The paper examines how the internal fragmentation of Egypt’s largest Salafi group, the Salafi Call (al-Da‘wa al-Salafiyya) and its external competition with the Muslim Brotherhood, have shaped its identity through its 40-year existence. It argues that ultimately the combination of internal divisions and tense external rivalry has led to the gradual fragmentation of the group’s authority following the 2013 Raba‘a al-Adawiya massacre. The paper is based on extensive fieldwork in Egypt between 2012 and 2015. Starting with the Da‘wa Salafiyya’s emergence at the University of Alexandria in the 1970s, the paper traces how a group of Alexandrians, primarily made up of medical doctors, became widely recognized and respected as a legitimate voice of Islam. Following this historical contextualization, it addresses the group’s sudden entry into Egyptian political life following the fall of Mubarak through its newly created al-Nour party. In the Egyptian parliamentary elections of 2011-2012, al-Nour captured 27% of the vote by mobilizing the broad and loyal following of the Da’wa Salafiya’s shaykhs and came to be regarded as the second most influential players in the Egyptian political arena, alongside the well-known Muslim Brotherhood. I argue that two main trends have shaped the group’s identity and aims, which led to its fragmentation. The first trend has been the constant tension between influential shaykhs and Salafi politicians. The former group believes that da‘wa (proselytization) should take precedence over the game of party politics, while the latter argues that the current situation calls for an intense involvement in politics. This dispute has manifested itself in the gradual division between the group’s figures of authority and even the rejection of the Da‘wa Salafiyya’s religious authority by some of its core constituencies. The second key trend pertains to the Da‘wa Salafiyya’s relation to the Muslim Brotherhood, which over the past 40 years has vacillated between amicable competition and cruel rivalry. I demonstrate that until 2013, the Da’wa Salafiyya had built considerable authority by aggressively trying to differentiate itself from its main Islamist competitor, namely by offering a model of affiliation that is non-hierarchical and fluid. However, the Da‘wa Salafiyya’s harsh attacks on the Muslim Brotherhood and its recent support of Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has also led to the delegitimization of some pre-eminent shaykhs and caused some Salafis to reject democratic politics.