Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966) was an Egyptian writer, educator, and religious leader. His writings about Islam, and especially his call for a revolution to establish an Islamic state and society, greatly influenced the Islamic resurgence movements of the 20th century.

Sayyid Qutb was born in 1906 in the village of Musha in the Asyut province of upper Egypt. His father was Hajji Ibrahim Qutb, a well-to-do farmer of the region. The family, which traces its ancestry ultimately to Central Asia via India, in addition to father and mother consisted of two brothers and three sisters, of whom Sayyid Qutb was the eldest. His brother Muhammad and two of his sisters, Aminah and Hamidah, were also writers active in Islamic causes; all suffered arrest for their views along with their brother in 1965.

In his writings Sayyid Qutb attributed his strong bent towards religion to the influence of his parents. His mother...