The Importance Of Shah Wali-Ullah In Current Islamic Revival Abul Hussein Al-Azhari*
“Some ask what is the benefit of Shah Wali Ullah? Why return to the works of Shah Wali-Ullah? Why mention Shah Wali Ullah? Shah Wali Ullah is pertinent in that he provides for us an understanding of the principles of Islamic revival. Shaikh Abu Hasan Nadwi, the complier of the work Saviors of the Islamic Spirit was a great historian of ideas and had much concern for Islamic revival addressing three arenas from which revival takes place: activism, and education and dealing with contemporary realities and he devoted a whole volume to explicating the ideas of Shah Wali Ullah in that work. The benefit of the work of Shaikh Nadwi is that it teaches Muslims in an easy to digest form the importance of becoming familiar with the principles of Islamic revival as established by revivalist scholars. Revival will not take place solely by a call to “tradition”. Islamic Revival demands much more than just teaching traditional works in a traditional way it demands building leaders and literate Muslims and activism and calling to unity and eliminating bid’ah and engaging the contemporary age and its challenges and standing with the poor and the oppressed and understanding and practicing spiritual purification according to the parameters set forth by the Qur’an and the Sunnah.”
Shah Wali Ullah is esteemed as a reviver of the Deen and a mujtahid. Unfortunately, given the current climate of illiteracy and intolerance we have failed to look thoroughly at contemporary figures that make clear to us a program for moving forward and initiating a complete Islamic movement. Shah Wali Ullah is one of those figures that demand attention.
In his book Insaf, Shah Wali Ullah taught us how to deal with differences in fiqh and why there are differences, in his call to master the Arabic language and read the Qur’an with a minimal amount of tafsir he hoped that new mature insights would emerge in the area of tafsir.
In his explanation of the Muwatta he brought us the science of fiqh of hadith showing how the schools of fiqh understand the prophetic sayings without limiting our understanding just to one school but rather he expanded our notion of fiqh of hadith.
In the work Hujjatul Allah Al Baligha he taught us the importance of the objectives of Shariah and is one of the latest works to be written on the objectives of Shariah without relying on the school of Imam Shatibi.
In the work Ta’wil Al-Ahadith he taught us that sound tazkiyyah is to rely on the Prophets so he patterned his work on the Fusus of Ibn Arabi and then showed the superiority of Shar’iah and Prophethood to Waliyah or Sainthood thereby injecting tasawwuf with the light of Prophethood and revelation and divorcing it from philosophy and innovation.
Shah Wali-Ullah knew that the Subcontinent would not accept change from any other direction than via the Hanafi school and he mentioned this but it did not stop his revivalist efforts rather Shah Wali-Ullah did not see that revival was stifled in an environment of bias but rather he worked with the people and their orientations.
Of the greatest contributions of Shah Wali-Ullah to the scholars of the subcontinent was the introduction of hadith evidence into the study program of the Ulema so that although the scholars of the subcontinent with the exception of the few are hanafi most have at minimum become familiar with the hadith evidence for the practice of their school and further produced some of the greatest scholars of hadith in this age.
Shah Wali-Ullah shows us that revival comes via a return to the Qur’an and the Sunnah and through a conscience effort to establish Shariah as the criteria for all action even in the realm of tasawwuf.
Shah Wali-Ullah teaches us that Deen will never be revived until we return to what Imam Malik {r} said: that the last of this Ummah will not be corrected except by which the first of this Ummah was corrected by and that is the Book and the Sunnah. Shah Wali-Ullah teaches us that illiteracy in the Book and the Sunnah is the greatest obstacle to revival and also he teaches us that we don’t have to throw out the efforts of the scholars of fiqh in order to proceed with revival but in the end we must make an effort to revival with etiquette and openness toward the truth which is revelation: Qur’an and Sunnah.
In my estimation there is no Priesthood and laity in Islam there are different degrees of knowledge possessed among the Ummah and the path to knowledge is open to all and obligatory: Seeking knowledge is obligatory on every Muslim.
It is when we are content with dividing the Ummah into the Ulema and the awwam that the decline of the Ummah will remain permanent there is no evidence for such division the Ulema say there are two types of people and no third there are scholars and students of knowledge.
The command of Allah {swt} to the Prophet {saw} to Read is a command for the Ummah to move out of illiteracy and into full literacy, literacy of how to be human and how to live life, the literacy of the Qur’an which is the source of all knowledge.
Today many occupy themselves with the books of mysticism and spiritual sciences but very few know what Allah {swt} says or what the Prophet {saw} says nor what the Ulema of Shariah say. How can we call to spiritual purification without first calling to knowledge of revelation which is the source of purification? What is the Wali next to the Nabi {saw}?
When we return back to the lives of the revivers of Deen we learn the essentials and how to distinguish between what is periphery to what is fundamental.
Shah Wali-Ullah teaches us that success in every sphere of our lives, spiritual to material, is in knowledge of Deen and particularly knowledge of the Qur’an and the Sunnah and he teaches us a gradual systematic way of achieving that knowledge or ascending along that path, the path to learn revelation.
Wa Allahu Al’am Wa Al’a
Abul-Hussein
http://thetranslators.wordpress.com/...ein-al-azhari/
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Originally Posted by OneLife
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