Abdallah ibn Yasin

Abdallah Ibn Yasin (died 1059) was a theologian and founder of the Al-Murabitoon movement and dynasty of North African rulers and later Iberian Peninsula. Abdallah ibn Yasin was from Gazula, and a member of the Sanhaja tribal group. He was a Maliki lawyer, and in 1046 was invited by the Judala ruler Yahya ibn Ibrahim to promulgate his teachings amongst the Berber of the Western Sahara. The Sanhaja were at this stage only superficially Islamicised and still clung to many heathen practices, and so Ibn Yasin preached to them an orthodox Sunnism.

After a revolt of the Judala he was forced to withdraw to the south with his followers. In alliance with Yahya ibn Umar, the leader of the Lamtuna tribe, he manage to quell the rebellion.

Ibn Yasin now formed the Al-Murabitoon alliance from the tribes of the Lamtuna, the Masufa and the Judala, with himself as spiritual leader and Yahya ibn Umar taking the military command. In 1054 the Maghrawa-ruled Sijilmasa was conquered. Ibn Yasa introduced his orthodox rule - amongst other things wine and music were forbidden, non-islamic taxes were abolished and one fifth of the spoils of war were allocated to the religious experts. This rigorous application of Islam soon provoked a revolt in 1055.

Yahya ibn Umar was killed in 1056 in a renewed revolt of the Judala in the Sahara, upon which Ibn Yasin appointed Yahyas brother Abu-Bakr Ibn-Umar (1056-1087) the new military leader. Abu Bakr destroyed Sijilmasa, but was not able to force the Judala back into the Al-Murabitoon league. He went on to capture Sūs and its capital Aghmat (close to where is now Marrakech) in 1057.

Ibn Yasin died while attempted to subjugate the Bargawata on the Atlantic coast in 1059. His grave is 33 km almost due south of Rabat, overlooking the Korifla River, marked on Michelin maps as the marabout of Sidi Abdallah. [A. Benachenchou, 1946. Sîdî 'Abdallâh Moul l-Gâra ou 'Abdallâh ibn Yâsîn. "Hespéris" 33, p. 406-413.]

References

*Norris, H.T. 1971. New evidence on the life of ‘Abdullah B. Yasin and the origins of the Almoravid movement. The Journal of African History, Vol. 12, No. 2 (1971), pp. 255-268.