differs in many ways from what many would call "Traditional" versions of Sunni Islam as represented by the scholars of the 4 main Sunni Mathhabs.
The Salafis reject metaphoric or symbolic interpretations. (Some consider Sufis heretics to be executed.) They regard many of the practices approved of by scholars after the first generation to be innovations "Bid'ah" and outside Islam. They emphasises the importance of Jihad and regard it as meaning mainly physical Jihad with the sword rather than just struggle against one's nafs (ego).
While they reject Taqleed (following past scholars of the main mathhabs) they nevertheless do have their own "select" group of favourite sheikhs from the past such as Ibn Taymiyya.
Salafis as a whole are a minority of Muslims.
IS are a minority of that minority. (IS are regarded extremists even by other Salafis.)
Now as I have said over and over - they do have authentic sources. But no - and a thousand times no - they do not represent "True Islam". They represent one view - a very literalist, puritanical view. As I have said, puritanical literalist movements have cropped up many times during Islamic history, but they have generally been minority movements that either splintered into ever smaller groups and disappeared or they moderated.
Thanks for the post ! I've been wondering for a while about the differences between salafis and other sunnis. I pmed HM about it and he pretty much said the same thing you did.
Although I can see these differences in "theology" I'm not sure if there really is much of a difference between say a hardcore mathab following sunni and a salafi in practice.
My family are hardcore beardo sunnis but they don't disagree with any of the sharia punishments in KSA which is run by salafis.
Do you know of any significant differences between salafis and mathab sunnis in terms of jurisprudence and islamic law ?
death for apostasy, stoning for adultery, lashing for fornication, interest is haraam, alcohol is haraam, hijaab is necessary, meat must be slaughtered in a halal fashion, music is haraam etc etc
Even though salafis might not follow mathabs I can't seem to find any major points of disagreements that salafis have with sunnis in terms of islamic laws.
Topic: Is Islamic State Islamic?