The article is dedicated to the major issues of the political philosophy of the prominent medieval philosopher of the Muslim East al-Ghazali (1058 - 1111). It is exactly the consideration of both the historical circumstances and political practice of the state (Caliphate / Imamate) of his days that allowed al-Ghazali to re-examine the traditional Sunni dogma of combining the authority and power, and to take a different look at the nature of the state in his teaching about the Imamate, which differed both from the model found during the reign of the Prophet and the Rashidun Caliphs, and from alGhazali's predecessors and contemporaries among the fuqaha (the Islamic jurists) and ulama (the scholars of Islamic doctrine and law).