Imām Rabbānī Shāykh Aḥmad ibn 'Abd al-Ahad al-Fārūqī al-Sirhindī Mūjaddīd al-Alf al-Thanī or simply known as Ahmad Sirhindi (1564 – 1624/1625) was an Indian Islamic scholar, Hanafi jurist, and member of the Naqshbandī Sufi order who lived during the era of Mughal Empire.. "Shaykh Aḥmad Sirhindī, (born 1564?, Sirhind, Patiāla, India—died 1624, Sirhind), Indian mystic and theologian who was largely responsible for the reassertion and revival in India of orthodox Sunnite Islam as a reaction against the syncretistic religious tendencies prevalent during the reign of the Mughal emperor Akbar."
Ahmad Sirhindi opposed heterodox movements within the Mughal court such as Din-i Ilahi, in support of more orthodox forms of Islamic Law. His act of preserving and urging the practice of Islamic orthodoxy and challenging Akbar and later Jahangir by rejecting Din-i Ilahi has cemented his reputation among South Asian Muslims as a Mujaddid, or a "reviver".Josef W. Meri, Medieval Islamic Civilization: An Encyclopedia, (Routledge 1 Dec 2005), p 678.
While early and modern South Asian scholarship credited him for contributing to conservative trends in Indian Islam, more recent works, such as Abul Hasan Ali Hasani Nadwi and commentaries from western scholars such as Ter Haar, Friedman, and Buehler, have pointed to Sirhindi's significant contributions to Sufi epistemology and practices.
Biography Sirhindi was born on 26 May 1564 in the village of Sirhind, Punjab to a Punjabi Muslim family. A descendant of 13th-century Sufi saint and poet Baba Farid, he claimed ancestry from the second Rashidun caliph, Umar (634–644). Sirhindi received most of his early education from his father, 'Abd al-Ahad, his brother, Muhammad Sadiq and from a Lahore-based scholar Muhammad Tahir al-Lahuri.Itzchak Weismann, The Naqshbandiyya: Orthodoxy and Activism in a Worldwide Sufi Tradition, Routledge (2007), p. 62 He also memorised the Qur'an. He then studied in Sialkot, which had become an intellectual centre under the scholar Kamaluddin Kashmiri.S.Z.H. Jafri, Recording the Progress of Indian History: Symposia Papers of the Indian History Congress, 1992-2010, Primus Books (2012), p. 156 Qazi Bahlol Badakhshani taught him jurisprudence, Seerah and history.Khwaja Jamil Ahmad, One Hundred greater Muslims, Ferozsons (1984), p. 292Sufism and Shari'ah: A study of Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi's effort to reform Sufism, Muhammad Abdul Haq Ansari, The Islamic Foundation, 1997, p. 11. He eventually joined the Naqshbandī order through the Sufi missionary Khwaja Baqi Billah when he was 36 years old, and became a leading master of the order. His deputies traversed the Mughal Empire in order to popularize the order and eventually won favour with the Mughal court.Medieval Islamic Civilization: An Encyclopedia, Routledge, 2006, p. 755. Sirhindi underwent his first Hajj pilgrimage in 1598, after the death of his father.
During the reign of emperor Akbar, Ahmad Sirhindi wrote hundreds of letters which were aimed towards his disciples, Mughal nobles, and even the emperor himself, to denounce the participations of Hindu figures in the government. Annemarie Schimmel recorded about 534 letters has been wrote by Ahmad Sirhindi regarding the subject of Syncretism. His efforts influenced Abul Fazl, the protegee of emperor Akbar, to support Ahmad Sirhindi in an effort to convince Jahangir, the successor of Akbar, to reverse the policies of Akbar of tolerating Hindus in Mughal court. According to the modern Syrian Salafi jurist Ali al-Tantawi, Ahmad Sirhindi never aspired to depose the emperor despite his fierce criticism; instead, he wanted to reform the religious policies of the late emperor so he sent letters inflamed with religious fervor and faith towards young commanders and courtiers and to gather them into his cause to reverse the emperor's religious policy to persuade the emperor.
Ahmad Sirhindi's letters contain heavy tone of support towards this spirit of religious reform by restoring Sharia and departure from Akbar's policy under the rule of Jahangir, as shown of the letter has stated: 'Today there is a revolution/transformation in the state (':wa lamma vaqa'a al-anabal-inqilabu fi al-duwali')'.
According to jesuit missionary Pierre de Jarric, Ahmad Sirhindi also sent letters to his disciple, Shaikh Farid Bukhari, a Mir Bakshi official who had been appointed as representative of the muslim orthodox faction of Mughal court, to support the future emperor Jahangir. The orthodox faction extracted promise from Jahangir that he would support the cause of orthodox faction's cause if he succeeded his father. It is also known through his letter correspondence with the imperial government figures that Ahmad Sirhindi routinely attended the court debates to counteract some religious beliefs and doctrines which were prevalent in the court. In the process, it is recorded from these correspondence which compiled in 1617, that Farid Murtaza Khan took Ahmad Sirhindi advices regarding this matter. Ahmad Sirhindi also wrote a letter to Mughal Emperor Jahangir emphasizing that he is now correcting the wrong path taken by his father, emperor Akbar.
At some point during the reign of Jahangir, Ahmad Sirhimdi sent many pupils for academic missionaries into various places, such as: 70 individuals which led by his pupil named Muhammad Qasim to Turkestan. 40 individuals under another pupil named Faruh Hussain into Arabian Peninsula, Yemen, Syria, and Anatolia. 10 individuals under another pupil named Muhammad Sadiq into Kashgar. 30 individuals under another pupil named Shaykh Ahmad Bakri into the outskirt of Turkestan, Badakhshan, and Khurasan.
Later, Ahmad Sirhindi was imprisoned by the emperor. This happened in 1618, Emperor Jahangir, who distanced himself from the Islam orthodoxy and admired Vaishnavite ascetic, Chitrarup. But later the emperor rectified his order and freed Ahmad Sirhindi. However, Ahmad Sirhindi was imprisoned once again in 1622, suggested to be due to the jealousy of several nobles for his popularity, before being released again after spending one year in Gwalior prison and another three years in a prison within emperor Jahangir army entourage.
After his release and restoration of favor and honor, Ahmad Sirhindi accompanied emperor Jahangir in his entourage into Deccan Plateau. Modern Indian historian Irfan Habib considers the efforts of Ahmad Sirhindi to bear success as emperor Jahangir started changing the policies which were criticized by Ahmad Sirhindi. Ahmad Sirhindi likely stayed to accompany the emperor for three years before his death. He continued to exercise influence over the Mughal court along with his son, Shaikh Masum, who tutored the young prince Aurangzeb. Ahmad Sirhindi died in the morning of 10 December 1624.
Another son of Ahmad Sirhindi, Khawaja Muhammad Masum, supported Aurangzeb during the Mughal succession conflict, by sending his two sons, Muhammad Al-Ashraf, and Khwaja Saifuddin, to support Aurangzeb in war. Aurangzeb himself provided Khwaja Muhammad and his youngest son, Muhammad Ubaidullah, with fifteen ships to seek refugee during the conflict to embark for Hajj pilgrimage, and Khwaja Muhammad returned to India after Aurangzeb won the conflict two years later.
Personal views Modern writer Zahid Yahya al-Zariqi has likened Ahmad Sirhindi's personal views to Muhammad ibn Ali al-Sanusi, Ibn Taymiyya, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Abd al-Razzaq al-San'ani, and Al-Shawkani, due to his orthodox stance, and his opposition to emperor Akbar in terms of religious practice. Similarly, Aḥmad ʻArafāt Qāḍi from Cairo University also likened the thoughts of Ahmad Sirhindi to the views of Ibn Taymiyya. , an Egyptian writer, suggested Sirhindi's views were similar to the Wahhabism movement that arose two centuries after Ahmad Sirhindi's death, with both arguing for the resurrection and revival of religious discourse, which also influenced Shah Waliullah Dehlawi.
Ahmad Sirhindi repeatedly emphasised his proud ancestry to Rashidun caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab to show he was similarly in favour of orthodoxy. Abul Hasan Ali Hasani Nadwi, an Islamic scholar, thinker, writer, preacher, reformer and a Muslim public intellectual of 20th century India, wrote a biography of Ahmad Sirhindi in his book, Rijal al-Fikr wa l-Da'wah fi al-Islam, which mostly covers Ahmad Sirhindi's efforts to revive Islam and his opposition to Bid'ah (heresy). On another occasion, in a letter to Lãlã Beg (a Subahdar of Bihar), he described Akbar's prohibition of cow-slaughter as interference against the religious freedom of Muslims.
In particular, Ahmad Sirhindi believed that every ritualistic practice which is not documented in Sunnah, such as the annual prophet anniversary, was forbidden in Islam. He also criticized practices such as Sufi whirling (Raqs), the tradition of Sujud or prostrating towards the ruler, and other rituals which he deemed unislamic.
The societal reforms of the Mughal empire following Ahmad Sirhindi's methodology had several targets which he aimed to convey. He believed that to reform society, one must convey his thoughts to the following six types of people, in various societal positions:
The non-governmental influential class Members of the imperial courts The king Scholars Heretics and ignorant Sufis Liberal scholars
At the same time, Ahmad Sirhindi personally accepted the use of Ijtihad and Qiyas in Fiqh and defended the use of both. Ahmad Sirhindi argued that Qiyas and Itjihad are not Bidʻah (heresy).
Regarding Hindu practice, Ahmad Sirhindi condemned the idea put forward by some Hindu thinkers, such as Hardai Ram, that the Bhakti movement was identical with Islamic mysticism.
Philosophy Ahmad Sirhindi's opposition to emperor Akbar regarding Din-i Ilahi's syncretic belief were recorded in fourth volume of Tarikh-e-Dawat-o-Azeemat. Ahmad Sirhindi also rejected the ideas of philosophy, particularly those rooted from Greek philosophy. Furthermore, Sirhindi criticize the method of interpretating the meaning of Quran with philosophy.
Ahmad Sirhindi view regarding some of teachings found in Ibn Arabi's teaching in Waḥdat al-Wujūd. He argued that the doctrine of Ibn Arabi is incompatible with Islam. In his book, Ahmad Sirhindi criticized the doctrine of Waḥdat al-Wujūd, by saying in his book, Al-Muntakhabaat Min Al-Maktubaat, that God is never united with anything, and nothing can be united with God. Ahmad Sirhindi argued that forms of pantheism were components of Hinduism. He rejected the core idea of Ibn Arabi that the creation could unite with the Creator, i.e., God.
Despite this, Sirhindi still used Ibn al-'Arabi's vocabulary without hesitation. William C. Chittick, an expert of Ibn 'Arabi biography, argued that Ahmad Sirhindi seems oblivious of Ibn 'Arabi doctrines, as the Imam insisted that Wahdat al-Wujud were "inadequate expression" which should be supplanted by his concept of Wahdat ash-Shuhud which Chittick claimed is just similar in essence. Ahmad Sirhindi advanced the notion of Wahdat ash-Shuhūd (oneness of appearance). According to this doctrine, the experience of unity between God and creation is purely subjective and occurs only in the mind of the Sufi who has reached the state of fana' fi Allah (to forget about everything except Almighty Allah). Sirhindi considered Wahdat ash-Shuhūd to be superior to Wahdat al-Wujūd (oneness of being), which he understood to be a preliminary step on the way to the Absolute Truth.Annemarie Schimmel, Islam in the Indian Subcontinent, p. 94.
Aside from the doctrine of pantheism of Ibn 'Arabi, Ahmad Sirhindi also expressed his opposition towards the idea of Metempsychosis or the migration of soul from one body to another.
Shia