In this paper, I provide a political sociology of Islamic intellectuals in the Middle East. Who are the Islamic intellectuals? And what role have they played in the contemporary Middle East when it comes to issues of political hegemony? I do this by summoning the Gramscian theoretical apparatus, specifically his work on intellectuals and their role in the formation of hegemony. On this basis, I offer a reading of the conditions and historical processes in which contemporary Islamic intellectuals have emerged, developed and antagonized each other. Methodologically, I propose to summon Gramsci, namely his categories of traditional and organic intellectuals; then to elaborate upon his insights (with reflections on concepts of authority and hegemonic project); and finally, to adapt those insights to some of the idiosyncratic features of the region (introducing the elements of educational background, vocation and political theology). In particular, I will focus on the cases of Egypt, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, discussing the momentous changes occurring the 1960s and 1970s in each country. It is in fact in those years that the traditional Islamic intellectual class, the ‘ulama, confronted the rise of new organic intellectuals, the product of transformational processes altering the socio-economic landscape of Arab countries. These intellectuals manifested markedly different dispositions vis à vis the incumbent power relations as arranged in the historical bloc – more antagonistic and, at times, even militant. I contend that such process may be configured as the progressive relegation of most of the ‘ulama to the role of Gramscian ‘traditional’ intellectuals, sustaining a process of ‘passive revolution’ implemented by Middle Eastern regimes; and the coterminous rise of ‘new religious intellectuals’ organic to rising subaltern social formations, which they embodied and offered a novel understanding of the role of Islam in political life. It may then be possible to read the contemporary rise of Islamism as a process pivoted on the emergence and performance of Islamic organic intellectuals, capable of performing such role out of a combination of theoretical and practical engagement with society at large and their social class more specifically; and to ponder over the impact of such phenomenon of competing hegemonic projects within the modern state, the main object of their preoccupations and efforts.