assassination, but was released by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in 1982 under the condition that he end his career as a public activist. His cassette tapes continued to be widely available thereafter, but the mosque in Cairo where he preached was converted into a public health center. Beliefs and political activities As a preacher at 'Ain al-Hayat mosque he condemned the social conditions in Egypt and the suppression of the Islamic Movement. This did not stop him from having distinctly spiritual approach to life, something which his speeches reflect. He was a dissident under the Nasser regime, refusing to sanction the government's execution of Sayyid Qutb or assert compatibility between Islam and socialism. He was boycotted by the official media under the Anwar Sadat regime (1970–1981), but cassette tapes of his sermons were widely distributed all over Egypt and the Arab world. Kishk held political views opposed to the modern bureaucratic state, and emphasized personal and private piety in his speeches. Marriage law Kishk attacked Egyptian secularists for the "abolition" of "personal statute" (al-ahwal al-shakhsiyya). This referred to the passing of a law (44/1979) on spousal relations which required men to inform their wives if they had married another woman. "Under the new law, if the first wife objected, she could immediately obtain a divorce and would preserve the right to live in the husband's home until their children attained the age of maturity. This law was drafted by the office of the Ministry of Social Affairs and a commission of Al-Azhar scholars, and aroused the fury" of Kishk and other sheikhs, who held that it "contravened the shari'a". Greater jihad According to Kishk, the greater jihad is a continuous struggle aimed at subduing one’s baser nature and attuning oneself to Allah’s moral standards. It is the basis for personal moral development, creating pious and philanthropic activism, promoting justice and prosperity in society, while combating ignorance, injustice and oppression. As a result of this greater jihad, says Kishk, Islam "heals those societies which follows its guidance and are built on consciences which have been awakened and hearts which have been illuminated by the light of belief." Naguib Mahfouz Kishk wrote "Our Response to Children of the Alley", attacking the controversial novel of Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz for "violating Muslim sacred belief" and "supplanting monotheism with communism and scientific materialism". Mahfouz had won the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature, (the only