In 1961, many students from Malaya (before it was named Malaysia) enrolled into the newly established Islamic University of Madinah (Saudi Arabia) to pursue an Islamic studies degree. Fifty years later, more than 500 Malaysians have graduated from this university (Mohammed 2014). Scholars have argued that the Islamic University of Madinah is the primary exporter of Wahhabi ideology, and has produced Salafi-inclined theologians, who later promoted the ideology throughout the world. This chapter examines the extent of Saudi involvement in Malaysia's religous education. It argues that the Saudis have pumped in huge amounts of resources, and this comes at a cost to the country's religious discourse: the promotion of Wahhabi-Salafi ideas, which are puritan, and not in-sync with how Islam is understood in Malay society for centuries. To examine this Wahhabi Islam influence on Malaysian religious discourse I will apply the forensic theology approach. This approach will be elaborated later.

Among the famous graduates from the Islamic University of Madinah are Azwira Abd Aziz, currently Head of the Al-Quran and Sunnah Department in the National University of Malaysia, and Fathul Bari Mat Jahya, an executive committee member in UMNO's youth wing (Malaysiakini 2009; Al-Ghari 2011b, pp. 139–40; Bernama 2013a).