An
Urdu tome that I recently chanced upon, Syed Ahmad Uruj
Qadri’s Awliya-e-Allah (Friends of God), is a fascinating critique of the
traditional Sufi understanding of the awliya of God. Before I turn to
this book, a brief account of the traditional Sufi concept of the waliand
the hierarchy of the awliya is in order. According to the tradition known
in Sufi literature as the hadith (saying) of Abdullah ibn Masud, there
are 355 or 356 awliya, ‘upon whom the life and death of all nations
depends.’ In popular Sufism, these awliya are considered spiritually
exalted creatures, raised far above the level of the common Muslim masses, and
ordered in a grand cosmic hierarchy. Various Sufi shaikhs have been
taken by their followers to be the qutb or the ‘pole’ or ‘axis’ around
which the entire cosmos revolves, around whom are a host of
lesser awliya of lesser ranks, such as
the nuqaba, awtad, abrar,abdal, akhyar and mijaba.
These and other such cosmic hierarchies that the Sufis elaborated upon were
believed to be the spiritual power through which the order and the continued
existence of the cosmos were assured. Belief in this hierarchy of Sufis
reflected the steeply hierarchical feudal system when this belief was evolved or
invented. -- Yoginder
Sikand
By
Yoginder Sikand
The wali (pl. awliya)
is a key figure in Islam. The term wali comes from the Arabic
rootwala (to be near).’ The most widely accepted definition
of wali is ‘one who is near’ or, more simply, ‘friend’. In the context of
Sufism, the wali is believed to be particularly near to God and who, for
that reason, enjoys His special favours. Such a central role does
the wali play in Sufism that, as one writer puts
it, wilayah (often, though incorrectly, translated as ‘sainthood’) ‘is
indeed the very principle of Sufism itself.’[1]
The term wali, as used in the context of
the Quran refers both to God in His capacity of a helper to His near ones, and
to God's friends, that is, pious people in general. It appears that, originally,
the term wali simply signified those Muslims who obey God, lead pious
lives and abided by His Will. Nevertheless, overtime, popular Islam came to see
the wali not just as an ordinary, pious Muslim but as a hallowed saint
whose special closeness to God enabled him to mediate between the general body
of believers and God. Many awliya were accredited with having
supernatural powers and the ability to work miracles. They were believed to
possess the mysterious attribute of barakah, a beneficent supernatural
potential or virtue. The saints’ barakah was said to abide in their tombs
even after their demise and, in many cases was believed to be transferred to
their descendants and spiritual vicegerents or khulafa. Over time,
therefore, their graves turned into shrines and became great centres of
pilgrimage. In complete contrast to what the Quran teaches, it came to be
believed that God could not be approached directly by the ordinary folk, who had
to do so indirectly, through an entire hierarchy of saints. So popular did the
cults centred on the shrines become that it led to forms of saint-worship, which
were unambiguously labelled by the ulema as un-Islamic. Throughout the
history of Islam, strenuous efforts have been made by the ulema to either
wipe out completely, or else to reform, by bringing in line with the demands of
the shariah, the cults associated with the awliya of God
(awliya-e-Allah).
Such attempts have met with particular success in
the present age, and many practices associated with popular Sufism are now
increasingly being looked upon by growing numbers of Muslims themselves as
superstitious, decadent, un-Islamic and a major cause of Muslim backwardness.
They are seen as inculcating Muslim passivity in that belief in the miraculous
powers of living or deceased saints tends to make their followers absolve
themselves of their own responsibilities to do or change things for themselves.
They are viewed as polytheistic, and, hence, as un-Islamic, because they are
rooted in belief in the power of beings other than God to grant their requests.
For many critics, the cults of supposedly miracle-wielding Sufis are nothing but
a cunning ruse invented by the custodians of Sufi shrines in order to further
their own worldly interests. These cults, based on the notion of a hierarchy of
saints that are said to rule the world, are seen as a gross affront to both pure
monotheism and the principle of spiritual democracy that are so central to the
Quranic vision.
An Urdu tome that I recently chanced upon, Syed
Ahmad Uruj Qadri’s Awliya-e-Allah(Friends of God), is a fascinating
critique of the traditional Sufi understanding of the awliya of
God.[2] Before I turn to this book, a brief account of
the traditional Sufi concept of the waliand the hierarchy of
the awliya is in order. According to the tradition known in Sufi
literature as the hadith (saying) of Abdullah ibn Masud, there are 355 or
356 awliya, ‘upon whom the life and death of all nations depends.’ In
popular Sufism, these awliya are considered spiritually exalted
creatures, raised far above the level of the common Muslim masses, and ordered
in a grand cosmic hierarchy. Various Sufi shaikhs have been taken by
their followers to be the qutb or the ‘pole’ or ‘axis’ around which the
entire cosmos revolves, around whom are a host of lesser awliya of lesser
ranks, such as
the nuqaba, awtad, abrar,abdal, akhyar and mijaba.
These and other such cosmic hierarchies that the Sufis elaborated upon were
believed to be the spiritual power through which the order and the continued
existence of the cosmos were assured. Belief in this hierarchy of Sufis
reflected the steeply hierarchical feudal system when this belief was evolved or
invented.
It is in the contest of this extremely
hierarchical understanding of the awliya-e Allah that Qadri's book needs
to be viewed. His book is essentially a reformist plea for a reconsideration of
the traditional beliefs about the awliya-e Allah, in order to bring Sufi
thought and practice in line with the dictates of the shariah. In the
process of doing so, he also democratizes it, by offering a different
understanding of wilayah.
‘The views that have been spread about
the awliya-e Allah’, writes Qadri in the Introduction, ‘have affected
both the beliefs as well as the practices of Muslims. It is, therefore,
necessary to see what the Quran and the genuine Prophetic traditions have to say
about the awliya-e Allah so that our own beliefs about them should be in
accordance with God's word and the Prophet's
practice.’
Qadri begins by referring to several verses of
the Quran wherein the term wali has been used (such as al-Baqara:
257, Qaf: 5, al-Infal: 34, Bani lsrail: 11l, Maryam:
145 and 6). In these verses, he says, the term wali has been employed to
mean one of the following:
1. That Allah is the wali of
the muminun (true believers);
2. That the muminun are
the awliya of Allah;
3. That shaytan (the Devil) is
the wali of the kafirun (unbelievers) and
the mushrikin(polytheists);
4. That the kafirun and
the mushrikin are the awliya-e shaytan (the awliya of the
Devil).17
When Allah calls Himself the wali of
the muminun, Qadri explains, what is meant is that He is their friend
(dost) and helper (madadgar). On the other hand, the Devil as
the wali of thekafirun and the mushrikin makes him their
helper and master. This world is thus but a battleground for the awliya-e
Allah and the awliya-e shaytan, who constantly war with each other.
Allah has given full freedom to his slaves to choose which of these two groups
they wish to join. Qadri here quotes several verses from the Quran, among which
the most significant is the following:
‘Allah is the Protecting Friend (wali) of
those who believe. He bringeth them out of darkness into light. As for those who
disbelieve, their patrons (awliya) are false deities (taghut).
They bring them out of light into darkness. Such are rightful owners of the
Fire. They will abide therein (al-Baqara:
257).
Having thus clearly divided humankind into two
opposing camps — the awliya-e Allah and the awliya-e shaytan—Qadri
goes on to show who precisely he believes the awliya-e Allahare. In this
regard he quotes the following verse of the Quran:
“Lo! Verily the friends (awliya) of Allah
are (those) on whom fear cometh not, nor do they grieve. Those who believe and
keep their duty (to Allah), theirs are good tidings in the life of the world and
in the hereafter — There is no changing the words of Allah — that is the Supreme
Truth’ (Yunus: 63-65).
This verse, says Qadri, refers to two attributes
which compound the status of wilayat-e-khassa, the higher stage
of wilayah. These are, firstly, taqwa (piety) and
secondly, iman(faith). Taqwa is, in fact, the way to acquire
closeness to God. In other words, Qadri writes, the awliya-e- khassa, or
those who attain the status of wilayat-e khassa, are none other than
the muminun, who are also called the muttaqin (pious souls),
ordinary Muslims who live pious lives according to the dictates of
the shariah. Qadri puts it thus: ‘In the Quran and the
Prophet’s sunnat, the term awliya-e Allah has been used for those
ordinary (sidhe sadhe) God-fearing and obedient Muslims who love God and
His Prophet.’ Here Qadri forcefully questions the traditional understanding
of wilayah which attributes wilayat-e amma(general sainthood) to
the ‘sincere faithful’ while carefully distinguishing it from the wilayat-e
khassa of the ‘advanced mystics who have been annihilated (fana) in
God’.
In popular Sufism it is generally believed that
one of the attributes of the wali is his capacity to perform miracles
(karamat). Qadri, however, disagrees and suggests that as the Surah
Yunus (63-65) makes clear, karamat and other such things are not a
necessary condition forwilayah. The ‘true’ Sufis, he says, also testify
to this. He goes so far as to say that in fact, many supposed miracle-workers
are actually ‘devils in the guise of men’ (insan numa shaytan). Actually,
he insists, the only condition for attaining wilayah is taqwa and
abiding by the Quran and the
Prophet’s sunnah.
The true muminun and muttaqin (in
other words, the awliya-e Allah), Qadri argues, are not saints with
supposed supernatural powers as they are commonly thought to be. Further, he
says, taqwa lies not in devoting oneself entirely to prayer or meditation
while ignoring one’s social responsibilities, as some Sufi recluses are known to
have done. This socially-engaged understanding of the awliya-e Allah,
Qadri says, is evident from the following verse of the Quran, according to
which:
‘ [R]ighteous is he who believes in Allah and the
Last Day and the angels and the Scripture and the Prophets, and gives his
wealth, for love of Him, to kinsfolk and to orphans and the needy and the
wayfarer and to those who ask, and to set slaves free; and observes proper
worship and pays the poor-due. And those who keep their treaty when they make
one, and the' patient in tribulation and adversity and time of stress. Such are
they who are sincere. Such are the God-fearing.
(al-Baqarah:177)
‘The popular belief in the saints and the rapid
growth of saint worship’, writes the well-known scholar of Sufism Reynold
Nicholson in his acclaimed The Mystics of Islam, ‘tended to aggrandize
the wali at the expense of the law and to foster the conviction that a
divinely gifted man can do no wrong, or at least that his actions must not be
judged by appearances.’ Qadri vehemently dissents from this belief in the
infallibility of the awliya. He refers here to the following verse of the
Quran about the muttaqin (in other words, the awliya), wherein it
is written that,
‘[…] when they do an evil thing or wrong
themselves, [they] remember Allah and implore forgiveness for their sins — Who
forgives sins save Allah only? — and will not knowingly repeat [the wrong] they
did. The rewards of such will be forgiveness from their Lord and Gardens
underneath which rivers flow, wherein they will abide forever — a bountiful
reward for workers! (Al-Imran: 135-36).
This verse suggests to Qadri that the difference
between a wali and one who is not is not that the wali cannot
commit any sin. Even a wali can be guilty of an aberration as a result of
lack of knowledge, Qadri says, although in case he does deviate from the
straight path, he immediately recognizes his error and sincerely repents for it,
fervently imploring God for forgiveness and resolves to strive not to stray away
in future. Even some among the companions of the Prophet, Qadri says, ‘who,
undoubtedly, were the unsurpassable awliyaof God’, are known to have
committed sins but that did not affect their exalted status
ofwilayat-e-khassa.
In the concluding portion of his book, Qadri
talks of five major deviations that have crept into Sufism as a result of what
he sees as the intrusion of un-Islamic beliefs. The first misconception, he
says, is that God has created a special category of people, who alone have been
bestowed with the title or status of awliya-e Allah. On the other hand,
other muttaqinand muminun, pious Muslims who abide by
the shariah, are usually (though mistakenly, Qadri believes) not thought
of as also being among the awliya-e Allah.
The second misconception is the belief that in
order for one to be qualified to be a wali of God, it is not enough just
to possess what the Quran lays down in this regard (piety and conforming to
the shariah) but one must also experience kashf (lit.
‘illumination’ from God),ilham (inspiration) and wajd (ecstasy),
give bayt (initiation) to disciples and must also set upkhanqah or
Sufi hospice of one's own.
The third misconception, a consequence, Qadri
writes, of ghulu-e aqidah (‘exaggeration in belief’) people have come to
imagine that the awliya-e Allah are perfect beings, capable of doing
anything they desire. Their supposed supernatural powers are believed to live on
in their graves after their death. These beliefs, says Qadri, are not in
accordance with the teachings of Islam.
The fourth misconception, Qadri says, is the
notion that wilayah is superior to nubuwwah or prophethood. This
erroneous belief, Qadri opines, is but a natural consequence of the powers that
came to be wrongly attributed to the awliya-e Allah. In fact, he points
out, ‘many Sufis began to claim for themselves such great qualities which even
the prophets of God did not possess.’
The last misconception, Qadri points out, is
that as a result of the distortions that entered Sufism, ‘it began to be
believed that ibadat and abiding by the dictates of God consisted simply
in such ritual acts as performing namaz, giving zakat,
observing roza, performing the hajj, reciting the Quran and engaging
in zikr.’ As a consequence of this narrowing down of the understanding
of ibadat or service to God, Qadri says, Muslims began to lose interest
in the affairs of the state and society at large, which too, according to Islam,
come under the sphere of ibadat. These affairs were then wrongly labelled
as ‘worldly’ (duniyavi), and were therefore treated as outside the sphere
of religion (deen). Qadri seems to suggest that the later decline of the
Muslims was caused, at least in part, by the creation of this hiatus
betweendeen and duniya, which he traces to the distortions which
he believes entered Sufi thought and practice over
time.
Qadri does not deny Sufism any legitimacy, and
here he contrasts strikingly with both some modernist Muslims as well as
‘Wahhabis’, who claim that Sufism is wholly un-Islamic. What he pleads for is a
Sufism that is in accordance with the shariah, one which, as he explains,
would challenge some of the major beliefs so central to popular Sufism, such as
the near infallibility of Sufi saints, the notion of a grand hierarchy of Sufi
saints controlling the entire cosmos, and the ability of Sufi saints to perform
miracles on their own and to grant requests. Using Quranic arguments to redefine
popular notions of wilayah, he critiques as un-Islamic the
other-worldliness of some strands of popular Sufism as well as the structures of
hierarchy and control that these forms of Sufism have traditionally
supported.
Yoginder
Sikand works with the Centre For the Study of Social Exclusion at the National
Law School, Bangalore
[1] Herman Landolt, ‘Walayah’, in The
Encyclopedia of Religion, (henceforth, ER), ed. Mircea Eliade, (London:
Macmillan Publishers, 1987), vol. 15, p. 321.
11:35 PM
Sultan Shahin
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