Rahmatullah Kairanawi | |
|---|---|
رحمت اللہ کیرانوی | |
| Personal life | |
| Born | Rahmatullah 1818 |
| Died | May 1, 1891(1891-05-01) (aged 72–73) |
| Resting place | Jannat al-Mu'alla |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Era | 19th century |
| Region | North India |
| Main interest(s) | Countering Christian missionary efforts |
| Notable work(s) | Izhar ul-Haqq |
| Occupation | Muhaddith[broken anchor],Faqeeh,Historiographer |
| Religious life | |
| Religion | Islam |
| Denomination | Sunni |
| Movement | Deobandi[1] |
| Muslim leader | |
Students | |
Influenced by
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Influenced | |
Rahmatullah Kairanawi al-Hindi (Urdu:رحمت اللہ کیرانوی ہندی; 1818–1891) was aSunniMuslimscholar andauthor who is best known for his work,Izhar ul-Haqq.[3]
Kairanawi was born inKairana,Muzaffarnagar in 1818.[4] He is a descendant of the third Caliph,Uthman ibn Affan, his full lineage is mentioned in family sources.[5] Part of the family wealth, a large property in Kairana, was granted byAkbar the Great.[5] Many family members held high positions and/or were intellectuals. Sheikh Hakeem Abdul Kareem who was an 8th great-grandfather of Rahmatullah was the Emperor Akbar's physician. Kairanwi began receiving traditional Islamic education at the age of 6, memorizing the Qur'an at 12.[5] He also learnedArabic andPersian. Later he moved toDelhi where he studied different disciplines includingmathematics andmedicine.[5] Working as aMufti andSharia teacher, he founded a religious school in Kairana.[5][6]
Hisism (given name) was Rahmatullāh. Hisnasab (patronymic) is: Rahmatullāh ibn Khalīlullāh ibn Najībullāh ibn Habībullāh ibn Abd al-Rahīm ibn Qutb al-Dīn ibn Fuzail ibn Abd al-Rahīm ibn Abd al-Karīm ibn Hasan ibn Abd al-Samad ibn Abu Ali ibn Muhammad Yūsuf ibn Abd al-Qādir ibn Jalāluddīn Muhammad ibn Mahmūd ibn Yaqūb ibn Īsā ibn Ismā'īl ibn Muhammad Taqi ibn Abī Bakr ibn Ali Naqi ibn Usmān ibn Abdullāh ibn Shihābuddīn ibn Abd al-Rahmān Gāzrūni ibn Abd al-Azīz Sarkhasi ibn Khālid ibn Walīd ibn Abd al-Azīz ibn Abd al-Rahmān ibn Abdullāh Sāni ibn Abd al-Azīz ibn Abdullāh Kabīr ibnAmar ibnUthman.[7]
In 1837 theChurch Mission Society appointedKarl Gottlieb Pfander, described by Eugene Stock as "perhaps the greatest of all missionaries to Mohammedans",[8] toAgra inNorthern India, where in 1854 he engaged in a famous public debate with leading Islamic scholars. The main Muslim debater was Kairanawi,[9][10] being assisted byEnglish-speakingMuhammad Wazîr Khân and influential Islamic writerImad ud-din Lahiz.[11] Kairanawi used arguments from recent European theologically critical works that Pfander was unfamiliar with, having left Europe before these were published, though his main source of reference was the apocryphal sixteenth-centuryGospel of Barnabas, which he held to be authentic.[12]
Followingarmed uprisings against the British in which he personally took part, Kairanawi (his property was confiscated by the Imperial British Raj) had to leave all of his property (auctioned later), and board a ship inBombay. Arriving at the port ofMocha, Yemen, he walked toMecca. The journey took two years.[5]
Kairanawi wrote books in Arabic, Persian and Urdu.
Written originally in Arabic, the bookIzhar ul-Haqq in six volumes was translated later into Urdu, and from Urdu into a summarized English version[13] published by Ta-Ha. The book aims to respond to Christian criticism of Islam. It is the first Muslim book to use Western scholarly works in order to ascertain the errors and contradictions of the Bible. The doctrine of Trinity is purportedly contested using biblical, Christian and other sources.Christine Schirrmacher, a German scholar of Islamic Studies, states in an article on the Pfander-Kairanawi debate: "The Demonstration of the Truth' (izhâr al-haqq) served as a summary of all possible charges against Christianity and was therefore used after al-Kairânawî's death as a sort of encyclopaedia since al-Kairânawî extended the material of former polemicists like 'Ali Tabarî, Ibn Hazm or Ibn Taymiyya to a great extent."[11]
While residing in Mecca, Kairanawi founded a religious school there namedMadrasah as-Sawlatiyah. Rahmatullah Kairanawi was appointed as a lecturer at the Masjid-e-Haram by the Sheikh-ul-Ulama (The Leading Scholar) Sheikh Ahmad Dahlan As-Shafiee. Kairanawi started teaching and realized that lessons were delivered as sermons, rather than, planned academic lectures. He gathered some of the Indian Muslim immigrants, wealthy benefactors to establish an authentic Islamic Law School to teach the Islamic sciences through a sound curriculum. He established the Madrassah in 1290 hijrah corresponding to 1874 A.D. The major contributor was a lady of Calcutta by the name of Sawlat-un-Nisa, on whose name the Madrassah is named. The Madrassah is still in existence and has well known alumni around the world,Madrasah as-Sawlatiyah.[14][15][16]
Kairanwi died in 1891 (22Ramadan 1308AH) inMecca and was buried inJannat al-Mu'alla.[17]
adapted from Imdād Sābri'sĀsār-e-Rahmat
