This is a strange world. Strange are the countless types of people living in it. Human beings appear to be same but, deep in their souls, are quite different. The noble and the ignoble, the arrogant and the humble, the scholar and the ignorant, the clean and the dirty can never be equal. Sufis seemingly eat the same food and wear the same clothes. They live and they die. But the divine light which kindles in their hearts separates them from the herds of people.
Born in a small village of district Mianwali in 1916, Khawaja Khan Muhammad, passed away on 5th of May 2010. An insightful scholar and a selfless sufi, he remained steadfast on the path he chose in his younger age. This steadfastness and perseverance is so rare a quality in this world of changing scenes and shifting images that the modern man has lost the faculty to fully appreciate this. Moments of virtue and instants of sincerity do come in everyone’s life but to remain constant and consistent on the right path throughout one’s life is extraordinary. Khawajah sahib was entrusted the responsibility of Khankah Sirajia in 1956. From 1956 to 5th May 2010, every single day of his life was spent in listening for hours and hours to the worries of people and making dua for them, without any worldly benefit, just for the sake of Allah.
In Muslim history and civilization, Khankahs occupy a significant place. They were the centers of learning and Tazkiyah (purification of hearts). With the decline of Muslim culture and civilization, this institution also lost its original role. Rituals became more important than objectives. Corrupt people in the guise of Sufis started deceiving people. But if physicians become greedy, and politicians corrupt, should we deny medicine and politics? In fact it requires a lot of superficiality to disregard the significance of Taswuf. Khankah Sirajia is a great Khankah of the classical tradition of Sufis of Naqshband. Named after Khawajah Baha al-Din Muhammad Naqshband (1317-1389), a native of Bukhara, the order first established itself in Central Asia and then spread out to Turkestan, Syria, Afghanistan, and India. In the sixteenth century the Naqshbandi order reached India, and a new phase of its spiritual activity began under the leadership of Shaykh Ahmad of Sirhind (1564-1624), known as Mujaddid-i Alf-I Thani (Reformer of the second millennium). One of the main branches of this order was Khankah Siajia which was founded in 1920 by Khawaja Abu Saad Ahmad Khan (1880-1941). At that time it was a place in the desert of Thal away from the noises and sounds of materialism. Seekers of truth and piety used to cross the sand dunes on foot and on the camels. Now the Chashma canal and the Nuclear Power plant have changed the landscape but one cannot not resist noticing a dignified silence and a noble serenity in the air of Khankah for the places and spaces are also influenced by Dhikr of Allah. Khawajah sahib was assigned the responsibility of Khankah Sirajia by his Sheikh Maulana Muhammad Abdullah (1904-1956) and for 54 years he guided the people with his enlightened soul.
Khawajah sahib always remained committed to the cause of Khatme Nabuwat (Finality of Prophet hood) and he made a constitutional struggle for it. Sometimes our secular intellectuals, out of their ignorance of Islamic theology, Muslim psyche, and the true nature of Ahmadism, criticize the anti-Ahmadi movement and portray the Muslim feelings towards Qadianism as extremist and fundamentalist. This is true that Indian Muslim scholars and masses have displayed an extraordinary reaction against Qadianis. Even Sufis and derwaishs, who are otherwise very tolerant, broadminded and lenient of the theological differences between various sects, have been very intolerant of the Ahmadi creed. In fact it was a sufi, Pir Mahar Ali Shah sahib of Golada Sharif, who first challenged the founder of Ahmadism. Our intellectuals need to study deeply the reasons of this extraordinary attitude of Muslim community toward Ahmadism. Instead of just labeling this reaction of Muslim sufis and scholars as extremism, our intellectuals need to focus on the foundations of Ahmadism and Muslim psyche. The sensitivity of Muslim community about the boundaries of their faith needs to be understood. Allama Iqbal, in his letters to Pandit Jawahir Lal Nehru, has elucidated this point. An excerpt from the letter reads:
For the benefit of those who want further elucidation of the general Muslim attitude towards the Qadianis, I would quote a passage from Durant's Story of Philosophy which, I hope, will give the reader a clearer idea of the issue involved in Qadianism. Durant has in a few sentences summed up the Jewish point of view in the excommunication of the great philosopher Spinoza. The reader must not think that in quoting this passage I mean to insinuate some sort of comparison between Spinoza and the founder of Ahmadism. The distance between them, both in point of intellect and character, is simply tremendous. The "God-intoxicated" Spinoza never claimed that he was the centre of a new organization and that all the Jews who did not believe in him were outside the pale of Judaism. Durant's passage, therefore, applies with much greater force to the attitude of Muslims towards Qadianism than to the attitude of the Jews towards the excommunication of Spinoza. The passage is as follows:
"Furthermore, religious unanimity seemed to the elders their sole means of preserving the little Jewish group in Amsterdam from disintegration, and almost the last means of preserving the unity, and so ensuring the survival, of the scattered Jews of the world. If they had had their own state, their own civil law, their own establishments of secular force and power, to compel internal cohesion and external respect, they might have been more tolerant; but their religion was to them their patriotism as well as their faith; the synagogue was their centre of social and political life as well as of ritual and worship; and the Bible whose veracity Spinoza had impugned was the 'portable fatherland' of their people; under the circumstances they thought heresy was treason, and toleration suicide."
Situated as the Jews were — a minority community in Amsterdam — they were perfectly justified in regarding Spinoza as a disintegrating factor threatening the dissolution of their community. Similarly, the Indian Muslims are right in regarding the Qadiani movement, which declares the entire world of Islam as Kafir and socially boycotts them, to be far more dangerous to the collective life of Islam in India than the metaphysics of Spinoza to the collective life of the Jews.
The Indian Muslim, I believe, instinctively realizes the peculiar nature of the circumstances in which he is placed in India and is naturally much more sensitive to the forces of disintegration than the Muslims of any other country. This instinctive perception of the average Muslim is in my opinion absolutely correct and has, I have no doubt, a much deeper foundation in the conscience of Indian Islam. Those who talk of toleration in a matter like this are extremely careless in using the word "toleration" which, I fear, they do not understand at all.
The life of Khawajah sahib was full of constant struggle and patience and he transformed the hearts and minds of ego-centered people by his spiritual light. With this light dawns the understanding that is beyond the material phenomena. Most of the times he remained silent but his dignified silence melted the frozen hearts. This is no exaggeration that just looking at his face was a spiritual experience. Many criminals and wrong doers made taubah (repentance) at his hands just by looking at him. His company had a healing impact for the sickness of soul and was an antidote to the poisons of greed, lust, and arrogance. Modern man with all his information and technologies needs the company of such saints if he wants to cure himself from the pathologies of self. And on this alone rests the harmony and health of individual and ultimately the future of human civilization.
THE AUTHOR IS A SOCIAL SCIENTIST AND CAN BE ACCESSED AT : raoshahid@talk21.com
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