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Shah
Waliullah Dehlavi - a educationist
Introduction
The anti-Islamic forces which had raised their head during
the reign of the irreligious Emperor Akbar and later found
their champions in Jahangir and Dara Shikoh were, to a
great extent, checked by Aurangzeb, the most honest, conscientious
and able Muslim monarch that ascended the throne of Delhi.
With his passing away in 1707 A.C. started the political
chaos which later culminated in the disintegration of
the Muslim power in the subcontinent. This political disintegration
which was the result of spiritual confusion encompassed
the socio-economic spheres also. Aurangzeb’s successors
were too weak and incapable of facing the rebellious forces
emerging on all hands. At such a critical period of Muslim
history was born Shah Waliullah, the greatest religious
thinker produced by Muslim India who has contributed immensely
to the reintegration of the structure of Islam.
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"The
essence of the teaching of the two brothers was the effort,
to discover a path which could be traversed together by
the Muslim philosophers (the Sufis and the Mutakallim)
and the Muslim Jurists (Faqih)." |
Article
by
Syed
Hassan Waqar |
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Shah Waliullah was born in 1703 A.C. four years
before the death of Aurangzeb. His grandfather, Sheikh Wajihuddin,
was an important officer in the army of Shah Jahan who supported
Prince Aurangzeb in the war of succession. His father, Shah
Abdur Rahim, a Sufi and an eminent scholar assisted in the compilation
of Fatwa-i-Alamgiri the voluminous code of Islamic law. lie,
however, refused an invitation to visit the Emperor and devoted
his energies to the organization and teaching at ‘Madrassa
Rahimia’ a Theological College which he had established
and which, later, played an important part in the religious
emancipation of Muslim India and became the breeding ground
of religious reformers and ‘Mujahid’ like Shah Waliullah,
Shah Abdul Aziz, Syed Ahmad of Bareli, Maulvi Abdul Haiy and
Shah Ismail Shaheed. Writing about the teachings of Shah Abdur
Rahim and his brother, Maulana Ubaidullah Sindhi observes:
“The essence of the teaching of the two brothers was the
effort, to discover a path which could be traversed together
by the Muslim philosophers (the Sufis and the Mutakallim) and
the Muslim Jurists (Faqih)”.
Education
Shah Waliullah received his early education from his father,
who was his teacher as well as his spiritual guide. Being a
precocious child with a retentive memory lie committed the Holy
Quran to memory at an early age of 7 years. On the death of
his father in 1131 A.H. when he was hardly 17 years old he started
teaching in his father's Madrassa Rahimiya and carried on the
work for 12 years when he left for Arabia for higher studies.
He was a brilliant scholar; during fourteen months’ stay
in Makkah and Madina he came into contact with the outstanding
teachers of Hejaz. His favorite teacher was Sheikh Abu Tahir
bin Ibrahim of Madina, from whom he obtained his Sanud (Degree)
in Hadis (Tradition). The Sheikh was an erudite scholar, possessing
encyclopedic knowledge; Shah Waliullah benefited much from him
too and speaks highly of his piety, independence of judgment
and scholarly talents.
Achievements and Services
During his stay at Makkah, Shah Waliullah had a dream in which
the Holy Prophet commanded him to work for the organization
and emancipation of the
Muslim community in the subcontinent, He, therefore, returned
to Delhi on July 9, 1732 and started his work in real earnest.
His was an uphill task in a
period when Muslim India was passing through the most critical
phase of its history and its entire social, political, economic
and spiritual fabric was torn to
pieces. On his arrival in Delhi, he started training pupils
in diverse branches of Islamic learning and entrusted them with
the missionary work of enlightening
people with the true nature of Islam. He embarked upon the task
of producing standard works on Islamic learning and, before
his death in 1762, completed a
large number of outstanding works on Islam.
He rose to be a great scholar of Islamic .studies, endowed with
saintly qualities. So great was his dedication to work that,
according to his talented son Shah Abdul Aziz, "he was
rarely ill and once he sat down to work after ‘Ishraq’
(post-sunrise prayers) he would not change his posture, till
midday”. He was a real genius, an intellectual giant who
set himself to the mission of educating the misguided Muslim
masses with the true spirit of Islam. His was the task of the
revival of Islam in the subcontinent which had been clouded
with mystic philosophy and to bring it out in its pristine glory.
He was a humble devotee to his cause, who resisted all temptations
of personal glory.
His activities were not confined to spiritual and intellectual
spheres only. He lived in troubled times and witnessed during
his lifetime about a dozen rulers occupying the throne of Delhi.
Endowed with a keen political insight, he observed with deep
anguish the breaking up of Muslim power in the subcontinent
and wrote to leading political dignitaries like Ahmad Shah Abdali,
Nizam ul Mulk and Najibuddaula to stop the rot which had set
in the political life of Muslim India. It was on account of
his call that Ahmad Shah Abdali appeared on the field of Panipat
in 1761 and put an end to the Marhatta dream of dominating the
subcontinent.
Shah Waliullah was a prolific writer. It is in the realm of
Islamic learning that he made a lasting contribution and within
a period of 30 years produced more than 50 works of outstanding
merit, both in Arabic and Persian languages. Some of these are
still unsurpassed in the whole domain of Islamic literature.
His most valuable service to the cause of Islamic learning was
that he codified the vast store of Islamic teachings under separate
heads. Both in thought and prediction, his works occupy an outstanding
place. As a reformer and as a propounder of theories dealing
with socialism, he may be considered as the forerunner of Karl
Marx.
His works may be classified into six categories. The first deals
with the Holy Quran. It includes his translation of the Holy
Book into Persian, the literary languages of the subcontinent
of those times. According to him, the object of studying the
Holy Book is “to reform human nature and correct the wrong
beliefs and injurious actions”. The second category deals
with Hadis (Traditions) in which he has left behind several
works including an Arabic and Persian Commentaries on Muwatta,
the well-known collection of the Traditions of the Holy Prophet
compiled by Imam Malik. He attached great importance to this
collection of Traditions by Imam Malik, even greater than those
of Imam Bukhari and Imam Muslim. He is an outstanding Muhuddis
(Traditionist) and links of all modern scholars of Hadis in
the subcontinent may be traced to him.
Books
Foremost among these modern Traditionalists were his son and
successor Shah Abdul Aziz and Syed Murtaza Bilgrami. Shah Waliullah
wrote a number of books and pamphlets dealing with Hadis. The
third category deals with ‘Fiqh’ or Islamic Jurisprudence,
which includes lnsaf-fi-bayan-i-Sahub-al-Ikhtilaf which is brief
but a very interesting and informative history of the Islamic
Jurisprudence of the last five centuries. The fourth category
deals with his works based on mysticism. The fifth category
pertains to his works on Muslim philosophy and Ilm-al-Kalam.
He also wrote a pamphlet on the principles of ‘Ijtihad’
(indepen¬dent interpretation) and taqlid (conformity). In
his principles of ‘Ijtihad’ he clarifies whether
it is obligatory for a Muslim to adhere to one of the four recognized
schools of Islamic Jurisprudence or whether he can exercise
his own judgment. In the opinion of Shah Waliullah, a layman
should rigidly follow his own Imam but a person well versed
in Islamic law can exercise his own judg¬ment which should
be in conformity with the practice of the Holy Prophet. But
the most outstanding of all his works is Hujjat-Ullh-il-Balighah
which deals with such aspects of Islam that are common among
all Muslim countries. In its introduction he observes: “Some
people think that there is no usefulness involved in the injunctions
of Islamic law and that in actions and rewards as prescribed
by ALLAH there is no beneficial purpose. They think that the
commandments of Islamic law are similar to a master ordering
his servant to lift a stone or touch a tree in order to test
his obedience and that in this there is no purpose except to
impose a test so that if the servant obeys, he is rewarded,
and if he disobeys, he is punished. This view is completely
incorrect. The Traditions of the Holy Prophet and the consensus
of opinion of those ages, contradict this view”.
The sixth category deals with his works on Shia—Sunni
problem which had become somewhat acute in those days. His writings
on this subject have done a great deal in simplifying this problem.
His theories pertaining to economics and socialism are of revolutionary
nature and he may be considered as the precursor of Karl Marx.
Writing about his works in the History of the Freedom Movement,
Sheikh Muhammad Ikram states: “Shah Waliullah wrote learned
works and initiated powerful and beneficial movements, but perhaps
no less important are the invisible qualities of approach and
outlook, which he bequeathed to Muslim religious thought in
the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent. His work is characterized by
knowledge, insight, moderation and tolerance, but the quality,
on which he laid the greatest emphasis, in theory and in practice,
was Adl or Adalat (justice, fairness, and balance). His works
and views bear ample testimony to the ways he observed this
principle in practice and he lost few opportunities of emphasizing
in theory its role in maintaining the social fabric”.
Reforms
Shah Waliullah introduced several reforms in religious and economic
spheres, He was first to translate the Holy Quran in a popular
language, a practice which was later usefully followed by others.
His own son, Shah Abdul Aziz, translated the Holy Book into
Urdu, the language of Muslim masses in India. There had been
a conflict between orthodox Islam revived under Mujaddid-Alif-Sani,
championed by Aurangzeb and heterodoxy introduced by Akbar and
championed by Dara Shikoh. The reign of orthodox Aurangzeb had
created aversion to Sufism and had led to the advent of extreme
Puritanism. Shah Waliullah struck a mean between the two extremes
and retained the virtues of both.
He was born in an atmosphere deeply imbued with the spirit of
Sufism. His father was a well-known Sufi. In his early age,
he came under the influence of Ibn Taimiya, a great religious
reformer. During his stay in Hejaz, he came into contact with
scholars who were influenced by Wahabisrn. This provided a check
to his blind following of Sufism. But unlike Wahabis, he did
not totally discard Sufism. He was aware of the services rendered
by Sufis in popularizing Islam in the subcontinent and the spiritual
self developed by the truly Islamic from of Sufism. But he was
highly critical of the decadent and traditional form of Sufism
which borders on the verge of asceticism and is, therefore,
averse to true Islam. In his Wasiyat Nama (Will) he observes:
“And the next advice (Wasiyat) is that one should not
entrust one's affairs to and become a disciple of the Saints
of this period who are given to a number of irregularities”.
Shall Saheb had urged for the reform and discipline of Sufism
and not its rejection. He wrote several pamphlets on this subject
in which he analyzed the evils and virtues of Sufism. “With
these books”, writes Maulana Manazir Ahsan, “the
disputes between the Sufis and the Ulema, provided one is just,
come to an end. By giving an Islamic interpretation to the Sufi
doctrines, Shah Waliullah removed the distaste which the Ulema
had felt for Sufism and the Sufis”. Shah Waliullah had,
therefore, not only bridged the gulf between the Sufis and Ulema
but also harmonized the differences prevalent among different
sects of Sufis. His principles on the subject were put into
practice in the great Theological College of Deoband, which
had among its patrons such well-known Sufis like Maulana Rashid
Ahmad Gangohi and Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanvi.
Shah Waliullah set upon the mission of reforming the social
and political order of his day. Being a realist, he diagnosed
the ills which had entered into the body politic of Muslim society
and suggested remedies. He criticized the un-Islamic customs
which had crept into Muslim society due to its contact with
Hinduism. He was particularly against excessive extravagance
in marriages, festivals and other ceremonies. He advocated the
remarriage of widows. He care¬fully analyzed the factors
responsible for the economic degeneration of Muslim society
during his time and proposed radical changes in the economy
of Muslim society. He advocated wider distribution of wealth
on socialistic lines and in this way became the forerunner of
Karl Marx. In an illuminating chapter of Hnjjat-Ullah-il-Baligah,
he outlined the evils of capitalism which brought about the
fall of the Roman and Sassanid Empires. He is highly critical
of the economic exploitation of the poor, which, in the past,
had brought about many revolutions and is the root cause of
all troubles and unrest in the world. He even criticized the
Mughal rulers and nobility for their indolence and luxury. Addressing
the rapacious nobility of his time he observes: “Oh Amir!
Do you not fear God? (How is it that) you have so completely
thrown yourself into the pursuit of momentary pleasures and
have neglected those people who have been committed to your
care! The result is that the strong are devouring the (weak)
people……… All your mental faculties are directed
towards providing yourself with sumptuous food and soft-skinned
women for enjoyment and pleasure. You do not turn your attention
to anything except good clothes and magnificent palaces”.
Shah Waliullah was of the opinion that intellectual revolution
should precede political change, He did not contemplate a change
with political or social set-up through a bloody revolution.
He wanted to bring revolutionary change in the society through
peaceful means. In his well-known book, Izalat-al-Khifa, he
discusses the ideology of political revolution which he envisaged.
No scholar of Mediaeval India had understood the various aspects
of civics as had been done by Shah Waliullah. He considered
“Self consciousness” as a prerequisite of “political
consciousness”. He has dealt in detail the factors which
contribute towards the growth of civil consciousness in his
immortal work Hujjat-Ullah-il-Baligah. Shah Waliullah was, perhaps,
the only Muslim scholar of Mediaeval India who realized the
importance of economics in a social and political set-up. He
advocated the maintenance of economic equilibrium in the society
and strongly criticized the accumulation of wealth which leads
to all sorts of evils in the world. He had visualized a social
order based on economic equality, fraternity and brotherhood
which are the principles governing Islamic socialistic practices
during the time of the pious Caliphs.
His seminary, Madrassa Rahimiya became the centre of Islamic
Renaissance in the subcontinent, where scholars flocked from
the four corners of the country and after being trained, became
the torch bearers of freedom movement in the subcontinent. The
“Madrasa” in fact, had become the nucleus of the
revolutionary movement for the reconstruction of religious thought
in Islam. It produced many zealous workers who carried on their
preacher’s mission with a missionary zeal. Among these
were Maulana Muhammad Ashiq of Phulat, Maulana Noorullah of
Budhana, Maulana Amin Kashmiri, Shah Abu Saeed of Rai Bareli
and his own son, Shah Abdul Aziz who was initiated into the
religious and political philosophy of his father.
Shah Waliullah played a vital role in the Indian politics of
his times. He was greatly instrumental in forging a united Muslim
front against the rising Marhatta power which was threatening
the last vestige of the Muslim power in northern India. It was
he who wrote to Najibuddaula and Nizam ul-Mulk and finally invited
Ahmad Shah Abdali who inflicted a crushing defeat on the Marhattas
in the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761. His letter to Ahmad
Shah Abdali inviting him to take up arms against the menacing
Marhatta power in India is one of the most important historical
documents of the 18th century. It surveys the political situation
in the subcontinent and the dangers which Muslim India faced
from different quarters. He had chosen the most vivid, capable
and disciplined Muslim leaders of his time for combating the
Marhattas. Among these were Najibuddaula, the leader of the
redoubtable Rohilas and Ahmad Shah Abdali, the ruler of the
brave Pathans. His efforts towards forging a united front against
the Marhattas were successful and the defeat of Marhattas in
the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761 provided a turning point
in the history of the subcontinent.
Shah Waliullah possessed a many-sided and versatile personality.
His real greatness lies in the cumulative effect produced by
his writings, by the contribution of persons trained by him
and by the achievements of the school of thought founded by
him. In religious matters he struck a mean between extremes,
in social affairs he strove to introduce in the Muslim society
the simplicity and purity of early Islam; in the sphere of economics
he advocated the revolutionary Islamic socialism and in the
political field he forged a united Muslim front against the
non-Muslim forces which were threatening to storm Muslim India.
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