The Six-Day War of June 1967 was a watershed event in the modern history of Egypt. In addition to shaking the foundations of the Nasserist state and diminishing the capacity of its charismatic leader to rule, the defeat signaled the return of two significant voices of opposition from within society: the student movement, with its legacy of popular activism, and the Islamic movement, thought to have been neutralized by Nasser's repression of the Muslim Brotherhood. These two forces combined in the form of Shabab al-Islam, an independent, religiously oriented student organization based at Cairo University. Through the use of memoirs, interviews, newsletters and other materials, this paper seeks to retrace the role of this little known organization in the so-called Islamic resurgence at a time when the Muslim Brotherhood had yet to re-emerge onto the scene. At its height, Shabab al-Islam claimed thousands of members from Egypt's student and young professional population, paved the way for the resumption of political activism within the university walls, and took the lead in the popular protests of 1972-1973. The organization was so effective that it drew the personal attention of Nasser and Sadat, both of whom sought to redress many of the rights denied to Egyptians over the previous decade and a half. Nonetheless, by 1974, Shabab al-Islam had become a defunct organization, penetrated by security agents and saboteurs. It was succeeded by al-Gama'ah al-Islamiyyah, a more traditionally organized Islamic group with close links to the recently reconstituted Muslim Brotherhood. In the areas in which Shabab al-Islam had failed, al-Gama'ah al-Islamiyyah was determined to succeed. The paper draws upon elements of Social Movement Theory (SMT), including a discussion of political opportunity structures, to analyze the reasons for Shabab al-Islam's failure to establish itself as a permanent fixture in Egypt's Islamic activist scene. Although it offered a fresh intellectual perspective that set the tone for the future of the Islamic movement, its organizational structure failed to keep up with the broad appeal of its ideas. As a result, the important legacy of Shabab al-Islam and its contribution to religious activism in Egypt has been lost in a contemporary narrative dominated by the forces that prevailed.