If any of his well-wishers sent him any money or gifts, Ahmad gave them away to the poor and needy. When he ran out of money, which he did regularly, he used to skip meals. His sincerity, simplicity and profound insight into Islamic teachings made him very popular with the masses in Baghdad.
The Mu’tazilites believed that the Qur’an was created (contrary to the traditional Islamic view, which stated that the Qur’an was the uncreated Word of God). When the Caliph eventually ordered all the defiant scholars to be brought to his palace in chains, they all relented save one. That indomitable scholar was Ahmad ibn Hanbal. Ahmad remained as firm as ever, refusing to bow before the scourge of rationalism, which at the time was threatening to undermine the very foundation of Islam. He continued his struggle against the Mu’tazilites until, in 846, Mutawakkil ala Allah ascended the Abbasid throne and reversed his predecessor’s harsh policies. The new Caliph also freed Ahmad from captivity so he could resume his normal activities. During this period he wrote numerous books on Hadith and Fiqh including his famous al-Musnad, which contains more than thirty thousand ahadith.
Ahmad ibn Hanbal died and was buried in Baghdad at the age of around seventy-seven. After his death, a new school of Islamic legal thought emerged named after him. The Hanbali Madh’hab is today followed mainly in Palestine and Saudi Arabia.
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Ahmad Khan, Sir Sayyid (1817-1898): The Asian subcontinent has produced some of the Muslim world’s most influential rulers, thinkers and reformers. Thus, famous Mughal rulers like Akbar the Great, Shah Jahan and Awrangzeb feature in this book on account of their enduring political and cultural contributions. These remarkable and gifted individuals were pioneers in their chosen fields of endeavor. Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan, an illustrious Indian Muslim educationalist and reformer, also belongs to this select group of inspirational subcontinental Muslims.
Sayyid Ahmad Khan, also known simply as Sir Sayyid, was born in Delhi, the capital of India, during the reign of the Mughal Emperor Akbar Shah II. His ancestors originally hailed from Arabia and settled in Heart before moving to Delhi during the sixteenth century. While Ahmad Khan was a child his devout father, Sayyid Muhammad Muttaqi Khan, embraced Sufism (Islamic mysticism); thus he retreated from worldly affairs and became an ascetic (Zahid). During his early years, Ahmad became very fond of Persian poetry. After the successive deaths of his older brother and father, his whole outlook on life changed. He grew a beard and became a practicing Muslim.
Following the horrific events of 1857 known as the Indian Mutiny, which led to the mass slaughter of Muslims at the hands of the British army as well as the expulsion of the last Mughal ruler, Bahadur Shah Zafar II, from India, more than three centuries of Mughal rule came to an abrupt end. A year later, Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India. Dismayed by the political upheavals of the time, Ahmad initially decided to leave India and settle in Egypt, but soon he changed his mind and instead decided to work with his fellow Muslims to improve their social, political, economic and cultural conditions. He felt opposing the British would be both futile and suicidal for the future of Indian Muslims; thus he decided to cooperate with the British authorities. He therefore declared his loyalty to the Crown and this, of course, endeared him to the ruling British elites.
Many of Ahmad’s recommendations for change were accepted and implemented by the ruling elite, in order to facilitate better communication between the rulers and the ruled. Ahmad became a powerful voice for educational and cultural reform across the country. He argued that there was no contradiction between modern science and Islamic teachings. The Indian Muslims, he felt, had nothing to fear from modern Western science and educational philosophy. In 1864, the British authorities helped him to establish a scientific society in Ghazipur in order to translate high quality, modern Western philosophical and scientific literature into Urdu, so as to make the treasures of modern scientific knowledge and scholarship accessible to the Indian Muslims.
During his stay in England, Ahmad became profoundly impressed by the scientific and technological achievements of the Western world and he hoped that his college would inspire the Indian Muslims to revive the Islamic intellectual and cultural heritage. After his return from England, he enlisted the help of several prominent British officials, including Lord Northbrook and Lord Lytton, and together they laid the foundations of the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College (MAO) in 1877. Now known as Aligarh Muslim University, this famous institution of higher education has produced generations of renowned Indian Muslim scholars, thinkers and leaders, including Mawlvi Abdul Haq, Ziauddin Ahmad, Muhammad Ali Jauhar, Liaquat Ali Khan and Zakir Hussain among others.
Heavily influenced by nineteenth century European philosophical and scientific thought, Ahmad attempted to reconcile religion and science, as if Islam and scientific thought were somehow incompatible. Given his ultra-rationalistic approach to the Qur’an, it is not surprising that the ulama severely criticized him for his neo-Mu’tazilite approach to the Islamic scriptural sources.
In recognition of his outstanding services to his people, Ahmad was knighted by the British Government in 1888. He died at the age of eighty-one and was buried in Aligarh.
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Ahmad ibn Yahya (1895-1962): ruler of North Yemen, 1948-62, Eldest son of Imam Yahya of the Hamid al Din branch of the Rassi dynasty, which for centuries has governed the northern and eastern highlands of Yemen, inhabited by Zaidi tribes and later under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Turks, which ended in 1918. Suffering from ill health, Ahmad passed on much of his authority to his eldest son, Muhammad al Badr before his death in September 1962, which triggered a military coup and ended the 1,064 year rule of the Rassi dynasty.
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Aishah bint Abu Bakr (also Ayisha; 610-677): Women have played a critical role in Islamic history. Of all the illustrious Muslim women who had played an instrumental role in the emergence and development of Islam as a religion, culture and civilization, one stands out over all others. That outstanding woman was Aishah bint Abu Bakr. Her achievements were so varied and startling that no other woman in Islamic history can be compared to her. She is, therefore, the most influential single Muslim woman in history.
Aishah bint Abi Bakr ibn Abi Quhafah was born into the Banu Taym clan of the Quraysh tribe of Makkah. Her father, Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, and her mother, Umm Ruman, became Muslims very early on. She not only possessed a photographic memory; she was also a gentle and cultured lady.
Aishah was married to the Prophet when she was very young, although at the time she had matured both intellectually and physically way beyond her age. After her marriage, Aishah became the youngest wife of the Prophet; she was also much wiser than, and intellectually far superior to, the others. She was the only wife of the Prophet who was a maiden.
When Aishah went to live with the Prophet in the small apartment attached to his mosque in Madinah, she was perhaps around thirteen years old. The Prophet had no possessions other than a straw mat, a thin mattress, a pillow made of dry tree barks and leaves, a leather water container, a small plate and a cup for drinking water. The Prophet not only occupied himself in prayers and meditation, but also reminded his wives, children and followers not to become lured by the wealth, glitter and riches of this world.
Since the Prophet used to visit Abu Bakr frequently, Aishah knew the Prophet very well even before their marriage. No other person claimed to know the Prophet as well as Aishah. Aishah’s enquiring mind and willingness to learn and disseminate knowledge endeared her to the Prophet. That is why Caliphs Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, Umar ibn al-Khattab and Uthman ibn Affan, who were three of the most prominent companions of the Prophet and outstanding jurists in their own right, regularly consulted her before deciding on complex and intractable legal issues during their reigns.
Aishah memorized and related more than two thousand ahadith of the Prophet, and was brave enough to lead an army into the battlefield and wage war. Known reverentially as ummul Mu’minin (the ‘mother of the believers’), Aishah passed away at the age of sixty-seven.
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Akbar the Great (1542–1605):