Al-Azhar, Dar-ul-Uloom and Nadwah

This less-than-dignified column, written without ablution, appears irregularly because of my laziness and “collateral excuses”. Things came to a head when the Editor scolded me amidst “constructive criticism.” I, unlike Shelley, had and have little in defence of my lotus eating, caused by anything except age.

Written by

AUSAF

Published on

June 17, 2022

This less-than-dignified column, written without ablution, appears irregularly because of my laziness and “collateral excuses”. Things came to a head when the Editor scolded me amidst “constructive criticism.” I, unlike Shelley, had and have little in defence of my lotus eating, caused by anything except age.
Ghalib rightly said: Earlier I used to laugh at my heart’s agony. Now I laugh at nothing!
The truth is in today’s fun loving and jokes-filled world, there is little to laugh at. Yea! You can legitimately laugh at the fun and joke lovers.
The New York Times carried a chilling 850-word story last week. Done by Katherine Zoepf, the story, reproduced in India also, filed from Maraba, Syria, said, “Back home in Iraq, Umm Hiba’s daughter was a devout school girl, modest in her dress and serious about her studies. The 16-year-old Hiba wore the hijab or Islamic headscarf, and rose early each day to say the dawn prayer before classes. But that was before militias began threatening their Baghdad neighbourhood and Umm Hiba, whose honorific means “mother of Hiba,” and her daughter fled to Syria last spring. There were no jobs and Umm Hiba’s elderly father developed complications related to his diabetes. Desperate, Umm Hiba followed the advice of an Iraqi acquaintance and brought her young daughter to work at a nightclub along a highway known for prostitution.”
As violence in Iraq has increased, the refugee population, adds the story, has come to include more female-headed households and unaccompanied women, groups that are particularly vulnerable to the sex trade. Some of these women, seeking work outside the home for the first time and living in a country with high unemployment find that their only marketable asset is their bodies. “We Iraqis used to be a proud people,” Umm Hiba said over the frantic blare of the club’s speakers. As Umm Hiba watched a middle-aged man climbed onto the platform and began to dance jerkily, arms flailing among the girls. “During the war we lost everything, we even lost our honour.”
You, in all innocence, turned to this column – after reading thoughtful analyses and logical conclusions – for lighter reading. Here is a piece of lighter reading: A 450-word story by Michael Slackman, datelined Cairo, June 12, speaks of two fatwas or religious edicts issued from the land of the Prophets (blessings of Allah with them). One has been issued by His Eminence, the Grand Mufti of Al-Azhar and the other one by a scholar of the renowned centre of Islamic learning. The Grand Mufti, Sheikh Ali Gomma’s edict is in one of his several books. In Religion and Life published six years ago, His Eminence says: Drinking urine of Prophet Mohammed (peace be with him) was deemed a blessing.
Who, on earth, has the cheek and temerity to join the issues with His Eminence. At least this sinner hasn’t any! But what this hell-deserving can recall is that at the time of the fall of Constantinople, the discussion that was at its peak was: How many angels can sit on a pin? And the second un-settled issue was: Was or was not, the excreta of Christ divine? (Allah’s blaming with him).
I am confident His Eminence would not mind incorporating this significant debate of yester centuries in Constantinople in the revised and much-awaited edition of his work – just to prove how important a subject he has discussed in his epoch-making book.
The second edict, issued in May by Izat Atiyah, an Al-Azhar scholar, who declared: The Islamic restriction on unmarried men and women being together could be lifted at work if the women breast-fed her male colleague five times, to establish family ties!
With much difficulty, I have succeeded in persuading upon this rather these masterpieces of learning and scholarship.
It is a matter of great satisfaction that out country has no Al-Azhar, has no Ali Gomma, and has no Izat Atiyah. We have a few seminaries like Dar-ul-Uloom, Deoband and Nadwat-ul-Ulema, Lucknow. Those who run them, run them with enormous difficulty. The teachers and students there lead modest lives and make both the ends meet with difficulty. It is, perhaps for the first time today that this sinner of sinners realised their importance and contribution. My un-called for suggestion is Sheikh Ali Gomma and Izat Atiyah apply for admission in the primary classes of these Indian institutions. This outrageous, though constructive and serious, suggestion is alright. But would the Rectors of Dar-ul-Uloom, Deoband and Nadwat-ul-Ulema, Lucknow agree to admit them?
In my muddle-headedness, I dished out the dishwater without finding out the opinion of the heads of the two seminaries.