NUZHATUL KHAWATER
A GRAND WORK ON MUSLIM SCHOLARS IN INDIA
BY ABU TARIQ HIJAZI
A GRAND WORK ON MUSLIM SCHOLARS IN INDIA
BY ABU TARIQ HIJAZI
When discussing about India we talk about Medieval India extending from Iran to Burma but which is now divided into Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Nepal. Islam reached this territory during the period of Khilafat Rasheda. Kabul and Makran were conquered during the reign of Third Caliph Usman bin Affan. Later during Omayyad & Abbasid Caliphates Muslim rule extended to Sind and Punjab. After 270 years of Caliphate control, the rule passed to Afghan dynasties until the conquest of North India. Sultan Qutubuddin established Delhi Sultanat in 1200 which ruled upto 1526 for 326 years. It was succeeded by Moghul Empire which again ruled at Delhi for 340 years upto 1857.
The historical record shows that Islam had deep and continuous relations with India from its beginning. There was a regular flow of Muslim scholars to preach the new religion to this part of the world. Later a large numbers of scholars emerged from the Indian soil and travelled to Hijaz.
Arab scholars like Ibn Hajar Asqalani, Mohammed Shawkani, Hadrami, Allama Sakhavi, Mohibbi and Muradi wrote many famous books on the biographies of scholar of the Muslim world. But because of long distance, separated by vast ocean and language barrier with Persian and Urdu, they could not record reasonable number of Muslim scholars from India. It is very shocking to note, that leading Arab biographer Allama Sakhavi who wrote “Zau al Lamea” covering 11,611 entries recorded only 38 scholars from India. Likewise Allama Mohibbi entered only 14 Indians in his collection named “Khulasat al Akhbaar” of 1290 entries. Qazi Mohammed Shawkani in his “Al Badr al Taleh,” entered only 7 Indians in his collection of 595. Muslims of India on their own wrote many treatises on their scholars but those were generally in Persian language. Thus there existed a large vacuum about Muslim scholars of India at the international level in Arabic language.
This vacuum was filled by Allama Abdul Haii al Hasani through his grand book named Nuzhatul Khawater in Arabic which is the largest encyclopedia on Muslim scholars in India. Allama Abdul Haii al Hasani, a descent of Sayyed Alamullah and Sayed Ahmad Shaheed Barelvi comes from a learned family of India. His father Fakhruddin Abdul Ali was a great scholar and author of Mehr Jahan Taab in 1300 pages. Allama Hasani (1286-1341 AH) (1869-1923 AD) was born at Dairah Alamullah, Raebareli U.P.and was raised in a literary environment of high profile. He was curious in reading and collecting biographies of Indian dignitaries from his early age. Though he lived a very short age of 55 years (his son Abul Hasan Ali Nadvi lived for 85 years)but through his strenuous efforts of 30 years, Allama Husani gave a marvel compilation to the history of the world. Though he wrote over 15 books but his Nuzhatul Khawater is a gem of his authorship.
Allama Hasani was busy in writing this book until his death in 1341 AH (1923). He collected 4,526 biographies from Kabul to Bengal and Kashmir to Calicut in eight volumes. This is the largest collection of Muslim scholars and dignitaries on Indian soil.Thousands of scholars and saints came from abroad to preach Islam in the sub-continent and thousands devoted persons went to Hijaz and lived there for decades. Allama Hasani tried his best to collect all possible information in details on these pious souls. It is reported that he consulted over 300 books and biographic collections to compile this monumental work.
He was busy in writing and though the book was not complete but his death took away him 1341 AH.The incomplete biographies were updated by his illustrous son Allama Abul Hasan Nadvi. However this large collection in eight volumes could not see the light of the day for about ten years. It was only in 1350 AH, when Dairatul Maaref Usmaina Haiderabad decided to publish his volume two. When this marvelous work appeared as a book, many historians and orientalists abroad emphasized to publish the complete version. Later volume no. one and other three were published in 1366, volume VI in 1376, volume VII in 1378 and finally volume VIII, in 1390 (1970).Thus it took more than 50 years for its complete publication. Finally Dar Ibn Hazim Beirut, Lebanon re-published the whole Arabic work in 1420 (1999AD) in well designed two large volumes covering 1508 pages. The book is bicolumns and equals to over 3000 pages.
Allama Abdul Haii recorded 4,526 biographies in Nuzhatul Khawater collecting them from 300 sources of Arabic, Persian and Urdu. He divided the entries in 14 Hijrah centuries and arranged them in alphabetical order. The majority of entries have been recorded with dates but there are 1,370 entries without any date of the scholars. The number of entries in each Hijrah century is as under:
Century I, 17 Century II, 31 Century III, 15
Century IV, 14 Century V, 18 Century V I, 27
Century VII, 141 Century VIII, 298 Century IX, 245
Century X, 592 Century XI, 760 Century XII, 774
Century XIII, 1031 Century IVX, 563 Total entries 4,511
In the absence of biographical literature, it was generally believed that only a handful Muslim saint like Sh. Ali Hajveri well known as, Data Ganj Bakhsh (d. 465AH) Sh. Moenuddin Chisti Ajmeri (d.627), Salar Masud Ghazi, Sh. Qutubuddin Bakhtiyar Awshi (d.633) Sayed Ali Hamadani came and preached Islam in India. But we are surprised to note the hundreds of saint and scholar of high descent from Sayyedna Hasan & Husain, of Sayyedna Abu Bakr Siddique, Omer Farooq, Usman Ghani, Khalid bin Walid, Imam Malik, Imam Abu Hanifa, Imam Bukhari & of other Sahaba migrated to India to preach Islam and settled in different parts from Sind to Bengal and Gujarat. On the other hand hundreds of Indian scholars and saints migrated to Hijaz and settled in the land of Haramain Sharifain. Thus there was a continuous two way flow of scholars between India and Hijaz.This has now been discovered and established by the grand work of Allama Hasani.
The love of Muslims from India was not limited to scholarship alone. The Rulers of Gujarat & Bengal kingdoms established numbers of Rabaat guest houses, mosques, schools and hospitals in Makkah Mukarramah and Madina Munawwara. Delhi rulers & Haiderabad state also distributed enormous donations in Hijaz. Moghul Emperor Aurangzaib Alamgir also sent precious gifts including Holy Quran written by himself to Haramain Sharifain.
The Encyclopedia was edited about 100 years ago. The Arabic book could not achieve the desired results because the Arabic readership in India was very limited and outside world had limited interest in scholars of India. But now this is our duty to scritinise, update and translate this prestigious work into Enfglish and Urdu. The missing dates of scholars should be traced out and new entries of the last century added. Thus this work will stand as the living record of Muslim scholars of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
To begin with, we translated the name of all scholars, with dates, into English and arranged them in Chronological order. This provides a comprenhenive look of working period of each scholar. More over there are thousands books and treatises written by these scholars. We should create and index of all their works in Arabic, Persian and Urdu and trace the places where those are preserved in India and abroad. A library-center should collect microfilms of all these documents. Separate anthologies of their poetry in Arabic & Persian with translation may also be published.This is the task for our young generation and can easily be done through Ph.D. awards. Similarly a geographical index should be prepared showing all places, where these scholars lived, died and are buried.
A chronological index in English, of over 3000 entries in of Nuzhatul Khawater has been prepared in 164 pages and will be displayed on our site (http://www.abutariqhijazi.com) shorltly.
ABU TARIQ HIJAZI
Madina Munawwarah
Friday 7TH Jamad II , 1436 / 27.3.2015