"God's Helpers": On the Diachrony and Becoming of Anṣār Allāh Ideology

Author Accepted Manuscript. Forthcoming in Arabica 74/1 (2027), Brill. This article traces the ideological trajectory of Anṣār Allāh (the Houthi movement) from its origins in Zaydi revivalism and the early teachings of Ḥusayn al-Ḥūṯī to its contemporary reformulations under ʿAbd al-Malik al-Ḥūṯī. Attending to the movement’s diachronic development, it approaches its ideology not as a bounded or static system, but as a dynamic, adaptive, and contested discourse – one shaped through ongoing engagement with the doctrinal foundations of Zaydism, internal and external influences, and the contingencies of the present. Reading Anṣār Allāh’s thought as both a mirror of its time and an attempt to transcend it, the article foregrounds the movement’s internal tensions between doctrinal fidelity and strategic reinvention. What emerges is not a monolithic project, but an ongoing effort to reimagine Yemen’s Zaydi history and tradition in light of contemporary crises: a hermeneutic project that is transformative, controversial, and continually rewritten.