Mahmud Nedim Pasha
Mahmud Nedim Pasha (1817-1883). Ottoman bureaucrat and Grand Vizier. In 1872, he was dismissed from the Grand Vizierate by Sultan Abdul-aziz as a result of Midhat Pasha’s energetic representation to the sultan about the harm he was causing. In 1875, he was re-installed as Grand Vizier to be dismissed again in 1876.
Mahmud Nedim Pasha was the son of Nejib Pasha, a former governor-general of Baghdad. After occupying various subordinate posts at the Porte he became undersecretary of state for foreign affairs, governor-general of Syria and Smyrna, minister of commerce, and governor-general of Tripoli; minister successively of justice and of marine (1869); grand vizier from 1871 to 1872 and from 1875 to 1876.
He was high in favor with Sultan Abdul Aziz and fell under the influence of General Ignatiev, the forceful Russian ambassador before the war of 1877-78. Mahmud's subserviency to Russia earned for him the nickname of "Nedimoff." Mahmud's administration was unsuccessful from every point of view, and he was largely responsible for the issue of the decree suspending the interest on the Turkish funds. He was also minister of the interior from 1879 to 1883.
Nedim, Mahmud see Mahmud Nedim Pasha
Nedimoff see Mahmud Nedim Pasha
Mahmud Nedim Pasha (1817-1883). Ottoman bureaucrat and Grand Vizier. In 1872, he was dismissed from the Grand Vizierate by Sultan Abdul-aziz as a result of Midhat Pasha’s energetic representation to the sultan about the harm he was causing. In 1875, he was re-installed as Grand Vizier to be dismissed again in 1876.
Mahmud Nedim Pasha was the son of Nejib Pasha, a former governor-general of Baghdad. After occupying various subordinate posts at the Porte he became undersecretary of state for foreign affairs, governor-general of Syria and Smyrna, minister of commerce, and governor-general of Tripoli; minister successively of justice and of marine (1869); grand vizier from 1871 to 1872 and from 1875 to 1876.
He was high in favor with Sultan Abdul Aziz and fell under the influence of General Ignatiev, the forceful Russian ambassador before the war of 1877-78. Mahmud's subserviency to Russia earned for him the nickname of "Nedimoff." Mahmud's administration was unsuccessful from every point of view, and he was largely responsible for the issue of the decree suspending the interest on the Turkish funds. He was also minister of the interior from 1879 to 1883.
Nedim, Mahmud see Mahmud Nedim Pasha
Nedimoff see Mahmud Nedim Pasha
Mahmud Pasha
Mahmud Pasha (d. 1474). Ottoman Grand Vizier. He took part in the siege of Istanbul and accompanied Sultan Muhammad II on several of his campaigns.
Mahmud Pasha (d. 1474). Ottoman Grand Vizier. He took part in the siege of Istanbul and accompanied Sultan Muhammad II on several of his campaigns.
Mahmud Riayat Syah III
Mahmud Riayat Syah III (1759-1812). Sultan of Johor (r. 1761-1812). His election was forced upon the Malays, who preferred a mature candidate, by the Bugis faction, which dominated Johor until it was driven out by Dutch forces in 1784. Mahmud found that in exchange for Dutch support he had to yield to the occupation, and consequent stultification, of Riau. He temporarily overcame the Dutch with the help of Illanun pirates in 1787 but was then forced to fell Riau to avoid Dutch retribution. Refused help by the English, he attempted to unite all Malay and Bugis against the Europeans but without success. The Napoleonic wars caused the Dutch to leave Riau in 1795, and the Bugis and Malays returned, along with their quarrel. On Mahmud’s death in 1812 the throne again became a bone of contention, as, perhaps intentionally, he had not clearly specified which of his two sons was his heir and had given one to each faction to raise. The Bugis again forced the success of their candidate, but the confusion was sufficient to give the English the opportunity to seize Singapore.
Mahmud Riayat Syah III (1759-1812). Sultan of Johor (r. 1761-1812). His election was forced upon the Malays, who preferred a mature candidate, by the Bugis faction, which dominated Johor until it was driven out by Dutch forces in 1784. Mahmud found that in exchange for Dutch support he had to yield to the occupation, and consequent stultification, of Riau. He temporarily overcame the Dutch with the help of Illanun pirates in 1787 but was then forced to fell Riau to avoid Dutch retribution. Refused help by the English, he attempted to unite all Malay and Bugis against the Europeans but without success. The Napoleonic wars caused the Dutch to leave Riau in 1795, and the Bugis and Malays returned, along with their quarrel. On Mahmud’s death in 1812 the throne again became a bone of contention, as, perhaps intentionally, he had not clearly specified which of his two sons was his heir and had given one to each faction to raise. The Bugis again forced the success of their candidate, but the confusion was sufficient to give the English the opportunity to seize Singapore.
Mahmud Shabistari
Mahmud Shabistari (1287/1288 - 1320/1340). Persian mystic and writer. His fame rests entirely on his poem in rhyming couplets, called The Secret Rose Garden.
Mahmud Shabistari was one of the most celebrated Persian Sufi poets of the 14th century. He was born in the town of Shabestar near Tabriz, where he received his education. He became deeply versed in the symbolic terminology of Ibn Arabi. He wrote during a period of Mongol invasions.
His most famous work is a mystic text called The Secret Rose Garden (Gulishan-i Rāz) written about 1311 in rhyming couplets (Mathnawi). This poem was written in response to seventeen queries concerning Sufi metaphysics posed to "the Sufi literati of Tabriz" by Rukh Al Din Amir Husayn Harawi (d. 1318). It was also the main reference used by François Bernier when explaining Sufism to his European friends (in: Lettre sur le Quietisme des Indes; 1688)
Other works include The Book of Felicity (Sa'adat-nāma) and The Truth of Certainty about the Knowledge of the Lord of the Worlds (Ḥaqq al-yaqīn fi ma'rifat rabb al-'alamīn). The former is regarded as a relatively unknown poetic masterpiece written in khafif meter, while the later is his lone work of prose.
Shabistari, Mahmud see Mahmud Shabistari
Mahmud Shabistari (1287/1288 - 1320/1340). Persian mystic and writer. His fame rests entirely on his poem in rhyming couplets, called The Secret Rose Garden.
Mahmud Shabistari was one of the most celebrated Persian Sufi poets of the 14th century. He was born in the town of Shabestar near Tabriz, where he received his education. He became deeply versed in the symbolic terminology of Ibn Arabi. He wrote during a period of Mongol invasions.
His most famous work is a mystic text called The Secret Rose Garden (Gulishan-i Rāz) written about 1311 in rhyming couplets (Mathnawi). This poem was written in response to seventeen queries concerning Sufi metaphysics posed to "the Sufi literati of Tabriz" by Rukh Al Din Amir Husayn Harawi (d. 1318). It was also the main reference used by François Bernier when explaining Sufism to his European friends (in: Lettre sur le Quietisme des Indes; 1688)
Other works include The Book of Felicity (Sa'adat-nāma) and The Truth of Certainty about the Knowledge of the Lord of the Worlds (Ḥaqq al-yaqīn fi ma'rifat rabb al-'alamīn). The former is regarded as a relatively unknown poetic masterpiece written in khafif meter, while the later is his lone work of prose.
Shabistari, Mahmud see Mahmud Shabistari
Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Mahmud Shewqat Pasha (Mahmud Sevket Pasha) (1856- June 11, 1913). Ottoman general, war minister and Grand Vizier. He was one of the most important military political figures of the Young Turk period.
Mahmud Shewqat Pasha was born in Baghdad. He played important roles in ending the 31 March Incident and the reign of Abdul Hamid II. He served as a Grand Vizier to Mehmed V, between January 23, 1913, and June 11, 1913, when he was assassinated in Istanbul.
Mahmud Sevket Pasha see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Sevket, Mahmud see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Shewqat, Mahmud see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Mahmud Shewqat Pasha (Mahmud Sevket Pasha) (1856- June 11, 1913). Ottoman general, war minister and Grand Vizier. He was one of the most important military political figures of the Young Turk period.
Mahmud Shewqat Pasha was born in Baghdad. He played important roles in ending the 31 March Incident and the reign of Abdul Hamid II. He served as a Grand Vizier to Mehmed V, between January 23, 1913, and June 11, 1913, when he was assassinated in Istanbul.
Mahmud Sevket Pasha see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Sevket, Mahmud see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Shewqat, Mahmud see Mahmud Shewqat Pasha
Mahmud Syah II
Mahmud Syah II (Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah) (1675 - September 3, 1699). Sultan of Johor (1685-1699). Mahmud Syah was unstable and sadistic. His irresponsible behavior did much to destroy in a short period the carefully nurtured prosperity that had come to Johor in the late seventeenth century with the decline of Aceh and Melaka. His behavior led to his murder, apparently with the collusion of the Orang Kaya -- a radical course of action in a Malay court, which held no crime more heinous than murder. He left no heirs and was the last Johor sultan who could claim direct descent from the Melaka sultans.
Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah was the 10th Sultan of Johor, Pahang and Lingga (1685 - September 3,1699).
Born in 1675, he was the last in line of a dynasty of the Sultanate of Johor (founded by his grandfather, Sultan Alauddin Ri'ayat Shah II) descended from the Sultans of Melaka (Malacca). As he was still a young boy when his father Sultan Ibrahim died (16th of February,1685), Sultan Mahmud II reigned under the joint regency of his mother and the Bendahara Paduka Raja until the death of the latter (July 27, 1697).
He had several wives and is said to have slain any of them to have the misfortune of becoming pregnant. Perhaps this could have been the result of his fear that the birth of a son would enable rivals to depose him. After all, he himself came to power at a young age through a palace conspiracy that led to the poisoning of his father Sultan Ibrahim by his wives. Sultan Mahmud Shah II is famously known as "Sultan Mahmud Mangkat Dijulang". The name Mangkat Dijulang was given in remembrance of the way he was killed (mangkat being the Malay word referring specifically to a royal death) while being carried (dijulang) in a royal litter or dais. On his way back from Friday prayers, he was assassinated by one of his military chiefs, Laksamana Megat Sri Rama (hailing from Bintan). The famous legend behind the murder of Sultan Mahmud Shah II is recounted in the 19th century Malay chronicle, the Tuhfat al-Nafis. Based on this story, he is mostly remembered for his decadence and cruelty, marking a shameful end to his dynasty.
Sultan Mahmud was buried in a village near Kota Tinggi in Johor, which is still known today as Kampung Makam (Village of the Tomb).
After Mahmud's death, his Bendahara (chief minister) Abdul Jalil declared himself the next Sultan of Johor. Upon ascending the throne, the new Sultan (Abdul Jalil IV) killed all the wives of Sultan Mahmud in order to avoid the possibility of any future claims to the throne. However, according to the Hikayat Negeri Johor (Chronicles of the State of Johor) and the Pahang Manuscripts, one wife, Che Mi, managed to escape to Minangkabau and gave birth to Raja Kechil. Less than two decades later in 1717, Raja Kechil would assemble a fleet from Minangkabau and succeed temporarily in ousting Sultan Abdul Jalil's successor Sultan Sulaiman and gain the Johor Sultanate, basing his legitimacy on the claim that he was the posthumous son of Sultan Mahmud Shah II. However, Bugis mercenaries that assisted him in this campaign changed sides and he was eventually forced to flee to Siak, where he founded a new Sultanate.
The legend of Sultan Mahmud II is recounted in a 1959 Malay film written by the famous Malay film star P. Ramlee as well as a 1961 Malay film directed by K. M. Basker.
Syah, Mahmud see Mahmud Syah II
Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah see Mahmud Syah II
Sultan Mahmud Mangkat Dijulang see Mahmud Syah II
Mahmud Syah II (Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah) (1675 - September 3, 1699). Sultan of Johor (1685-1699). Mahmud Syah was unstable and sadistic. His irresponsible behavior did much to destroy in a short period the carefully nurtured prosperity that had come to Johor in the late seventeenth century with the decline of Aceh and Melaka. His behavior led to his murder, apparently with the collusion of the Orang Kaya -- a radical course of action in a Malay court, which held no crime more heinous than murder. He left no heirs and was the last Johor sultan who could claim direct descent from the Melaka sultans.
Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah was the 10th Sultan of Johor, Pahang and Lingga (1685 - September 3,1699).
Born in 1675, he was the last in line of a dynasty of the Sultanate of Johor (founded by his grandfather, Sultan Alauddin Ri'ayat Shah II) descended from the Sultans of Melaka (Malacca). As he was still a young boy when his father Sultan Ibrahim died (16th of February,1685), Sultan Mahmud II reigned under the joint regency of his mother and the Bendahara Paduka Raja until the death of the latter (July 27, 1697).
He had several wives and is said to have slain any of them to have the misfortune of becoming pregnant. Perhaps this could have been the result of his fear that the birth of a son would enable rivals to depose him. After all, he himself came to power at a young age through a palace conspiracy that led to the poisoning of his father Sultan Ibrahim by his wives. Sultan Mahmud Shah II is famously known as "Sultan Mahmud Mangkat Dijulang". The name Mangkat Dijulang was given in remembrance of the way he was killed (mangkat being the Malay word referring specifically to a royal death) while being carried (dijulang) in a royal litter or dais. On his way back from Friday prayers, he was assassinated by one of his military chiefs, Laksamana Megat Sri Rama (hailing from Bintan). The famous legend behind the murder of Sultan Mahmud Shah II is recounted in the 19th century Malay chronicle, the Tuhfat al-Nafis. Based on this story, he is mostly remembered for his decadence and cruelty, marking a shameful end to his dynasty.
Sultan Mahmud was buried in a village near Kota Tinggi in Johor, which is still known today as Kampung Makam (Village of the Tomb).
After Mahmud's death, his Bendahara (chief minister) Abdul Jalil declared himself the next Sultan of Johor. Upon ascending the throne, the new Sultan (Abdul Jalil IV) killed all the wives of Sultan Mahmud in order to avoid the possibility of any future claims to the throne. However, according to the Hikayat Negeri Johor (Chronicles of the State of Johor) and the Pahang Manuscripts, one wife, Che Mi, managed to escape to Minangkabau and gave birth to Raja Kechil. Less than two decades later in 1717, Raja Kechil would assemble a fleet from Minangkabau and succeed temporarily in ousting Sultan Abdul Jalil's successor Sultan Sulaiman and gain the Johor Sultanate, basing his legitimacy on the claim that he was the posthumous son of Sultan Mahmud Shah II. However, Bugis mercenaries that assisted him in this campaign changed sides and he was eventually forced to flee to Siak, where he founded a new Sultanate.
The legend of Sultan Mahmud II is recounted in a 1959 Malay film written by the famous Malay film star P. Ramlee as well as a 1961 Malay film directed by K. M. Basker.
Syah, Mahmud see Mahmud Syah II
Mahmud Shah II ibni al-Marhum Sultan Ibrahim Shah see Mahmud Syah II
Sultan Mahmud Mangkat Dijulang see Mahmud Syah II
Mahmud Taymur
Mahmud Taymur (1894-1973). Egyptian writer. His prolific output includes novels and short stories, theatrical pieces, accounts of journeys, articles and various studies, in particular relating to Arabic language and literature.
Taymur, Mahmud see Mahmud Taymur
Mahmud Taymur (1894-1973). Egyptian writer. His prolific output includes novels and short stories, theatrical pieces, accounts of journeys, articles and various studies, in particular relating to Arabic language and literature.
Taymur, Mahmud see Mahmud Taymur
Mahmud Yalawac
Mahmud Yalawac (d. 1254). Minister in Central Asia and China. The Mongol Great Khan Ogedey appointed him governor of Beijing, an office confirmed by the Great Khans Guyuk and Mongke.
Yalawac, Mahmud see Mahmud Yalawac
Mahmud Yalawac (d. 1254). Minister in Central Asia and China. The Mongol Great Khan Ogedey appointed him governor of Beijing, an office confirmed by the Great Khans Guyuk and Mongke.
Yalawac, Mahmud see Mahmud Yalawac
Mahra
Mahra. Tribe living in the southeastern part of the Arabian Peninsula, in a stretch of land along the coast of the Indian Ocean between Hadhramaut and Oman, and in the hinterland belonging to that region.
The Mahra Sultanate was a sultanate that included both the historical region of Mahra and the Indian Ocean island of Socotra in what is now eastern Yemen. It was ruled by the Banu Afrar dynasty and is sometimes called Mahra State in English.
The capitals of Mahra were Qishn in Mahra and Tamrida (Hadiboh) on Socotra. During 1886, the sultanate became a British protectorate and later became a part of the Aden Protectorate. In the 1960s, Mahra declined to join the Federation of South Arabia but remained under British protection as part of the Protectorate of South Arabia. In 1967, the sultanate was abolished and Mahra became part of newly independent South Yemen which united with North Yemen in 1990 to become the Republic of Yemen. Today the Mahra area (without Socotra) is the Al Mahrah Governorate of Yemen.
The Mahra Sultanate of Qishn and Socotra (Arabic: Salṭanat Mahrah fī Qishn wa Suquṭrah) or sometimes the Mahra Sultanate of Ghayda and Socotra (Arabic: Salṭanat Mahrah fī-l Ghayḍā’ wa Suquṭrah]) was a sultanate that included both the historical region of Mahra and the Indian Ocean island of Socotra in what is now eastern Yemen.
The capitals of Mahra were Qishn in Mahra and Tamrida (Hadiboh) on Socotra. During 1886, the sultanate became a British protectorate and later became a part of the Aden Protectorate. In the 1960s, Mahra declined to join the Federation of South Arabia but remained under British protection as part of the Protectorate of South Arabia. In 1967, the sultanate was abolished and Mahra became part of newly independent South Yemen which united with North Yemen in 1990 to become the Republic of Yemen. Today the Mahra area (without Socotra) is the Al Mahrah Governorate of Yemen.
In addition to Arabic, Mehri, a Modern South Arabian language is spoken in Mahra. Mahra shares with the neighboring Dhofar in Oman cultural treats such as the modern South Arabian language spoken, the importance of frankincense and geographic and climatic ties as well, which distinguish these regions from the desert surrounding them, mostly due to the beneficial action of the khareef monsoon.
The Mahra are a Jat clan, found in the Punjab province of Pakistan. According to their traditions, they were originally Mughal, and settled near Delhi. About 10 or 12 generations ago, the whole tribe was exterminated with the exception of a boy who was found lying among the slain, hence the name Mara (which means the dead in the local Saraiki language). He and his descendants then migrated to the banks of the Indus River. By contracting marriages with the local Jat community, they also became Jat. They are a Saraiki speaking community.
The Mahra are found mainly in Dera Ghazi Khan, Multan, Muzaffargarh and Layyah districts of Punjab.
Their main villages include Kot Mahra in Multan District, Bahadur Mahra, Mahra Faraz and Mahra Sharqi in Muzaffargarh District
Mahra. Tribe living in the southeastern part of the Arabian Peninsula, in a stretch of land along the coast of the Indian Ocean between Hadhramaut and Oman, and in the hinterland belonging to that region.
The Mahra Sultanate was a sultanate that included both the historical region of Mahra and the Indian Ocean island of Socotra in what is now eastern Yemen. It was ruled by the Banu Afrar dynasty and is sometimes called Mahra State in English.
The capitals of Mahra were Qishn in Mahra and Tamrida (Hadiboh) on Socotra. During 1886, the sultanate became a British protectorate and later became a part of the Aden Protectorate. In the 1960s, Mahra declined to join the Federation of South Arabia but remained under British protection as part of the Protectorate of South Arabia. In 1967, the sultanate was abolished and Mahra became part of newly independent South Yemen which united with North Yemen in 1990 to become the Republic of Yemen. Today the Mahra area (without Socotra) is the Al Mahrah Governorate of Yemen.
The Mahra Sultanate of Qishn and Socotra (Arabic: Salṭanat Mahrah fī Qishn wa Suquṭrah) or sometimes the Mahra Sultanate of Ghayda and Socotra (Arabic: Salṭanat Mahrah fī-l Ghayḍā’ wa Suquṭrah]) was a sultanate that included both the historical region of Mahra and the Indian Ocean island of Socotra in what is now eastern Yemen.
The capitals of Mahra were Qishn in Mahra and Tamrida (Hadiboh) on Socotra. During 1886, the sultanate became a British protectorate and later became a part of the Aden Protectorate. In the 1960s, Mahra declined to join the Federation of South Arabia but remained under British protection as part of the Protectorate of South Arabia. In 1967, the sultanate was abolished and Mahra became part of newly independent South Yemen which united with North Yemen in 1990 to become the Republic of Yemen. Today the Mahra area (without Socotra) is the Al Mahrah Governorate of Yemen.
In addition to Arabic, Mehri, a Modern South Arabian language is spoken in Mahra. Mahra shares with the neighboring Dhofar in Oman cultural treats such as the modern South Arabian language spoken, the importance of frankincense and geographic and climatic ties as well, which distinguish these regions from the desert surrounding them, mostly due to the beneficial action of the khareef monsoon.
The Mahra are a Jat clan, found in the Punjab province of Pakistan. According to their traditions, they were originally Mughal, and settled near Delhi. About 10 or 12 generations ago, the whole tribe was exterminated with the exception of a boy who was found lying among the slain, hence the name Mara (which means the dead in the local Saraiki language). He and his descendants then migrated to the banks of the Indus River. By contracting marriages with the local Jat community, they also became Jat. They are a Saraiki speaking community.
The Mahra are found mainly in Dera Ghazi Khan, Multan, Muzaffargarh and Layyah districts of Punjab.
Their main villages include Kot Mahra in Multan District, Bahadur Mahra, Mahra Faraz and Mahra Sharqi in Muzaffargarh District
Mahsati
Mahsati (Mahsati Ganjavi) (b. c. 1089, Ganja — c. 1159). Persian female poet who lived sometime between the eleventh and twelfth centuries. An original collection of her quatrains is not known to exist. The current collections of her poetry are modern compilations from many different sources. Usually, she is represented as a singer, a musician and a court poet.
Mahsati is a compound of two words "Maah" (Moon) and "Sati" (Lady) and the name appears in the works of Saadi, Nizami, and Sanai. As an eminent poetess, she was composer of quatrains (ruba'is). Originated from Ganja, she was said to have associated with both Omar Khayyam and Nizami. She is also said to have been a companion of Sultan Sanjar. Her alleged free way of living and peddled verses stamped her as a Persian Madame Sans-Gene. Her purported love affairs are recounted in the works of Jauhari of Bukhara.
No details about her life are documented except that she was born in Ganja and was highly esteemed at the court of Sultan Sanjar of the Seljuk dynasty. She is said to have attracted the notice and gained the favor of Sanjar by the following verse, which she extemporized one evening when the King, on going out from his audience-hall to mount his horse found that a sudden fall of snow had covered the ground.
It is also known that Mahsati was persecuted for her courageous poetry condemning religious obscurantism, fanaticism, and dogmas. Her only works that have come down to us are philosophical and love quatrains (rubaiyat), glorifying the joy of living and the fullness of love.
About 200 works of Mahsati remain. A monument to Mahsati was erected in Ganja in 1980.
Mahsati Ganjavi see Mahsati
Ganjavi, Mahsati see Mahsati
Mahsati (Mahsati Ganjavi) (b. c. 1089, Ganja — c. 1159). Persian female poet who lived sometime between the eleventh and twelfth centuries. An original collection of her quatrains is not known to exist. The current collections of her poetry are modern compilations from many different sources. Usually, she is represented as a singer, a musician and a court poet.
Mahsati is a compound of two words "Maah" (Moon) and "Sati" (Lady) and the name appears in the works of Saadi, Nizami, and Sanai. As an eminent poetess, she was composer of quatrains (ruba'is). Originated from Ganja, she was said to have associated with both Omar Khayyam and Nizami. She is also said to have been a companion of Sultan Sanjar. Her alleged free way of living and peddled verses stamped her as a Persian Madame Sans-Gene. Her purported love affairs are recounted in the works of Jauhari of Bukhara.
No details about her life are documented except that she was born in Ganja and was highly esteemed at the court of Sultan Sanjar of the Seljuk dynasty. She is said to have attracted the notice and gained the favor of Sanjar by the following verse, which she extemporized one evening when the King, on going out from his audience-hall to mount his horse found that a sudden fall of snow had covered the ground.
It is also known that Mahsati was persecuted for her courageous poetry condemning religious obscurantism, fanaticism, and dogmas. Her only works that have come down to us are philosophical and love quatrains (rubaiyat), glorifying the joy of living and the fullness of love.
About 200 works of Mahsati remain. A monument to Mahsati was erected in Ganja in 1980.
Mahsati Ganjavi see Mahsati
Ganjavi, Mahsati see Mahsati
Mahsud
Mahsud (Masood) (Mahsood) (Masud) (Maseed) . Pathan (Pashtun) tribe on the northwest frontier of Pakistan. In British Indian times, they were the fiercest opponents of British rule.
The Mahsud tribe lives in the very center of Waziristan, Pakistan. They are divided into three great clans namely Alizai, Bahlolzai, and Shaman Khel.
In 1860, 3000 Mahsud tribesmen attacked the British regiment base in Tank (in present day Waziristan). The British struggled to defeat them.
In 1897, Mahsud tribesmen again stood up against the British all the way from Chitral to Quetta and the British experienced difficulty while engaging them. It was during this time that the name of Mullah Powindah emerged. Over time, Mullah Powindah grew more popular and famous. He emerged as a legendary figure among the people of the region and beyond.
In 1907, the Wazir and Mahsud tribesmen were blocked from entry into any government controlled territory. Economic sanctions were placed on them so that even basic amenities such as food and medicine could be blocked from going into their hands. Various areas were searched to arrest Mullah Powindah but to no avail.
Mullah Powindah died in 1913. Upon his death, his son Shah Fazal Din was given leadership and his son-in-law, Mulla Abdul Hakeem, was appointed his adviser.
When the First World War began, the English were concerned that they would be engaged in battle on more than one front. This was a threat to their safety and economy so they decided to close fronts of lesser significance. The British abandoned their "Forward Policy" and sent a message of friendship and peace to the tribes. The tribes did not trust the British and rejected these peace proposals. Instead, the Mahsuds put in place a Lashkar to attack the British.
At this time, the British had established an airforce in the subcontinent which was used to harass the tribesmen and as a result the tribe's hatred of the British increased. Due to their sufferings, they were bent upon taking revenge and hence their morale increased. a series of attacks were made by the Mahsuds inflicting heavy losses on the enemy. An attack on the Marhatta Regiment resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Sepoys and five British officers. In the attack on the Punjab Regiment, Ghazis slaughtered everyone. the aerial bombardments had inflicted significant losses on the tribesmen but they were content that they were also doing well and had killed around 250 of the enemy forces.
After the end of the First World War, the British returned to Waziristan. This time, they constructed an airport in Razmak. Instead of flying all the way from India, their aircraft would fly from Razmak Airport and bomb the countryside. Because of this, the countryside of Makin was totally devastated. The Mahsuds deemed it appropriate to agree to a ceasefire because this tactic adopted by the British was inflicting wide scale losses on their side. The ceasefire would also enable them to devise a strategy of how to counter the latest British advances.
In 1925, the Royal Air Force successfully put down a Mahsud rebellion by strafing the tribes' mountain strongholds. The action, which came to be known as Pink's War led to the tribal leaders seeking peace terms.
After independence, many social, economic and demographic changes occurred in Wazaristan. A large number of Mahsuds joined mainstream Pakistani society. When the Hindu traders of Tank left after the Partition of India in 1947, most of their shops were taken over by Mahsuds. Now Mahsuds are employed in the militia and regular army, state bureaucracy, and involved in business all around the country. Many of them are now living far away from their native lands.
Immediately after independence, Mahsuds raised a tribal lashkar which entered Kashmir. They quickly reached the outskirts of Srinagar defeating the Maharaja's troops.
Historically, the Wazirs and Mahsuds always looked toward Afghanistan as their home, and throughout the British Colonial period, they supported Afghan kings in their wars against the British. On many occasions, the Afghan throne was saved with the help of the Mahsuds and Wazirs from Waziristan. Of those who fought during this time, most of them came back to their homeland, but those who stayed were given high ranks of office such as Faiz Muhammad Mahsud who later became equivalent to the title of prime minister during the 1970s. The majority are still in the province of Logar with the title of Waziri, but by caste, they are Mahsuds. The majority of these are Manzai with a sub-caste of Dramankel, Faridi, and others. When the Soviet-Afghan War started, some of these families came back to Waziristan but could not stay there, so they moved to cities like Peshawar and Karachi.
Masood see Mahsud
Mahsood see Mahsud
Masud see Mahsud
Maseed see Mahsud
Mahsud (Masood) (Mahsood) (Masud) (Maseed) . Pathan (Pashtun) tribe on the northwest frontier of Pakistan. In British Indian times, they were the fiercest opponents of British rule.
The Mahsud tribe lives in the very center of Waziristan, Pakistan. They are divided into three great clans namely Alizai, Bahlolzai, and Shaman Khel.
In 1860, 3000 Mahsud tribesmen attacked the British regiment base in Tank (in present day Waziristan). The British struggled to defeat them.
In 1897, Mahsud tribesmen again stood up against the British all the way from Chitral to Quetta and the British experienced difficulty while engaging them. It was during this time that the name of Mullah Powindah emerged. Over time, Mullah Powindah grew more popular and famous. He emerged as a legendary figure among the people of the region and beyond.
In 1907, the Wazir and Mahsud tribesmen were blocked from entry into any government controlled territory. Economic sanctions were placed on them so that even basic amenities such as food and medicine could be blocked from going into their hands. Various areas were searched to arrest Mullah Powindah but to no avail.
Mullah Powindah died in 1913. Upon his death, his son Shah Fazal Din was given leadership and his son-in-law, Mulla Abdul Hakeem, was appointed his adviser.
When the First World War began, the English were concerned that they would be engaged in battle on more than one front. This was a threat to their safety and economy so they decided to close fronts of lesser significance. The British abandoned their "Forward Policy" and sent a message of friendship and peace to the tribes. The tribes did not trust the British and rejected these peace proposals. Instead, the Mahsuds put in place a Lashkar to attack the British.
At this time, the British had established an airforce in the subcontinent which was used to harass the tribesmen and as a result the tribe's hatred of the British increased. Due to their sufferings, they were bent upon taking revenge and hence their morale increased. a series of attacks were made by the Mahsuds inflicting heavy losses on the enemy. An attack on the Marhatta Regiment resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Sepoys and five British officers. In the attack on the Punjab Regiment, Ghazis slaughtered everyone. the aerial bombardments had inflicted significant losses on the tribesmen but they were content that they were also doing well and had killed around 250 of the enemy forces.
After the end of the First World War, the British returned to Waziristan. This time, they constructed an airport in Razmak. Instead of flying all the way from India, their aircraft would fly from Razmak Airport and bomb the countryside. Because of this, the countryside of Makin was totally devastated. The Mahsuds deemed it appropriate to agree to a ceasefire because this tactic adopted by the British was inflicting wide scale losses on their side. The ceasefire would also enable them to devise a strategy of how to counter the latest British advances.
In 1925, the Royal Air Force successfully put down a Mahsud rebellion by strafing the tribes' mountain strongholds. The action, which came to be known as Pink's War led to the tribal leaders seeking peace terms.
After independence, many social, economic and demographic changes occurred in Wazaristan. A large number of Mahsuds joined mainstream Pakistani society. When the Hindu traders of Tank left after the Partition of India in 1947, most of their shops were taken over by Mahsuds. Now Mahsuds are employed in the militia and regular army, state bureaucracy, and involved in business all around the country. Many of them are now living far away from their native lands.
Immediately after independence, Mahsuds raised a tribal lashkar which entered Kashmir. They quickly reached the outskirts of Srinagar defeating the Maharaja's troops.
Historically, the Wazirs and Mahsuds always looked toward Afghanistan as their home, and throughout the British Colonial period, they supported Afghan kings in their wars against the British. On many occasions, the Afghan throne was saved with the help of the Mahsuds and Wazirs from Waziristan. Of those who fought during this time, most of them came back to their homeland, but those who stayed were given high ranks of office such as Faiz Muhammad Mahsud who later became equivalent to the title of prime minister during the 1970s. The majority are still in the province of Logar with the title of Waziri, but by caste, they are Mahsuds. The majority of these are Manzai with a sub-caste of Dramankel, Faridi, and others. When the Soviet-Afghan War started, some of these families came back to Waziristan but could not stay there, so they moved to cities like Peshawar and Karachi.
Masood see Mahsud
Mahsood see Mahsud
Masud see Mahsud
Maseed see Mahsud
Ma Hua-lung
Ma Hua-lung (Ma Ch’ao-ching) (Ma Hualong) (d. March 2, 1871). Chinese Muslim leader. He was an exponent of the “New Teaching,” a neo-orthodox reformist movement in Chinese Islam that originated in northwest China in the latter half of the eighteenth century. He played an important part in the great mid-nineteenth century Muslim uprisings against the Ch’ing dynasty. Ma led a rebellion in Kansu and Shessi from 1862 to 1877 and tried to establish a Muslim state.
Ma Hualong was the fifth leader (jiaozhu) of the Jahriyya, a Sufi order (menhuan) in northwestern China. From the beginning of the anti-Qing Muslim Rebellion in 1862, and until his surrender and death in 1871, he was one of the main leaders of the rebellion.
Ma Hualong became the leader of the Jahriyya around 1849, succeeding the menhuan's fourth shaykh, Ma Yide (late 1770s - 1849). Although the Jahriyya had been originally created by Ma Mingxin in the central Gansu, by the time of Ma Hualong's succession to the leadership position the order was centered in the northern Ningxia (which in the 19th century was also part of Gansu Province), its headquarters being located in Jinjipu, a few kilometers south from today's Wuzhong City. The town of Jinjipu became an important religious and commercial center, and the menhuan's leaders grew wealthy thanks to the order's profitable participation in the caravan trade across Inner Mongolia, between Baotou, Huhhot and Beijing.
Since the beginning of the Muslim Rebellion in 1862, Ma Hualong was based at the Jahriyya headquarters in Jinjipu. The area of his direct influence included the Jahriyya-heavy eastern parts of the 19th-century Gansu Province, i.e. today's Ningxia and easternmost sections of today's Gansu. While the rebels elsewhere within the 19th-century borders of Gansu had their own leaders - notably, Ma Zhan'ao in Hezhou (now Linxia), Ma Guiyuan in Xining, and Ma Wenlu in Suzhou (Jiuquan), who, in the view of modern historians, were acting essentially independent from each other, there were Jahriyya members (all owing allegiance to Ma Hualong) participating in the rebellion throughout the region.
At some points during the rebellion, Ma Hualong negotiated with the authorities, and at least once he even surrendered, taking a new name, "Ma Chaoqing" ("one who attends on the Qing"). However, instead of disbanding his militias, he continued fortifying Jinjipu, and collaborating with the rebels who had retreated to Gansu from Shaanxi.
Ma was besieged in Jinjipu in July 1869 by the Qing forces led by General Zuo Zongtang. After fortifications outside of the town itself had been captured by the government troops, and starvation started inside the walls, Ma Hualong surrendered in January 1871, hoping to spare the lives of his people. However, once Zuo's troops entered Jinjipu, a massacre followed, with over a thousand people losing their lives. and the town being destroyed.
Existing accounts on Ma Hualong's death differ. It is likely that he was executed on Zuo's orders on March 2, 1871, along with his son Ma Yaobang and over eighty rebel officials (supposedly, Zuo sentenced them to death by slicing), although it was said by some that he had been murdered by a traitor from within his own ranks.
Few of Ma Hualong's family survived the massacre at Jinjipu. Two of his grandsons, Ma Jincheng and Ma Jinxi, were sentenced to castration upon reaching the age of 12. Ma Jincheng ended his days as a eunuch slave in Kaifeng in 1890, although the new Jahriyya leader, Ma Yuanzhang (the 1850s - 1920), managed to secretly provide him with some support until his death. The younger grandson, Ma Jinxi, was spirited away, intact, from his Xi'an confinement by Ma Yuanzhang, and was hidden at a Hui household in Hangzhou.
Many years later, Ma Yuanzhang managed to obtain a pardon for Ma Jinxi, and Ma Hualong's grandson returned to Ningxia. A split within the Jahriyya followed, with some members becoming followers of Ma Jinxi, and others holding for Ma Yuanzhang (who claimed descent from the order's founder Ma Mingxin, and was also related to Ma Hualong's family through his marriage).
According to Jahriyya adherents in Ningxia, Ma Hualong's grave is in Dongta Town, which now is a suburb of Wuzhong City. Accordingly, a tomb shrine called Siqiliangzi gongbei was established there. More than 10,000 people from all over China attended a commemoration ceremony (ermaili) at that site in 1985.
Adherents of a rival tradition within Jahriyya, however, believe that Ma Hualong's true tomb is in Xuanhuagang, in Gansu's Zhangjiachuan County, which, coincidentally, was the base of Ma Hualong's successor, Ma Yuanzhang.
Some authors try to reconcile the two traditions, by saying that Ma Hualong's body is in Dongta, and the head is in Zhangjiachuan.
Ma Ch'ao-ching see Ma Hua-lung
Ch'ao-ching, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Hua-lung, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Ma Hualong see Ma Hua-lung
Hualong, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Ma Hua-lung (Ma Ch’ao-ching) (Ma Hualong) (d. March 2, 1871). Chinese Muslim leader. He was an exponent of the “New Teaching,” a neo-orthodox reformist movement in Chinese Islam that originated in northwest China in the latter half of the eighteenth century. He played an important part in the great mid-nineteenth century Muslim uprisings against the Ch’ing dynasty. Ma led a rebellion in Kansu and Shessi from 1862 to 1877 and tried to establish a Muslim state.
Ma Hualong was the fifth leader (jiaozhu) of the Jahriyya, a Sufi order (menhuan) in northwestern China. From the beginning of the anti-Qing Muslim Rebellion in 1862, and until his surrender and death in 1871, he was one of the main leaders of the rebellion.
Ma Hualong became the leader of the Jahriyya around 1849, succeeding the menhuan's fourth shaykh, Ma Yide (late 1770s - 1849). Although the Jahriyya had been originally created by Ma Mingxin in the central Gansu, by the time of Ma Hualong's succession to the leadership position the order was centered in the northern Ningxia (which in the 19th century was also part of Gansu Province), its headquarters being located in Jinjipu, a few kilometers south from today's Wuzhong City. The town of Jinjipu became an important religious and commercial center, and the menhuan's leaders grew wealthy thanks to the order's profitable participation in the caravan trade across Inner Mongolia, between Baotou, Huhhot and Beijing.
Since the beginning of the Muslim Rebellion in 1862, Ma Hualong was based at the Jahriyya headquarters in Jinjipu. The area of his direct influence included the Jahriyya-heavy eastern parts of the 19th-century Gansu Province, i.e. today's Ningxia and easternmost sections of today's Gansu. While the rebels elsewhere within the 19th-century borders of Gansu had their own leaders - notably, Ma Zhan'ao in Hezhou (now Linxia), Ma Guiyuan in Xining, and Ma Wenlu in Suzhou (Jiuquan), who, in the view of modern historians, were acting essentially independent from each other, there were Jahriyya members (all owing allegiance to Ma Hualong) participating in the rebellion throughout the region.
At some points during the rebellion, Ma Hualong negotiated with the authorities, and at least once he even surrendered, taking a new name, "Ma Chaoqing" ("one who attends on the Qing"). However, instead of disbanding his militias, he continued fortifying Jinjipu, and collaborating with the rebels who had retreated to Gansu from Shaanxi.
Ma was besieged in Jinjipu in July 1869 by the Qing forces led by General Zuo Zongtang. After fortifications outside of the town itself had been captured by the government troops, and starvation started inside the walls, Ma Hualong surrendered in January 1871, hoping to spare the lives of his people. However, once Zuo's troops entered Jinjipu, a massacre followed, with over a thousand people losing their lives. and the town being destroyed.
Existing accounts on Ma Hualong's death differ. It is likely that he was executed on Zuo's orders on March 2, 1871, along with his son Ma Yaobang and over eighty rebel officials (supposedly, Zuo sentenced them to death by slicing), although it was said by some that he had been murdered by a traitor from within his own ranks.
Few of Ma Hualong's family survived the massacre at Jinjipu. Two of his grandsons, Ma Jincheng and Ma Jinxi, were sentenced to castration upon reaching the age of 12. Ma Jincheng ended his days as a eunuch slave in Kaifeng in 1890, although the new Jahriyya leader, Ma Yuanzhang (the 1850s - 1920), managed to secretly provide him with some support until his death. The younger grandson, Ma Jinxi, was spirited away, intact, from his Xi'an confinement by Ma Yuanzhang, and was hidden at a Hui household in Hangzhou.
Many years later, Ma Yuanzhang managed to obtain a pardon for Ma Jinxi, and Ma Hualong's grandson returned to Ningxia. A split within the Jahriyya followed, with some members becoming followers of Ma Jinxi, and others holding for Ma Yuanzhang (who claimed descent from the order's founder Ma Mingxin, and was also related to Ma Hualong's family through his marriage).
According to Jahriyya adherents in Ningxia, Ma Hualong's grave is in Dongta Town, which now is a suburb of Wuzhong City. Accordingly, a tomb shrine called Siqiliangzi gongbei was established there. More than 10,000 people from all over China attended a commemoration ceremony (ermaili) at that site in 1985.
Adherents of a rival tradition within Jahriyya, however, believe that Ma Hualong's true tomb is in Xuanhuagang, in Gansu's Zhangjiachuan County, which, coincidentally, was the base of Ma Hualong's successor, Ma Yuanzhang.
Some authors try to reconcile the two traditions, by saying that Ma Hualong's body is in Dongta, and the head is in Zhangjiachuan.
Ma Ch'ao-ching see Ma Hua-lung
Ch'ao-ching, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Hua-lung, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Ma Hualong see Ma Hua-lung
Hualong, Ma see Ma Hua-lung
Ma Huan
Ma Huan (Chung-dao) (Mountain woodcutter) (c. 1380-1460). Chinese Muslim interpreter and traveller. He was born in Hui Ji county of Zhejiang province. He is the author of an account of the Ming Chinese maritime expeditions to Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Arabian Peninsula and East Africa. Ma Huan was a Chinese Muslim interpreter who accompanied the eunuch admiral Zheng He on three of his seven maritime missions to Southeast Asia in the early fifteenth century.
On the 1413 expedition (Zheng He's third), he visited Champa, Java, Sumatra, Palembang, Siam, Kochi and Hormuz; on the 1421 expedition, he visited Malacca, Aru, Sumatra, Ceylon, Kochi, Calicut, Zufar, and Hormuz; and on the 1431 expedition, he visited Bengal, Chittagong, Sonargaon, Gaur, and Calicut. From Calicut, he was sent by the eunuch Hong Bao as emissary to Mecca.
He wrote about his experiences on these voyages in the Yingyai shenglan (Description of the Coasts of the Ocean or Overall Survey of the Ocean's Shores), which he originally compiled in 1416 and later expanded. It was published in 1451. This text, together with the Xiyang fanguo zhi (Record of the Western Barbarians) of Gongzhen (1434), who accompanied the expedition of 1431-1433 as a secretary, and the Xingcha shenglan (Description of the Starry Raft) by the Confucian scholar Feixin (1436), provides valuable firsthand descriptions of Zheng He’s efforts to solicit foreign trade in the South China Sea, the Indian Ocean, and beyond, under the third Ming dynasty emperor. Among these Ma Huan’s account is considered by scholars to have the highest standard of factual accuracy. His account is especially valuable as a source of information on the small states in the Strait of Melaka region. He describes the founding of Melaka in 1403 and records its early fifteenth-century history.
During Ma's travels, he took notes about the geography, politics, weather conditions, environment, economy, local customs, and even method of punishment for criminals. Returned home on his first expedition, he began writing a book about his expedition, the first draft of which was ready around 1416. He expanded and modified his draft during later expeditions, the final version was ready around 1451. The title of his book was Yingyai shenglan. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, there were many printed and hand-copied editions of this work. The Yingyai shenglan is considered by many sinologists worldwide as a primary source for the history of the Ming dynasty naval expeditions, along with the history of South East Asia and the history of India.
Huan, Ma see Ma Huan
Chung-dao see Ma Huan
Mountain Woodcutter see Ma Huan
Ma Huan (Chung-dao) (Mountain woodcutter) (c. 1380-1460). Chinese Muslim interpreter and traveller. He was born in Hui Ji county of Zhejiang province. He is the author of an account of the Ming Chinese maritime expeditions to Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Arabian Peninsula and East Africa. Ma Huan was a Chinese Muslim interpreter who accompanied the eunuch admiral Zheng He on three of his seven maritime missions to Southeast Asia in the early fifteenth century.
On the 1413 expedition (Zheng He's third), he visited Champa, Java, Sumatra, Palembang, Siam, Kochi and Hormuz; on the 1421 expedition, he visited Malacca, Aru, Sumatra, Ceylon, Kochi, Calicut, Zufar, and Hormuz; and on the 1431 expedition, he visited Bengal, Chittagong, Sonargaon, Gaur, and Calicut. From Calicut, he was sent by the eunuch Hong Bao as emissary to Mecca.
He wrote about his experiences on these voyages in the Yingyai shenglan (Description of the Coasts of the Ocean or Overall Survey of the Ocean's Shores), which he originally compiled in 1416 and later expanded. It was published in 1451. This text, together with the Xiyang fanguo zhi (Record of the Western Barbarians) of Gongzhen (1434), who accompanied the expedition of 1431-1433 as a secretary, and the Xingcha shenglan (Description of the Starry Raft) by the Confucian scholar Feixin (1436), provides valuable firsthand descriptions of Zheng He’s efforts to solicit foreign trade in the South China Sea, the Indian Ocean, and beyond, under the third Ming dynasty emperor. Among these Ma Huan’s account is considered by scholars to have the highest standard of factual accuracy. His account is especially valuable as a source of information on the small states in the Strait of Melaka region. He describes the founding of Melaka in 1403 and records its early fifteenth-century history.
During Ma's travels, he took notes about the geography, politics, weather conditions, environment, economy, local customs, and even method of punishment for criminals. Returned home on his first expedition, he began writing a book about his expedition, the first draft of which was ready around 1416. He expanded and modified his draft during later expeditions, the final version was ready around 1451. The title of his book was Yingyai shenglan. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, there were many printed and hand-copied editions of this work. The Yingyai shenglan is considered by many sinologists worldwide as a primary source for the history of the Ming dynasty naval expeditions, along with the history of South East Asia and the history of India.
Huan, Ma see Ma Huan
Chung-dao see Ma Huan
Mountain Woodcutter see Ma Huan
Mai
Mai. Title of the rulers of the thousand year Sefawa dynasty of the Kanem-Bornu empire. From about the tenth century, the mai was considered a divine king. The twelfth mai, Humai (c. 1190), was the first to convert to Islam. Sefawa rule ended when al-Kanemi took over Bornu in the 19th century.
The Duguwa dynasty is the line of kings (mai) of the Kanem Empire prior to the rise of the Islamic Seyfawa dynasty in 1081. According to the Girgam, the Duguwa kings were Zaghawa.
The Duguwa dynasty mais of the Kanem period were:
Sef c. 700
Dugu c. 785 (son of Sef, namesake of the dynasty)
Fune c. 835
Aritso c. 893
Katuri c. 942
Ayoma c. 961
Bula c. 1019
Arki c. 1035
Shu c. 1077
Abd al-Dhel c. 1081
Mai. Title of the rulers of the thousand year Sefawa dynasty of the Kanem-Bornu empire. From about the tenth century, the mai was considered a divine king. The twelfth mai, Humai (c. 1190), was the first to convert to Islam. Sefawa rule ended when al-Kanemi took over Bornu in the 19th century.
The Duguwa dynasty is the line of kings (mai) of the Kanem Empire prior to the rise of the Islamic Seyfawa dynasty in 1081. According to the Girgam, the Duguwa kings were Zaghawa.
The Duguwa dynasty mais of the Kanem period were:
Sef c. 700
Dugu c. 785 (son of Sef, namesake of the dynasty)
Fune c. 835
Aritso c. 893
Katuri c. 942
Ayoma c. 961
Bula c. 1019
Arki c. 1035
Shu c. 1077
Abd al-Dhel c. 1081
Maimonides
Maimonides. See Ibn Maymun.
Maimonides. See Ibn Maymun.
Mai Tatsine
Mai Tatsine (Mohammed Marwa Maitatsine) (Muhammadu 'Arab) (Muhammadu Marwa) (1927?-1980). Leader of a separatist sect in Kano, Nigeria. Mai Tatsine was the nickname given by people in Kano to Muhammadu Marwa (also known as Muhammadu ‘Arab), the leader of an Islamic sect that was involved in violent disturbances in that city in December 1980. The name is derived from a Hausa phrase he commonly employed against his detractors, Alla ya tsine maka albarka (“May God deprive you of his blessing”). His followers were known as the ‘Yan Tatsine. Because the group was intensely suspicious of outsiders, and because the disturbances gave rise to many wild rumors and apocryphal stories, little reliable knowledge exists of the movement or its leader.
Muhammadu Marwa was reportedly born in the region of Marwa, a city in northern Cameroon, probably in the 1920s. (A Nigerian passport that he acquired gave the date 1927.) He is commonly thought to have been Kirdi by origin, a member of one of the small hill peoples, followers of indigenous religions, who inhabit the region, the plains of which have been dominated by Muslim Fulani since the jihad of the early nineteenth century. But there are also reports that at least one of his parents belonged to the Shuwa, an Arabic speaking group living in the region. In the 1920s and 1930s, there was a large scale emigration of young Kirdi men from the hills to the plains, driven by poverty and, in 1931, by a severe famine. The young Muhammadu Marwa may have been among them. He reportedly became the servant of a Muslim scholar who inspired his conversion to Islam. On that occasion, he took his Muslim name, Muhammadu. He may have been exposed to Mahdist ideas. In the 1890s this region served as the base for the Mahdist movement led by Hayat Bin Sa‘id (d. 1899), a member of the Sokoto royal family.
Muhammadu Marwa is said to have come to Kano in 1945, but nothing is known of his activities there until the early 1960s. By this time, he had acquired a reputation for tafsir, or Qur’anic commentary, and so was given the nickname “Mallam Mai Tafsiri.” This presumably was the origin of his later derogatory nickname. The political and religious life of Kano in the years just after Nigeria’s independence in 1960 was turbulent, and Muhammadu Marwa joined in the fray. In 1962, Emir Muhammadu Sanusi (r.1953-1963) had him brought before a Muslim judge on charges of illegal preaching and an offense known in the Arabic legal records as shatimah, or abusive language. The latter offense was severely -- and frequently -- punished in Kano at the time, since the exchange of insults by political or religious groups often led to violence. The judge gave Marwa a three-month prison term, to be followed by deportation to his native Cameroon.
The Nigerian military takeover of 1966 brought an end to the formal powers of the emirs and in general weakened traditional social controls. This change made it possible for Marwa to return to Kano in the late 1960s. In 1971, he was issued a Nigerian passport in order to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca.
By the late 1970s, the petroleum boom had brought a major new injection of wealth to Kano, and with it came rapid social change. For many of the established residents of the city this meant accelerated incorporation into the modern sector of Nigerian society, especially through the state-run secular school system. At the same time, young men were drawn from the countryside in increasing numbers. Many of them followed a traditional pattern in the region, leaving their families to become Qur’anic students (Hausa, almajirai) and supporting themselves and their teacher through begging (Hausa, bara) and casual labor. The economic and educational changes of the 1970s made this group increasingly marginal. Such youth were the main recruiting ground for the ‘Yan Tatsine. Groups affiliated with them sprang up in other towns in northern Nigeria and developed their own separate ritual centers.
Starting in 1977, the aggressive preaching of Marwa’s disciples and the growth of his commnity of followers inspired vociferous public complaints. The approach of the turn of the Islamic century (fourteenth century AH) in 1979, an event associated with the arrival of a renewer of the faith, apparently inspired Marwa to announce his claim to prophethood. In 1978, as Nigeria returned to civilian rule, Kano state elected a governor from the People’s Redemption Party, Abubakar Rimi. The Nigerian presidency, however, was captured by this party’s conservative rival in northern politics, the National Party of Nigeria. The distrust between the federal and state levels of government hampered efforts to control the ‘Yan Tatsine.
On November 26, 1980, Governor Rimi issued an ultimatum demanding the dispersal of the large group of followers who had gathered around Marwa’s compound in ‘Yan Awaki Quarters, just outside the old walled city. At this time, the arrival of Libyan troops in the Chadian capital of Njamena added to public anxiety. Governor Rimi took no immediate action on the expiration of the ultimatum. Rumors circulated that the ‘Yan Tatsine planned to take over the city’s two main mosques at congregational prayers on Friday, December 19. The day before, however, a group of ‘Yan Tatsine entered into a violent confrontation with the police at Shahuci Field, near the emir’s palace. With bows and machetes, they drove off the police, captured weapons, and burned trucks.
Ten days of heavy fighting ensued in which more than four thousand people were killed. Many were victims of vigilante groups that sprang up around the city and attacked anyone they suspected of belonging to the ‘Yan Tatsine. The Nigerian army finally was called in to quell the disturbances. Marwa and his followers fled their stronghold on December 29. Marwa himself was killed in the process and some one thousand of his followers arrested. In October 1982, violent disturbances linked to the ‘Yan Tatsine occurred in the city of Maiduguri in northeastern Nigeria. Other disturbances followed at Yola (March 1984) and Gombe (April 1985).
The ‘Yan Tatsine follows a pattern common in Muslim West Africa that may be termed “religious separatism,” or, in the phrase of Jean-Paul Charnay (1980), “closed Islam.” Such groups embrace heterodox practices and esoteric interpretations of the Qur’an. They emphasixe their own purity and refuse contact with the rest of society. Muhammadu Marwa was especially known for his condemnation of all modern innovations from bicycles to radios and buttons. He reportedly accepted only the Qur’an as a valid source of religious teaching, yet as a prophet claimed the right to issue new religious injunctions, or at least new interpretations of the Qur’an. He had no known links with other Islamic groups of either Sufi or Wahhabi orientation.
Tatsine, Mai see Mai Tatsine
Mohammaed Marwa Maitatsine see Mai Tatsine
Muhammadu 'Arab see Mai Tatsine
Muhammadu Marwa see Mai Tatsine
Mallam Mai Tafsiri see Mai Tatsine
Mai Tatsine (Mohammed Marwa Maitatsine) (Muhammadu 'Arab) (Muhammadu Marwa) (1927?-1980). Leader of a separatist sect in Kano, Nigeria. Mai Tatsine was the nickname given by people in Kano to Muhammadu Marwa (also known as Muhammadu ‘Arab), the leader of an Islamic sect that was involved in violent disturbances in that city in December 1980. The name is derived from a Hausa phrase he commonly employed against his detractors, Alla ya tsine maka albarka (“May God deprive you of his blessing”). His followers were known as the ‘Yan Tatsine. Because the group was intensely suspicious of outsiders, and because the disturbances gave rise to many wild rumors and apocryphal stories, little reliable knowledge exists of the movement or its leader.
Muhammadu Marwa was reportedly born in the region of Marwa, a city in northern Cameroon, probably in the 1920s. (A Nigerian passport that he acquired gave the date 1927.) He is commonly thought to have been Kirdi by origin, a member of one of the small hill peoples, followers of indigenous religions, who inhabit the region, the plains of which have been dominated by Muslim Fulani since the jihad of the early nineteenth century. But there are also reports that at least one of his parents belonged to the Shuwa, an Arabic speaking group living in the region. In the 1920s and 1930s, there was a large scale emigration of young Kirdi men from the hills to the plains, driven by poverty and, in 1931, by a severe famine. The young Muhammadu Marwa may have been among them. He reportedly became the servant of a Muslim scholar who inspired his conversion to Islam. On that occasion, he took his Muslim name, Muhammadu. He may have been exposed to Mahdist ideas. In the 1890s this region served as the base for the Mahdist movement led by Hayat Bin Sa‘id (d. 1899), a member of the Sokoto royal family.
Muhammadu Marwa is said to have come to Kano in 1945, but nothing is known of his activities there until the early 1960s. By this time, he had acquired a reputation for tafsir, or Qur’anic commentary, and so was given the nickname “Mallam Mai Tafsiri.” This presumably was the origin of his later derogatory nickname. The political and religious life of Kano in the years just after Nigeria’s independence in 1960 was turbulent, and Muhammadu Marwa joined in the fray. In 1962, Emir Muhammadu Sanusi (r.1953-1963) had him brought before a Muslim judge on charges of illegal preaching and an offense known in the Arabic legal records as shatimah, or abusive language. The latter offense was severely -- and frequently -- punished in Kano at the time, since the exchange of insults by political or religious groups often led to violence. The judge gave Marwa a three-month prison term, to be followed by deportation to his native Cameroon.
The Nigerian military takeover of 1966 brought an end to the formal powers of the emirs and in general weakened traditional social controls. This change made it possible for Marwa to return to Kano in the late 1960s. In 1971, he was issued a Nigerian passport in order to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca.
By the late 1970s, the petroleum boom had brought a major new injection of wealth to Kano, and with it came rapid social change. For many of the established residents of the city this meant accelerated incorporation into the modern sector of Nigerian society, especially through the state-run secular school system. At the same time, young men were drawn from the countryside in increasing numbers. Many of them followed a traditional pattern in the region, leaving their families to become Qur’anic students (Hausa, almajirai) and supporting themselves and their teacher through begging (Hausa, bara) and casual labor. The economic and educational changes of the 1970s made this group increasingly marginal. Such youth were the main recruiting ground for the ‘Yan Tatsine. Groups affiliated with them sprang up in other towns in northern Nigeria and developed their own separate ritual centers.
Starting in 1977, the aggressive preaching of Marwa’s disciples and the growth of his commnity of followers inspired vociferous public complaints. The approach of the turn of the Islamic century (fourteenth century AH) in 1979, an event associated with the arrival of a renewer of the faith, apparently inspired Marwa to announce his claim to prophethood. In 1978, as Nigeria returned to civilian rule, Kano state elected a governor from the People’s Redemption Party, Abubakar Rimi. The Nigerian presidency, however, was captured by this party’s conservative rival in northern politics, the National Party of Nigeria. The distrust between the federal and state levels of government hampered efforts to control the ‘Yan Tatsine.
On November 26, 1980, Governor Rimi issued an ultimatum demanding the dispersal of the large group of followers who had gathered around Marwa’s compound in ‘Yan Awaki Quarters, just outside the old walled city. At this time, the arrival of Libyan troops in the Chadian capital of Njamena added to public anxiety. Governor Rimi took no immediate action on the expiration of the ultimatum. Rumors circulated that the ‘Yan Tatsine planned to take over the city’s two main mosques at congregational prayers on Friday, December 19. The day before, however, a group of ‘Yan Tatsine entered into a violent confrontation with the police at Shahuci Field, near the emir’s palace. With bows and machetes, they drove off the police, captured weapons, and burned trucks.
Ten days of heavy fighting ensued in which more than four thousand people were killed. Many were victims of vigilante groups that sprang up around the city and attacked anyone they suspected of belonging to the ‘Yan Tatsine. The Nigerian army finally was called in to quell the disturbances. Marwa and his followers fled their stronghold on December 29. Marwa himself was killed in the process and some one thousand of his followers arrested. In October 1982, violent disturbances linked to the ‘Yan Tatsine occurred in the city of Maiduguri in northeastern Nigeria. Other disturbances followed at Yola (March 1984) and Gombe (April 1985).
The ‘Yan Tatsine follows a pattern common in Muslim West Africa that may be termed “religious separatism,” or, in the phrase of Jean-Paul Charnay (1980), “closed Islam.” Such groups embrace heterodox practices and esoteric interpretations of the Qur’an. They emphasixe their own purity and refuse contact with the rest of society. Muhammadu Marwa was especially known for his condemnation of all modern innovations from bicycles to radios and buttons. He reportedly accepted only the Qur’an as a valid source of religious teaching, yet as a prophet claimed the right to issue new religious injunctions, or at least new interpretations of the Qur’an. He had no known links with other Islamic groups of either Sufi or Wahhabi orientation.
Tatsine, Mai see Mai Tatsine
Mohammaed Marwa Maitatsine see Mai Tatsine
Muhammadu 'Arab see Mai Tatsine
Muhammadu Marwa see Mai Tatsine
Mallam Mai Tafsiri see Mai Tatsine
Majd al-Dawla, Abu Talib Rustam
Majd al-Dawla, Abu Talib Rustam (Abu Talib Rustam Majd al-Dawla) (b. 989). Ruler of the northern Buyid amirate of Rayy and Jibal (r.997-1029). The amirate was overrun by the Ghaznavid Mahmud ibn Sebuktigin.
Abu Taleb Rostam, known as Majd al-Dawla, was the Buyid amir of Ray, a city in Iran. He was the eldest son of Fakhr al-Daula. His reign saw the removal of the Buyids as a power in central Iran.
Abu Taleb Rostam succeeded his father upon the latter's death in 997. At the time, he was four years old. His younger brother, Abu Taher ("Shams al-Daula"), meanwhile, became the ruler of Hamadan. Since both brothers were in the age of minority, power was assumed by their mother Sayyida. Both sons initially declared themselves independent and assumed the title of Shâhanshâh, but by 1009 or 1010 at the latest had recognized the authority of Baha' al-Daula, who controlled Fars and Iraq, and abandoned the title.
In 1006 or 1007, with the assistance of his vizier Abu 'Ali ibn 'Ali, Majd al-Daula attempted to throw off the regency of his mother. Sayyida, however, escaped to the Kurd Abu Najr Badr ibn Hasanuya, and together with Shams al-Daula they put Ray under siege. After several battles, the city was taken and Majd al-Daula was captured. He was imprisoned by his mother in the fort of Tabarak, while Shams al-Daula took to power in Ray. After a year, Majd al-Daula was released and reinstated in Ray; Shams al-Daula returned to Hamadan. Power continued to be held by his mother.
Majd al-Daula's reign saw the gradual shrinking of Buyid holdings in central Iran. Gorgan and Tabaristan had been lost to the Ziyarids in 997, while several of the western towns were seized by the Sallarids of Azerbaijan. There were also internal troubles, such as a revolt in 1016 or 1017. Towards the end of her life, Sayyida had to prevent Shams al-Daula from seizing Ray from his brother.
When Sayyida died in 1028, the consequences of the political seclusion of Majd al-Daula became apparent. He was soon faced with a revolt by his Dailamite soldiers, and requested the assistance of Mahmud of Ghazni in dealing with them. Mahmud came to Ray, deposed Majd al-Daula as ruler, and sacked the city, bringing an end to Buyid rule there. One of his sons, Fana-Khusrau, would attempt to restore the power of the Buyids in the following years, but failed.
Abu Talib Rustam Majd al-Dawla see Majd al-Dawla, Abu Talib Rustam
Majd al-Dawla, Abu Talib Rustam (Abu Talib Rustam Majd al-Dawla) (b. 989). Ruler of the northern Buyid amirate of Rayy and Jibal (r.997-1029). The amirate was overrun by the Ghaznavid Mahmud ibn Sebuktigin.
Abu Taleb Rostam, known as Majd al-Dawla, was the Buyid amir of Ray, a city in Iran. He was the eldest son of Fakhr al-Daula. His reign saw the removal of the Buyids as a power in central Iran.
Abu Taleb Rostam succeeded his father upon the latter's death in 997. At the time, he was four years old. His younger brother, Abu Taher ("Shams al-Daula"), meanwhile, became the ruler of Hamadan. Since both brothers were in the age of minority, power was assumed by their mother Sayyida. Both sons initially declared themselves independent and assumed the title of Shâhanshâh, but by 1009 or 1010 at the latest had recognized the authority of Baha' al-Daula, who controlled Fars and Iraq, and abandoned the title.
In 1006 or 1007, with the assistance of his vizier Abu 'Ali ibn 'Ali, Majd al-Daula attempted to throw off the regency of his mother. Sayyida, however, escaped to the Kurd Abu Najr Badr ibn Hasanuya, and together with Shams al-Daula they put Ray under siege. After several battles, the city was taken and Majd al-Daula was captured. He was imprisoned by his mother in the fort of Tabarak, while Shams al-Daula took to power in Ray. After a year, Majd al-Daula was released and reinstated in Ray; Shams al-Daula returned to Hamadan. Power continued to be held by his mother.
Majd al-Daula's reign saw the gradual shrinking of Buyid holdings in central Iran. Gorgan and Tabaristan had been lost to the Ziyarids in 997, while several of the western towns were seized by the Sallarids of Azerbaijan. There were also internal troubles, such as a revolt in 1016 or 1017. Towards the end of her life, Sayyida had to prevent Shams al-Daula from seizing Ray from his brother.
When Sayyida died in 1028, the consequences of the political seclusion of Majd al-Daula became apparent. He was soon faced with a revolt by his Dailamite soldiers, and requested the assistance of Mahmud of Ghazni in dealing with them. Mahmud came to Ray, deposed Majd al-Daula as ruler, and sacked the city, bringing an end to Buyid rule there. One of his sons, Fana-Khusrau, would attempt to restore the power of the Buyids in the following years, but failed.
Abu Talib Rustam Majd al-Dawla see Majd al-Dawla, Abu Talib Rustam
Majid ibn Sa‘id
Majid ibn Sa‘id (b. c. 1832 - October 7, 1870). Sultan of Zanzibar and of the Al Bu-Sa‘id dynasty. He ruled Zanzibar from October 19, 1856 to October 7, 1870. After his father Sa‘id ibn Sultan had died in 1856, Majid’s eldest brother Thuwayni, designated by his father as sultan in Oman, attempted to gain control of the African dominions of the sultanate of Oman and Zanzibar, but his armed expedition was turned back at sea by a British man-of-war. The dispute, settled by the Award of Lord Canning, Viceroy of India, and recognized by an Anglo-French Declaration in 1862, led to the independence of Zanzibar from Oman.
Sayyid Majid Ibn Sa‘id was the second Busaidi ruler of Zanzibar (Tanzania). Majid was the first son of Sayyid Sa‘id to reign as the Sultan of Zanzibar and to hold his father’s title Sayyid -- an Islamic honorific title taken by learned men which was adopted as a dynastic title by the Busaidi dynasty of Zanzibar.
Upon his succession in 1856, Sayyid Sa‘id’s commercial empire was divided between Majid in the materially wealthy lands of east Africa and his half-brother Thuwayni (Thuwain) in the previous Busaidi capital of Muscat in southern Arabia. Majid relied greatly on the support of the British consular officials to maintain his position vis-a-vis his jealous brother. Majid became beholden to the British navy for its assistance in foiling an attempted invasion by Thuwain in 1859. In 1861, the dispute between Majid and Thuwain was resolved by British arbitrators. The arbitration affirmed Zanzibar’s independence from Muscat but required Majid to pay an annual tribute to Thuwain in to compensate Thuwain for their economically unequal inheritance. The payment of these tributary amounts ended in 1866 when Thuwain was assassinated by his own son. It was this termination of the payment of the tributary amounts which enabled Majid to embark upon a period of construction on the Tanzanian mainland.
During Majid’s tenure as Sultan of Zanzibar, the first serious attempts were made by Zanzibar to dominate the Tanzanian mainland. Majid began to develop Dar es Salaam as a future capital, but died before the project was completed.
Upon his death in 1870, Majid was peacefully succeeded by another brother, Barghash.
Today, Dar es Salaam, the pride of Sayyid Majid Ibn Said is the largest town and main port of Tanzania. It is Majid’s greatest legacy.
Majid ibn Sa‘id (b. c. 1832 - October 7, 1870). Sultan of Zanzibar and of the Al Bu-Sa‘id dynasty. He ruled Zanzibar from October 19, 1856 to October 7, 1870. After his father Sa‘id ibn Sultan had died in 1856, Majid’s eldest brother Thuwayni, designated by his father as sultan in Oman, attempted to gain control of the African dominions of the sultanate of Oman and Zanzibar, but his armed expedition was turned back at sea by a British man-of-war. The dispute, settled by the Award of Lord Canning, Viceroy of India, and recognized by an Anglo-French Declaration in 1862, led to the independence of Zanzibar from Oman.
Sayyid Majid Ibn Sa‘id was the second Busaidi ruler of Zanzibar (Tanzania). Majid was the first son of Sayyid Sa‘id to reign as the Sultan of Zanzibar and to hold his father’s title Sayyid -- an Islamic honorific title taken by learned men which was adopted as a dynastic title by the Busaidi dynasty of Zanzibar.
Upon his succession in 1856, Sayyid Sa‘id’s commercial empire was divided between Majid in the materially wealthy lands of east Africa and his half-brother Thuwayni (Thuwain) in the previous Busaidi capital of Muscat in southern Arabia. Majid relied greatly on the support of the British consular officials to maintain his position vis-a-vis his jealous brother. Majid became beholden to the British navy for its assistance in foiling an attempted invasion by Thuwain in 1859. In 1861, the dispute between Majid and Thuwain was resolved by British arbitrators. The arbitration affirmed Zanzibar’s independence from Muscat but required Majid to pay an annual tribute to Thuwain in to compensate Thuwain for their economically unequal inheritance. The payment of these tributary amounts ended in 1866 when Thuwain was assassinated by his own son. It was this termination of the payment of the tributary amounts which enabled Majid to embark upon a period of construction on the Tanzanian mainland.
During Majid’s tenure as Sultan of Zanzibar, the first serious attempts were made by Zanzibar to dominate the Tanzanian mainland. Majid began to develop Dar es Salaam as a future capital, but died before the project was completed.
Upon his death in 1870, Majid was peacefully succeeded by another brother, Barghash.
Today, Dar es Salaam, the pride of Sayyid Majid Ibn Said is the largest town and main port of Tanzania. It is Majid’s greatest legacy.
Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir (Mullah Muhammad Baqir Majlisi) (Majlesi-ye Thani -- Majlesi the Second)(‘Allama Majlisi) (1616-1698). Authoritative jurist and a prolific collector of traditions and an unprecedentedly influential author of the Twelver Shi‘a. Under the Safavid Shah Suleiman, he was, in effect, the ruler of Iran. Muhammad Baqir Majlisi was an Iranian religious scholar, strongly exoteric in outlook, who exerted considerable influence on the Safavid state and left behind an important corpus of writings still studied in Iran.
Born in Isfahan in 1616, his father, Mullah Muhammad Taqi al-Majlisi, was a cleric of Islamic jurisprudence. The genealogy of his family is traced back to Bu Noaym Ahamad bin Abdallah Esfahani, the author, inter alia, of a History of Isfahan, entitled Zekr-e akhbar-e Esfahan.
By the age of 14, Muhammad Baqir gained certification of "riwayat" from Mulla Sadra to teach. He is said to have completed studies under twenty-one masters (ustadh). He is reported to have trained 181 students to become masters themselves.
Gaining fame as a prodigy of erudition, he swiftly advanced to the position of mullabashi (“chief mulla,” -- head of the religious hierarchy), from which he was able to set the Safavid state on what would be a disastrous course of confrontation with the Sunni Afghans. His main scholarly accomplishment was a vast collection of Shi‘ite traditions, Bihar al-anwar (Oceans of Lights). Noteworthy, too, are the shorter handbooks of religious practice he wrote, in Persian, for a broader audience.
In 1678, the Safavid King, Shah Suleiman, appointed "Sheikh ul-Islam" (Chief Religious Leader of the land) in Isfahan, the capital of the Persian Empire (Iran). In this influential position, he was given a free hand by the Sultan to encourage and to punish as he saw fit. The three inter-related areas in which Majlisi exerted his efforts were the suppression of Sufism, mystical philosophies, and philosophic rationalism known as Falsafah; the propagation of a legalistic form of Twelver Shi'ism and "the suppression of Sunnism and other religious groups."
Majlisi's era marked a breaking point, as he successfully undercut the influence of Sufism and philosophic rationalism in Shi'ism. Up to the time of Majlisi, Shiism and Sufism were closely linked and indeed Sufism had been a vehicle for pro-Shi'a sentiment among the Sunnis. Even the most eminent members of the Shi'a 'ulama' in the preceding centuries had come under the influence of Sufism. After the death of Majlisi, this process continued along the succeeding generations of 'ulama' so that Sufism became divorced from Shi'ism and ceased to influence the main stream of Shi'a development. Philosophy was also downgraded and ceased to be an important part of studies at the religious institutions.
Majlisi was not successful in suppressing Sunnism. Though he waged a relentless campaign of persecution wherever he found any Sunnis, the pockets of Sunnism in Iran he targeted remained.
Majlisi was a leading Iranian Shi‘a scholar of the late Safavid period. He was born in Isfahan, the capital of the Safavid state, into a family of ‘ulama’ (religious scholars). His father, Muhammad Taqi al-Majlisi, was a noted religious figure. It is said the Majlisis were related to the ‘Amilis of south Lebanon (Jabal ‘Amil) who, when Shah Isma‘il founded the Shi‘a Safavid state in Iran in 1501, flocked to Iran to participate in the flowering of a new era of Shi‘a scholarship. Al-Majlisi’s life and works marked the end of this “golden age.” He died in Isfahan and was buried in the great old mosque of the city.
The most readily accessible biography of Majlisi is to be found in Muhammd Baqir Khwansari’s well-known nineteenth-century biographical dictionary, Rawdat al-jannat. In narrating the life and works of Majlisi, Khwansari, as is his usual style, quotes from contemporary and later sources. He refers to him as “Shaykh al-Islam” of the Safavid capital, adding that “he was the chief figure (ra’is) in religious and secular matters.” During the reign of the last Safavid ruler, Shah Sultan Husayn, the affairs of the state had deteriorated to such a degree that it was only thanks to Majlisi’s activities that the country maintained a semblance of unity. The end came soon after Majlisi’s death.
Aside from his religious duties as a member of the ‘ulama’, which the sources describe in exaggerated detail, Majlisi’s position in regard to the government and the shah is unclear. He was not a statesman.
In addition to the material in Khwansari’s work, the earliest life of Majlisi is included in Mir’at al-ahval-i Jahan-nama, written by Ahmad ibn Muhammad ‘Ali Bihbahani (d. 1819 or 1820) and recently published in Tehran, edited by ‘Ali Davvani. This work served as the basis for a more elaborate biography of Majlisi written in 1884 by Husayn ibn Muhammad Taqi ibn ‘Ali ibn Muhammad al-Nuri al-Tabarsi, entitled Al-fayd al-qudsi fi tarjamat al-‘Allamah al-Majlisi. This work was published as part of volume 105 of the new edition of Majlisi’s Bihar al-anwar. After a short introduction, the biography deals with Majlisi’s personal characteristics, his works, his teachers and students, his ancestors, his descendants, and his life and visions of him after his death.
The sources stress two aspects of Majlisi’s life: his strong opposition to Sufism and his attempt at popularizing Shi’a thought among Iranians by writing several of his works in Persian rather than Arabic. His major work, however, Bihar al-anwar, a compendium of Shi‘a knowledge, is in Arabic. A new (second) edition of this work, which began to appear in Tehran in the 1960s is in 110 volumes. Karl-Heinz Pampus wrote a doctoral dissertation on Bihar al-anwar in 1970. The first part of Pampus’s work is a comprehensive biography of Majlisi; the rest is a detailed analysis of Bihar.
Majlisi is said to have written as many as thirteen books in Arabic and fifty-three in Persian. Some of these compositions are short treatises dealing with such topics as belief, prayer, ethics, and morality, many of which intended to teach the common person. In Shi‘a thought and scholarship, Majlisi represents the culminating point in the Ithna ‘Ashari revival that can be said to have begun with the rise of the Safavid dynasty. The continuity in Shi‘a learning that the Safavid rulers provided for Ithna ‘Ashari scholars (thus linking them with their predecessors of the late Middle Ages, such as Ibn al-Mujtahar al-Hilli, Ibn Makki al-‘Amili, Ibn Fahd al-Hilli and others) is counterbalanced with the continuity that Majlisi himself provided for future generations of Shi‘a scholars, linking the Safavid period with that of the Qajar dynasty in the nineteenth century -- all the way to the present Islamic Republic of Iran.
No modern scholar today dealing with Islamic thought, Shi’a or otherwise, can afford to ignore the writings of Muhammad Baqir al-Majilisi. Majlisi, al-Hurr al-‘Amili, and Mulla Muhsin Fayd constitute the so-called Three Later Muhammads who, with the “Three Early Muhammads” (Kulayni, Ibn Babuyah, and Shaykh al-Ta’ifah al-Tusi), share among themselves the most important writings of the teachings of the Shi‘a tradition of Islam.
Majlisi re-established clerical authority under his leadership, and renewed the impetus for conversion from Sunnism to Shi'ism. Majlisi is credited with propagating numerous Shi'a rituals that Iranians regularly practice, such as mourning ceremonies for fallen imams, particularly the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali at Karbala; and pilgrimages to shrines of imams and their families.
Majlisi fervently upheld the concepts of enjoining the good and prohibiting evil, and in so doing endeavored to provide fatwa (judgments) for all of the hypothetical situations a true believer could or might face. In one exposition of virtues of proper behavior, he gave directions on everything from how to wear clothes to sexual intercourse and association with females, clipping fingernails, sleeping, waking, bathroom functions, enemas, sneezing, entering and leaving a domicile, and treatments and cures for many illnesses and diseases.
More controversially, Majlisi defined science very narrowly as knowledge of the clear, secure ayat (verses of the Qur'an); of the religious duties and obligations which God has fixed in his Justice; and of the Prophetic Traditions (Hadith), which are valid until the day of Resurrection. Beyond this, he warned, the seeking of knowledge is a waste of one's life, and worse would generally lead to apostasy and heresy, in which case the likelihood of salvation is remote. Majlisi opposed the school of mystical philosophy developed by Mir Damad and Mulla Sadra, who argued that the Qur'an was always open to re-interpretation, and valued insights that came from intuition and ecstasy rather than reason.
Majlisi is also controversial for his close relationship with Indian Mughal ruler Aurangzeb Alamgir who was known commonly for his anti-Shi'a inclinations. Aurangzeb is said to have referred to Majlisi as the real leader of all true Muslims of Persia. Majlisi visited India on nine occasions between 1660 and 1695 and was awarded the respect of a government emissary thereby offending the Shah of Iran. Shah Suleiman made a futile effort of winning over Majlisi against Aurangzeb by giving him a high level post in his court but failed to win his support for his wars against the latter.
Mullah Muhammad Baqir Majlisi see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlesi-ye Thani see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlesi the Second see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Thani, Majlesi-ye see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
'Allama Majlisi see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir (Mullah Muhammad Baqir Majlisi) (Majlesi-ye Thani -- Majlesi the Second)(‘Allama Majlisi) (1616-1698). Authoritative jurist and a prolific collector of traditions and an unprecedentedly influential author of the Twelver Shi‘a. Under the Safavid Shah Suleiman, he was, in effect, the ruler of Iran. Muhammad Baqir Majlisi was an Iranian religious scholar, strongly exoteric in outlook, who exerted considerable influence on the Safavid state and left behind an important corpus of writings still studied in Iran.
Born in Isfahan in 1616, his father, Mullah Muhammad Taqi al-Majlisi, was a cleric of Islamic jurisprudence. The genealogy of his family is traced back to Bu Noaym Ahamad bin Abdallah Esfahani, the author, inter alia, of a History of Isfahan, entitled Zekr-e akhbar-e Esfahan.
By the age of 14, Muhammad Baqir gained certification of "riwayat" from Mulla Sadra to teach. He is said to have completed studies under twenty-one masters (ustadh). He is reported to have trained 181 students to become masters themselves.
Gaining fame as a prodigy of erudition, he swiftly advanced to the position of mullabashi (“chief mulla,” -- head of the religious hierarchy), from which he was able to set the Safavid state on what would be a disastrous course of confrontation with the Sunni Afghans. His main scholarly accomplishment was a vast collection of Shi‘ite traditions, Bihar al-anwar (Oceans of Lights). Noteworthy, too, are the shorter handbooks of religious practice he wrote, in Persian, for a broader audience.
In 1678, the Safavid King, Shah Suleiman, appointed "Sheikh ul-Islam" (Chief Religious Leader of the land) in Isfahan, the capital of the Persian Empire (Iran). In this influential position, he was given a free hand by the Sultan to encourage and to punish as he saw fit. The three inter-related areas in which Majlisi exerted his efforts were the suppression of Sufism, mystical philosophies, and philosophic rationalism known as Falsafah; the propagation of a legalistic form of Twelver Shi'ism and "the suppression of Sunnism and other religious groups."
Majlisi's era marked a breaking point, as he successfully undercut the influence of Sufism and philosophic rationalism in Shi'ism. Up to the time of Majlisi, Shiism and Sufism were closely linked and indeed Sufism had been a vehicle for pro-Shi'a sentiment among the Sunnis. Even the most eminent members of the Shi'a 'ulama' in the preceding centuries had come under the influence of Sufism. After the death of Majlisi, this process continued along the succeeding generations of 'ulama' so that Sufism became divorced from Shi'ism and ceased to influence the main stream of Shi'a development. Philosophy was also downgraded and ceased to be an important part of studies at the religious institutions.
Majlisi was not successful in suppressing Sunnism. Though he waged a relentless campaign of persecution wherever he found any Sunnis, the pockets of Sunnism in Iran he targeted remained.
Majlisi was a leading Iranian Shi‘a scholar of the late Safavid period. He was born in Isfahan, the capital of the Safavid state, into a family of ‘ulama’ (religious scholars). His father, Muhammad Taqi al-Majlisi, was a noted religious figure. It is said the Majlisis were related to the ‘Amilis of south Lebanon (Jabal ‘Amil) who, when Shah Isma‘il founded the Shi‘a Safavid state in Iran in 1501, flocked to Iran to participate in the flowering of a new era of Shi‘a scholarship. Al-Majlisi’s life and works marked the end of this “golden age.” He died in Isfahan and was buried in the great old mosque of the city.
The most readily accessible biography of Majlisi is to be found in Muhammd Baqir Khwansari’s well-known nineteenth-century biographical dictionary, Rawdat al-jannat. In narrating the life and works of Majlisi, Khwansari, as is his usual style, quotes from contemporary and later sources. He refers to him as “Shaykh al-Islam” of the Safavid capital, adding that “he was the chief figure (ra’is) in religious and secular matters.” During the reign of the last Safavid ruler, Shah Sultan Husayn, the affairs of the state had deteriorated to such a degree that it was only thanks to Majlisi’s activities that the country maintained a semblance of unity. The end came soon after Majlisi’s death.
Aside from his religious duties as a member of the ‘ulama’, which the sources describe in exaggerated detail, Majlisi’s position in regard to the government and the shah is unclear. He was not a statesman.
In addition to the material in Khwansari’s work, the earliest life of Majlisi is included in Mir’at al-ahval-i Jahan-nama, written by Ahmad ibn Muhammad ‘Ali Bihbahani (d. 1819 or 1820) and recently published in Tehran, edited by ‘Ali Davvani. This work served as the basis for a more elaborate biography of Majlisi written in 1884 by Husayn ibn Muhammad Taqi ibn ‘Ali ibn Muhammad al-Nuri al-Tabarsi, entitled Al-fayd al-qudsi fi tarjamat al-‘Allamah al-Majlisi. This work was published as part of volume 105 of the new edition of Majlisi’s Bihar al-anwar. After a short introduction, the biography deals with Majlisi’s personal characteristics, his works, his teachers and students, his ancestors, his descendants, and his life and visions of him after his death.
The sources stress two aspects of Majlisi’s life: his strong opposition to Sufism and his attempt at popularizing Shi’a thought among Iranians by writing several of his works in Persian rather than Arabic. His major work, however, Bihar al-anwar, a compendium of Shi‘a knowledge, is in Arabic. A new (second) edition of this work, which began to appear in Tehran in the 1960s is in 110 volumes. Karl-Heinz Pampus wrote a doctoral dissertation on Bihar al-anwar in 1970. The first part of Pampus’s work is a comprehensive biography of Majlisi; the rest is a detailed analysis of Bihar.
Majlisi is said to have written as many as thirteen books in Arabic and fifty-three in Persian. Some of these compositions are short treatises dealing with such topics as belief, prayer, ethics, and morality, many of which intended to teach the common person. In Shi‘a thought and scholarship, Majlisi represents the culminating point in the Ithna ‘Ashari revival that can be said to have begun with the rise of the Safavid dynasty. The continuity in Shi‘a learning that the Safavid rulers provided for Ithna ‘Ashari scholars (thus linking them with their predecessors of the late Middle Ages, such as Ibn al-Mujtahar al-Hilli, Ibn Makki al-‘Amili, Ibn Fahd al-Hilli and others) is counterbalanced with the continuity that Majlisi himself provided for future generations of Shi‘a scholars, linking the Safavid period with that of the Qajar dynasty in the nineteenth century -- all the way to the present Islamic Republic of Iran.
No modern scholar today dealing with Islamic thought, Shi’a or otherwise, can afford to ignore the writings of Muhammad Baqir al-Majilisi. Majlisi, al-Hurr al-‘Amili, and Mulla Muhsin Fayd constitute the so-called Three Later Muhammads who, with the “Three Early Muhammads” (Kulayni, Ibn Babuyah, and Shaykh al-Ta’ifah al-Tusi), share among themselves the most important writings of the teachings of the Shi‘a tradition of Islam.
Majlisi re-established clerical authority under his leadership, and renewed the impetus for conversion from Sunnism to Shi'ism. Majlisi is credited with propagating numerous Shi'a rituals that Iranians regularly practice, such as mourning ceremonies for fallen imams, particularly the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali at Karbala; and pilgrimages to shrines of imams and their families.
Majlisi fervently upheld the concepts of enjoining the good and prohibiting evil, and in so doing endeavored to provide fatwa (judgments) for all of the hypothetical situations a true believer could or might face. In one exposition of virtues of proper behavior, he gave directions on everything from how to wear clothes to sexual intercourse and association with females, clipping fingernails, sleeping, waking, bathroom functions, enemas, sneezing, entering and leaving a domicile, and treatments and cures for many illnesses and diseases.
More controversially, Majlisi defined science very narrowly as knowledge of the clear, secure ayat (verses of the Qur'an); of the religious duties and obligations which God has fixed in his Justice; and of the Prophetic Traditions (Hadith), which are valid until the day of Resurrection. Beyond this, he warned, the seeking of knowledge is a waste of one's life, and worse would generally lead to apostasy and heresy, in which case the likelihood of salvation is remote. Majlisi opposed the school of mystical philosophy developed by Mir Damad and Mulla Sadra, who argued that the Qur'an was always open to re-interpretation, and valued insights that came from intuition and ecstasy rather than reason.
Majlisi is also controversial for his close relationship with Indian Mughal ruler Aurangzeb Alamgir who was known commonly for his anti-Shi'a inclinations. Aurangzeb is said to have referred to Majlisi as the real leader of all true Muslims of Persia. Majlisi visited India on nine occasions between 1660 and 1695 and was awarded the respect of a government emissary thereby offending the Shah of Iran. Shah Suleiman made a futile effort of winning over Majlisi against Aurangzeb by giving him a high level post in his court but failed to win his support for his wars against the latter.
Mullah Muhammad Baqir Majlisi see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlesi-ye Thani see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlesi the Second see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Thani, Majlesi-ye see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
'Allama Majlisi see Majlisi, Muhammad Baqir
Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi
Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi (Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi Awwal) (1594-1659). Shi‘a religious leader and author. He was the father of Mulla Muhammad Baqir Majlisi.
Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi Awwal see Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi
Awwal, Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi see Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi
Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi (Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi Awwal) (1594-1659). Shi‘a religious leader and author. He was the father of Mulla Muhammad Baqir Majlisi.
Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi Awwal see Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi
Awwal, Muhammad Taqi Majlisi-yi see Majlisi-yi Awwal, Muhammad Taqi
Majnun-Layla
Majnun-Layla (“The Madman of Layla”) ("Layla's Lunatic"). Name given to the hero of a romantic love story, the original form of which could date back as far as the second half of the seventh century. The tale is known in Arabic, Persian, Kurdish, Pashto, Turkish and Urdu literatures.
The story of Layla and Majnun is based on the real story of a young man called Qays ibn al-Mulawwah from the northern Arabian Peninsula, in the Umayyad era during the 7th century. There were two Arabic versions of the story at the time. In one version, Majnun spent his youth together with his cousin, Layla, tending their flocks. In the other version, upon seeing Layla he fell passionately in love with her. In both versions, however, Majnun went mad when her father prevented him from marrying her. For that reason, Majnun came to be called Majnun-Layla, which means "Driven mad by Layla." To Majnun were attributed a variety of incredibly passionate romantic Arabic poems, considered among the foremost examples of the Udhari school.
Qays ibn al-Mulawwah ibn Muzahim, a Bedouin poet, was from the Bani Aamir tribe of Arabia. He fell in love with Layla bint Mahdi ibn Sa'd from the same tribe, better known as Layla Al-Aamiriya. He soon began creating poems about his love for her, mentioning her name often. When he asked for her hand in marriage her father refused as this would mean a scandal for Layla according to Arab traditions. Soon after, Layla married another man.
When Qays heard of her marriage, he fled the tribe camp and began wandering the surrounding desert. His family eventually gave up on his return and left food for him in the wilderness. He could sometimes be seen reciting poetry to himself or writing in the sand with a stick.
Layla moved to Iraq with her husband, where she became ill and eventually died. Qays was later found dead in the wilderness in 688 near an unknown woman's grave. He had carved three verses of poetry on a rock near the grave, which are the last three verses attributed to him.
From Arab and Habib folklore, the story passed into Persian literature, and in the 12th century, Nizami wrote a famous adaptation of Layla and Majnun in Persian. In Nizami's adaptation, the young lovers become acquainted at school and fell desperately in love. However, they could not see each other due to a family feud, and Layla's family arranged for her to marry another man. It is a tragic story of undying love much like the later Romeo and Juliet, which was itself said to have been inspired by a Latin version of Layla and Majnun.
The type of love exhibited by Layla and Majnun is known in Arabic culture as "Virgin Love", because the lovers never married or made love. Other famous Virgin Love stories are the stories of "Qays and Lubna", "Kuthair and Azza", "Marwa and Al Majnoun Al Faranasi" and "Antara and Abla." The literary motif itself is common throughout the world, notably in the Muslim literature of South Asia, such as Urdu ghazals.
The Azerbaijani Turkish adaptation of the story, Dastan-i Leyli vu Mecnun ("The Epic of Layla and Majnun") was written in the 16th century by Fuzuli. Fuzuli's version was borrowed by the renowned Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyov, who used the material to create what became the Middle East's first opera. It premiered in Baku on January 25, 1908. The story had previously been brought to the stage in the late 19th century, when Ahmed Shawqi wrote a poetic play about the tragedy, now considered one of the best in modern Arab poetry.
The enduring popularity of the legend of Layla and Majnun has exerted great influence on Middle Eastern literature, especially Sufi writers, in whose literature the name Layla refers to their concept of the Beloved. The original story is featured in Baha'ullah's writings, the Seven Valleys. Etymologically, the word "Layla" is related to the Hebrew and Arabic words for "night," and is thought to mean "one who works by night." This is an apparent allusion to the fact that the romance of the star-crossed lovers was hidden and kept secret. In the Persian and Arabic languages, the word "Majnun" means "crazy." In addition to this creative use of language, the tale has also made at least one linguistic contribution, inspiring a Turkish collquialism: to "feel like Layla" is to feel completely dazed, as might be expected of a person who is literarlly madly in love.
In contemporary times, the name "Layla" served as the inspiration for the title of Derek and the Dominos' famous album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs and its title track.
The Madman of Layla see Majnun-Layla
Layla's Lunatic see Majnun-Layla
Majnun-Layla (“The Madman of Layla”) ("Layla's Lunatic"). Name given to the hero of a romantic love story, the original form of which could date back as far as the second half of the seventh century. The tale is known in Arabic, Persian, Kurdish, Pashto, Turkish and Urdu literatures.
The story of Layla and Majnun is based on the real story of a young man called Qays ibn al-Mulawwah from the northern Arabian Peninsula, in the Umayyad era during the 7th century. There were two Arabic versions of the story at the time. In one version, Majnun spent his youth together with his cousin, Layla, tending their flocks. In the other version, upon seeing Layla he fell passionately in love with her. In both versions, however, Majnun went mad when her father prevented him from marrying her. For that reason, Majnun came to be called Majnun-Layla, which means "Driven mad by Layla." To Majnun were attributed a variety of incredibly passionate romantic Arabic poems, considered among the foremost examples of the Udhari school.
Qays ibn al-Mulawwah ibn Muzahim, a Bedouin poet, was from the Bani Aamir tribe of Arabia. He fell in love with Layla bint Mahdi ibn Sa'd from the same tribe, better known as Layla Al-Aamiriya. He soon began creating poems about his love for her, mentioning her name often. When he asked for her hand in marriage her father refused as this would mean a scandal for Layla according to Arab traditions. Soon after, Layla married another man.
When Qays heard of her marriage, he fled the tribe camp and began wandering the surrounding desert. His family eventually gave up on his return and left food for him in the wilderness. He could sometimes be seen reciting poetry to himself or writing in the sand with a stick.
Layla moved to Iraq with her husband, where she became ill and eventually died. Qays was later found dead in the wilderness in 688 near an unknown woman's grave. He had carved three verses of poetry on a rock near the grave, which are the last three verses attributed to him.
From Arab and Habib folklore, the story passed into Persian literature, and in the 12th century, Nizami wrote a famous adaptation of Layla and Majnun in Persian. In Nizami's adaptation, the young lovers become acquainted at school and fell desperately in love. However, they could not see each other due to a family feud, and Layla's family arranged for her to marry another man. It is a tragic story of undying love much like the later Romeo and Juliet, which was itself said to have been inspired by a Latin version of Layla and Majnun.
The type of love exhibited by Layla and Majnun is known in Arabic culture as "Virgin Love", because the lovers never married or made love. Other famous Virgin Love stories are the stories of "Qays and Lubna", "Kuthair and Azza", "Marwa and Al Majnoun Al Faranasi" and "Antara and Abla." The literary motif itself is common throughout the world, notably in the Muslim literature of South Asia, such as Urdu ghazals.
The Azerbaijani Turkish adaptation of the story, Dastan-i Leyli vu Mecnun ("The Epic of Layla and Majnun") was written in the 16th century by Fuzuli. Fuzuli's version was borrowed by the renowned Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyov, who used the material to create what became the Middle East's first opera. It premiered in Baku on January 25, 1908. The story had previously been brought to the stage in the late 19th century, when Ahmed Shawqi wrote a poetic play about the tragedy, now considered one of the best in modern Arab poetry.
The enduring popularity of the legend of Layla and Majnun has exerted great influence on Middle Eastern literature, especially Sufi writers, in whose literature the name Layla refers to their concept of the Beloved. The original story is featured in Baha'ullah's writings, the Seven Valleys. Etymologically, the word "Layla" is related to the Hebrew and Arabic words for "night," and is thought to mean "one who works by night." This is an apparent allusion to the fact that the romance of the star-crossed lovers was hidden and kept secret. In the Persian and Arabic languages, the word "Majnun" means "crazy." In addition to this creative use of language, the tale has also made at least one linguistic contribution, inspiring a Turkish collquialism: to "feel like Layla" is to feel completely dazed, as might be expected of a person who is literarlly madly in love.
In contemporary times, the name "Layla" served as the inspiration for the title of Derek and the Dominos' famous album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs and its title track.
The Madman of Layla see Majnun-Layla
Layla's Lunatic see Majnun-Layla
Makassar
Makassar. See Makassarese.
Makassarese see Makassar.
Makassar. See Makassarese.
Makassarese see Makassar.
Makassarese
Makassarese. The Makassarese (or Mangkasara’, as they call themselves) form one of the major groups in the Indonesian province of South Sulawesi (formerly South Celebes). They inhabit the coastal plains and mountainous interior of the southern regions as well as the island of Salayar lying off the south coast. Ujung Pandang, called Makassar until 1971, which is the capital and largest city of this province, is located in the Makassarese area. About half of its population is Makassarese.
The Makassarese have a longstanding tradition of seafaring, fishing and overseas trade. In the seventeenth century, Gowa, the main Makassar kingdom, expanded into a maritime empire dominating the South Sulawesi peninsula, the coasts of the whole of Sulawesi and some neighboring islands. Its power was based on the wealth accumulated through an overseas trade extending over the entire Indonesian archipelago and beyond.
Malay traders began visiting the port of Makassar in the 1540s and helped it dominate rival ports on the trade route to the Maluku -- Bantaeng, Bira, and Selayar. The economic foundation for Makassar’s greatness was laid by Karaeng Matoaya, ruler of Tallo (1593-1637) and prime minister of Makassar, who expanded local rice production to supply the Maluku in exchange for cloves and nutmeg. As the Dutch East India Company (VOC) asserted a monopoly over spices from Maluku, other Europeans based themselves in Makassar, where they could buy from Malay and Makassarese traders prepared to defy Dutch claims. The British (1613) and the Danes (1618) established factories, and Golconda, Aceh, and Spanish Manila sent their agents. Makassar became the major Portuguese base in Southeast Asia after the loss of Melaka in 1641, when three thousand Portuguese and four churches were reported in the city.
Matoaya was also responsible for Makassar’s acceptance of Islam (1605) and the subsequent wars (1608-1611) in which the Bugis states accepted Islam and Makassar hegemony. Makassar’s power also extended to Sumbawa (1617), Buton, and eastern Borneo. As a result of the humiliating Treaty of Bungaya (1667) and series of defeats by an alliance of Dutch and Bugis (1666-1669), Sultan Hasan-uddin (1653-1669) became the last ruler of a strong Makassar empire. His successors ruled only Goa. The large urban population was dispersed. The Dutch renamed the northerly Makassarese fort of Ujung Pandang Fort Rotterdam and fortified it strongly. A much smaller city of Dutch, Eurasians, Chinese, Malays and Bugis grew around the fort to work in the declining Dutch trade to the Malukus and handle local exports, consisting mostly of Bugis slaves.
After this Makassar empire was destroyed by the Dutch in 1669, large Makassar fleets for years roamed the intra-island seas in search of spoils and action.
A Makassar venture combining fishery and commerce was first started in the eighteenth century, when there was a growing demand for trepang or beche-de-mer, a small edible marine animal, for the Chinese cuisine. Makassarese fishermen took part in collecting trepang from where it grew on the seabed in shallow water and brought large quantities to Makassar, mainly for export to China. Their search for trepang led them to the southern seas and eventually to the coastal waters of northern Australia, which became their principal trepang grounds. For about a century and a half, until 1906, when Australia closed its coasts to them, a fleet of their vessels used to set out annually from Makassar with the northwest monsoon and return six months later with the southeast wind. Artifacts found on the northern Australia coasts and traces of Makassarese influence on the culture and languages of the local aborigines testify to their former presence and activities there.
Ever since the king of Gowa adopted Islam in 1605, the life and society of the Makassarese have been marked by this religion, including its more and its less rigidly orthodox elements. The most revered saint is the seventeenth century mystic Shaikh Yusuf (1626-1699), whose tomb in the center of the old kingdom of Gowa is an object of pilgrimage. He not only was a learned Sufi who had studied in Mecca but also is commemorated as a national hero. He was one of the leaders of the resistance against the Dutch in Java until his capture and banishment first to Ceylon and later to South Africa. He is venerated as a great Muslim leader both in South Africa, where he died and was buried, and in South Sulawesi, where his remains were transferred in 1705. One of the local Sufi orders, the Khalwatiyya Yusuf, traces its origins to Shaikh Yusuf. The people of certain villages even believe that a visit to his grave is the equivalent to a pilgrimage to Mecca.
Mangkasara' see Makassarese.
Makassarese. The Makassarese (or Mangkasara’, as they call themselves) form one of the major groups in the Indonesian province of South Sulawesi (formerly South Celebes). They inhabit the coastal plains and mountainous interior of the southern regions as well as the island of Salayar lying off the south coast. Ujung Pandang, called Makassar until 1971, which is the capital and largest city of this province, is located in the Makassarese area. About half of its population is Makassarese.
The Makassarese have a longstanding tradition of seafaring, fishing and overseas trade. In the seventeenth century, Gowa, the main Makassar kingdom, expanded into a maritime empire dominating the South Sulawesi peninsula, the coasts of the whole of Sulawesi and some neighboring islands. Its power was based on the wealth accumulated through an overseas trade extending over the entire Indonesian archipelago and beyond.
Malay traders began visiting the port of Makassar in the 1540s and helped it dominate rival ports on the trade route to the Maluku -- Bantaeng, Bira, and Selayar. The economic foundation for Makassar’s greatness was laid by Karaeng Matoaya, ruler of Tallo (1593-1637) and prime minister of Makassar, who expanded local rice production to supply the Maluku in exchange for cloves and nutmeg. As the Dutch East India Company (VOC) asserted a monopoly over spices from Maluku, other Europeans based themselves in Makassar, where they could buy from Malay and Makassarese traders prepared to defy Dutch claims. The British (1613) and the Danes (1618) established factories, and Golconda, Aceh, and Spanish Manila sent their agents. Makassar became the major Portuguese base in Southeast Asia after the loss of Melaka in 1641, when three thousand Portuguese and four churches were reported in the city.
Matoaya was also responsible for Makassar’s acceptance of Islam (1605) and the subsequent wars (1608-1611) in which the Bugis states accepted Islam and Makassar hegemony. Makassar’s power also extended to Sumbawa (1617), Buton, and eastern Borneo. As a result of the humiliating Treaty of Bungaya (1667) and series of defeats by an alliance of Dutch and Bugis (1666-1669), Sultan Hasan-uddin (1653-1669) became the last ruler of a strong Makassar empire. His successors ruled only Goa. The large urban population was dispersed. The Dutch renamed the northerly Makassarese fort of Ujung Pandang Fort Rotterdam and fortified it strongly. A much smaller city of Dutch, Eurasians, Chinese, Malays and Bugis grew around the fort to work in the declining Dutch trade to the Malukus and handle local exports, consisting mostly of Bugis slaves.
After this Makassar empire was destroyed by the Dutch in 1669, large Makassar fleets for years roamed the intra-island seas in search of spoils and action.
A Makassar venture combining fishery and commerce was first started in the eighteenth century, when there was a growing demand for trepang or beche-de-mer, a small edible marine animal, for the Chinese cuisine. Makassarese fishermen took part in collecting trepang from where it grew on the seabed in shallow water and brought large quantities to Makassar, mainly for export to China. Their search for trepang led them to the southern seas and eventually to the coastal waters of northern Australia, which became their principal trepang grounds. For about a century and a half, until 1906, when Australia closed its coasts to them, a fleet of their vessels used to set out annually from Makassar with the northwest monsoon and return six months later with the southeast wind. Artifacts found on the northern Australia coasts and traces of Makassarese influence on the culture and languages of the local aborigines testify to their former presence and activities there.
Ever since the king of Gowa adopted Islam in 1605, the life and society of the Makassarese have been marked by this religion, including its more and its less rigidly orthodox elements. The most revered saint is the seventeenth century mystic Shaikh Yusuf (1626-1699), whose tomb in the center of the old kingdom of Gowa is an object of pilgrimage. He not only was a learned Sufi who had studied in Mecca but also is commemorated as a national hero. He was one of the leaders of the resistance against the Dutch in Java until his capture and banishment first to Ceylon and later to South Africa. He is venerated as a great Muslim leader both in South Africa, where he died and was buried, and in South Sulawesi, where his remains were transferred in 1705. One of the local Sufi orders, the Khalwatiyya Yusuf, traces its origins to Shaikh Yusuf. The people of certain villages even believe that a visit to his grave is the equivalent to a pilgrimage to Mecca.
Mangkasara' see Makassarese.
Makhdum al-Mulk
Makhdum al-Mulk (Makhdoom-ul-Mulk). Title of ‘Abd Allah Sultanpuri.
Makhdoom is a Muslim Sufi title in South Asia and Central Asia. This title is now used by the descendents of the Sufi masters who are mostly Pirs, politicians and landlords in southern Punjab and Sindh in Pakistan. Hazrat Abbas, respectable maternal uncle of the Prophet Muhammad, usually visited Mecca and Medina. The Prophet Muhammad received him and always addressed him with the title of Makhdoom. From that time Arab people descended from that family are especially called "Makhdoom" which means one who is served. Quraishis in Punjab and Sindh provinces of Pakistan use this title as sacerdotal dignity.
People with the title Makhdoom include:
* Makhdoom Muhammad Ameen Faheem, Pakistani politician, and central leader of PPP.
* Makhdoom Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat, Pakistani politician affiliated with PML-Q, and former Interior Minister of Pakistan.
* Hamza Makhdum, Sufi saint from Kashmir (d. 1563 AD)
* Makhdoom Muhammad Javed Hashmi, Pakistani politician, and central leader of PML-N.
* Junaydollo Makhdoom Hodeq, Uzbekistan, Tajik poet
* Makhdoom Abdul Baqa bin Khawaja Baha Al Din bin Khawaja Ahmed, Naqsbandi saint, author of Jame al Maqamat
* Makhdoom Abhari, Darya Khan Sind, preacher of rational sciences
* Makhdoom Abul Fateh Hosayni Jorjani, Shia Jurist
* Makhdoom Ahmed Danes, Sufi, Engineer, Historian and progressive Tajik Writer in Bukhara
* Makhdoom Ahmed Nawaz, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Ali Hijvari Almaroof Datta Gunj Bhaksh, a famous Sufi of Punjab Pakistan.
* Makhdoom Ali Khan, Former Attorney General of Pakistan.
* Makhdoom Ali Mahimi, Sufi saint from the Konkan in India.
* Makhdoom Bah ud din Zakria, Sufi
* Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs within Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2004 to 2007.
* Makhdoom Mohammad Rafique, Grammarian, Dramatist, Communist Mazdoor Kissan Party
* Makhdoom Mohiuddin, Urdu poet and Marxist politician from India.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Aslam, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Sadiq, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Shaikh Jala al Din Bokari, Almaroof Makhdoom-e-Jahanian and Jahangast, Sufi
* Makhdoom Syed Akhtar Husain Shah, Pakistani politician in affiliation with PPP, former MPA Sindh.
* Makhdoom Syed Bashir Ahmed Shah, Political leader affiliated with PPP, and former Minister for Food, Agriculture and Forests during the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto government.
* Makhdoom Syed Muhammad Hashim Thattvi Sindhi, Renowned Islamic scholar
* Makhdoom-e-Azam Ahmed Khajagi bin Jalal Al din Kasani, Sufi, and author of about 30 treatises.
* Makhdoom-ul-mulk Hazrat Shaikh Sharafuddin Ahmad bin Yahya Maneri of Biharsharif 1263 - 1379 AD
* Makhdoom Mian Mir, Sufi from Lahore At the request of Sikh High priests laid first foundation of Golden Temple.
* Sayed Makhdoom Raheen, Afghanistan Ambassador in India And former Information Minister of Afghanistan.
* Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Pakistani politician, current Foreign Minister of Pakistan and president of PPP Punjab.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Zaman Talib-ul-Mola, Founding member of Pakistan Peoples Party, famous Sindhi poet, Ex. Sajjadah Nasheen of Dargah Sarwar Nooh, Hala Sindh.
* Makhdoom Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani, Prime Minister of Pakistan and Vice-Chairman of PPP
'Abd Allah Sultanpuri see Makhdum al-Mulk
Sultanpuri, 'Abd Allah see Makhdum al-Mulk
Makhdoom-ul-Mulk see Makhdum al-Mulk
Makhdum al-Mulk (Makhdoom-ul-Mulk). Title of ‘Abd Allah Sultanpuri.
Makhdoom is a Muslim Sufi title in South Asia and Central Asia. This title is now used by the descendents of the Sufi masters who are mostly Pirs, politicians and landlords in southern Punjab and Sindh in Pakistan. Hazrat Abbas, respectable maternal uncle of the Prophet Muhammad, usually visited Mecca and Medina. The Prophet Muhammad received him and always addressed him with the title of Makhdoom. From that time Arab people descended from that family are especially called "Makhdoom" which means one who is served. Quraishis in Punjab and Sindh provinces of Pakistan use this title as sacerdotal dignity.
People with the title Makhdoom include:
* Makhdoom Muhammad Ameen Faheem, Pakistani politician, and central leader of PPP.
* Makhdoom Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat, Pakistani politician affiliated with PML-Q, and former Interior Minister of Pakistan.
* Hamza Makhdum, Sufi saint from Kashmir (d. 1563 AD)
* Makhdoom Muhammad Javed Hashmi, Pakistani politician, and central leader of PML-N.
* Junaydollo Makhdoom Hodeq, Uzbekistan, Tajik poet
* Makhdoom Abdul Baqa bin Khawaja Baha Al Din bin Khawaja Ahmed, Naqsbandi saint, author of Jame al Maqamat
* Makhdoom Abhari, Darya Khan Sind, preacher of rational sciences
* Makhdoom Abul Fateh Hosayni Jorjani, Shia Jurist
* Makhdoom Ahmed Danes, Sufi, Engineer, Historian and progressive Tajik Writer in Bukhara
* Makhdoom Ahmed Nawaz, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Ali Hijvari Almaroof Datta Gunj Bhaksh, a famous Sufi of Punjab Pakistan.
* Makhdoom Ali Khan, Former Attorney General of Pakistan.
* Makhdoom Ali Mahimi, Sufi saint from the Konkan in India.
* Makhdoom Bah ud din Zakria, Sufi
* Makhdoom Khusro Bakhtiar, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs within Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2004 to 2007.
* Makhdoom Mohammad Rafique, Grammarian, Dramatist, Communist Mazdoor Kissan Party
* Makhdoom Mohiuddin, Urdu poet and Marxist politician from India.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Aslam, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Sadiq, Landlord of Mianwali and Bhakkar Punjab.
* Makhdoom Shaikh Jala al Din Bokari, Almaroof Makhdoom-e-Jahanian and Jahangast, Sufi
* Makhdoom Syed Akhtar Husain Shah, Pakistani politician in affiliation with PPP, former MPA Sindh.
* Makhdoom Syed Bashir Ahmed Shah, Political leader affiliated with PPP, and former Minister for Food, Agriculture and Forests during the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto government.
* Makhdoom Syed Muhammad Hashim Thattvi Sindhi, Renowned Islamic scholar
* Makhdoom-e-Azam Ahmed Khajagi bin Jalal Al din Kasani, Sufi, and author of about 30 treatises.
* Makhdoom-ul-mulk Hazrat Shaikh Sharafuddin Ahmad bin Yahya Maneri of Biharsharif 1263 - 1379 AD
* Makhdoom Mian Mir, Sufi from Lahore At the request of Sikh High priests laid first foundation of Golden Temple.
* Sayed Makhdoom Raheen, Afghanistan Ambassador in India And former Information Minister of Afghanistan.
* Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Pakistani politician, current Foreign Minister of Pakistan and president of PPP Punjab.
* Makhdoom Muhammad Zaman Talib-ul-Mola, Founding member of Pakistan Peoples Party, famous Sindhi poet, Ex. Sajjadah Nasheen of Dargah Sarwar Nooh, Hala Sindh.
* Makhdoom Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani, Prime Minister of Pakistan and Vice-Chairman of PPP
'Abd Allah Sultanpuri see Makhdum al-Mulk
Sultanpuri, 'Abd Allah see Makhdum al-Mulk
Makhdoom-ul-Mulk see Makhdum al-Mulk
Makhfi
Makhfi (Zib al-Nisa’ Begum) (Zeb-un-Nisa) (Zebunnisa) (Zeb-ul-Nissa) (Zeb-un-Nisa Makhfi) (1637-1702). Daughter of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzib. Competent in Arabic and Persian and skilled in calligraphy, she was a great lover of books.
The name Zeb-un-Nisa is derived from two words. "Zeb" means "beauty" or "ornament" in Persian. "Nisa" means "women" in Arabic. Combined the name "Zeb-un-Nisa" means "most beautiful of all women."
Zeb-un-Nisa was the eldes daughter of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzib (known as Alamgir). She was born during the reign of Shah Jahan. Her mother was Delras Baneo, daughter of Shahnawaz Safavid.
Aurangzeb charged Mariam, one of the women of the court, with the education of Zeb-un-Nisa. Through her efforts, Zeb-un-Nisa memorized the Qur'an in three years. Then she studied the sciences of the time with Mohammad Saeed Ashraf Mazandarani. Zeb-un-Nisa also studied philosophy, astronomy, and literature while becoming fluent in Persian, Arabic and Urdu.
Zeb-un-Nisa began to narrate poems in Persian from the age of 14, but as her father did not like poetry, she would write secretly. Ustad Bayaz, one of her teachers, found her poems and then encouraged her to continue narrating poems. It is reported that in the court of Aurangzeb, there were literary and poetry parties and the great poets like Ghani Kashmiri, Naimatullah Khan and Aqil Khan Razi, and Zeb-un-Nisa participated secretly in these parties.
When Aurangzeb became the emperor after Shah Jahan, Zeb-un-Nisa was 21 years old. Aurangzeb came to appreciate the talent and ability of his daughter, Zeb-un-Nisa. Aurangzeb discussed affairs of state with Zeb-un-Nisa and listened to her opinions. It has been mentioned in some books that Aurangzeb sent all the royal princes for the reception of Zeb-un-Nisa each time she entered the court. Zeb-un-Nisa had four other sisters: Zeenat-un-Nisa, Badr-un-Nisa, Mehr-un-Nisa and Zehdat-un-Nisa. Among them, Zeenat-un-Nisa and Zebdat-un-Nisa wrote poems too.
Zeb-un-Nisa did not get married and remained single until her death, despite the fact she had many suitors. She devoted all her life on literary works and poetry.
Zeb-un-Nisa selected the name "Makhfi" (meaning "Hidden One" in Persian) as her literary pen name. In addition to her poetic book or collection of poems, called Diwan, which contains approximately 5,000 verses, she also wrote "Monis-ul-Roh", "Zeb-ul Monsha'at" and "Zeb-ul-Tafasir."
Zeb-un-Nisa died in 1702 in Shahjahanabad (old Delhi, India), while Aurangzeb was on a trip to the Deccan. Her tomb was originally in the garden of "Thirty thousand trees", outside of the Kabuli Gate. However, when the railway line was laid out at Delhi, her tomb was shifted to Akhbar's mausoleum at Sikandara, Agra.
Zib al-Nisa' Begum see Makhfi
Begum, Zib al-Nisa' see Makhfi
Zeb-un-Nisa see Makhfi
Zebunnisa see Makhfi
Zeb-ul-Nissa see Makhfi
Zeb-un-Nisa Makhfi see Makhfi
Makhfi (Zib al-Nisa’ Begum) (Zeb-un-Nisa) (Zebunnisa) (Zeb-ul-Nissa) (Zeb-un-Nisa Makhfi) (1637-1702). Daughter of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzib. Competent in Arabic and Persian and skilled in calligraphy, she was a great lover of books.
The name Zeb-un-Nisa is derived from two words. "Zeb" means "beauty" or "ornament" in Persian. "Nisa" means "women" in Arabic. Combined the name "Zeb-un-Nisa" means "most beautiful of all women."
Zeb-un-Nisa was the eldes daughter of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzib (known as Alamgir). She was born during the reign of Shah Jahan. Her mother was Delras Baneo, daughter of Shahnawaz Safavid.
Aurangzeb charged Mariam, one of the women of the court, with the education of Zeb-un-Nisa. Through her efforts, Zeb-un-Nisa memorized the Qur'an in three years. Then she studied the sciences of the time with Mohammad Saeed Ashraf Mazandarani. Zeb-un-Nisa also studied philosophy, astronomy, and literature while becoming fluent in Persian, Arabic and Urdu.
Zeb-un-Nisa began to narrate poems in Persian from the age of 14, but as her father did not like poetry, she would write secretly. Ustad Bayaz, one of her teachers, found her poems and then encouraged her to continue narrating poems. It is reported that in the court of Aurangzeb, there were literary and poetry parties and the great poets like Ghani Kashmiri, Naimatullah Khan and Aqil Khan Razi, and Zeb-un-Nisa participated secretly in these parties.
When Aurangzeb became the emperor after Shah Jahan, Zeb-un-Nisa was 21 years old. Aurangzeb came to appreciate the talent and ability of his daughter, Zeb-un-Nisa. Aurangzeb discussed affairs of state with Zeb-un-Nisa and listened to her opinions. It has been mentioned in some books that Aurangzeb sent all the royal princes for the reception of Zeb-un-Nisa each time she entered the court. Zeb-un-Nisa had four other sisters: Zeenat-un-Nisa, Badr-un-Nisa, Mehr-un-Nisa and Zehdat-un-Nisa. Among them, Zeenat-un-Nisa and Zebdat-un-Nisa wrote poems too.
Zeb-un-Nisa did not get married and remained single until her death, despite the fact she had many suitors. She devoted all her life on literary works and poetry.
Zeb-un-Nisa selected the name "Makhfi" (meaning "Hidden One" in Persian) as her literary pen name. In addition to her poetic book or collection of poems, called Diwan, which contains approximately 5,000 verses, she also wrote "Monis-ul-Roh", "Zeb-ul Monsha'at" and "Zeb-ul-Tafasir."
Zeb-un-Nisa died in 1702 in Shahjahanabad (old Delhi, India), while Aurangzeb was on a trip to the Deccan. Her tomb was originally in the garden of "Thirty thousand trees", outside of the Kabuli Gate. However, when the railway line was laid out at Delhi, her tomb was shifted to Akhbar's mausoleum at Sikandara, Agra.
Zib al-Nisa' Begum see Makhfi
Begum, Zib al-Nisa' see Makhfi
Zeb-un-Nisa see Makhfi
Zebunnisa see Makhfi
Zeb-ul-Nissa see Makhfi
Zeb-un-Nisa Makhfi see Makhfi
Makhrama, Ba
Makhrama, Ba (Ba Makhrama) (Abu Makhrama). South Arabian Himyarite clan of Shafi‘i jurists and Sufis who lived in Hadhramaut and Aden in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
Bamakhrama is a tribe from Hadhramaut state in the Republic of Yemen. This family is one of the tribes which constitute the "Hemiyar" tribe. Hemiyar is one of the largest tribes in the Arabian Peninsula. Bamakhrama is famous for its scientists, judges, and scholars. For thousands of years Bamakhrama was responsible for the "justice" affairs between Hemiyar tribes.
Here are some of the most famous scholars from Bamakhrama:
- Ahmed bin Abdullah bin Ahmed Bamakhrama: Born in Aden on 1461. He studied Islamic Fiqh, mathematics and became famous scholar and scientist. He died on 1505.
- El-Tayeb bin Abdullah bin Ahmed Bamakhrama: Born in Aden on 1465. He studied Islamic Fiqh, mathematics, Arabic and became the judge of Aden until he died on 1540.
- Abdullah bin Ahmed bin Ali Bamakhrama: Born in Hajrin, Hadhramaut on 1429, then he moved to Aden for study. He studied Islamic fiqh, mathematics, engineering, Arabic, Tafseer, and Arabic grammar. After that he became the judge of Aden. He wrote books in Islamic fiqh, engineering and mathematics, and Arabic.
Ba Makhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Abu Makhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Bamakhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Makhrama, Ba (Ba Makhrama) (Abu Makhrama). South Arabian Himyarite clan of Shafi‘i jurists and Sufis who lived in Hadhramaut and Aden in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
Bamakhrama is a tribe from Hadhramaut state in the Republic of Yemen. This family is one of the tribes which constitute the "Hemiyar" tribe. Hemiyar is one of the largest tribes in the Arabian Peninsula. Bamakhrama is famous for its scientists, judges, and scholars. For thousands of years Bamakhrama was responsible for the "justice" affairs between Hemiyar tribes.
Here are some of the most famous scholars from Bamakhrama:
- Ahmed bin Abdullah bin Ahmed Bamakhrama: Born in Aden on 1461. He studied Islamic Fiqh, mathematics and became famous scholar and scientist. He died on 1505.
- El-Tayeb bin Abdullah bin Ahmed Bamakhrama: Born in Aden on 1465. He studied Islamic Fiqh, mathematics, Arabic and became the judge of Aden until he died on 1540.
- Abdullah bin Ahmed bin Ali Bamakhrama: Born in Hajrin, Hadhramaut on 1429, then he moved to Aden for study. He studied Islamic fiqh, mathematics, engineering, Arabic, Tafseer, and Arabic grammar. After that he became the judge of Aden. He wrote books in Islamic fiqh, engineering and mathematics, and Arabic.
Ba Makhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Abu Makhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Bamakhrama see Makhrama, Ba
Makhzum, Banu
Makhzum, Banu (Banu Makhzum). Clan of Quraysh which achieved a prominent position in pre-Islamic MeccBanū Makhzūm was one of the wealthy clans of Quraysh, the Arab tribe of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
Famous individuals of the Banū Makhzūm include
* Amr ibn Hishām better known as Abu Al-Hakam or Abu Jahl
* Walid ibn al-Mughira
* Umm Salama Hind bint Abi Umayya
* Khalid ibn al-Walid
* Mughira ibn Abd-Allah
* Hisham ibn al-Mughirah
* Ibn Zaydún
Banu Makhzum see Makhzum, Banu
Makhzum, Banu (Banu Makhzum). Clan of Quraysh which achieved a prominent position in pre-Islamic MeccBanū Makhzūm was one of the wealthy clans of Quraysh, the Arab tribe of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.
Famous individuals of the Banū Makhzūm include
* Amr ibn Hishām better known as Abu Al-Hakam or Abu Jahl
* Walid ibn al-Mughira
* Umm Salama Hind bint Abi Umayya
* Khalid ibn al-Walid
* Mughira ibn Abd-Allah
* Hisham ibn al-Mughirah
* Ibn Zaydún
Banu Makhzum see Makhzum, Banu
Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al- (Jirjis al-Makin ibn al-‘Amid) (George Elmacin) (Girgis al-Makin) (Ibn Amid) (1205-1273). Arabic-speaking Coptic historian. His History, covering the period from the creation of the world to the accession of the Mameluke Sultan Baybars in 1260, was one of the first medieval Arabic chronicles to become known in Europe.
Girgis al-Makin, also known as Ibn Amid, was an Arabic Christian historian. The details of his life come from passages at the end of his own history. He was born in Cairo in Egypt in 1205. His full name in His great grandfather was a merchant from Tikrit in Iraq who settled in Egypt.
He was a Coptic Christian and was known in the east as Ibn-Amid. He held high office in the military office (dīwān alğayš) in Cairo.
Such a position carried risks. He was twice imprisoned, possibly because of links to the contemporary unrest in Syria at the time of the Mongol invasion; in one case for over a decade.
After his release, he wrote his chronicle in the years 1262-8, after his career (and his time in prison) was over. Later he moved to Damascus, where he died in 1273.
His sole surviving work is a world chronicle in two parts, entitled al-Majmu` al-Mubarak (The blessed collection). The first portion runs from Adam down to the 11th year of Heraclius. The second half is a history of the Saracens, which extends from the time of Mohammed to the accession of the Mameluke Sultan Baybars in 1260. The second half is mainly derived from the Persian writer Al-Tabari, as the author tells us, and was used by later Muslim and Christian writers.
In the first half, the work is structured as a series of numbered biographies of the most important men of the time, with Adam as the first. Down to 586 B.C.T., the history is based on the Bible. Later data is based on various sources. The first half ends with a list of Patriarchs of the church of Alexandria.
Ibn Amid's work was not hugely original. He drew on earlier sources, including the world history of Ibn al-Rahib. But it was very influential in both East and West. It was used by the 14-15th century Muslim historians Ibn Khaldun, al-Qalqashandi, and al-Maqrizi.
The second half was published in Arabic and Latin at Leiden in 1625. The Latin version is a translation by Erpenius (van Erpen), under the title, Historia saracenica, and from this a French translation was made by Wattier as L'Histoire mahomtane (Paris, 1657). An abbreviated English translation was also made from the Latin by Purchas. The translation by Erpenius was one of the first ever made of an Arabic text in modern times, and suffers accordingly from the lack of Lexica and difficulties with the language.
A continuation of the Chronicle also exists, written by Al-Muffadal ibn abi Al-Fada`il, who was also a Copt and may have been the author's great-nephew. It continues the text to the death of al-Malik al-Nasir in 1341. This contains only limited references to events in the Coptic community, and is mainly a secular history concerned with Muslim affairs. The continuation survives in only a single manuscript, and was apparently written for personal use.
Jirjis al-Makin ibn al-'Amid see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Girgis al-Makin see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
George Elmacin see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Ibn Amid see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al- (Jirjis al-Makin ibn al-‘Amid) (George Elmacin) (Girgis al-Makin) (Ibn Amid) (1205-1273). Arabic-speaking Coptic historian. His History, covering the period from the creation of the world to the accession of the Mameluke Sultan Baybars in 1260, was one of the first medieval Arabic chronicles to become known in Europe.
Girgis al-Makin, also known as Ibn Amid, was an Arabic Christian historian. The details of his life come from passages at the end of his own history. He was born in Cairo in Egypt in 1205. His full name in His great grandfather was a merchant from Tikrit in Iraq who settled in Egypt.
He was a Coptic Christian and was known in the east as Ibn-Amid. He held high office in the military office (dīwān alğayš) in Cairo.
Such a position carried risks. He was twice imprisoned, possibly because of links to the contemporary unrest in Syria at the time of the Mongol invasion; in one case for over a decade.
After his release, he wrote his chronicle in the years 1262-8, after his career (and his time in prison) was over. Later he moved to Damascus, where he died in 1273.
His sole surviving work is a world chronicle in two parts, entitled al-Majmu` al-Mubarak (The blessed collection). The first portion runs from Adam down to the 11th year of Heraclius. The second half is a history of the Saracens, which extends from the time of Mohammed to the accession of the Mameluke Sultan Baybars in 1260. The second half is mainly derived from the Persian writer Al-Tabari, as the author tells us, and was used by later Muslim and Christian writers.
In the first half, the work is structured as a series of numbered biographies of the most important men of the time, with Adam as the first. Down to 586 B.C.T., the history is based on the Bible. Later data is based on various sources. The first half ends with a list of Patriarchs of the church of Alexandria.
Ibn Amid's work was not hugely original. He drew on earlier sources, including the world history of Ibn al-Rahib. But it was very influential in both East and West. It was used by the 14-15th century Muslim historians Ibn Khaldun, al-Qalqashandi, and al-Maqrizi.
The second half was published in Arabic and Latin at Leiden in 1625. The Latin version is a translation by Erpenius (van Erpen), under the title, Historia saracenica, and from this a French translation was made by Wattier as L'Histoire mahomtane (Paris, 1657). An abbreviated English translation was also made from the Latin by Purchas. The translation by Erpenius was one of the first ever made of an Arabic text in modern times, and suffers accordingly from the lack of Lexica and difficulties with the language.
A continuation of the Chronicle also exists, written by Al-Muffadal ibn abi Al-Fada`il, who was also a Copt and may have been the author's great-nephew. It continues the text to the death of al-Malik al-Nasir in 1341. This contains only limited references to events in the Coptic community, and is mainly a secular history concerned with Muslim affairs. The continuation survives in only a single manuscript, and was apparently written for personal use.
Jirjis al-Makin ibn al-'Amid see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Girgis al-Makin see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
George Elmacin see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Ibn Amid see Makin ibn al-‘Amid, Jirjis al-
Makramids
Makramids. Family which held the spiritual and political leadership of the Banu Yam and the Sulaymani Isma‘ili community in Najran and Yemen since the seventeenth century.
Makramids. Family which held the spiritual and political leadership of the Banu Yam and the Sulaymani Isma‘ili community in Najran and Yemen since the seventeenth century.
Makua
Makua. Largest tribal group of Muslims in Mozambique. The Makua also have a large population residing in the Masasi District of the Mtwara Region in southern Tanzania. They live in the region to the north of the Zambezi River.
Most Makua are Christians or Sunni Muslims, with some animists.
There are some Makua people known to be residing in South Africa. They first lived in the Durban township called Bluff. However, due to the Group Areas Act, they were forcibly removed from Bluff and settled in Bayview, Chatsworth, and Durban in 1960. Although the majority of the Makua people in South Africa were settled in Bayview, some live in Wentworth, Marianhill, Marianridge, Umlazi, Newlands East and West, Pietermaritzburg, Cape Town and Johannesburg.
The Makua people in South Africa are predominantly Muslims. The Makua language, a Niger-Congo language, is still spoken among the people, alongside Afrikaans and Zulu (in South Africa), Portuguese in Mozambique, some Swahili by the elders of the community but still spoken by many on the Tanzania-Mozambican border, and English in South Africa and Tanzania.
The Makua are the largest ethnic group in northern Mozambique, and also have a large population across the border in the Masasi District of Mtwara Region in southern Tanzania. They live in the region to the north of the Zambezi River.
Makua. Largest tribal group of Muslims in Mozambique. The Makua also have a large population residing in the Masasi District of the Mtwara Region in southern Tanzania. They live in the region to the north of the Zambezi River.
Most Makua are Christians or Sunni Muslims, with some animists.
There are some Makua people known to be residing in South Africa. They first lived in the Durban township called Bluff. However, due to the Group Areas Act, they were forcibly removed from Bluff and settled in Bayview, Chatsworth, and Durban in 1960. Although the majority of the Makua people in South Africa were settled in Bayview, some live in Wentworth, Marianhill, Marianridge, Umlazi, Newlands East and West, Pietermaritzburg, Cape Town and Johannesburg.
The Makua people in South Africa are predominantly Muslims. The Makua language, a Niger-Congo language, is still spoken among the people, alongside Afrikaans and Zulu (in South Africa), Portuguese in Mozambique, some Swahili by the elders of the community but still spoken by many on the Tanzania-Mozambican border, and English in South Africa and Tanzania.
The Makua are the largest ethnic group in northern Mozambique, and also have a large population across the border in the Masasi District of Mtwara Region in southern Tanzania. They live in the region to the north of the Zambezi River.
Mala’ika
Mala’ika (Malaekah). Arabic word which means “angels”. Given its form and and the confusion of the root in the singular with the Arabic word for king (malik), the word mala’ika is probably borrowed from the Northwest Semitic word mal’ak which means “messenger.” This Semitic word was then adopted by pre-Islamic Arabic.
The plural word mala’ika occurs frequently in the Qur’an, but the singular only twelve times. In accord with usual Middle Eastern views, angels are described as winged, with two, three, or four wings. All angels have defined functions. There is an Angel of Death, unnamed in the Qur’an, and a keeper of Hell, called Malik, a probable derivative from the common noun.
The angels Michael and Gabriel are messengers. Gabriel is deemed to be the most important of all the angels because of his role as bearer of the Qur’an to Muhammad.
The Qur’an spends little time in descriptions of angels but devotes attention to their role and function. The Qur’anic attitude assumes a knowledge and understanding of angels on the part of the reader, but later commentary expanded on the brief accounts of the angels and added elements derived from Judeo-Christian tradition and from folklore.
Of some concern in the Qur’an and its commentaries is the status of Iblis -- Satan -- the Devil. In one passage, Iblis is termed a jinn, but, in another passage, Iblis is called an angel. This dual designation for Iblis has led to jinn and angels being equated in the minds of some commentators. In Sura 2:30, the story of the submission of the angels to the will of Allah is given along with the account of the rebellion of Iblis and his band. In hadith from ‘A’isha, Muhammad is supposed to have said that angels were created from light and the jinn from fire, the words having the same root in Arabic. The two angels Harut and Marut (see Sura 2:102) and their association with magic have caused the commentators some problems, as have the two angels Munkar and Nakir, not mentioned in the Qur’an but only in the commentaries, who have the duty of questioning the dead in the grave to determine whether or not they will be punished or rewarded. Angels are guardians of humankind but also recorders of human deeds.
The writers of kalam sought by combining passages from the Qur’an, hadith, and ideas derived from philosophy to further define the nature of angels. The Neoplatonists made some of the angels into the animating forces of the spheres, and there was much discussion about whether the angels could be classed as animals.
An angel whose legend has no basis in the Qur’an or in prophetic tradition, but who is prominent in later eschatological discussion, is Israfil. He is assigned the task of reading the divine decree and of blowing the trumpet to signal the Day of Judgment.
Malaekah see Mala’ika
Angels see Mala’ika
Mala’ika (Malaekah). Arabic word which means “angels”. Given its form and and the confusion of the root in the singular with the Arabic word for king (malik), the word mala’ika is probably borrowed from the Northwest Semitic word mal’ak which means “messenger.” This Semitic word was then adopted by pre-Islamic Arabic.
The plural word mala’ika occurs frequently in the Qur’an, but the singular only twelve times. In accord with usual Middle Eastern views, angels are described as winged, with two, three, or four wings. All angels have defined functions. There is an Angel of Death, unnamed in the Qur’an, and a keeper of Hell, called Malik, a probable derivative from the common noun.
The angels Michael and Gabriel are messengers. Gabriel is deemed to be the most important of all the angels because of his role as bearer of the Qur’an to Muhammad.
The Qur’an spends little time in descriptions of angels but devotes attention to their role and function. The Qur’anic attitude assumes a knowledge and understanding of angels on the part of the reader, but later commentary expanded on the brief accounts of the angels and added elements derived from Judeo-Christian tradition and from folklore.
Of some concern in the Qur’an and its commentaries is the status of Iblis -- Satan -- the Devil. In one passage, Iblis is termed a jinn, but, in another passage, Iblis is called an angel. This dual designation for Iblis has led to jinn and angels being equated in the minds of some commentators. In Sura 2:30, the story of the submission of the angels to the will of Allah is given along with the account of the rebellion of Iblis and his band. In hadith from ‘A’isha, Muhammad is supposed to have said that angels were created from light and the jinn from fire, the words having the same root in Arabic. The two angels Harut and Marut (see Sura 2:102) and their association with magic have caused the commentators some problems, as have the two angels Munkar and Nakir, not mentioned in the Qur’an but only in the commentaries, who have the duty of questioning the dead in the grave to determine whether or not they will be punished or rewarded. Angels are guardians of humankind but also recorders of human deeds.
The writers of kalam sought by combining passages from the Qur’an, hadith, and ideas derived from philosophy to further define the nature of angels. The Neoplatonists made some of the angels into the animating forces of the spheres, and there was much discussion about whether the angels could be classed as animals.
An angel whose legend has no basis in the Qur’an or in prophetic tradition, but who is prominent in later eschatological discussion, is Israfil. He is assigned the task of reading the divine decree and of blowing the trumpet to signal the Day of Judgment.
Malaekah see Mala’ika
Angels see Mala’ika
Malak Hifni Nasif
Malak Hifni Nasif (Bahithat al-Badiya) (Malak Hifni Nassif) (1886-1918). Pen-name of Bahithat al-Badiya, a pioneer protagonist of women’s rights in Egypt. In her ideas on emancipation, she was influenced by the writings of Qasim Amin, though her goals usually remained more moderate and her concern with proper Islamic norms was strong. She defended the veil but was bitterly opposed to polygamy.
An Egyptian Muslim, Malak Hifni Nasif publicly advocated women's advancement in the early twentieth century during the al-nahda al-nisa'iyya (women's awakening). This was a period in which women were increasingly able to publish essays, stories, and letters in the nascent women's press and also in the general press. The women's press and the writers who contributed to it played an important role in the development of feminism and the reform of social institutions in a number of Middle Eastern countries. Nasif, along with prominent figures such as May Ziadeh, were active in literary and social groups through which they contributed to the intellectual and public debate about nationalism and how to define Egyptian and Arab political and cultural identity under the British colonial government.
Nasif articulated one of the founding discourses of feminism that emerged in Egypt during the first third of the twentieth century. Her strain of feminism remained secondary to that embodied in the work of Huda al-Sha'rawi (1882-1947) until the final decades of the twentieth century. In contrast to Sha'rawi's secular and Western-oriented feminism, Nasif's feminism, expressed in her collection of talks and essays, Al-nisa'iyyat (Women's affairs, 1910), de-emphasized Western values as it attempted to affirm and improve women's lives and experience through increased educational and work opportunities within a reformed Islamic context.
Bahithat al-Badiya see Malak Hifni Nasif
Nasif, Malak Hifni see Malak Hifni Nasif
Malak Hifni Nassif see Malak Hifni Nasif
Nassif, Malak Hifni see Malak Hifni Nasif
Badiya, Bahithat al- see Malak Hifni Nasif
Malak Hifni Nasif (Bahithat al-Badiya) (Malak Hifni Nassif) (1886-1918). Pen-name of Bahithat al-Badiya, a pioneer protagonist of women’s rights in Egypt. In her ideas on emancipation, she was influenced by the writings of Qasim Amin, though her goals usually remained more moderate and her concern with proper Islamic norms was strong. She defended the veil but was bitterly opposed to polygamy.
An Egyptian Muslim, Malak Hifni Nasif publicly advocated women's advancement in the early twentieth century during the al-nahda al-nisa'iyya (women's awakening). This was a period in which women were increasingly able to publish essays, stories, and letters in the nascent women's press and also in the general press. The women's press and the writers who contributed to it played an important role in the development of feminism and the reform of social institutions in a number of Middle Eastern countries. Nasif, along with prominent figures such as May Ziadeh, were active in literary and social groups through which they contributed to the intellectual and public debate about nationalism and how to define Egyptian and Arab political and cultural identity under the British colonial government.
Nasif articulated one of the founding discourses of feminism that emerged in Egypt during the first third of the twentieth century. Her strain of feminism remained secondary to that embodied in the work of Huda al-Sha'rawi (1882-1947) until the final decades of the twentieth century. In contrast to Sha'rawi's secular and Western-oriented feminism, Nasif's feminism, expressed in her collection of talks and essays, Al-nisa'iyyat (Women's affairs, 1910), de-emphasized Western values as it attempted to affirm and improve women's lives and experience through increased educational and work opportunities within a reformed Islamic context.
Bahithat al-Badiya see Malak Hifni Nasif
Nasif, Malak Hifni see Malak Hifni Nasif
Malak Hifni Nassif see Malak Hifni Nasif
Nassif, Malak Hifni see Malak Hifni Nasif
Badiya, Bahithat al- see Malak Hifni Nasif
Malayo-Polynesians
Malayo-Polynesians. The East Indonesian province of Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) is one of two in this “Muslim” country in which Muslims are a minority (the other is Bali). According to the 1980 census, 8.5 percent of the NTT population was Muslim. Despite their numbers, the diverse Muslim peoples of NTT are of interest because of their long historical association with Islam dating from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
More than 80 percent of the Muslim population of NTT is concentrated in five regencies, or kabupaten: (1) East Flores, which includes the islands of Solor, Adonara and Lembara; (2) Alor, which includes the island of Pantar; (3) Ende on the south central coast of the island of Flores; (4) Manggarai on the western end of Flores and (5) Kupang, the regency at the western end of Timor which incorporates the present provincial capital. These regencies are precisely the areas with the oldest links to Islam.
Islam reached these islands from various directions in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries at a time when the Muslim community consisted of peoples of many ethnic groups whose specific origins were less important than their adherence to Islam. Historical evidence suggests that one of the earliest sources of contact with Islam was with Muslim traders from the north coast of Java, particularly Gresik. A second source of contact was with Muslims from the sultanate of Ternate in the northern Moluccas. A third source was with Muslims from the sultanate of Bima on the island of Sumbawa. Since both Ternate and Bima looked to the north coast of Java for their religious traditions, these three sources of contact represent a similar tradition. The Sultan of Ternate claimed sovereignty over Timor and the islands to the east of Flores, whereas the Sultan of Bima claimed Flores and the island of Sumba. Later, in the seventeenth century, Islamic influence emanating from Makassar came to predominate as Makassarese, Bugis and Butonese sailors, accompanied by groups of Bajau, began to penetrate the area and occasionally settle in or near established Muslim communities.
The Portuguese reached these islands by the middle of the sixteenth century, just as Islam was beginning to become established in various coastal settlements. The Portuguese established Christian settlements in opposition to Islam, and this resulted in clashes involving the local population, particularly on the islands of Sotor and Adonara and on the south coast of Flores and Ende. The Dutch arrived early in the seventeenth century and immediately aligned themselves with the Muslims in opposition to their trading rivals, the Portuguese. They signed contracts of trade and alliance with the Sultans of Ternate and Bima as well as with the Muslim rulers of Solor and Adonara, but eventually they were able to compel the sultans of Ternate and Bima to relinquish their claims to these islands, and thereafter the Dutch dealt exclusively with local Muslim rulers. When, in the middle of the seventeenth century, they founded their principal settlement at Kupang on Timor, they ceded a portion of beach near their fort to their Muslim allies. This beach, known as Pantai Solor with its associated settlement, Kampung Solor, has remained an Islamic residence to this day.
The complicated history of Dutch, Portuguese and Islamic relations accounts for the location and distribution of the Muslim peoples of NTT as well as the occurrence of Christian and Muslim members of the same ethnic group. Furthermore, the scattering of Muslim communities throughout the islands has facilitated the historical migration of Bugis and Makassarese, which has increased considerably in recent years. The traditional and still predominant occupations of the Muslim peoples of NTT as fishermen, sailors and traders also have their bases in the history of these islands.
Throughout NTT most Muslims are settled along the coast. Few live in the interior, and virtually none of the population of the interior has converted to Islam. One exception occurred just after 1965 when a sizable group of Timorese or Atoni Pah Meto in the highland district of East Amanuban in the regency of South Central Timor converted to Islam.
Malayo-Polynesians. The East Indonesian province of Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) is one of two in this “Muslim” country in which Muslims are a minority (the other is Bali). According to the 1980 census, 8.5 percent of the NTT population was Muslim. Despite their numbers, the diverse Muslim peoples of NTT are of interest because of their long historical association with Islam dating from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
More than 80 percent of the Muslim population of NTT is concentrated in five regencies, or kabupaten: (1) East Flores, which includes the islands of Solor, Adonara and Lembara; (2) Alor, which includes the island of Pantar; (3) Ende on the south central coast of the island of Flores; (4) Manggarai on the western end of Flores and (5) Kupang, the regency at the western end of Timor which incorporates the present provincial capital. These regencies are precisely the areas with the oldest links to Islam.
Islam reached these islands from various directions in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries at a time when the Muslim community consisted of peoples of many ethnic groups whose specific origins were less important than their adherence to Islam. Historical evidence suggests that one of the earliest sources of contact with Islam was with Muslim traders from the north coast of Java, particularly Gresik. A second source of contact was with Muslims from the sultanate of Ternate in the northern Moluccas. A third source was with Muslims from the sultanate of Bima on the island of Sumbawa. Since both Ternate and Bima looked to the north coast of Java for their religious traditions, these three sources of contact represent a similar tradition. The Sultan of Ternate claimed sovereignty over Timor and the islands to the east of Flores, whereas the Sultan of Bima claimed Flores and the island of Sumba. Later, in the seventeenth century, Islamic influence emanating from Makassar came to predominate as Makassarese, Bugis and Butonese sailors, accompanied by groups of Bajau, began to penetrate the area and occasionally settle in or near established Muslim communities.
The Portuguese reached these islands by the middle of the sixteenth century, just as Islam was beginning to become established in various coastal settlements. The Portuguese established Christian settlements in opposition to Islam, and this resulted in clashes involving the local population, particularly on the islands of Sotor and Adonara and on the south coast of Flores and Ende. The Dutch arrived early in the seventeenth century and immediately aligned themselves with the Muslims in opposition to their trading rivals, the Portuguese. They signed contracts of trade and alliance with the Sultans of Ternate and Bima as well as with the Muslim rulers of Solor and Adonara, but eventually they were able to compel the sultans of Ternate and Bima to relinquish their claims to these islands, and thereafter the Dutch dealt exclusively with local Muslim rulers. When, in the middle of the seventeenth century, they founded their principal settlement at Kupang on Timor, they ceded a portion of beach near their fort to their Muslim allies. This beach, known as Pantai Solor with its associated settlement, Kampung Solor, has remained an Islamic residence to this day.
The complicated history of Dutch, Portuguese and Islamic relations accounts for the location and distribution of the Muslim peoples of NTT as well as the occurrence of Christian and Muslim members of the same ethnic group. Furthermore, the scattering of Muslim communities throughout the islands has facilitated the historical migration of Bugis and Makassarese, which has increased considerably in recent years. The traditional and still predominant occupations of the Muslim peoples of NTT as fishermen, sailors and traders also have their bases in the history of these islands.
Throughout NTT most Muslims are settled along the coast. Few live in the interior, and virtually none of the population of the interior has converted to Islam. One exception occurred just after 1965 when a sizable group of Timorese or Atoni Pah Meto in the highland district of East Amanuban in the regency of South Central Timor converted to Islam.
Malayo-Polynesian speaking peoples
Malayo-Polynesian speaking peoples. Several different geographical groups are represented by populations that speak Malayo-Polynesian languages. Although these various populations speak languages of a single family of languages and share certain cultural traits associated with an ancient horticultural technology, they are culturally diverse.
Islam spread into Southeast Asia within a century or two of the Prophet’s lifetime, but it was not immediately successful. Marco Polo noted that it was the religion of Pasai, in northern Sumatra, at the end of the thirteenth century, but Hindu-Buddhism was elsewhere the major religion. Probably, native chiefs came to view Islam as an ideology that might focus support for overthrowing traditional empires, such as Javanese Majapahit, that were overbearing and that interfered with chiefly interests in local and long-distance sea trade. Moreover, Islam provided a means for claiming special trading privileges with Gujarati, Arab, Persian and Turkish traders who controlled so much of Western commerce in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Melaka was not the first city state in the area to become Islamic, but it was the most successful and was most responsible for the further spread of Islam throughout Southeast Asia. The Acehnese were probably converted earlier to Islam, and they developed an important trading empire that existed along with that of Johore and Portugal after the fall of Melaka to the Portuguese in 1511. The Acehnese did not succeed in assimilating many other ethnic groups to their culture, not even those whom they conquered, such as the Gayo (who still maintain much of their Batak culture) or the northern Minangkabau, but their capital city, Kota Raja, did become a center of Islamic learning that was important not only to Southeast Asia but to the Islamic world generally.
Malayo-Polynesian speaking peoples. Several different geographical groups are represented by populations that speak Malayo-Polynesian languages. Although these various populations speak languages of a single family of languages and share certain cultural traits associated with an ancient horticultural technology, they are culturally diverse.
Islam spread into Southeast Asia within a century or two of the Prophet’s lifetime, but it was not immediately successful. Marco Polo noted that it was the religion of Pasai, in northern Sumatra, at the end of the thirteenth century, but Hindu-Buddhism was elsewhere the major religion. Probably, native chiefs came to view Islam as an ideology that might focus support for overthrowing traditional empires, such as Javanese Majapahit, that were overbearing and that interfered with chiefly interests in local and long-distance sea trade. Moreover, Islam provided a means for claiming special trading privileges with Gujarati, Arab, Persian and Turkish traders who controlled so much of Western commerce in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Melaka was not the first city state in the area to become Islamic, but it was the most successful and was most responsible for the further spread of Islam throughout Southeast Asia. The Acehnese were probably converted earlier to Islam, and they developed an important trading empire that existed along with that of Johore and Portugal after the fall of Melaka to the Portuguese in 1511. The Acehnese did not succeed in assimilating many other ethnic groups to their culture, not even those whom they conquered, such as the Gayo (who still maintain much of their Batak culture) or the northern Minangkabau, but their capital city, Kota Raja, did become a center of Islamic learning that was important not only to Southeast Asia but to the Islamic world generally.
Malays
Malays. People of Southeast Asia who are Sunni Muslims. The Malays are an ethnic group of Austronesian peoples predominantly inhabiting the Malay Peninsula, the east coast of Sumatra, the coast of Borneo, and the smaller islands between these locations. The Malay ethnic group is distinct from the concept of a Malay race, which encompasses a wider group of people, including most of Indonesia and the Philippines.
The ancestor of Malays are believed to be seafarers who moved from island to island in great distances between New Zealand and Madagascar, and they served as navigation guide, crew and labor to Indian, Persian and Chinese traders for nearly 2000 years, and over the years they settled at various places and adopted various cultures and religions. Notable Malay seafarers of today are Moken and Orang laut.
Some historians suggest that the Malays were descendants of Austronesian-speakers who migrated from the Philippines and originally from Taiwan. Malay culture reached its golden age during Srivijayan times and they practiced Buddhism, Hinduism, and their native Animism before converting to Islam in the 15th century.
The oldest Malay texts which show Muslim influences come from Trengganu in West Malaysia and Atjeh in Sumatra. Both date from the fourteenth century. The oldest literary manuscripts, written in Arabic letters, date from the last years of the sixteenth century. Malay, as a modern literary language, is generally said to begin with the writings of Abdullah ibn Abdul Kadir Munshi, known as Munshi Abdullah (d. 1854).
Malays call themselves Orang Melayu (Malay persons). Others refer to them as Melayu (or a cognate term, such as Malay in English). The basic meaning of melayu, except as it applies to Malays and to their ancient center of empire near present day Djambi in Sumatra, is lost. Various folk explanations of the term depend on the possible meanings of the apparent root word layu in related dialects and languages, such as “flee,” “fade,” “parch” or “sail.” The word Melayu began in use during the time of the Sultanate of Melaka, founded by the fleeing prince Parameswara, from the declining Melayu Kingdom of Srivijaya in Palembang. The word was in popular use in the 17th century onwards.
During the European colonization, the word "Malay" was adopted into English via the Dutch word "Malayo", itself from the Portuguese "Malaio", which originated from the Malay word "Melayu".
Geographical dispersal has been as effective as assimilation of other populations in creating diversity within Malay culture. The dispersal of Malays was well underway by the fifth century of the Christian calendar when they began to dominate local trade in Southeast Asia and long distance sea trade between northwestern Indian and southern China. Their domination of sea trade continued until the sixteenth century, and even into the early European colonial period before the onset of the Industrial Revolution.
Malays founded several trading empires, among which Sri Vijaya, Melayu and Melaka were most important, and their language became the major language of commerce in Southeast Asian ports. Melaka, successor of fourteenth century Melayu, which lost its empire to the Javanese kingdom of Majapahit, was instrumental in converting many Southeast Asian kingdoms to Islam in the fifteenth century.
In the idiom of the Malay language, to be converted to the Islamic faith is to enter Malay ethnicity (masok melayu). And many non-Malays have become Malays through conversion to Islam and residence in a Malay community. According to folk definition and according to the constitution of the Federation of Malaysia, anyone who habitually speaks Malay language, follows Malay custom, and adheres to the religion of Islam is a Malay. The folk ideal is that all Malays are Muslims.
Various Islamic reform movements have been represented in the Malay world during the twentieth century, but the most revolutionary in its effect was the dakwah “missionary” movement of the 1970s, which convinced some devout Malays that parts of their own traditional world as well as the modern Westernized world are not in conformity with the orthodox practice of Islam. Malays interested in retaining their Malay culture as well as their devotion to Islam comprise a social category separate from that of the dakwahs, and both of these are distinct from “secular” Malays, who are concerned with modernization. The dakwah movement is heavily involved in a persuasive missionary campaign. One manifestation of this is the magazine Dakwah, which began publication in 1977.
Except in rare instances, such as in Sungei Penchala (within the limits of the metropolitan area of Kuala Lumpur), the dakwah movement has not resulted in physically separating Malay communities. Traditional, dakwah and secular Malays live side by side in the same communities. Throughout this ideological fissioning they have remained together residentially and segregated from other ethnic communities of Malaysia. Malay ethnic identity has become more important during this period in part because of the government’s efforts to provide opportunities to recover from the low economic status they held as colonial wards of the British before independence. Many members of the other ethnic communities, principally the Chinese and Indians, object to the present advantages afforded Malays.
Malays. People of Southeast Asia who are Sunni Muslims. The Malays are an ethnic group of Austronesian peoples predominantly inhabiting the Malay Peninsula, the east coast of Sumatra, the coast of Borneo, and the smaller islands between these locations. The Malay ethnic group is distinct from the concept of a Malay race, which encompasses a wider group of people, including most of Indonesia and the Philippines.
The ancestor of Malays are believed to be seafarers who moved from island to island in great distances between New Zealand and Madagascar, and they served as navigation guide, crew and labor to Indian, Persian and Chinese traders for nearly 2000 years, and over the years they settled at various places and adopted various cultures and religions. Notable Malay seafarers of today are Moken and Orang laut.
Some historians suggest that the Malays were descendants of Austronesian-speakers who migrated from the Philippines and originally from Taiwan. Malay culture reached its golden age during Srivijayan times and they practiced Buddhism, Hinduism, and their native Animism before converting to Islam in the 15th century.
The oldest Malay texts which show Muslim influences come from Trengganu in West Malaysia and Atjeh in Sumatra. Both date from the fourteenth century. The oldest literary manuscripts, written in Arabic letters, date from the last years of the sixteenth century. Malay, as a modern literary language, is generally said to begin with the writings of Abdullah ibn Abdul Kadir Munshi, known as Munshi Abdullah (d. 1854).
Malays call themselves Orang Melayu (Malay persons). Others refer to them as Melayu (or a cognate term, such as Malay in English). The basic meaning of melayu, except as it applies to Malays and to their ancient center of empire near present day Djambi in Sumatra, is lost. Various folk explanations of the term depend on the possible meanings of the apparent root word layu in related dialects and languages, such as “flee,” “fade,” “parch” or “sail.” The word Melayu began in use during the time of the Sultanate of Melaka, founded by the fleeing prince Parameswara, from the declining Melayu Kingdom of Srivijaya in Palembang. The word was in popular use in the 17th century onwards.
During the European colonization, the word "Malay" was adopted into English via the Dutch word "Malayo", itself from the Portuguese "Malaio", which originated from the Malay word "Melayu".
Geographical dispersal has been as effective as assimilation of other populations in creating diversity within Malay culture. The dispersal of Malays was well underway by the fifth century of the Christian calendar when they began to dominate local trade in Southeast Asia and long distance sea trade between northwestern Indian and southern China. Their domination of sea trade continued until the sixteenth century, and even into the early European colonial period before the onset of the Industrial Revolution.
Malays founded several trading empires, among which Sri Vijaya, Melayu and Melaka were most important, and their language became the major language of commerce in Southeast Asian ports. Melaka, successor of fourteenth century Melayu, which lost its empire to the Javanese kingdom of Majapahit, was instrumental in converting many Southeast Asian kingdoms to Islam in the fifteenth century.
In the idiom of the Malay language, to be converted to the Islamic faith is to enter Malay ethnicity (masok melayu). And many non-Malays have become Malays through conversion to Islam and residence in a Malay community. According to folk definition and according to the constitution of the Federation of Malaysia, anyone who habitually speaks Malay language, follows Malay custom, and adheres to the religion of Islam is a Malay. The folk ideal is that all Malays are Muslims.
Various Islamic reform movements have been represented in the Malay world during the twentieth century, but the most revolutionary in its effect was the dakwah “missionary” movement of the 1970s, which convinced some devout Malays that parts of their own traditional world as well as the modern Westernized world are not in conformity with the orthodox practice of Islam. Malays interested in retaining their Malay culture as well as their devotion to Islam comprise a social category separate from that of the dakwahs, and both of these are distinct from “secular” Malays, who are concerned with modernization. The dakwah movement is heavily involved in a persuasive missionary campaign. One manifestation of this is the magazine Dakwah, which began publication in 1977.
Except in rare instances, such as in Sungei Penchala (within the limits of the metropolitan area of Kuala Lumpur), the dakwah movement has not resulted in physically separating Malay communities. Traditional, dakwah and secular Malays live side by side in the same communities. Throughout this ideological fissioning they have remained together residentially and segregated from other ethnic communities of Malaysia. Malay ethnic identity has become more important during this period in part because of the government’s efforts to provide opportunities to recover from the low economic status they held as colonial wards of the British before independence. Many members of the other ethnic communities, principally the Chinese and Indians, object to the present advantages afforded Malays.
Malcolm X (Malcolm Little) (El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz) (May 19, 1925 - February 21, 1965). Icon of the black power movement. Malcolm X, was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska.
Malcolm Little was the son of a Baptist minister who was an avid supporter of Marcus Garvey’s United Negro Improvement Association. While living in Omaha, the Little family was often harassed. At one point, the family’s house was set afire.
In 1929, the Little family moved to Lansing, Michigan. While in Michigan, Malcolm’s father was killed -- his body severed in two by a streetcar and his head smashed. In his autobiography, written with Alex Haley, Malcolm asserted that his father may have been killed by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Malcolm’s mother, stricken by the death of her husband and the demands of providing for the family, was committed to a mental institution.
Leaving school after the eighth grade, Malcolm made his way to New York City, working for a time as a waiter at Smalls Paradise in Harlem. Malcolm began selling and using drugs. He also began to engage in burglary. It was for burglary that Malcolm was sentenced to a ten-year prison term in 1946.
While in prison, Malcolm became acquainted with the Black Muslim sect, then headed by Elijah Muhammad. Malcolm soon became a convert to the Nation of Islam. Not long afterwards, Malcolm Little became Malcolm X.
Following his parole in 1952, Malcolm became an outspoken defender of Black Muslim doctrines, accepting the basic argument that evil was an inherent characteristic of the “white man’s Christian world.”
Unlike his mentor Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X sought publicity, making provocative and inflammatory statements to predominantly European American civic groups and college campus audiences. Branding European Americans as “devils,” Malcolm X spoke bitterly of a philosophy of vengeance and “an eye for an eye.” When, in 1963, Malcolm characterized the Kennedy assassination as a case of “chickens coming home to roost,” he was suspended from the Nation of Islam by Elijah Muhammad.
Disillusioned with Elijah Muhammad’s teachings (and with Elijah Muhammad’s personal indiscretions), Malcolm formed his own organizations, the Organization of Afro-American Unity and the Muslim Mosque, Inc. In 1964, Malcolm made a pilgrimage to Islam’s holy city, Mecca. After his experiences in Mecca, Malcolm underwent another spiritual metamorphosis. Malcolm became a more orthodox practitioner of Islam and adopted the name El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz.
As a believer in the more orthodox tenets of Islam, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz adopted views that were not popular with other black nationalists, including the view that not all Europeans and European Americans were evil and that Africans and African Americans could make gains by working through established channels.
As a result of his new views, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz became the recipient of death threats. On February 14, 1965, his home was firebombed. His wife and children escaped unharmed. A week later, on February 21, 1965, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz was shot and killed at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, while preparing to speak. Three of the men arrested were later identified as members of the Nation of Islam.
As Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz had a profound influence on both African Americans and European Americans. Many African Americans responded to a feeling that he was a man of the people, experienced in the ways of the street rather than the pulpit or the college campus, which traditionally had provided the preponderance of African American leaders. Many young European Americans responded to Malcolm’s blunt, colorful language and unwillingness to retreat in the face of hostility.
During the 1960s, as Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz was considered to be a violent fanatic by mainstream America and mainstream Afro-America. Over time, his image as Malcolm X was transformed into one in which the Malcolm X persona became an advocate of self-help, self-defense, and education.
However, the most enduring legacy
may not be the one that is commonly accepted. It should be remembered that just as Malcolm X tried to put his past as Malcolm Little behind so too did El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz try to put his past as Malcolm X behind him. It is important to understand that the man known as Malcolm X was buried under the name El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz was a devout Sunni Muslim who believed in justice and in the brotherhood of man.
Compounding the misunderstanding concerning the legacy of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is the 1992 theatrical release of a movie directed by Spike Lee, a movie entitled Malcolm X. As titled, the movie Malcolm X is respectful iconolatry of a man who evolved into the more fully developed El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. However, because of the importance of distinguishing historical fact from cinematic myth, some of the historical discrepancies with the movie Malcolm X are discussed here.
The first historical discrepancy centers on the movie's portrayal of Earl Little. In the film, Earl Little is portrayed as a race leader -- a man willing to stand up against European American racists to promote Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association. As a defiant African American in a racist America, the film Malcolm X leaves little doubt that European American racists murdered Earl Little.
However, in The Autobiography of Malcolm X, which was written with Alex Haley’s assistance and was published posthumously, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz paints a far less idealized portrait of his father. As remembered by El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, Earl Little was an abusive husband and father who “savagely” beat his children, except for his favored son, Malcolm. As recalled by El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, “I actually believe that as anti-white as my father was, he was subconsciously so afflicted with the white man’s brainwashing of Negroes that he inclined to favor the light one.”
"My father was a big, six-foot-four, very black man. He had only one eye. How he had lost the other one I have never known. He was from Reynolds, Georgia, where he had left school after the third or maybe fourth grade. ... One of the reasons I’ve always felt that my father favored me was that to the best of my remembrance, it was only me that he sometimes took with him to the Garvey U.N.I.A. meetings which he held quietly in people’s homes. ... I noticed how differently they all acted, although sometimes they were the same people who jumped and shouted in church. But in these meetings both they and my father were more intense, more intelligent and down to earth, it made me feel the same way. ... I remember how the meetings always closed with my father saying, several times, and the people chanting after him, “Up, you mighty race, you can accomplish what you will!”" -- From The Autobiography of Malcolm X.
Only six at the time of Earl Little’s death in 1931, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz could only remember “a vague commotion, the house filled up with people crying, saying bitterly that the white Black Legion had finally gotten him.”
Much of the movie Malcolm X glamorizes the criminal career of Malcolm Little and the fiery speeches of Malcolm X. Unlike the Autobiography, the movie spends little time reflecting on the significance of the final year in the life of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. Instead of focusing on the mature political perspective that El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz developed, the movie Malcolm X emphasizes Malcolm’s cynicism, racial pessimism, and uncritical acceptance of the teachings of Elijah Muhammad. The film treats Malcolm’s break with Muhammad as a son’s disillusionment with a morally flawed surrogate father, but Malcolm left the Nation of Islam for political as well as personal reasons. Malcolm’s Autobiography makes it very clear that before Malcolm learned of Elijah Muhammad’s marital infidelities, Malcolm had already become dissatisfied with his leader’s policy of nonengagement, -- a policy which not only prevented members of the Nation of Islam from participating in civil rights protests but even prohibited Nation of Islam members from voting. The blistering verbal attacks that Malcolm X makes on national civil rights leaders are highlighted in the film without showing the ties that El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz made with those same civil rights leaders in the last year of his life.
As the southern civil rights movement grew in scale during 1963, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz came to recognize that Elijah Muhammad’s nonengagement policy was hurting the Nation of Islam’s recruitment efforts in African American communities. Indeed, in the Autobiography, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz admitted his disappointment with the failure of the Nation of Islam in becoming involved in the expanding freedom struggle. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz said, “I felt that, wherever black people committed themselves, the Little Rocks and the Birminghams and other places, militantly disciplined Muslims should also be there -- for all the world to see, and respect, and discuss. It could be heard increasingly in the Negro communities: ‘Those Muslims talk tough, but they never do anything, unless somebody bothers Muslims.’”
One of the more dramatic scenes in the movie underscores the limitations placed upon those in the Nation of Islam but in the manner portrayed is rather misleading. In the film, Malcolm X is shown demanding and getting hospital treatment for a member of the Nation of Islam named Brother Johnson (Johnson Hinton), who was beaten by New York City police in 1957. Although the incident confirms the notion that the Nation of Islam did not engage in militant action unless its members were threatened, Lee stages the event to suggest that the Nation was far more willing to challenge European American authority than it actually was.
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz initially defended Elijah Muhammad’s nonengagement policy and fiercely attacked Martin Luther King, Jr.’s strategy of nonviolent resistance. However, he later recognized that the Nation of Islam offered no real alternative for African American civil rights activists who were then facing vicious European American racists in the South. It was far easier to talk about armed self-defense in Harlem than it ever was to face unarmed Bull Connor’s police dogs in Birmingham, Alabama.
Even though the film ignores this fact, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz knew that the Nation of Islam was not above making deals with the “white devils” when such deals served its leaders’ interests. Near the end of his life, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz admitted that, even while criticizing civil rights activists for working with European American liberals, he once, on Elijah Muhammad’s orders, negotiated a mutual non-interference agreement with Ku Klux Klan leaders in Atlanta.
Although Spike Lee’s film depicts Malcolm’s period of independence from the Nation mainly through scenes of foreboding, such as repeated threatening telephone calls, his final months consisted of much more than waiting for martyrdom. Among the many important episodes from the last year of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz which the film overlooks include (1) the brief meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., at the United States Capitol; (2) the crucial “The Ballot or the Bullet” speech delivered at a symposium sponsored by the Congress of Racial Equality; (3) the meeting of the Organization of African Unity and subsequent talks with leaders of Egypt, Tanzania, Nigeria, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, and Uganda; (4) the day long October 1964 meeting in Nairobi with leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the resulting cooperation between SNCC and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s newly formed Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU); and (5) the December 1964 appearance of Fannie Lou Hamer and other Mississippi civil rights activists as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s honored guests at an OAAU meeting in Harlem.
The film shows El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz watching televised scenes of civil rights activities but fails to mention his February 1965 trip to Selma, Alabama, where he addressed young protesters and expressed support for the voting rights struggle. While in Selma, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz met with Coretta Scott King, whose husband was then in jail. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz affirmed his desire to assist King’s voting rights efforts, explaining that if European Americans knew that Malcolm X was the alternative, “It might be easier for them to accept Martin’s proposals.” El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s increasing political involvement was further indicated in the weeks before his assassination by the telegram he sent to the head of the American Nazi party: “I am no longer held in check from fighting white supremacists by Elijah Muhammad’s separationists Black Muslim Movement, and if your present racist agitation of our people there in Alabama causes physical harm to Reverend King or any other Black Americans ... you and your KKK friends will be met with maximum physical retaliation.”
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s political militancy led to increasing governmental interest and escalating threats from members of the Nation of Islam. The new political course caused El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz to attract very powerful and very deadly enemies.
The movie Malcolm X shows various members of the Nation of Islam preparing to kill El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, while also intimating that European American government agents may have also been involved. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is depicted as being followed, presumably by CIA agents, while on his trip to Mecca and Africa. The movie shows a hidden microphone in El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s New York City hotel room. In the movie, when El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz and his wife, Betty, discuss the many threats they had received, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz speculates, “The more I keep thinking about the things that have been happening lately, I’m not at all sure it’s solely the Muslims. I trained them, I know what they can and cannot do, and they can’t do some of the stuff that’s recently been going on.”
It is somewhat ironic that after the assassination of President Kennedy, Malcolm X had remarked that the killing of Kennedy was a case of the chickens coming home to roost. In an oddly reciprocal way, the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz was a case of the chickens coming home to roost. For years as Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz had helped foster a mentality that encouraged members of the Nation of Islam to define other African Americans as race traitors. As Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz espoused an often vicious rhetorical militancy which created an environment where the death of the traitor could be deemed appropriate. Once El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz left the Nation of Islam and began criticizing it, he too became the object for rhetorical vilification. Indeed, one of his former proteges, a certain Louis X (now known as Louis Farrakhan) went so far as to label El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz as a Judas “worthy of death.” Within such a climate of animosity, the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz became almost inevitable.
Despite the historical inaccuracies, the director Spike Lee must be commended for the effort that was involved in developing and producing a movie such as Malcolm X. Indeed, one of the more encouraging trends of the last decade of the twentieth century, was the fact that such stories about the African and African American experience could finally be made. However, while presenting an entertaining story about the life and career of the man known as Malcolm X, the movie ultimately fails to adequately address the seeds of destruction which Malcolm X himself had sown. Additionally, by glamorizing the rebelliousness of Malcolm Little, and the subsequent racist demagoguery of Malcolm X, the meaning of the mature statesmanship of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is obscured and the true lesson of Malcolm's life -- the true lesson of his “entire” life -- is missed.
Part of the lesson of Malcolm's life, is also found tragically in the story of the family that he left behind. In 1958, Malcolm X married Betty X (nee Betty Jean Sanders) in Lansing, Michigan. The couple had six daughters. Their names were Attalah, Qubilah, Ilyasah, Gamilah Lumumba, Malaak, and Malikah. After the death of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, his widow, Betty Shabazz, received financial support from a number of benefactors and celebrities. She was able to raise her children in upper class affluence, sending her children to private, predominantly European American schools.
In 1994, Betty Shabazz openly criticized Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, of having been involved in the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. Farrakhan denied any involvement and blamed the assassination on the turbulence of the times. Subsequently, in 1995, Qubilah, the daughter of Betty Shabazz and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, was implicated in a murder for hire plot to kill Farrakhan. As it turned out, the man that Qubilah had contacted was an undercover law enforcement agent.
Surprisingly, Louis Farrakhan, the target of the murder for hire plot, came to the defense of Qubilah. Farrakhan accused the government of manipulating Qubilah into engaging in the murder for hire plot. Farrakhan even sponsored a fundraiser for Qubilah's legal defense. Farrakhan's actions led to a reconciliation between himself and Betty Shabazz. Betty Shabazz even spoke at the 1995 Million Man March.
Qubilah was not imprisoned for her actions but was ordered to undergo two years of psychological counseling and therapy for her drug addiction and alcohol abuse. During this two year period, Qubilah's son, Malcolm, lived with his grandmother, Betty Shabazz. Malcolm proved to be a rebellious child who resented having to live with his grandmother. In retaliation, on June 1, 1997, Malcolm then twelve years old, set his grandmother's house on fire with his grandmother, Betty Shabazz, in it. On June 23, 1997, Betty Shabazz died from the burns she endured. Malcolm, the namesake grandchild of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, was sentenced to eighteen months in juvenile detention for manslaughter.
It cannot be escaped that the one of the lessons of the life of Malcolm X, and of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, is one marked by tragedy. While his militant stance against oppression became an inspiration for many, his embracing of violence as a viable force against oppression also became an indelible part of his legacy, and sadly it is this legacy of violence which continues to manifest itself in African American families and communities to this day.
X, Malcolm see Malcolm X
Little, Malcolm see Malcolm X
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz see Malcolm X
Shabazz, El-Hajj Malik El- see Malcolm X
Compounding the misunderstanding concerning the legacy of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is the 1992 theatrical release of a movie directed by Spike Lee, a movie entitled Malcolm X. As titled, the movie Malcolm X is respectful iconolatry of a man who evolved into the more fully developed El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. However, because of the importance of distinguishing historical fact from cinematic myth, some of the historical discrepancies with the movie Malcolm X are discussed here.
The first historical discrepancy centers on the movie's portrayal of Earl Little. In the film, Earl Little is portrayed as a race leader -- a man willing to stand up against European American racists to promote Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association. As a defiant African American in a racist America, the film Malcolm X leaves little doubt that European American racists murdered Earl Little.
However, in The Autobiography of Malcolm X, which was written with Alex Haley’s assistance and was published posthumously, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz paints a far less idealized portrait of his father. As remembered by El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, Earl Little was an abusive husband and father who “savagely” beat his children, except for his favored son, Malcolm. As recalled by El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, “I actually believe that as anti-white as my father was, he was subconsciously so afflicted with the white man’s brainwashing of Negroes that he inclined to favor the light one.”
"My father was a big, six-foot-four, very black man. He had only one eye. How he had lost the other one I have never known. He was from Reynolds, Georgia, where he had left school after the third or maybe fourth grade. ... One of the reasons I’ve always felt that my father favored me was that to the best of my remembrance, it was only me that he sometimes took with him to the Garvey U.N.I.A. meetings which he held quietly in people’s homes. ... I noticed how differently they all acted, although sometimes they were the same people who jumped and shouted in church. But in these meetings both they and my father were more intense, more intelligent and down to earth, it made me feel the same way. ... I remember how the meetings always closed with my father saying, several times, and the people chanting after him, “Up, you mighty race, you can accomplish what you will!”" -- From The Autobiography of Malcolm X.
Only six at the time of Earl Little’s death in 1931, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz could only remember “a vague commotion, the house filled up with people crying, saying bitterly that the white Black Legion had finally gotten him.”
Much of the movie Malcolm X glamorizes the criminal career of Malcolm Little and the fiery speeches of Malcolm X. Unlike the Autobiography, the movie spends little time reflecting on the significance of the final year in the life of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. Instead of focusing on the mature political perspective that El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz developed, the movie Malcolm X emphasizes Malcolm’s cynicism, racial pessimism, and uncritical acceptance of the teachings of Elijah Muhammad. The film treats Malcolm’s break with Muhammad as a son’s disillusionment with a morally flawed surrogate father, but Malcolm left the Nation of Islam for political as well as personal reasons. Malcolm’s Autobiography makes it very clear that before Malcolm learned of Elijah Muhammad’s marital infidelities, Malcolm had already become dissatisfied with his leader’s policy of nonengagement, -- a policy which not only prevented members of the Nation of Islam from participating in civil rights protests but even prohibited Nation of Islam members from voting. The blistering verbal attacks that Malcolm X makes on national civil rights leaders are highlighted in the film without showing the ties that El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz made with those same civil rights leaders in the last year of his life.
As the southern civil rights movement grew in scale during 1963, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz came to recognize that Elijah Muhammad’s nonengagement policy was hurting the Nation of Islam’s recruitment efforts in African American communities. Indeed, in the Autobiography, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz admitted his disappointment with the failure of the Nation of Islam in becoming involved in the expanding freedom struggle. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz said, “I felt that, wherever black people committed themselves, the Little Rocks and the Birminghams and other places, militantly disciplined Muslims should also be there -- for all the world to see, and respect, and discuss. It could be heard increasingly in the Negro communities: ‘Those Muslims talk tough, but they never do anything, unless somebody bothers Muslims.’”
One of the more dramatic scenes in the movie underscores the limitations placed upon those in the Nation of Islam but in the manner portrayed is rather misleading. In the film, Malcolm X is shown demanding and getting hospital treatment for a member of the Nation of Islam named Brother Johnson (Johnson Hinton), who was beaten by New York City police in 1957. Although the incident confirms the notion that the Nation of Islam did not engage in militant action unless its members were threatened, Lee stages the event to suggest that the Nation was far more willing to challenge European American authority than it actually was.
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz initially defended Elijah Muhammad’s nonengagement policy and fiercely attacked Martin Luther King, Jr.’s strategy of nonviolent resistance. However, he later recognized that the Nation of Islam offered no real alternative for African American civil rights activists who were then facing vicious European American racists in the South. It was far easier to talk about armed self-defense in Harlem than it ever was to face unarmed Bull Connor’s police dogs in Birmingham, Alabama.
Even though the film ignores this fact, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz knew that the Nation of Islam was not above making deals with the “white devils” when such deals served its leaders’ interests. Near the end of his life, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz admitted that, even while criticizing civil rights activists for working with European American liberals, he once, on Elijah Muhammad’s orders, negotiated a mutual non-interference agreement with Ku Klux Klan leaders in Atlanta.
Although Spike Lee’s film depicts Malcolm’s period of independence from the Nation mainly through scenes of foreboding, such as repeated threatening telephone calls, his final months consisted of much more than waiting for martyrdom. Among the many important episodes from the last year of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz which the film overlooks include (1) the brief meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., at the United States Capitol; (2) the crucial “The Ballot or the Bullet” speech delivered at a symposium sponsored by the Congress of Racial Equality; (3) the meeting of the Organization of African Unity and subsequent talks with leaders of Egypt, Tanzania, Nigeria, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, and Uganda; (4) the day long October 1964 meeting in Nairobi with leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the resulting cooperation between SNCC and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s newly formed Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU); and (5) the December 1964 appearance of Fannie Lou Hamer and other Mississippi civil rights activists as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s honored guests at an OAAU meeting in Harlem.
The film shows El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz watching televised scenes of civil rights activities but fails to mention his February 1965 trip to Selma, Alabama, where he addressed young protesters and expressed support for the voting rights struggle. While in Selma, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz met with Coretta Scott King, whose husband was then in jail. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz affirmed his desire to assist King’s voting rights efforts, explaining that if European Americans knew that Malcolm X was the alternative, “It might be easier for them to accept Martin’s proposals.” El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s increasing political involvement was further indicated in the weeks before his assassination by the telegram he sent to the head of the American Nazi party: “I am no longer held in check from fighting white supremacists by Elijah Muhammad’s separationists Black Muslim Movement, and if your present racist agitation of our people there in Alabama causes physical harm to Reverend King or any other Black Americans ... you and your KKK friends will be met with maximum physical retaliation.”
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s political militancy led to increasing governmental interest and escalating threats from members of the Nation of Islam. The new political course caused El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz to attract very powerful and very deadly enemies.
The movie Malcolm X shows various members of the Nation of Islam preparing to kill El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, while also intimating that European American government agents may have also been involved. El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is depicted as being followed, presumably by CIA agents, while on his trip to Mecca and Africa. The movie shows a hidden microphone in El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz’s New York City hotel room. In the movie, when El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz and his wife, Betty, discuss the many threats they had received, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz speculates, “The more I keep thinking about the things that have been happening lately, I’m not at all sure it’s solely the Muslims. I trained them, I know what they can and cannot do, and they can’t do some of the stuff that’s recently been going on.”
It is somewhat ironic that after the assassination of President Kennedy, Malcolm X had remarked that the killing of Kennedy was a case of the chickens coming home to roost. In an oddly reciprocal way, the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz was a case of the chickens coming home to roost. For years as Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz had helped foster a mentality that encouraged members of the Nation of Islam to define other African Americans as race traitors. As Malcolm X, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz espoused an often vicious rhetorical militancy which created an environment where the death of the traitor could be deemed appropriate. Once El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz left the Nation of Islam and began criticizing it, he too became the object for rhetorical vilification. Indeed, one of his former proteges, a certain Louis X (now known as Louis Farrakhan) went so far as to label El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz as a Judas “worthy of death.” Within such a climate of animosity, the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz became almost inevitable.
Despite the historical inaccuracies, the director Spike Lee must be commended for the effort that was involved in developing and producing a movie such as Malcolm X. Indeed, one of the more encouraging trends of the last decade of the twentieth century, was the fact that such stories about the African and African American experience could finally be made. However, while presenting an entertaining story about the life and career of the man known as Malcolm X, the movie ultimately fails to adequately address the seeds of destruction which Malcolm X himself had sown. Additionally, by glamorizing the rebelliousness of Malcolm Little, and the subsequent racist demagoguery of Malcolm X, the meaning of the mature statesmanship of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz is obscured and the true lesson of Malcolm's life -- the true lesson of his “entire” life -- is missed.
Part of the lesson of Malcolm's life, is also found tragically in the story of the family that he left behind. In 1958, Malcolm X married Betty X (nee Betty Jean Sanders) in Lansing, Michigan. The couple had six daughters. Their names were Attalah, Qubilah, Ilyasah, Gamilah Lumumba, Malaak, and Malikah. After the death of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, his widow, Betty Shabazz, received financial support from a number of benefactors and celebrities. She was able to raise her children in upper class affluence, sending her children to private, predominantly European American schools.
In 1994, Betty Shabazz openly criticized Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, of having been involved in the assassination of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. Farrakhan denied any involvement and blamed the assassination on the turbulence of the times. Subsequently, in 1995, Qubilah, the daughter of Betty Shabazz and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, was implicated in a murder for hire plot to kill Farrakhan. As it turned out, the man that Qubilah had contacted was an undercover law enforcement agent.
Surprisingly, Louis Farrakhan, the target of the murder for hire plot, came to the defense of Qubilah. Farrakhan accused the government of manipulating Qubilah into engaging in the murder for hire plot. Farrakhan even sponsored a fundraiser for Qubilah's legal defense. Farrakhan's actions led to a reconciliation between himself and Betty Shabazz. Betty Shabazz even spoke at the 1995 Million Man March.
Qubilah was not imprisoned for her actions but was ordered to undergo two years of psychological counseling and therapy for her drug addiction and alcohol abuse. During this two year period, Qubilah's son, Malcolm, lived with his grandmother, Betty Shabazz. Malcolm proved to be a rebellious child who resented having to live with his grandmother. In retaliation, on June 1, 1997, Malcolm then twelve years old, set his grandmother's house on fire with his grandmother, Betty Shabazz, in it. On June 23, 1997, Betty Shabazz died from the burns she endured. Malcolm, the namesake grandchild of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, was sentenced to eighteen months in juvenile detention for manslaughter.
It cannot be escaped that the one of the lessons of the life of Malcolm X, and of El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, is one marked by tragedy. While his militant stance against oppression became an inspiration for many, his embracing of violence as a viable force against oppression also became an indelible part of his legacy, and sadly it is this legacy of violence which continues to manifest itself in African American families and communities to this day.
X, Malcolm see Malcolm X
Little, Malcolm see Malcolm X
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz see Malcolm X
Shabazz, El-Hajj Malik El- see Malcolm X
Males
Males. In Brazil, a Muslim black slave; a term employed by the Berbers and Arabs for the Mandingo blacks. These slaves worshipped Allah and were very fond of wearing a talisman engraved with fragments of verse from the Qur’an in Arabic script. Many males were literate and were trained in different crafts. The planters considered them their most valuable slaves, even though they were rebellious and were ever ready to flee to the wilderness. In 1805, it was estimated that one-third of the blacks in Bahia were males. The term males also refers to a vigorous and flourishing Muslim sect with temples, leaders, and well-organized congregations; still active at the turn of the nineteenth century all over northeastern Brazil.
Males. In Brazil, a Muslim black slave; a term employed by the Berbers and Arabs for the Mandingo blacks. These slaves worshipped Allah and were very fond of wearing a talisman engraved with fragments of verse from the Qur’an in Arabic script. Many males were literate and were trained in different crafts. The planters considered them their most valuable slaves, even though they were rebellious and were ever ready to flee to the wilderness. In 1805, it was estimated that one-third of the blacks in Bahia were males. The term males also refers to a vigorous and flourishing Muslim sect with temples, leaders, and well-organized congregations; still active at the turn of the nineteenth century all over northeastern Brazil.
Malik, Adam
Malik, Adam (Adam Malik) (July 22, 1917 - September 5, 1984). Indonesian journalist and politician. He was active in the nationalist Partindo and Gerindo and in 1937 established the Indonesian news agnecy Antara. With Tan Malaka he founded the Partai Murba, which he represented in Parliament (1956-1960). As trade minister under Sukarno, he opposed the growth of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and proposed the establishment of a single-state party in which the PKI would be submerged. He became one on the leading civilian politicians associated with Suharto’s New Order, as foreign minister (1966-1977) and vice president (1978-1983). In later years, he was occasionally critical of the New Order’s record on human rights.
Malik was born in Pematang Siantar, North Sumatra, Dutch East Indies to Abdul Malik and Salamah Lubis. After completing junior high school, he received his first job as a shopkeeper, filling in time by reading books and increasing his knowledge. Malik quickly developed an interest in politics and at the age of 17 became the Chairman of the Pematang Siantar branch of Partindo (Indonesia Party). In this position, Malik campaigned for the Dutch Colonial Government to grant independence to Indonesia. As a result of this, Malik was put in prison for disobeying the Colonial Government's ban on political assemblies. Once he was freed, Malik left Pematang Siantar for Jakarta.
After leaving hometown, Malik pursued a job as a journalist. He wrote for Partindo's Party Magazine and Pelita Andalas Newspaper. In 1937, along with like-minded colleagues, Malik formed ANTARA. ANTARA would develop to become Indonesia's national news agency.
Malik played an important role in the events leading up to Indonesia's Declaration of Independence. On August 16, 1945, Malik and other pro-Independence youths kidnapped Nationalist movement leaders, Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta. They took the two leaders to the town of Rengasdengklok and forced them to declare Indonesia's independence to fill the vacuum left by the Japanese Occupational Forces which had surrendered. Sukarno and Hatta finally declared Indonesia's independence, on August 17, 1945. The two were also elected as Indonesia's first President and Vice President. After Indonesia's independence, Malik formed the Murba Party and used it as a platform to become a Parliament member. Malik also served as the Third Deputy Chairman of the Indonesian Central National Committee (KNIP).
After becoming a journalist and a politician, Malik took up the duties of diplomat. In 1959, he was appointed ambassador to the Soviet Union and Poland. This was followed in 1962 by an appointment as Chairman of the Indonesian Delegation for the negotiations to hand over West Irian to Indonesia. He then served as Minister for Trade before being appointed Minister for the Implementation of the Guided Economy in Sukarno's Cabinet.
With Sukarno being increasingly influenced by the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in his policies, Malik set up the Preservation of Sukarnoism Body (BPS). This organization aimed to translate Sukaroist ideas in a non-Communist sense and to use the name Sukarno to criticise the PKI. Sukarno was not oblivious to this and banned BPS in 1965. Together with General Abdul Haris Nasution and Ruslan Abdulgani, Malik was despised by the PKI for his anti-Communist stance.
1966 was the year which saw Sukarno lose his executive powers as he passed them over to Lieutenant General Suharto through a presidential decree known as Supersemar. Although Sukarno continued to keep the title of President, all the de facto power was in the hands of Suharto. A Cabinet reshuffle followed in which Malik took up the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs. Malik, together with Suharto and Hamengkubuwono IX formed a triumvirate as they sought to reverse Sukarno's policies.
As Foreign Affairs Minister, Malik conducted trips to Western Countries to reschedule debt payments. Malik also quit the Murba Party that year to put himself more in line with the new regime's more open economic policies. The Murba Party having been a party that rejected foreign investments. In 1967, Malik, together with the Foreign Ministers of Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Singapore would officially form ASEAN in a bid to form a united front in the face of Communist expansion in Vietnam.
With Suharto finally elected as President in 1968, Malik continued to serve as the Foreign Affairs Minister. In 1970, Malik solidified his position with the regime by officially joining Golkar. Malik would also represent Indonesia and deputize for Suharto in summits with Suharto not showing much interest in foreign policy in the first years of his Presidency.
As Foreign Affairs Minister, Malik had had differences with Suharto's ABRI Generals such as General Maraden Panggabean over the way in which Indonesia should approach its Foreign Policy in Southeast Asia. The Generals wanted Indonesia and its regional neighbors in ASEAN to have a closer security cooperation which in effect. The Generals were also in favor of sending Indonesian troops to help the South Vietnamese in the Vietnam War. On the other hand, Malik insisted that ASEAN should only be about economic, not military cooperation. In this he was supported by Suharto. Malik also adopted a softer stance towards the People's Republic of China which the Suharto regime saw as supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).
In 1971, Malik was chosen as President of the United Nations General Assembly.
Malik was briefly involved in the crisis that would lead to the invasion of East Timor. Malik had assured an East Timorese delegation led by Jose Ramos-Horta that Indonesia would not be involved in the crisis in East Timor. Suharto at first supported this stance towards East Timor. However, in 1975, was convinced by his generals to intervene and invade.
In 1977, Malik was replaced as Foreign Minister as he took on the Chairmanship of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).
Malik's stint as MPR Chairman would not last long. In March 1978, Suharto was elected President for a third term and expected Hamengkubuwono IX to continue as Vice President. As it turned out, Hamengkubuwono refused to be nominated. After considering some alternative candidates, Suharto chose Malik to be his Vice President.
In his position as Vice President, Malik was not afraid to criticize the Government. In 1979, he admitted that the current regime had violated the spirit of the 1945 constitution. He also criticized the increasing feudalism in the regime. A reference to Suharto, who acted in the manner of a feudal Javanese king. In 1981, Malik commented on the corruption in the regime, referring to it as an "epidemic."
In 1982, Malik received the Dag Hannarskjold Award from the United Nations. He was also recognized as a National Hero of Indonesia.
In 1983, Malik's term as Vice President came to an end and he was replaced by Umar Wirahadikusumah.
Malik died on September 5, 1984, in Bandung, West Java, as a result of liver cancer. He was married to Nelly and had four sons and one daughter.
Adam Malik see Malik, Adam
Malik, Adam (Adam Malik) (July 22, 1917 - September 5, 1984). Indonesian journalist and politician. He was active in the nationalist Partindo and Gerindo and in 1937 established the Indonesian news agnecy Antara. With Tan Malaka he founded the Partai Murba, which he represented in Parliament (1956-1960). As trade minister under Sukarno, he opposed the growth of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and proposed the establishment of a single-state party in which the PKI would be submerged. He became one on the leading civilian politicians associated with Suharto’s New Order, as foreign minister (1966-1977) and vice president (1978-1983). In later years, he was occasionally critical of the New Order’s record on human rights.
Malik was born in Pematang Siantar, North Sumatra, Dutch East Indies to Abdul Malik and Salamah Lubis. After completing junior high school, he received his first job as a shopkeeper, filling in time by reading books and increasing his knowledge. Malik quickly developed an interest in politics and at the age of 17 became the Chairman of the Pematang Siantar branch of Partindo (Indonesia Party). In this position, Malik campaigned for the Dutch Colonial Government to grant independence to Indonesia. As a result of this, Malik was put in prison for disobeying the Colonial Government's ban on political assemblies. Once he was freed, Malik left Pematang Siantar for Jakarta.
After leaving hometown, Malik pursued a job as a journalist. He wrote for Partindo's Party Magazine and Pelita Andalas Newspaper. In 1937, along with like-minded colleagues, Malik formed ANTARA. ANTARA would develop to become Indonesia's national news agency.
Malik played an important role in the events leading up to Indonesia's Declaration of Independence. On August 16, 1945, Malik and other pro-Independence youths kidnapped Nationalist movement leaders, Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta. They took the two leaders to the town of Rengasdengklok and forced them to declare Indonesia's independence to fill the vacuum left by the Japanese Occupational Forces which had surrendered. Sukarno and Hatta finally declared Indonesia's independence, on August 17, 1945. The two were also elected as Indonesia's first President and Vice President. After Indonesia's independence, Malik formed the Murba Party and used it as a platform to become a Parliament member. Malik also served as the Third Deputy Chairman of the Indonesian Central National Committee (KNIP).
After becoming a journalist and a politician, Malik took up the duties of diplomat. In 1959, he was appointed ambassador to the Soviet Union and Poland. This was followed in 1962 by an appointment as Chairman of the Indonesian Delegation for the negotiations to hand over West Irian to Indonesia. He then served as Minister for Trade before being appointed Minister for the Implementation of the Guided Economy in Sukarno's Cabinet.
With Sukarno being increasingly influenced by the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in his policies, Malik set up the Preservation of Sukarnoism Body (BPS). This organization aimed to translate Sukaroist ideas in a non-Communist sense and to use the name Sukarno to criticise the PKI. Sukarno was not oblivious to this and banned BPS in 1965. Together with General Abdul Haris Nasution and Ruslan Abdulgani, Malik was despised by the PKI for his anti-Communist stance.
1966 was the year which saw Sukarno lose his executive powers as he passed them over to Lieutenant General Suharto through a presidential decree known as Supersemar. Although Sukarno continued to keep the title of President, all the de facto power was in the hands of Suharto. A Cabinet reshuffle followed in which Malik took up the position of Minister of Foreign Affairs. Malik, together with Suharto and Hamengkubuwono IX formed a triumvirate as they sought to reverse Sukarno's policies.
As Foreign Affairs Minister, Malik conducted trips to Western Countries to reschedule debt payments. Malik also quit the Murba Party that year to put himself more in line with the new regime's more open economic policies. The Murba Party having been a party that rejected foreign investments. In 1967, Malik, together with the Foreign Ministers of Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Singapore would officially form ASEAN in a bid to form a united front in the face of Communist expansion in Vietnam.
With Suharto finally elected as President in 1968, Malik continued to serve as the Foreign Affairs Minister. In 1970, Malik solidified his position with the regime by officially joining Golkar. Malik would also represent Indonesia and deputize for Suharto in summits with Suharto not showing much interest in foreign policy in the first years of his Presidency.
As Foreign Affairs Minister, Malik had had differences with Suharto's ABRI Generals such as General Maraden Panggabean over the way in which Indonesia should approach its Foreign Policy in Southeast Asia. The Generals wanted Indonesia and its regional neighbors in ASEAN to have a closer security cooperation which in effect. The Generals were also in favor of sending Indonesian troops to help the South Vietnamese in the Vietnam War. On the other hand, Malik insisted that ASEAN should only be about economic, not military cooperation. In this he was supported by Suharto. Malik also adopted a softer stance towards the People's Republic of China which the Suharto regime saw as supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).
In 1971, Malik was chosen as President of the United Nations General Assembly.
Malik was briefly involved in the crisis that would lead to the invasion of East Timor. Malik had assured an East Timorese delegation led by Jose Ramos-Horta that Indonesia would not be involved in the crisis in East Timor. Suharto at first supported this stance towards East Timor. However, in 1975, was convinced by his generals to intervene and invade.
In 1977, Malik was replaced as Foreign Minister as he took on the Chairmanship of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).
Malik's stint as MPR Chairman would not last long. In March 1978, Suharto was elected President for a third term and expected Hamengkubuwono IX to continue as Vice President. As it turned out, Hamengkubuwono refused to be nominated. After considering some alternative candidates, Suharto chose Malik to be his Vice President.
In his position as Vice President, Malik was not afraid to criticize the Government. In 1979, he admitted that the current regime had violated the spirit of the 1945 constitution. He also criticized the increasing feudalism in the regime. A reference to Suharto, who acted in the manner of a feudal Javanese king. In 1981, Malik commented on the corruption in the regime, referring to it as an "epidemic."
In 1982, Malik received the Dag Hannarskjold Award from the United Nations. He was also recognized as a National Hero of Indonesia.
In 1983, Malik's term as Vice President came to an end and he was replaced by Umar Wirahadikusumah.
Malik died on September 5, 1984, in Bandung, West Java, as a result of liver cancer. He was married to Nelly and had four sons and one daughter.
Adam Malik see Malik, Adam
Malik Ahmad Bahri
Malik Ahmad Bahri. First independent ruler of the Nizam Shahi sultanate of Ahmadnagar in the Deccan (r.1490-1509).
Bahri, Malik Ahmad see Malik Ahmad Bahri.
Malik Ahmad Bahri. First independent ruler of the Nizam Shahi sultanate of Ahmadnagar in the Deccan (r.1490-1509).
Bahri, Malik Ahmad see Malik Ahmad Bahri.
Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al- (Sayf al-Din al-Malik al-‘Adil) (al-Malik al-Adil Sayf al-Din Abu-Bakr ibn Ayyub) (Al-Adil I) (June 1145-1218). Ruler of the Ayyubid dynasty who ruled in Egypt (1200- 1218) and in Damascus (1196-1218). Called Saphadin by the Crusaders, he was the brother, assistant, and spiritual heir of Saladin. In 1207, he distributed his provinces between his sons: al-Malik al-Kamil in Egypt, al-Mu‘azzam in Damascus, al-Ahwad and al-Ashraf in al-Jazira and Diyarbakr, himself moving from place to place as circumstances required.
Malik al-'Adil was an Ayyubid-Egyptian general and ruler of Kurdish descent. From his honorific "Sayf al-Din," he was sometimes known to the Frankish crusaders as "Saphadin." He was a son of Najm ad-Din Ayyub and a younger brother of Saladin. He was born in June 1145, probably in Damascus. He first achieved distinction as an officer in Nur ad-Din's army during his uncle Shirkuh's third and final campaign in Egypt (1168-1169). Following Nur ad-Din's death in 1174, Malik al-'Adil governed Egypt on behalf of his brother Saladin and mobilized that country's vast resources in support of his brother's campaigns in Syria and his war against the Crusaders (1175-1183).
In 1176, Malik al-'Adil suppressed the revolt of the Christian Copts of the Egyptian city of Qift and hanged nearly 3000 of them on the trees around the city.
Malik al-'Adil was governor of Aleppo (1183-1186) but returned to administer Egypt during the Third Crusade (1186-1192). As governor of Saladin's northern provinces (1192-1193), he suppressed the revolt of 'Izz Al-Din of Mosul following Saladin's death (March 1193), and played the role of kingmaker during the succession dispute among Saladin's sons Al-Aziz Uthman and Al-Afdal (1193-1196). He was named governor of
Damascus and used this base to expand his power, and championed the faction opposed to Al-Afdal's inept rule following Al-Aziz's death in 1198. Although he was closely besieged in Damascus in 1199, Malik al-'Adil defeated Al-Afdal at the Battle of Bilbeis in January of 1200. After this victory, he was proclaimed Sultan and ruled wisely and well over both Egypt and Syria for nearly two decades, promoting trade and good relations with the Crusader states (1200-1217). He took the field again on hearing news of the Fifth Crusade, despite his advanced age (1217), and organized the defenses of Egypt and Palestine. He fell ill and died while on campaign (August 1218) and was succeeded by his son Malik al-Kamil.
A gifted and effective administrator and organizer, Malik al-'Adil provided crucial military and civilian support for Saladin's great campaigns (an early example of the great minister of war). He was also a capable general and strategist in his own right, and the foundation and persistence of the Ayyubid state was as much his achievement as it was Saladin's.
Sayf al-Din al-Malik al-'Adil see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
'Adil, Sayf al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Al-Adil I see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Malik al-Adil Sayf al-Din Abu-Bakr ibn Ayyub, al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Saphadin see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Adil I, Al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
A gifted and effective administrator and organizer, Malik al-'Adil provided crucial military and civilian support for Saladin's great campaigns (an early example of the great minister of war). He was also a capable general and strategist in his own right, and the foundation and persistence of the Ayyubid state was as much his achievement as it was Saladin's.
Sayf al-Din al-Malik al-'Adil see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
'Adil, Sayf al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Al-Adil I see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Malik al-Adil Sayf al-Din Abu-Bakr ibn Ayyub, al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Saphadin see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Adil I, Al- see Malik al-‘Adil, Sayf al-Din al-
Malik al-Kamil I
Malik al-Kamil I (Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil I) (al-Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali Muhammed)
(1177/1180-1238). Ruler of the Ayyubid dynasty (1218-1238). The eldest son of al-Malik al-‘Adil, he became viceroy of Egypt in 1207 and, at his father’s death, sultan of Egypt and supreme head of the Ayyubid realm. During the fifth Crusade, the Franks took Damietta in 1219 but, with the help of his brothers al-Malik al-Mu‘azzam and al-Malik al-Ashraf I, al-Kamil forced them to surrender in 1221. The second period of al-Kamil’s reign was marked by the struggle for the leadership with al-Mu ‘azzam and al-Ashraf. In 1227, al-Kamil offered much of Saladin’s conquests to Emperor Frederick II Hohenstaufen in exchange for the Crusaders’ withdrawal from Egypt. The Emperor then landed at Acre in 1228. The famous treaty which delivered Jerusalem to the Franks was signed in 1229.
Malik al-Kamil was the son of sultan al-Adil, a brother of Saladin. In 1218, al-Kamil led the defense during the Siege of Damietta against the Fifth Crusade, and later that year became sultan when his father died. In 1219, he was almost overthrown by a conspiracy among Coptic Christians, and considered fleeing to Yemen until the conspiracy was put down by his brother al-Mu'azzam, governor of Damascus.
Malik al-Kamil made many offers of peace to the Crusaders, all of which were rejected, due to the influence of the papal legate Pelagius. He offered to return Jerusalem and rebuild its walls (which his brother had torn down earlier in the year), and to return the True Cross (which he probably did not have). At one point, he even negotiated with Francis of Assisi, who had accompanied the crusade, and who apparently tried to convert the sultan.
Due to famine and disease after the Nile failed to flood, Malik al-Kamil could not defend Damietta and it was captured in November of 1219. The sultan withdrew to al-Mansourah, a fortress further up the Nile. After this there was little action until 1221, when Malik al-Kamil offered peace again, but was again refused. The Crusaders marched out towards Cairo, but al-Kamil simply opened the dams and allowed the Nile to flood, and finally the Crusaders accepted an eight-year peace. He retook Damietta in September.
In the following years, there was a power struggle with his brother al-Mu'azzam, and al-Kamil was willing to accept a peace with emperor and King of Sicily, Frederick II, who was planning the Sixth Crusade. Al-Mu'azzam died in 1227, eliminating the need for a peace, but Frederick had already arrived. After al-Mu'azzam's death, Malik al-Kamil and his older brother al-Ashraf Khalil negotiated a treaty giving all of Palestine (including Transjordan) to Malik al-Kamil and Syria to al-Ashraf. In February of 1229, Malik al-Kamil negotiated a ten-year peace with Frederick II and returned Jerusalem and other holy sites to the Crusader kingdom.
The treaty of 1229 is unique in the history f the Crusades. By diplomacy alone and without major military confrontation, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and a corridor running to the sea were ceded to the kingdom of Jerusalem. Exception was made for the Temple area, the Dome of the Rock, and the Aqsa Mosque, which the Muslims retained. Moreover, all Muslim residents f the city would retain their homes and property. They would also have their own city officials to administer a separate justice system and safeguard their religious interests. The walls of Jerusalem, which had already been destroyed, were not rebuilt, and the peace was to last for ten years.
Nevertheless, many Muslims were still opposed to this treaty, as were many Christians, including the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who placed an interdict over the holiest city in Christianity -- an interdict which Frederick summarily ignored. After this there was peace with the Crusaders, but al-Kamil had to contend with the Seljuks and the Khwarezmians before he died in 1238.
The sons of Malik al-Kamil, as-Salih Ayyub and al-Adil II, succeeded him in Syria and Egypt respectively, but the Ayyubid empire soon descended into civil war. In 1239, the treaty with Frederick expired, and Jerusalem came under Ayyubid control.
The Crusades of 1239 to 1241, under Thibaut IV of Champagne and Richard of Cornwall, brought about the return to Christendom of the city as well as other lost territories through negotiation. However, in 1244, an alliance of Jerusalem and Damascus failed to prevent the capture and sack of Jerusalem by Khwarezmians with Egyptian aid. All the diplomatic gains of the preceding years were lost. Once again the Christians were confined to a thin strip of ports along the Mediterranean coast.
Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil I see Malik al-Kamil I
Kamil, Nasir al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Kamil I
Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali Muhammed, al- see Malik al-Kamil I
Muhammed, al-Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali see Malik al-Kamil I
Malik al-Kamil I (Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil I) (al-Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali Muhammed)
(1177/1180-1238). Ruler of the Ayyubid dynasty (1218-1238). The eldest son of al-Malik al-‘Adil, he became viceroy of Egypt in 1207 and, at his father’s death, sultan of Egypt and supreme head of the Ayyubid realm. During the fifth Crusade, the Franks took Damietta in 1219 but, with the help of his brothers al-Malik al-Mu‘azzam and al-Malik al-Ashraf I, al-Kamil forced them to surrender in 1221. The second period of al-Kamil’s reign was marked by the struggle for the leadership with al-Mu ‘azzam and al-Ashraf. In 1227, al-Kamil offered much of Saladin’s conquests to Emperor Frederick II Hohenstaufen in exchange for the Crusaders’ withdrawal from Egypt. The Emperor then landed at Acre in 1228. The famous treaty which delivered Jerusalem to the Franks was signed in 1229.
Malik al-Kamil was the son of sultan al-Adil, a brother of Saladin. In 1218, al-Kamil led the defense during the Siege of Damietta against the Fifth Crusade, and later that year became sultan when his father died. In 1219, he was almost overthrown by a conspiracy among Coptic Christians, and considered fleeing to Yemen until the conspiracy was put down by his brother al-Mu'azzam, governor of Damascus.
Malik al-Kamil made many offers of peace to the Crusaders, all of which were rejected, due to the influence of the papal legate Pelagius. He offered to return Jerusalem and rebuild its walls (which his brother had torn down earlier in the year), and to return the True Cross (which he probably did not have). At one point, he even negotiated with Francis of Assisi, who had accompanied the crusade, and who apparently tried to convert the sultan.
Due to famine and disease after the Nile failed to flood, Malik al-Kamil could not defend Damietta and it was captured in November of 1219. The sultan withdrew to al-Mansourah, a fortress further up the Nile. After this there was little action until 1221, when Malik al-Kamil offered peace again, but was again refused. The Crusaders marched out towards Cairo, but al-Kamil simply opened the dams and allowed the Nile to flood, and finally the Crusaders accepted an eight-year peace. He retook Damietta in September.
In the following years, there was a power struggle with his brother al-Mu'azzam, and al-Kamil was willing to accept a peace with emperor and King of Sicily, Frederick II, who was planning the Sixth Crusade. Al-Mu'azzam died in 1227, eliminating the need for a peace, but Frederick had already arrived. After al-Mu'azzam's death, Malik al-Kamil and his older brother al-Ashraf Khalil negotiated a treaty giving all of Palestine (including Transjordan) to Malik al-Kamil and Syria to al-Ashraf. In February of 1229, Malik al-Kamil negotiated a ten-year peace with Frederick II and returned Jerusalem and other holy sites to the Crusader kingdom.
The treaty of 1229 is unique in the history f the Crusades. By diplomacy alone and without major military confrontation, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and a corridor running to the sea were ceded to the kingdom of Jerusalem. Exception was made for the Temple area, the Dome of the Rock, and the Aqsa Mosque, which the Muslims retained. Moreover, all Muslim residents f the city would retain their homes and property. They would also have their own city officials to administer a separate justice system and safeguard their religious interests. The walls of Jerusalem, which had already been destroyed, were not rebuilt, and the peace was to last for ten years.
Nevertheless, many Muslims were still opposed to this treaty, as were many Christians, including the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who placed an interdict over the holiest city in Christianity -- an interdict which Frederick summarily ignored. After this there was peace with the Crusaders, but al-Kamil had to contend with the Seljuks and the Khwarezmians before he died in 1238.
The sons of Malik al-Kamil, as-Salih Ayyub and al-Adil II, succeeded him in Syria and Egypt respectively, but the Ayyubid empire soon descended into civil war. In 1239, the treaty with Frederick expired, and Jerusalem came under Ayyubid control.
The Crusades of 1239 to 1241, under Thibaut IV of Champagne and Richard of Cornwall, brought about the return to Christendom of the city as well as other lost territories through negotiation. However, in 1244, an alliance of Jerusalem and Damascus failed to prevent the capture and sack of Jerusalem by Khwarezmians with Egyptian aid. All the diplomatic gains of the preceding years were lost. Once again the Christians were confined to a thin strip of ports along the Mediterranean coast.
Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil I see Malik al-Kamil I
Kamil, Nasir al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Kamil I
Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali Muhammed, al- see Malik al-Kamil I
Muhammed, al-Malik al-Kamel Naser al-Din Abu al-Ma'ali see Malik al-Kamil I
Malik al-Kamil II
Malik al-Kamil II (Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil II). Ayyubid ruler of Mayyafariqqin (r.1244-1260). He was the son of al-Malik al-Muzaffar Shihab al-Din, the Ayyubid ruler of Mayyafariqqin, and a nephew of al-Malik al-Kamil (I). Brought with his brother al-Ashraf before the Il-Khan Hulegu, the latter killed them both personally.
Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil see Malik al-Kamil II
Kamil, Nasir al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Kamil II
Malik al-Kamil II (Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil II). Ayyubid ruler of Mayyafariqqin (r.1244-1260). He was the son of al-Malik al-Muzaffar Shihab al-Din, the Ayyubid ruler of Mayyafariqqin, and a nephew of al-Malik al-Kamil (I). Brought with his brother al-Ashraf before the Il-Khan Hulegu, the latter killed them both personally.
Nasir al-Din al-Malik al-Kamil see Malik al-Kamil II
Kamil, Nasir al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Kamil II
Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Malik al-Mu‘azzam (Sharaf al-Din ‘Isa al-Malik al-Mu‘azzam) (al-Mu'azzam 'Isa Sharaf ad-Din) (1180-1227). Ayyubid ruler of Damascus (1218-1227). He was a son of al-Malik al-‘Adil and brother of al-Malik al-Kamil I. He concurred in the latter’s policy in Palestine, but later struggled with him to secure his own position in Syria.
The son of Sultan al-Malik al-'Adil and the nephew of Saladin, founder of the dynasty, al-Mu'azzam was installed by his father as governor of Damascus in 1201. After his father's death in 1218, al-Mu'azzam ruled the Ayyubid lands in Syria in his own name, down to his own death in 1227. He was succeeded by his son, an-Nasir Dawud.
Sharaf al-Din 'Isa al-Malik al-Mu'azzam see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Mu'azzam, Sharaf al-Din 'Isa al-Malik al- see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Mu'azzam 'Isa Sharaf ad-Din, al- see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Malik al-Mu‘azzam (Sharaf al-Din ‘Isa al-Malik al-Mu‘azzam) (al-Mu'azzam 'Isa Sharaf ad-Din) (1180-1227). Ayyubid ruler of Damascus (1218-1227). He was a son of al-Malik al-‘Adil and brother of al-Malik al-Kamil I. He concurred in the latter’s policy in Palestine, but later struggled with him to secure his own position in Syria.
The son of Sultan al-Malik al-'Adil and the nephew of Saladin, founder of the dynasty, al-Mu'azzam was installed by his father as governor of Damascus in 1201. After his father's death in 1218, al-Mu'azzam ruled the Ayyubid lands in Syria in his own name, down to his own death in 1227. He was succeeded by his son, an-Nasir Dawud.
Sharaf al-Din 'Isa al-Malik al-Mu'azzam see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Mu'azzam, Sharaf al-Din 'Isa al-Malik al- see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Mu'azzam 'Isa Sharaf ad-Din, al- see Malik al-Mu‘azzam
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Dawud, al-
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Dawud, al- (b. 1205). Ayyubid ruler of Damascus (1227-1229). His uncles al-Malik al-Kamil of Egypt and al-Malik al-Ashraf of Diyarbakr opposed him and divided the Ayyubid Empire between themselves. After a three months’ siege of Damascus, al-Nasir had to yield. He nevertheless remained loyal to al-Malik al-Kamil when the other Ayyubids combined against him. During the following years he was harassed, put under arrest and not admitted into Baghdad.
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Dawud, al- (b. 1205). Ayyubid ruler of Damascus (1227-1229). His uncles al-Malik al-Kamil of Egypt and al-Malik al-Ashraf of Diyarbakr opposed him and divided the Ayyubid Empire between themselves. After a three months’ siege of Damascus, al-Nasir had to yield. He nevertheless remained loyal to al-Malik al-Kamil when the other Ayyubids combined against him. During the following years he was harassed, put under arrest and not admitted into Baghdad.
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al- (An-Nasir Yusuf) (1228-1260). Last Ayyubid ruler of Aleppo (r.1236-1260) and Damascus (r.1250-1260). Until 1242, the regency was in the hands of his grandmother, Dayfa Khatun, and the period until 1251 saw the ascendancy of the amir Shams al-Din Lu’lu’ al-Amini. These two periods were successful, but by the time the Mongols appeared in Syria, al-Nasir’s regime was on the verge of disintegration. In 1260, the Il-Khan Hulegu captured and sacked Aleppo. Al-Nasir abandoned Damascus, fled to Gaza but lost his nerve and surrendered to the Mongols. After the Mongols were defeated at ‘Ayn Jalut in 1260, Hulegu put him to death.
The great grandson of Saladin, Malik al-Nasir became the Ayyubid ruler of Aleppo when he was seven years old after the death of his father al-Aziz. His grandmother Daifah Khatun, daughter of al-Adil I, was his regent until her death in 1242.
When the Ayyubid sultan of Egypt as-Salih Ayyub died and his son Turanshah was murdered by the Bahri Mamelukes of Egypt, Shajar al-Durr (widow of as-Salih Ayyub) seized the throne of Egypt (in 1250). Malik al-Nasir, being an Ayyubid, refused to recognize Shajar al-Durr as the Sultana of Egypt and, as a sign of support, the Emirs of Syria granted him the city of Damascus, in Syria.
Alarmed by these developments, the Mameluke leaders in Egypt decided to replace Shajar al-Durr with the Atabek (commander-in-chief) Aybak. In October 1250, Malik al-Nasir sent forces to Gaza to conquer Egypt and overthrow Aybak, but Egyptian forces led by Faris ad-Din Aktai defeated them.
In January 1251, Malik al-Nasir led another army to Egypt and clashed with Aybak's army in a significant battle that resulted in the defeat of Malik al-Nasir. He fled back to Damascus, though some of his soldiers who could reach Cairo spread the initial impression inside Egypt that Malik al-Nasir had won the battle. Later, when the news of Aybak's ultimate victory arrived, the soldiers and their commanders were arrested, and Aybak sent back the soldiers, some 3,000 in number, to Damascus on the backs of donkeys.
In 1253, through mediation of some Emirs, an accord was reached between Malik al-Nasir and Aybak which gave the Egyptians control over Gaza, Jerusalem, Nablus, and the coastline of al-Sham. By 1254, another power shift occurred in Egypt, as Aybak killed Faris ad-Din Aktai, the leader of the Bahri Mamelukes. Some of his Mamelukes, among them Baybars al-Bunduqdari and Qalawun al-Alfi, fled to Malik al-Nasir in Syria, persuading him to break the accord and invade Egypt. Aybak wrote to Malik al-Nasir warning him of the dangerr of these Mamelukes who took refuge in Syria, and agreed to grant him their territorial domains on the coast, but Malik al-Nasir refused to expel them and instead returned to them the domains which Aybak had granted.
In 1255, Malik al-Nasir sent new forces to the Egyptian border, this time with many of Aktai's Mamelukes, among them Baybars al-Bunduqdari, and Qalawun al-Alfi, but he was defeated again.
Malik al-Nasir had contact and correspondence with the European Crusaders, and tried to reach an accord with the barons of Acre. He indirectly suggested to King Louis IX of France the possibility of surrendering Jerusalem to Louis, in return for assistance in conquering Egypt. But Louis, who had already lost an army in Egypt during the Seventh Crusade and was still trying to free his imprisoned soldiers, was not willing yet to make such a deal. Louis did, however, send his royal armorer to Damascus to purchase materials to make crossbows, and in 1224, Malik al-Nasir signed a truce with the Crusaders.
The Egyptian ruler Aybak was murdered in 1257 and his young son al-Mansur Ali, only fifteen years old, became the new sultan, with Qutuz as vice-sultan. The following year (in 1258) the Mongols led by Hulegu Khan sacked Baghdad.
Baybars al-Bunduqdari argued that Malik al-Nasir should mobilize his army and make preparations to fight the Mongols who were marching towards Syria. However, instead Malik al-Nasir sent his son al-Malik al-Aziz with a present to Hulegu, requesting Hulegu's assistance in invading Egypt. Hulegu's response, however, was simply a warning that Malik al-Nasir should quickly submit to Mongol authority. This answer frightened Malik al-Nasir who at once sent a message to Egypt, requesting help. Saif ad-Din Qutuz, the vice Sultan of Egypt decided to confront the Mongols. Arguing that Egypt could not face the approaching danger while ruled by a young boy, Qutuz prcclaimed himself Sultan, and began to raise a large army, though he assured Malik al-Nasir that his action was only a temporarily measure until the danger of the Mongols was overcome.
As the Mongols marched toward Aleppo, some of Malik al-Nasir's advisors recommended surrendering to Hulegu as the best solution. This angered Baybars and his Mamelukes who attempted to assassinate Malik al-Nasir. However, Malik al-Nasir escaped and fled with his brother to the castle in Damascus, also sending his wife, son, and money to Egypt. Many f the citizens of Damascus also fled to Egypt.
The Mongols arrived in Aleppo in December 1259. Turanshah, the uncle of Malik al-Nasir, refused to surrender. After a siege of seven days, the Mongols stormed Aleppo and massacred its population for another five days. Turanshah fled the city but died a few days later. When the news of the sack of Aleppo reached Malik al-Nasir, he and his army fled towards Gaza on January 31, stopping in Nablus for several days and leaving a contingent which may have been intended as a rearguard. After the capture of Damascus, some of the Mongol troops raided Palestine, and fought with Malik al-Nasir's troops in the olive groves of Nablus, defeating the entire force.
Damascus fell to the hands of the Mongols, under general Kitbuqa, 16 days after the sack of Aleppo. The Emirs of Damascus surrendered without resistance.
Once arriving at the border with Egypt, some Emirs of Malik al-Nasir abandoned him and joined Qutuz. Malik al-Nasir, his son al-Aziz, and his brother al-Zahir were abducted in Gaza by one of his servants and were sent to Hulegu. Malik al-Nasir and his brother were executed after Hulegu heard the news of the defeat of the Mongol army at Ayn Jalut by an Egyptian army led by Qutuz and Baybars on September 3, 1260.
An-Nasir Yusuf see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Nasir Yusuf, An- see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Yusuf, An-Nasir see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Yusuf, al-Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al- (An-Nasir Yusuf) (1228-1260). Last Ayyubid ruler of Aleppo (r.1236-1260) and Damascus (r.1250-1260). Until 1242, the regency was in the hands of his grandmother, Dayfa Khatun, and the period until 1251 saw the ascendancy of the amir Shams al-Din Lu’lu’ al-Amini. These two periods were successful, but by the time the Mongols appeared in Syria, al-Nasir’s regime was on the verge of disintegration. In 1260, the Il-Khan Hulegu captured and sacked Aleppo. Al-Nasir abandoned Damascus, fled to Gaza but lost his nerve and surrendered to the Mongols. After the Mongols were defeated at ‘Ayn Jalut in 1260, Hulegu put him to death.
The great grandson of Saladin, Malik al-Nasir became the Ayyubid ruler of Aleppo when he was seven years old after the death of his father al-Aziz. His grandmother Daifah Khatun, daughter of al-Adil I, was his regent until her death in 1242.
When the Ayyubid sultan of Egypt as-Salih Ayyub died and his son Turanshah was murdered by the Bahri Mamelukes of Egypt, Shajar al-Durr (widow of as-Salih Ayyub) seized the throne of Egypt (in 1250). Malik al-Nasir, being an Ayyubid, refused to recognize Shajar al-Durr as the Sultana of Egypt and, as a sign of support, the Emirs of Syria granted him the city of Damascus, in Syria.
Alarmed by these developments, the Mameluke leaders in Egypt decided to replace Shajar al-Durr with the Atabek (commander-in-chief) Aybak. In October 1250, Malik al-Nasir sent forces to Gaza to conquer Egypt and overthrow Aybak, but Egyptian forces led by Faris ad-Din Aktai defeated them.
In January 1251, Malik al-Nasir led another army to Egypt and clashed with Aybak's army in a significant battle that resulted in the defeat of Malik al-Nasir. He fled back to Damascus, though some of his soldiers who could reach Cairo spread the initial impression inside Egypt that Malik al-Nasir had won the battle. Later, when the news of Aybak's ultimate victory arrived, the soldiers and their commanders were arrested, and Aybak sent back the soldiers, some 3,000 in number, to Damascus on the backs of donkeys.
In 1253, through mediation of some Emirs, an accord was reached between Malik al-Nasir and Aybak which gave the Egyptians control over Gaza, Jerusalem, Nablus, and the coastline of al-Sham. By 1254, another power shift occurred in Egypt, as Aybak killed Faris ad-Din Aktai, the leader of the Bahri Mamelukes. Some of his Mamelukes, among them Baybars al-Bunduqdari and Qalawun al-Alfi, fled to Malik al-Nasir in Syria, persuading him to break the accord and invade Egypt. Aybak wrote to Malik al-Nasir warning him of the dangerr of these Mamelukes who took refuge in Syria, and agreed to grant him their territorial domains on the coast, but Malik al-Nasir refused to expel them and instead returned to them the domains which Aybak had granted.
In 1255, Malik al-Nasir sent new forces to the Egyptian border, this time with many of Aktai's Mamelukes, among them Baybars al-Bunduqdari, and Qalawun al-Alfi, but he was defeated again.
Malik al-Nasir had contact and correspondence with the European Crusaders, and tried to reach an accord with the barons of Acre. He indirectly suggested to King Louis IX of France the possibility of surrendering Jerusalem to Louis, in return for assistance in conquering Egypt. But Louis, who had already lost an army in Egypt during the Seventh Crusade and was still trying to free his imprisoned soldiers, was not willing yet to make such a deal. Louis did, however, send his royal armorer to Damascus to purchase materials to make crossbows, and in 1224, Malik al-Nasir signed a truce with the Crusaders.
The Egyptian ruler Aybak was murdered in 1257 and his young son al-Mansur Ali, only fifteen years old, became the new sultan, with Qutuz as vice-sultan. The following year (in 1258) the Mongols led by Hulegu Khan sacked Baghdad.
Baybars al-Bunduqdari argued that Malik al-Nasir should mobilize his army and make preparations to fight the Mongols who were marching towards Syria. However, instead Malik al-Nasir sent his son al-Malik al-Aziz with a present to Hulegu, requesting Hulegu's assistance in invading Egypt. Hulegu's response, however, was simply a warning that Malik al-Nasir should quickly submit to Mongol authority. This answer frightened Malik al-Nasir who at once sent a message to Egypt, requesting help. Saif ad-Din Qutuz, the vice Sultan of Egypt decided to confront the Mongols. Arguing that Egypt could not face the approaching danger while ruled by a young boy, Qutuz prcclaimed himself Sultan, and began to raise a large army, though he assured Malik al-Nasir that his action was only a temporarily measure until the danger of the Mongols was overcome.
As the Mongols marched toward Aleppo, some of Malik al-Nasir's advisors recommended surrendering to Hulegu as the best solution. This angered Baybars and his Mamelukes who attempted to assassinate Malik al-Nasir. However, Malik al-Nasir escaped and fled with his brother to the castle in Damascus, also sending his wife, son, and money to Egypt. Many f the citizens of Damascus also fled to Egypt.
The Mongols arrived in Aleppo in December 1259. Turanshah, the uncle of Malik al-Nasir, refused to surrender. After a siege of seven days, the Mongols stormed Aleppo and massacred its population for another five days. Turanshah fled the city but died a few days later. When the news of the sack of Aleppo reached Malik al-Nasir, he and his army fled towards Gaza on January 31, stopping in Nablus for several days and leaving a contingent which may have been intended as a rearguard. After the capture of Damascus, some of the Mongol troops raided Palestine, and fought with Malik al-Nasir's troops in the olive groves of Nablus, defeating the entire force.
Damascus fell to the hands of the Mongols, under general Kitbuqa, 16 days after the sack of Aleppo. The Emirs of Damascus surrendered without resistance.
Once arriving at the border with Egypt, some Emirs of Malik al-Nasir abandoned him and joined Qutuz. Malik al-Nasir, his son al-Aziz, and his brother al-Zahir were abducted in Gaza by one of his servants and were sent to Hulegu. Malik al-Nasir and his brother were executed after Hulegu heard the news of the defeat of the Mongol army at Ayn Jalut by an Egyptian army led by Qutuz and Baybars on September 3, 1260.
An-Nasir Yusuf see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Nasir Yusuf, An- see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Yusuf, An-Nasir see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Yusuf, al-Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din see Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf, al-
Malik al-Salih, ‘Imad al-Din al-
Malik al-Salih, ‘Imad al-Din al- (‘Imad al-Din al-Malik al-Salih) (1202-1250). Ayyubid ruler in Damascus (r.1237-1238 and 1239-1245). A son of al-Malik al-‘Adil, he repeatedly allied himself with the Khwarazm-Shahs and with the Crusaders out of selfish ambition.
'Imad al-Din al-Malik al-Salih see Malik al-Salih, ‘Imad al-Din al-
Malik al-Salih, ‘Imad al-Din al- (‘Imad al-Din al-Malik al-Salih) (1202-1250). Ayyubid ruler in Damascus (r.1237-1238 and 1239-1245). A son of al-Malik al-‘Adil, he repeatedly allied himself with the Khwarazm-Shahs and with the Crusaders out of selfish ambition.
'Imad al-Din al-Malik al-Salih see Malik al-Salih, ‘Imad al-Din al-
Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al- (Najm al-Din al-Malik al-Salih) (al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub) (Abu al-Fituh) (c.1207 - November 22, 1249). Ayyubid ruler of Egypt (r.1240-1249). The eldest son of al-Malik al-Kamil I, he strengthened his position by the formation of a corps of Mamelukes who in the end were to bring about the fall of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt.
In 1221, Malik al-Salih became a hostage at the end of the Fifth Crusade, while John of Brienne became a hostage of Malik al-Salih's father al-Kamil, until Damietta was reconstructed and restored to Egypt. In 1232, Malik al-Salih was given Hisn Khayfa in the Jazirah (northern Iraq), which his father had captured from the Ortoqids. In 1234, his father sent him to rule Damascus, removing him from the succession in Egypt after suspecting him of conspiring against him with the Mamelukes. His uncle as-Salih Ismail soon expelled him from Damascus, and he fled to the Jazirah, where he allied with the Khwarezmians.
In 1238, al-Kamil died and was succeeded by his son al-Adil, Malik al-Salih's brother. By 1240, Malik al-Salih had overthrown him and taken control of Egypt. In 1244, the Khwarezmians sacked Jerusalem, which had been handed over to Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor by al-Kamil during the Sixth Crusade. Later that year Malik al-Salih and the Khwarezmians defeated Malik al-Salih's uncle in Syria, who had allied with the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, at the Battle of La Forbie. In 1245, Malik al-Salih captured Damascus, and was awarded the title of sultan by the caliph al-Musta'sim in Baghdad. The next year the combined forces of the Ayyubids defeated the unruly Khwarezmians, who no longer recognized Malik al-Salih as their lord.
In 1249, Louis IX of France invaded Egypt on the Seventh Crusade, and occupied Damietta. Malik al-Salih was away fighting his uncle in Syria, but quickly returned and encamped at al-Mansourah, where he died after having his leg amputated in an attempt to save his life from a serious abscess affliction in November. Malik al-Salih's heir, al-Muazzam Turanshah, was far away in Hasankeyf, and his widow, Shajar al-Durr, hid his death until Turanshah arrived. Nevertheless, the Mamelukes, whom Malik al-Salih had mostly recruited from the Kipchak Turks, gained power in Egypt, and were ultimately responsible for defeating the crusade. Their dynasty, the Bahri dynasty, was named after their barracks on an island in the Nile (Bahr al-Nil). The Bahriyya were also called Salihiyya, after Malik al-Salih. The Mamelukes did not control Syria, however, and Malik al-Salih was the last Ayyubid to rule a united territory.
Malik al-Salih also purchased a slave who would later become Sultan. He purchased Qalawun al-Alfi for 1000 dinars. He was called al-Alfi ("the Thousand-man") because he was bought for a thousand dinars of gold. Qalawun was an important Sultan in the Bahri dynasty of Mamelukes.
Najm al-Din al-Malik al-Salih see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Salih, Najm al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Ayyub, al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Abu al-Fituh see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Fituh, Abu al- see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al- (Najm al-Din al-Malik al-Salih) (al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub) (Abu al-Fituh) (c.1207 - November 22, 1249). Ayyubid ruler of Egypt (r.1240-1249). The eldest son of al-Malik al-Kamil I, he strengthened his position by the formation of a corps of Mamelukes who in the end were to bring about the fall of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt.
In 1221, Malik al-Salih became a hostage at the end of the Fifth Crusade, while John of Brienne became a hostage of Malik al-Salih's father al-Kamil, until Damietta was reconstructed and restored to Egypt. In 1232, Malik al-Salih was given Hisn Khayfa in the Jazirah (northern Iraq), which his father had captured from the Ortoqids. In 1234, his father sent him to rule Damascus, removing him from the succession in Egypt after suspecting him of conspiring against him with the Mamelukes. His uncle as-Salih Ismail soon expelled him from Damascus, and he fled to the Jazirah, where he allied with the Khwarezmians.
In 1238, al-Kamil died and was succeeded by his son al-Adil, Malik al-Salih's brother. By 1240, Malik al-Salih had overthrown him and taken control of Egypt. In 1244, the Khwarezmians sacked Jerusalem, which had been handed over to Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor by al-Kamil during the Sixth Crusade. Later that year Malik al-Salih and the Khwarezmians defeated Malik al-Salih's uncle in Syria, who had allied with the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, at the Battle of La Forbie. In 1245, Malik al-Salih captured Damascus, and was awarded the title of sultan by the caliph al-Musta'sim in Baghdad. The next year the combined forces of the Ayyubids defeated the unruly Khwarezmians, who no longer recognized Malik al-Salih as their lord.
In 1249, Louis IX of France invaded Egypt on the Seventh Crusade, and occupied Damietta. Malik al-Salih was away fighting his uncle in Syria, but quickly returned and encamped at al-Mansourah, where he died after having his leg amputated in an attempt to save his life from a serious abscess affliction in November. Malik al-Salih's heir, al-Muazzam Turanshah, was far away in Hasankeyf, and his widow, Shajar al-Durr, hid his death until Turanshah arrived. Nevertheless, the Mamelukes, whom Malik al-Salih had mostly recruited from the Kipchak Turks, gained power in Egypt, and were ultimately responsible for defeating the crusade. Their dynasty, the Bahri dynasty, was named after their barracks on an island in the Nile (Bahr al-Nil). The Bahriyya were also called Salihiyya, after Malik al-Salih. The Mamelukes did not control Syria, however, and Malik al-Salih was the last Ayyubid to rule a united territory.
Malik al-Salih also purchased a slave who would later become Sultan. He purchased Qalawun al-Alfi for 1000 dinars. He was called al-Alfi ("the Thousand-man") because he was bought for a thousand dinars of gold. Qalawun was an important Sultan in the Bahri dynasty of Mamelukes.
Najm al-Din al-Malik al-Salih see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Salih, Najm al-Din al-Malik al- see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din Ayyub see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Ayyub, al-Malik as-Salih Najm al-Din see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Abu al-Fituh see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Fituh, Abu al- see Malik al-Salih, Najm al-Din al-
Malik ‘Ambar
Malik ‘Ambar (Malik Anbar) (c. 1548/1549-1626). Habshi vizier and military commander who served the Nizam Shahi dynasty of Ahmadnagar. Purchased as a slave in Baghdad, he supported several Maratha families and thus contributed to the subsequent rise of Maratha power in western India.
Malik 'Ambar was born in Harar, a province of Ethiopia. He was born in the capital of the dying Adal Sultanate in eastern Ethiopia. both Ethiopia and the rebellious Adal sultanate were devastated after two decades of war with each other. His Ethiopian name was Shambu and, aside from his Ethiopian name, little is known of his youth except that he was sold into slavery. During his youthful enslavement, Shambu would be sold several times in such Arab cities as Hejaz, Mocha (al-Mukha) and Baghdad.
According to the Futuhat-i 'adil Shahi, Shambu was sold into slavery by his parents. He ended up in Mocha in Yemen. While in Mocha, Shambu's Arab owner, Kazi Hussein, came to recognize that his slave had certain intellectual abilities and decided to train him in the areas of finance and administration. As the relationship between Shambu and Hussein became stronger, Shambu became a Muslim and Hussein gave him the name 'Ambar.
When Hussein died, 'Ambar was sold to a slave dealer, who sold Malik 'Ambar again for twenty ducats. Malik 'Ambar was then taken taken to the slave market in Baghdad, where he was sold a third time to the Qadi al-Qudat of Mecca and again in Baghdad to Mir Qasim al-Baghdadi, who took him to India.
Around 1575, 'Ambar was purchased by Chingiz Khan, the prime minister to Nizam mul-Mulk Bani -- the King of Ahmadnagar. It is reported that Chingiz Khan was also of African origin and may very well have been a descendant of African mercenaries who served in India as early as the 1200s.
Chingiz Khan was impressed by 'Ambar's knowledge of Arabic, his loyalty, and his general intelligence. Seeking to solidify his control of the rather prominent (and mercenary) contingent of African (Habshi) slaves in the Deccan region, Chingiz Khan appointed 'Ambar as a key lieutenant with significant military and administrative responsibilities.
'Ambar's future was for a time hopeful. However, Chingiz Khan unexpectedly died, and 'Ambar was once again sold.
First 'Ambar was sold to the Shah of Golconda and later to the King of Bijapur. (Golconda and Bijapur were both kingdoms in the Deccan area of India.) Because of the training he had received from Kazi Hussein and Chingiz Khan, 'Ambar soon found favor with the King of Bijapur. So impressed was the King that he gave 'Ambar the title of Malik ("like a king").
While at Bijapur, Malik 'Ambar became a military commander. As a military commander, Malik 'Ambar was well respected by the Arab and African troops which were subject to his commands. Contrary to policy, Malik 'Ambar habitually promoted Arabs (as opposed to Indians) to positions of authority. This practice led to a dispute between Malik 'Ambar and the King of Bijapur which resulted in Malik 'Ambar's desertion in 1590 from the service of the King.
Malik 'Ambar became a wild card mercenary. He attracted not only independent Arab and African warriors but also Deccani (Indian) warriors. Eventually, Malik 'Ambar built a personal (private) army of over 1,500 well-trained cavalrymen and infantrymen. These soldiers of fortune were employed in various conflicts by various rulers in India.
In 1595, the King of Ahmadnagar organized a Habshi (African) army and his wise counselor, the Habshi (African) prime minister Abhangar Khan, invited Malik 'Ambar and his men to join him.
The return of Malik 'Ambar to Ahmadnagar was providential. Malik 'Ambar's return provided the opportunity for him to become a great champion of the Deccanis (Hindu Indians) against the Mughals (Muslim Indians). Malik 'Ambar and a Deccani, Mian Raju Dakhani, combined their military efforts on several occasions to repel attacks by the Mughals. Although Malik 'Ambar and Mian Raju Dakhani would become political and military rivals, on this occasion they worked together to defend the province of Ahmadnagar from the Mughals.
After repulsing the Mughals, the rivalry between Malik 'Ambar and Mian Raju Dakhani came to the fore. Both men sought to usurp the throne of King Murtaza II. In 1602, Malik 'Ambar imprisoned Murtaza and named himself regent-minister. As regent minister, Malik 'Ambar repelled a series of Mughal attacks and prevented the Great Mughal, the Emperor Akbar, from fulfilling his aim of conquering the Indian subcontinent.
By the time that Jahangir had succeeded Akbar as the Mughal Emperor in 1605, Malik 'Ambar had established a capital at Kirkee and had become well entrenched in the Deccan. During all this time, Malik 'Ambar also fought off the ventures of his rival Mian Raju Dakhani. In 1607, Malik 'Ambar captured Raju and had him executed. After this act, Malik 'Ambar was the supreme lord of Ahmadnagar.
Upon consolidation of his power, Malik 'Ambar organized an estimated 60,000 horse army. His light cavalry was very effective as a mobile unit. Malik 'Ambar also enlisted the naval support of the Siddis (fellow Africans) of Janjira Island in 1616 in order to cut the Mughal supply lines and to conduct harassing missions.
Malik 'Ambar thrust defeats on the Mughal General Khan Khanan many times and attacked Ahmadnagar often. The guerrilla tactics employed by Malik 'Ambar proved to be very successful against the Mughals. On one occasion, the Mughal Emperor Jahangir was moved to remark: "'Ambar, the black-faced, who had himself in command of the enemy, continually brought up reinforcements till he assembled a large force. ... It was deemed expedient to retreat and prepare for a new campaign."
'Ambar built his greatest fortifications at Daulatabad to protect his kingdom from Prince Shah Jahan -- the Prince destined to become the next Mughal Emperor. In 1621, Shah Jahan's forces launched an attack on Daulatabad. Surprisingly, the Mughal forces were defeated and forced to retreat after suffering heavy losses at the hands of Malik 'Ambar.
However, while this victory over the Mughals was welcomed by Malik 'Ambar, it also brought the realization that he could not continue to resist without reinforcements. Seeking the support of the Deccani ruler, Ibrahim Adil Shah II, Malik 'Ambar had his daughter married to the Shah's favorite courtier. Additionally, his long and distinguished service in Golconda and Bijapur (along with their realization that Malik 'Ambar provided a buffer from the Mughals for them) brought support from those kingdoms. For a time, Malik 'Ambar was able to continue to resist the power of the Mughals.
Nevertheless, by the 1620s, Malik 'Ambar was having difficulty in maintaining the loyalty of his officers and forces. Almost continuous warfare for over a twenty year period of time had demoralized the army and drained the local economy. Although he was never defeated, Malik 'Ambar died a besieged man in 1626.
Malik 'Ambar was succeeded as regent minister of the kingdom of Ahmadnagar by his son Fettah Khan (Fatehkhan). But Fettah Khan was not Malik 'Ambar. He was deposed in 1629. Thus ended the short but glorious reign of the Africans in the Deccan.
During his time, Malik 'Ambar founded and inhabited Aurangabad on the site of the Kirkee (Khadke - "Big Rock") village in 1610. After his death in 1626, the name was changed to Fatehpur by his son Fatehkhan. When Aurangzeb, the Mughal Emperor invaded Deccan in the year 1653, he made Fatehpur his capital and renamed it Aurangabad.
'Ambar, Malik see Malik ‘Ambar
Shambu see Malik ‘Ambar
Malik Anbar see Malik ‘Ambar
Anbar, Malik see Malik ‘Ambar
Malik ‘Ambar (Malik Anbar) (c. 1548/1549-1626). Habshi vizier and military commander who served the Nizam Shahi dynasty of Ahmadnagar. Purchased as a slave in Baghdad, he supported several Maratha families and thus contributed to the subsequent rise of Maratha power in western India.
Malik 'Ambar was born in Harar, a province of Ethiopia. He was born in the capital of the dying Adal Sultanate in eastern Ethiopia. both Ethiopia and the rebellious Adal sultanate were devastated after two decades of war with each other. His Ethiopian name was Shambu and, aside from his Ethiopian name, little is known of his youth except that he was sold into slavery. During his youthful enslavement, Shambu would be sold several times in such Arab cities as Hejaz, Mocha (al-Mukha) and Baghdad.
According to the Futuhat-i 'adil Shahi, Shambu was sold into slavery by his parents. He ended up in Mocha in Yemen. While in Mocha, Shambu's Arab owner, Kazi Hussein, came to recognize that his slave had certain intellectual abilities and decided to train him in the areas of finance and administration. As the relationship between Shambu and Hussein became stronger, Shambu became a Muslim and Hussein gave him the name 'Ambar.
When Hussein died, 'Ambar was sold to a slave dealer, who sold Malik 'Ambar again for twenty ducats. Malik 'Ambar was then taken taken to the slave market in Baghdad, where he was sold a third time to the Qadi al-Qudat of Mecca and again in Baghdad to Mir Qasim al-Baghdadi, who took him to India.
Around 1575, 'Ambar was purchased by Chingiz Khan, the prime minister to Nizam mul-Mulk Bani -- the King of Ahmadnagar. It is reported that Chingiz Khan was also of African origin and may very well have been a descendant of African mercenaries who served in India as early as the 1200s.
Chingiz Khan was impressed by 'Ambar's knowledge of Arabic, his loyalty, and his general intelligence. Seeking to solidify his control of the rather prominent (and mercenary) contingent of African (Habshi) slaves in the Deccan region, Chingiz Khan appointed 'Ambar as a key lieutenant with significant military and administrative responsibilities.
'Ambar's future was for a time hopeful. However, Chingiz Khan unexpectedly died, and 'Ambar was once again sold.
First 'Ambar was sold to the Shah of Golconda and later to the King of Bijapur. (Golconda and Bijapur were both kingdoms in the Deccan area of India.) Because of the training he had received from Kazi Hussein and Chingiz Khan, 'Ambar soon found favor with the King of Bijapur. So impressed was the King that he gave 'Ambar the title of Malik ("like a king").
While at Bijapur, Malik 'Ambar became a military commander. As a military commander, Malik 'Ambar was well respected by the Arab and African troops which were subject to his commands. Contrary to policy, Malik 'Ambar habitually promoted Arabs (as opposed to Indians) to positions of authority. This practice led to a dispute between Malik 'Ambar and the King of Bijapur which resulted in Malik 'Ambar's desertion in 1590 from the service of the King.
Malik 'Ambar became a wild card mercenary. He attracted not only independent Arab and African warriors but also Deccani (Indian) warriors. Eventually, Malik 'Ambar built a personal (private) army of over 1,500 well-trained cavalrymen and infantrymen. These soldiers of fortune were employed in various conflicts by various rulers in India.
In 1595, the King of Ahmadnagar organized a Habshi (African) army and his wise counselor, the Habshi (African) prime minister Abhangar Khan, invited Malik 'Ambar and his men to join him.
The return of Malik 'Ambar to Ahmadnagar was providential. Malik 'Ambar's return provided the opportunity for him to become a great champion of the Deccanis (Hindu Indians) against the Mughals (Muslim Indians). Malik 'Ambar and a Deccani, Mian Raju Dakhani, combined their military efforts on several occasions to repel attacks by the Mughals. Although Malik 'Ambar and Mian Raju Dakhani would become political and military rivals, on this occasion they worked together to defend the province of Ahmadnagar from the Mughals.
After repulsing the Mughals, the rivalry between Malik 'Ambar and Mian Raju Dakhani came to the fore. Both men sought to usurp the throne of King Murtaza II. In 1602, Malik 'Ambar imprisoned Murtaza and named himself regent-minister. As regent minister, Malik 'Ambar repelled a series of Mughal attacks and prevented the Great Mughal, the Emperor Akbar, from fulfilling his aim of conquering the Indian subcontinent.
By the time that Jahangir had succeeded Akbar as the Mughal Emperor in 1605, Malik 'Ambar had established a capital at Kirkee and had become well entrenched in the Deccan. During all this time, Malik 'Ambar also fought off the ventures of his rival Mian Raju Dakhani. In 1607, Malik 'Ambar captured Raju and had him executed. After this act, Malik 'Ambar was the supreme lord of Ahmadnagar.
Upon consolidation of his power, Malik 'Ambar organized an estimated 60,000 horse army. His light cavalry was very effective as a mobile unit. Malik 'Ambar also enlisted the naval support of the Siddis (fellow Africans) of Janjira Island in 1616 in order to cut the Mughal supply lines and to conduct harassing missions.
Malik 'Ambar thrust defeats on the Mughal General Khan Khanan many times and attacked Ahmadnagar often. The guerrilla tactics employed by Malik 'Ambar proved to be very successful against the Mughals. On one occasion, the Mughal Emperor Jahangir was moved to remark: "'Ambar, the black-faced, who had himself in command of the enemy, continually brought up reinforcements till he assembled a large force. ... It was deemed expedient to retreat and prepare for a new campaign."
'Ambar built his greatest fortifications at Daulatabad to protect his kingdom from Prince Shah Jahan -- the Prince destined to become the next Mughal Emperor. In 1621, Shah Jahan's forces launched an attack on Daulatabad. Surprisingly, the Mughal forces were defeated and forced to retreat after suffering heavy losses at the hands of Malik 'Ambar.
However, while this victory over the Mughals was welcomed by Malik 'Ambar, it also brought the realization that he could not continue to resist without reinforcements. Seeking the support of the Deccani ruler, Ibrahim Adil Shah II, Malik 'Ambar had his daughter married to the Shah's favorite courtier. Additionally, his long and distinguished service in Golconda and Bijapur (along with their realization that Malik 'Ambar provided a buffer from the Mughals for them) brought support from those kingdoms. For a time, Malik 'Ambar was able to continue to resist the power of the Mughals.
Nevertheless, by the 1620s, Malik 'Ambar was having difficulty in maintaining the loyalty of his officers and forces. Almost continuous warfare for over a twenty year period of time had demoralized the army and drained the local economy. Although he was never defeated, Malik 'Ambar died a besieged man in 1626.
Malik 'Ambar was succeeded as regent minister of the kingdom of Ahmadnagar by his son Fettah Khan (Fatehkhan). But Fettah Khan was not Malik 'Ambar. He was deposed in 1629. Thus ended the short but glorious reign of the Africans in the Deccan.
During his time, Malik 'Ambar founded and inhabited Aurangabad on the site of the Kirkee (Khadke - "Big Rock") village in 1610. After his death in 1626, the name was changed to Fatehpur by his son Fatehkhan. When Aurangzeb, the Mughal Emperor invaded Deccan in the year 1653, he made Fatehpur his capital and renamed it Aurangabad.
'Ambar, Malik see Malik ‘Ambar
Shambu see Malik ‘Ambar
Malik Anbar see Malik ‘Ambar
Anbar, Malik see Malik ‘Ambar
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