CAIRO, Egypt One of the Muslim world's leading clerics, Sheikh Mohammed Mutwali Sharawi of Egypt, died Wednesday, his family said. He was 87. Egypt's leading Islamic authority, the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar, Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, described Sharawi's death as a great loss not only to Egypt, but to the whole Islamic world. Time rarely gives birth to such a glorious Imam who devoted his life to making the word of God esteemed, Tantawi said in a statement.

Sharawi's fingerprints on Islamic teaching were matchless, said Moustafa Mashhour, the leader of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Sharawi, who served as minister of religious endowments under Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1976-78, died at his home near the pyramids of Giza at dawn, his family said. The cause of his death was not immediately known. Last week Sharawi was admitted to hospital after a severe bout of asthma.

Sharawi's teachings and rulings won him wide acclaim in the Muslim world. (AP)