Al-Kutub al-Sittah

[3] Kedourie, E. (1997). Afghani and 'Abduh: An Essay on Religious Unbelief and Political Activism in Modern Islam, London: Frank Cass.
ISBN 071464355.
[4] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and
Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[5] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and
Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[6] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and
Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[7] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and
Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[8] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas and
Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[9]
[9] Gelvin , J. L. (2008). The Modern Middle East (2nd ed., pp. 161-162). New York: Oxford university Press.
[10] Kügelgen, Anke von. "ʿAbduh, Muḥammad." Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE. Edited by: Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas
and Everett Rowson. Brill, 2009. Brill Online. Syracuse University. 23 April 2009

[11]
[11] Benzine, Rachid. Les nouveaux penseurs de l'islam, p. 43-44.
[12]
[12] Benzine, Rachid. Les nouveaux penseurs de l'islam, p. 44.

Muhammad Abduh
160
External links
• Center for Islam and Science: Muhammad `Abduh (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
cis-ca.
 
org/
 
voices/
 
a/
 
abduh.
 
htm)
Jamal-al-Din al-Afghani
Jamal-ad-Din (al-Afghani)
Religion
political Islam (perhaps Shia)
Personal
Born
19 June 1838
Asadabad, Afghanistan
Died
September 1, 1897 (aged 59)
Istanbul, Ottoman Empire
Sayyid Jamāl-ad-Dīn al-Afghānī
[1][2][3][4] 
(Persian: ﻝﺎﻤﺟ ﺪﯿﺳﯽﻧﺎﻐﻓﺍ ﻦﯾﺪﻟﺍ), also known as Sayyid Jamal-ad-Din
Asadabadi (Persian: ﻝﺎﻤﺟ ﺪﯿﺳﺪﺳﺍ ﻦﯾﺪﻟﺍﯼﺩﺎﺑﺁ), (1838 – March 9, 1897), was a political activist and Islamic ideologist in
the Muslim world during the late 19th century, particularly in the Middle East, South Asia and Europe. One of the
founders of Islamic modernism
[4][5] 
and an advocate of pan-Islamic unity,
[6] 
he has been described as "less interested
in theology than he was in organizing a Muslim response to Western pressure."
[7]
Surprisingly, some sources highlight that he was a British intelligence agent.
[8] 
Throughout his forty-year career as a
British intelligence agent, Jamal ad-Din Afghani was guided by two British Islamic and cult specialists, Wilfred
Scawen Blunt and Edward G. Browne.
[8] 
E. G. Browne was Britain’s leading Orientalist of the nineteenth century,
and numbered among his protégés at Cambridge University’s Orientalist department Harry “Abdullah” St. John B.
Philby, a British intelligence specialist behind the Wahhabi movement.
[9] 
Wilfred S. Blunt, another member of the
British Orientalist school, was given the responsibility by the Scottish Rite Masons to organize the Persian and the
Middle East lodges. Jamal ad-Din Afghani was their primary agent. 
[10][9]

Jamal-al-Din al-Afghani
161
Early life and origin
He claimed to be of Afghan origin most of his life but some evidence shows that he was in fact born in Iran.
[3][11]
Although some older sources claim that al-Afghani was born in a district of Kunar Province in Afghanistan which is
also called Asadabad,
[12][13] 
overwhelming documentation (especially a collection of papers left in Iran upon his
expulsion in 1891) now proves that he was born in Iran, in the village of Asadābād, near the city of Hamadān into a
family of Sayyids.
[1][2][11] 
Records indicate that he spent his childhood in Iran and was brought up as a Shi'a
Muslim.
[1][2] 
According to evidence reviewed by Nikki Keddie, he was educated first at home then taken by his
father for further education to Qazvin, to Tehran, and finally, while he was still a youth, to the Shi'a shrine cities in
Iraq.
[11] 
It is thought that followers of Shia revivalist Shaikh Ahmad Ahsa'i had an influence on him.
[14] 
An ethnic
Persian, al-Afghani claimed to be an Afghan in order to present himself as a Sunni Muslim
[14][15] 
and escape
oppression by the Iranian ruler Nāṣer ud-Dīn Shāh.
[2] 
One of his main rivals, the sheikh Abū l-Hudā, called him
Mutaʾafghin ("the one who claims to be Afghan") and tried to expose his Shi'a roots.
[16] 
Other names adopted by
al-Afghani were al-Kābulī ("[the one] from Kabul") and al-Istānbulī ("[the one] from Istanbul"). Especially in his
writings published in Afghanistan, he also used the pseudonym ar-Rūmī ("the Roman" or "the Anatolian").
[11]
Political activism
At the age of 17 or 18 in 1855–56, al-Afghani travelled to British India and spent a number of years there studying
religions. In 1859, a British spy reported that al-Afghani was a possible Russian agent. The British representatives
reported that he wore traditional cloths of Noghai Turks in Central Asia and spoke Persian, Arabic and Turkish
language fluently.
[17] 
After this first Indian tour, he decided to perform Hajj or pilgrimage at Mecca. His first
documents are dated from Autumn of 1865, where he mentions leaving the "revered place" (makān-i musharraf) and
arriving in Tehran around mid-December of the same year. In the spring of 1866 he left Iran for Afghanistan, passing
through Mashad and Herat.
After the Indian stay, all sources have Afghānī next take a leisurely trip to Mecca, stopping at several points
along the way. Both the standard biography and Lutfallāh's account take Afghānī's word that he entered
Afghan government service before 1863, but since document from Afghanistan show that he arrived there only
in 1866, we are left with several years unaccounted for. The most probably supposition seems to be that he
may spent longer in India than he later said, and that after going to Mecca he travelled elsewhere in the
Ottoman Empire. When he arrived in Afghanistan in 1866 he claimed to be from Istanbul, and he might not
have made this claim if he had never even seen the city, and could be caught in ignorance of it.
[18]
—Nikki R. Keddie, 1983
He was spotted in Afghanistan in 1866 and spent time in Qandahar, Ghazni, and Kabul.
[1] 
He became a counsellor to
the King Dost Mohammad Khan (who died, however, on June 9, 1863) and later to Mohammad Azam. At that time
he encouraged the king to oppose the British but turn to the Russians. However, he did not encourage Mohammad
Azam to any reformist ideologies that later were attributed to al-Afghani. Reports from the colonial British Indian
and Afghan government stated that he was a stranger in Afghanistan, and spoke the Persian language with Iranian
accent and followed European lifestyle more than that of Muslims, not observing Ramadan or other Muslim rites.
[17]
In 1868, the throne of Kabul was occupied by Sher Ali Khan, and al-Afghani was forced to leave the country.
[2]
He travelled to Istanbul, passing through Cairo on his way there. He stayed in Cairo long enough to meet a young
student who would become a devoted disciple of his, Muhammad 'Abduh.
[19]
In 1871, al-Afghani moved to Egypt and began preaching his ideas of political reform. His ideas were considered
radical, and he was exiled in 1879. He then travelled to different European and non-European cities: Istanbul,
London, Paris, Moscow, St. Petersburg and Munich.
In 1884, he began publishing an Arabic newspaper in Paris entitled al-Urwah al-Wuthqa ("The Indissoluble Link"
[1]
) 
with Muhammad Abduh. The newspaper called for a return to the original principles and ideals of Islam, and for

Jamal-al-Din al-Afghani
162
greater unity among Islamic peoples. He argued that this would allow the Islamic community to regain its former
strength against European powers.
al-Afghani was invited by Shah Nasser ad-Din to come to Iran and advise on affairs of government, but fell from
favour quite quickly and had to take sanctuary in a shrine near Tehran. After seven months of preaching to admirers
from the shrine, he was arrested in 1891, transported to the border with Ottoman Mesopotamia, and evicted from
Iran. Although al-Afghani quarrelled with most of his patrons, it is said he "reserved his strongest hatred for the
Shah," whom he accused of weakening Islam by granting concessions to Europeans and squandering the money
earned thereby. His agitation against the Shah is thought to have been one of the "fountain-heads" of the successful
1891 protest against the granting a tobacco monopoly to a British company, and the later 1905 Constitutional
Revolution.
[20]
Political and religious views
al-Afghani's ideology has been described as a welding of "traditional" religious antipathy toward non-Muslims "to a
modern critique of Western imperialism and an appeal for the unity of Islam", urging the adoption of Western
sciences and institutions that might strengthen Islam.
[15]
Although called a liberal by the contemporary English admirer, Wilfrid Scawen Blunt,
[21] 
Jamal ad-Din did not
advocate constitutional government. In the volumes of the newspaper he published in Paris, "there is no word in the
paper's theoretical articles favoring political democracy or parliamentarianism," according to his biographer. Jamal
ad-Din simply envisioned "the overthrow of individual rulers who were lax or subservient to foreigners, and their
replacement by strong and patriotic men."
[22]
According to another source al-Afghani was greatly disappointed by the failure of the Indian Mutiny and came to
three principal conclusions from it:
• that European imperialism, having conquered India, now threatened the Middle East
•• that Asia, including the Middle East, could prevent the onslaught of Western powers only by immediately
adopting the modern technology of the West
• and that Islam, despite its traditionalism, was an effective creed for mobilizing the public against the
imperialists.
[23]
He believed that Islam and its revealed law were compatible with rationality and, thus, Muslims could become
politically unified while still maintaining their faith based on a religious social morality. These beliefs had a
profound effect on Muhammad Abduh, who went on to expand on the notion of using rationality in the human
relations aspect of Islam (mu'amalat) .
[24]
According to a report, from a man who must have been an Afghan with the local government, Jamal ad-Din Afghani
was: "…well versed in geography and history, speaks Arabic and Turkish fluently, talks Persian like an Irani.
Apparently, follows no particular religion." 
[25]
In 1881 he published a collection of polemics titled Al-Radd 'ala al-Dahriyyi (Refutation of the Materialists),
agitating for pan-Islamic unity against Western Imperialism. It included one of the earliest pieces of Islamic thought
arguing against Darwin's then-recent On the Origin of Species; however, his arguments incorrectly caricatured
evolution, provoking criticism that he had not read Darwin's writings.
[26] 
In his later work Khatirat Jamal ad-Din
al-Afghani (The Ideas of al-Afghani), he accepted the validity of evolution, asserting that the Islamic world had
already known and used it. Although he accepted abiogenesis and the evolution of animals, he rejected the theory
that the human species is the product of evolution, arguing that humans have souls.
[26]
Among the reasons why al-Afghani thought to have had a less than deep religious faith was his lack of interest in 
finding theologically common ground between Shia and Sunni (despite the fact that he was very interested in 
political unity between the two groups),
[27] 
and his failure to marry. He is said to have "picked up female 
companionship when he wanted it without any show of religious scruples.", probably practising the temporary

Jamal-al-Din al-Afghani
163
marriage (nikah al-mut'a) that only Shia communities recognize as licit (halal).
[28]
Death and legacy
"Asad Abadi square" in Tehran, Iran
Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani died on March 9, 1897 in Istanbul and was
buried there. In late 1944, due to the request of the Afghan
government, his remains were taken to Afghanistan and laid in Kabul
inside the Kabul University, a mausoleum was erected for him there. In
Tehran, the capital of Iran, there is a square named after him (Asad
Abadi Square).
Works
• Sayyid Jamāl-ad-Dīn al-Afghānī: ", Continued the statement in the
history of Afghans Egypt, original in Arabic: ﻥﺎﻐﻓﻷﺍ ﺦﻳﺭﺎﺗ ﻲﻓ ﻥﺎﻴﺒﻟﺍ ﺔﻤﺘﺗ
Tatimmat al-bayan fi tarikh al-Afghan, 1901 ( Mesr, 1318 Islamic lunar jear (calendar)
[29]
• Sayyid Jamāl-ad-Dīn al-Afghānī: Brochure about Naturalism or materialism, original in Persian language : ﻪﻟﺎﺳﺭ
ﻪﯾﺮﭽﯿﻧ 
(Ressalah e Natscheria) translatr of Muhammad Abduh in Arabic.
References
[1] "Jamāl ad-Dīn al-Afghānī" (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
britannica.
 
com/
 
ebc/
 
article-9368411). Elie Kedourie. The Online Encyclopædia Britannica. .
Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[2] "Afghani, Jamal-ad-Din" (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
iranicaonline.
 
org/
 
articles/
 
afgani-jamal-al-din). N.R. Keddie. Encyclopædia Iranica. December 15,
1983. . Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[3] "Afghani, Jamal ad-Din al-" (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
oxfordislamicstudies.
 
com/
 
article/
 
opr/
 
t243/
 
e8?_hi=5&
 
_pos=1). Oxford Centre for Islamic
Studies. Oxford University Press. . Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[4] "Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani" (https:/
 
/
 
www.
 
jewishvirtuallibrary.
 
org/
 
jsource/
 
biography/
 
Afghani.
 
html). Jewish Virtual Library. . Retrieved
2010-09-05.
[5] "Sayyid Jamal ad-Din Muhammad b. Safdar al-Afghani (1838–1897)" (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
cis-ca.
 
org/
 
voices/
 
a/
 
afghni.
 
htm). Saudi Aramco
World. Center for Islam and Science. 2002. . Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[6] Ludwig W. Adamec, Historical Dictionary of Islam (Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2001), p. 32
[7] Vali Nasr, The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future (New York: Norton, 2006), p. 103.
[8]
[8] Dreyfuss, Robert, "Hostage to Khomeini", (New Benjamin Franklin House Publishing Company, Inc., New York, USA: 1980), p. 113.
[9]
[9] Dreyfuss, Robert, "Hostage to Khomeini", (New Benjamin Franklin House Publishing Company, Inc., New York, USA: 1980), p. 121 and
123.
[10] Livingstone, David Terrorism and the Illuminati - A Three Thousand Year History (Charleston, SC, USA: 2007), p. 163.
[11] Keddie, Nikki R (1983). An Islamic response to imperialism: political and religious writings of Sayyid Jamāl ad-Dīn "al-Afghānī" (http:/
 
/
books.
 
google.
 
com/
 
books?id=ThR-B9BmWdYC&
 
dq=Al-Afghan+
 
was+
 
Afghan+
 
by+
 
birth). United States: University of California Press.
p. 212. ISBN 0-520-04774-5, 9780520047747. . Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[12] From Reform to Revolution, Louay Safi, Intellectual Discourse 1995, Vol. 3, No. 1 LINK (http:/
 
/
 
lsinsight.
 
org/
 
articles/
 
1998_Before/
Reform.
 
htm)
[13] Historia, Le vent de la révolte souffle au Caire, Baudouin Eschapasse, LINK (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
historia.
 
presse.
 
fr/
 
data/
 
thematique/
 
105/
10502401.
 
html)
[14] Edward Mortimer, Faith and Power, Vintage, (1982)p.110
[15] "Arab awakening and Islamic revival By Martin S. Kramer" (http:/
 
/
 
books.
 
google.
 
com/
 
books?id=SRkTJCcyn00C&
 
pg=PA143&
lpg=PA143&
 
dq=kramer+
 
al-afghani&
 
source=bl&
 
ots=17FMWFJMcG&
 
sig=JxEgQwqt9BCy24w0Lac2WTPQj98&
 
hl=en&
ei=PpXrSYjOBovGMtnWme4F&
 
sa=X&
 
oi=book_result&
 
ct=result&
 
resnum=1). Books.google.com. . Retrieved 2012-06-08.
[16] A. Hourani: Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798–1939. London, Oxford University Press, p. 103–129 (108)
[17]
[17] Molefi K. Asante, Culture and customs of Egypt, Published by Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002, ISBN 0-313-31740-2, ISBN
978-0-313-31740-8, Page 137
[18] Keddie, Nikki R (1983). An Islamic response to imperialism: political and religious writings of Sayyid Jamāl ad-Dīn "al-Afghānī" (http:/
 
/
books.
 
google.
 
com/
 
books?id=ThR-B9BmWdYC&
 
dq=Al-Afghan+
 
was+
 
Afghan+
 
by+
 
birth). United States: University of California Press.
p. 212. ISBN 0-520-04774-5, 9780520047747. . Retrieved 2010-09-05.
[19] Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age (Cambridge: Cambride UP, 1983), pp. 131–2

Jamal-al-Din al-Afghani
164
[20] Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran (Oxford: One World, 2000), pp. 183–4
[21] Wilfrid Scawen Blunt, Secret History of the English Occupation of Egypt (London: Unwin, 1907), p. 100.
[22] Nikki R. Keddie, Sayyid Jamal ad-Din “al-Afghani”: A Political Biography (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), pp. 225–26.
[23] Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), pp. 62–3
[24] Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age (Cambridge: Cambride UP, 1983), pp. 104–125
[25] Livingstone, David Terrorism and the Illuminati - A Three Thousand Year History (Charleston, SC, USA: 2007), p. 165.
[26]
[26] The Comparative Reception of Darwinism, edited by Thomas Glick, ISBN 0-226-29977-5
[27] Nasr, The Shia Revival, p.103
[28] Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet, p. 184
[29] "Tatimmat al-bayan fi tarikh al-Afghan" (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
archive.
 
org/
 
stream/
 
tatimmatalbayanf00afghuoft#page/
 
193/
 
mode/
 
2up).
Archive.org. . Retrieved 2012-06-08.
In late 1944, due to the request of the Afghan government, his remains were taken to Afghanistan by Abdul Rahmon
Popal and laid in Kabul inside the Kabul University
Further reading
• Bashiri, Iraj, Bashiri Working Papers on Central Asia and Iran (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
angelfire.
 
com/
 
rnb/
 
bashiri/
Afghani/
 
Afghani.
 
html), 2000.
• Black, Antony (2001). The History of Islamic Political Thought. New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-93243-2.
• Cleveland, William (2004). A History of the Modern Middle East. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
ISBN 0-8133-4048-9.
• Keddie, Nikki Ragozin. Sayyid Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani: A Political biography. Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1972. ISBN 978-0-520-01986-7
• Watt, William Montgomery (1985). Islamic Philosophy and Theology. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
ISBN 0-7486-0749-8.
• Mehrdad Kia, Pan-Islamism in Late Nineteenth-Century Iran, Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 32, No. 1, pp. 30–52
(1996).
External links
• Jamal-ad-Din Afghani (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
iranicaonline.
 
org/
 
articles/
 
afgani-jamal-al-din), a comprehensive article in
Encyclopædia Iranica.
• Sayyid Jamal ad-Din Muhammad b. Safdar al-Afghani (1838–1897) (http:/
 
/
 
www.
 
cis-ca.
 
org/
 
voices/
 
a/
 
afghni.
htm), a complete biography.

Al-Suyuti
165
Al-Suyuti
Muslim
 
scholar
Abu al-Fadl 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Abi Bakr Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti
Title
Ibn al Kutb (Son of Books)
Born
1445 CE/ Rajab of 849 AH
Died
1505/911
Ethnicity
Arab
Region
Egypt
Maddhab
Shafi'i,Ash`ari,Shadhilli
Main interests Tafsir, Sharia, Fiqh. Hadith
Works
Tafsir Jalalyn
Influences
Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani, Siraj-ud-din al-Bulqini, Sharaf-ud-din al-Munawi, Ibn Arabi, etc.
Influenced
Abd Al-Wahhab bin Ahmad Al-Misri Al-Sharani, al-Dawudi, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri. etc.
Jalaluddin Al-Suyuti (Arabic: ﻲﻃﻮﻴﺴﻟﺍ ﻦﻳﺪﻟﺍ ﻝﻼﺟ) (c. 1445–1505 AD) also known as Ibn al-Kutub (son of books) was
an Egyptian writer, religious scholar, juristic expert and teacher whose works deal with a wide variety of subjects in
Islamic theology. He was precocious and was already a teacher in 1462. In 1486, he was appointed to a chair in the
mosque of Baybars in Cairo. He adhered to the Shafi'i Madhab and is one of the latter-day authorities of the Shafi'i
School, considered to be one of the Ashabun-Nazzar (Assessors) whose degree of Ijtihad is agreed upon.