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About Sufi Master Sidi Ibn al-Nahwi famous for Qasidah al-Munfarijah
Sidi Abul Fadl ibn
Nahwi (d. 513/1098)
The great Sufi Shaykh
Sidi Ibn Nahwi keep good company with young Sidi Ali ibn
Harzihim-(Ghazalian in tariqah) Later Sidi Ali ibn Harzihim become the Sufi
master of Sidi Abu Madyan Ghawth-(Sidi Abu Maydan was the Sufi master of
the Great Qutb Sidi Ibn Mashish, Sidi Ibn Mashish was the Sufi master of
the greatest Qutb Imam Shadhili).
The grandson of Sidi
Ali ibn Harzihim, The Sufi master Sidi Mohammed ibn Harazem, was the Sufi
master that educated the young Imam Shadhili and started his journey sufi
to seek the 'Spiritual Pole of the Time-'Qutb az-Zaman' who was Imam
Shadhili's Master, the Great Al-Qutb Sidi Ibn Mashish.
Qasidah Munfarijah- is
sung along side the other Famous Dua 'The Prayer of the Oppressed'-al-Du’a
al-Nasiri by Sidi Ibn Nasir.
An important associate
of Sidi Ali ibn Harzihim (d. 559/1164) in Fez was a legist and a teacher of
usul al-fiqh named Sidi Abul Fadl Yusuf ibn Mohammed ibn Yusuf at-Tutri
at-Tilimsani, know with Ibn Nahwi. Originally from the tribe of Tutra near
al- Qayrawan, Ibn Nahwi lived for a time in the caravan centre of Sijilmasa
and then moved to Fez, from which he was eventually expelled by the city's
Almoravid governor. After being exiled from his adopted home, he settled
Qal'at Bani Hammad, where he died in 513/1098.
His main teachers are
Sidi Abul Hassan Ali al-Lakhmi, Sidi Abu Abdellah Mohammed al-Maziri, Sidi
Abu Abdellah Mohammed Ibn ar-Rammama, Sidi Abu Zakariyya Shaqratisi, and
Sidi Abdelljalil ar-Rab'i. Ibn Nahwi advocated an usul-based prioritisation
of the texts that formed the basis that for juridical decision-making.
According to this method, each mujtahid, an interpreter if Islamic law, had
to search for the answer of a juridical problem (mas'ala) in the Quran or
the hadith. If these sources were not sufficient, he could then consult the
traditions of the Prophet's Companions and others among as-salaf salih.
Only when these primary sources failed to provide guidance could the
mujtahid resort to the traditional guidance of his legal school or his own
reasoning.
Because of his fondness
for the usul method, Ibn Nahwi shared with Ibn Harzihim a preference for
al-Ghazali's Ihya' ulum ad-din. His devotion to this work was so great that
he had it copied in thirty sections of equal length, so that he could read
a section each evening in the month of Ramadan. He particularly agreed with
al-Ghazali's emphasis on the Quranic verse commanding Muslims to
"enjoy the good and forbid the bad" (amr bil ma'ruf wa nahy 'ani
al-munkar), an attitude that allied him with the Almohad Sidi Mohammed
al-Mahdi ibn Tumart (d. 524/1130), who was similarly expelled from Fez for
preaching his doctrine.
At-Tadili reports that
Ibn Nahwi even went so far to write a letter to the Sultan disputing the
order to burn the Ihya'. When sympathetic jurists in Fez informed him that
Ali ibn Yusuf had ordered the Sufis to publicly swear that they did not
possess any copies of the condemned book, he issued a fatwa in which he
claimed that the Sultan's command was not legally binding. By asserting
that Ali ibn Yusuf's order did not reflect the unanimous opinion (ijma') of
the ulama, he was treading on a dangerous ground, for his fatwa implied
that the Sultan's decree was fasid, illegitimate.
This isolation felt by
Ibn Nahwi as the proponent of an innovative doctrine is unreceptive
environment is poignantly evoked in the following lines of poetry,
I Have fallen among
those who have religion without manners,
And those who have
manners [but are] devoid of religion
I have fallen among
them—an isolated species—alone,
Like the verse of
Hassan in the compendium of Sahnoun
Ibn Nahwi was not
content, however, with writing bitter lines of poetry. He actively promoted
the teaching of usul throughout Morocco and spoke out against the
injustices that, in his opinion, arose from a lack of concern for the
Prophetic Sunna. Even his opponents accorded him a reluctant respect for
his persistence and stubbornly held convictions. A common saying in the
twelfth-century Fez was: "I seek refuge in God from the curse of Ibn
Nahwi!" to illustrate the truth of this saying, at-Tadili reports that
when Ibn Nahwi lived in Sijilmasa he stayed at a certain mosque, where he
taught usul al-fiqh.
One day an official
notary ('adil) passed by the door to the mosque and asked, "What is
the discipline that this person is teaching?" When told that Ibn Nahwi
was conducting lessons on the scripturally passed sources of jurisprudence,
the notary, who followed only the early unreformed-Maliki tradition,
replied derisively, "How is this one allowed to teach us subjects we
do not know of?" and ordered the Shaykh to be thrown out of the
mosque. Before leaving, Ibn Nahwi rose to his feet and said to his
tormentor, "You killed knowledge. Now God will kill you in this very
place!" The next day, when the man went to the mosque in order to
notarise a marriage contract, he was killed by a tribesman whose clan was
feuding with his own.
Ibn Nahwi is best
remembered for his poem named al-Munfarija (She who liberates), a quite
popular supplication in verse (jimiyya), which substituted the Munfarija of
al-Ghazali and defeated the one of the Qadiri master Sidi Mohammed Ibn
Yajbash at-Tazi (d. 920/1505). Al-Munfarija was welcomed by the masses as
well as by the Sufis of Morocco who turned it a piece of supplication and
invocation in their lodgings. Many ulama and Sufis in the Arab world wrote
commentaries on al-Munfarija, from whom we mention Sidi Abul Abbas Naqwasi,
Sidi Zakariyya al-Ansari, and Sidi Ahmed ibn Ajiba Hassani (d. 1224/1809)
http://sajadaliuk.blogspot.com/2012/10/ibn-nahwi-and-qasidah-al-munfarijah.html
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