Adil al-Kalbani

Adil al-Kalbani is a Saudi Arabian Muslim cleric who served as an Imam of the Great Mosque of Mecca.

Biography Early years and studies Adil al-Kalbani was born in Riyadh on April 4, 1958 to poor emigrants from Ras Al Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates who came to Saudi Arabia in the 1950s. His father used to work as a government clerk. Due to his family's financial situation, al-Kalbani took a job with Saudi Arabian Airlines after finishing high school, whilst attending evening classes at King Saud University.

Al-Kalbani has said he is not a Shaykh (an authority in religious matters) but a Qari.

Personal life He has two wives and twelve children.

Mecca crane collapse Al-Kalbani criticised a tweet from a Saudi poet that said that the cranes that collapsed in Mecca "fell to the ground in prayer". Al-Kalbani said that this was the "stupidest kind of nonsense". He sarcastically suggested that the other cranes did not collapse because they were "liberal". Segregation of men and women He criticised the current situation of gender segregation in mosques, where women are "completely isolated" from men and only connected via a microphone. He called this a "phobia of women".

Shias In an interview with the BBC, al-Kalbani declared Twelver Shias as apostates, which triggered a backlash from followers of the sect in Saudi Arabia. In 2019, however, he retracted his position after reading a book by fellow scholar Hatim al-Awni, stating that he no longer considers as apostates those who "believe in one God, eat our halal meat, and prostrate toward our Qibla direction of Mecca".

Stance on musical instruments In a fatwa, al-Kalbani considered singing to be permissible under Islamic law, but retracted it in 2010. In 2019, he backtracked on his retraction and again considered it permissible. A religious singing event was attended by al-Kalbani. A flute was purportedly used.

Filmography In November 2021 he appeared in a promotional video for Combat Field - Riyadh Season 2021.