Wafd
Wafd (Hizb al-Wafd) (Delegation Party). Name of a political party organized in Egypt by Sa‘d Zaghlul (1857-1927). In 1918, Zaghlul led a delegation (in Arabic, wafd) which demanded that the British protectorate in Egypt be abolished. After much unrest, the British created some form of independence for Egypt in 1922, and the Wafd organized itself as a political party in 1923, calling for internal autonomy, constitutional government, civil rights, and Egyptian control of both the Sudan and the Suez Canal. After Egypt gained complete independence in 1936, Wafd governments were in constant conflict with the monarchy. In 1952, the Revolutionary Command Council under Nasser put an end to both the monarchy and the Wafd. But it was revived in 1978.
Wafd was the Egyptian nationalist political party that was the leading political organization of the country between World War I and the Nasser revolution (1918-1952), and central in the work for establishing Egyptian independence. The full name of the organization would be translated as “Egyptian delegation.”
On November 13, 1918, Wafd was organized by Sa’ad Zaghlul in response to the end of World War I. A delegation led by Zaghlul to the British high commissioner in Cairo demands a voice at the peace conferences following the World War, but this was refused. From then on, three years of demonstrations and riots followed. Through these years there were talks between the British and Wafd.
In March of 1919, the leaders of Wafd, Zaghlul, Ismail Sidqi and Hamid al-Basil were exiled for a short period.
In September of 1923, following the partial independence of 1922, Wafd established itself as a political party.
In February of 1924, Wafd won ninety percent of the seats in the First Chamber and formed a government.
In 1927, Zaghlul died, and the Egyptian nationalist movement was divided, into Wafd, now led by Mustafa Nahas Pasha, and King Fu’ad.
In 1931, the king sacked premier minister Nahas Pasha, and suspended the constitution of 1923.
In April of 1936, elections returned Wafd to power, and a Regency Council ruled on behalf of Egypt’s new king, Faruk. In August of 1936, Egypt became an independent kingdom.
In 1937, Wafd formed the League of Wafdist Youth, which developed into a para-military organization, called the Blueshirts.
In February of 1938, King Faruk was 18, and tensions between him and Wafd reach the same level as under his father. He had prime minister Nahas Pasha dismissed.
In February of 1942, during World War II, when King Faruk exercised Italian sympathies, the British forced him to elect Nahas Pasha for the job as prime minister. The authority of this Wafd government gave them the power to start talks with other Arab states about closer ties. This eventually led to establishment of the Arab League in 1945.
In January of 1950, Wafd won the general election with an overwhelming majority.
In October of 1951, Wafd unilaterally abrogated the treaty with the British of 1936, which gave the British control over foreign interests and the safety of national minorities. They also demanded a British withdrawal from the Suez Canal, and Wafd members took part in guerrilla attacks on their installations.
In January of 1952, King Faruk dismissed the Wafd government, following riots in Cairo.
In 1953, Wafd was dissolved together with all other parties by the Revolution Command Council.
In February of 1978, Wafd was reconstituted as a consequence of the legalization of political parties. The new party was referred to as Neo-Wafd.
Wafd proved to be far more effective than other political groups to get popular support against British presence in Egypt, and exercised their power through demonstrations and riots in addition to participation in normal elections. The core of Wafd’s supporters were the professional elite and the bourgeoisie.
Wafd called for the internal autonomy, constitutional government, civil rights and Egyptian control over the Sudan and the Suez Canal. Wafd was an important political factor in all fields of the society, by controlling four daily and four weekly newspapers.
Wafd formed the government of Egypt from 1924, and these governments were in constant conflicts with the ruling kings of Egypt, even after Egypt gained its independence in 1936. The fall of Wafd in the 1950's came from strong discontent among normal Egyptians as well as military leaders, for their inconclusive dealing with the continued British presence in Egypt.
Easily the greatest factor contributing to popular disillusionment with the Wafd was the party's failure to boycott the Farouk government after it acceded to the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936. The policies followed by the party during the Anglo-Egyptian crisis of the mid-1930s alienated many Egyptian nationalists - heretofore the single most reliable support bloc for the Wafd - and severed the party between its small but powerful accommodationist minority and its large but voiceless resistant majority. The failure of the Wafd to more aggressively oppose the continuation of the British presence left Egyptian politics devoid of a popularly legitimized leader or party.
The leaders of the Wafd were:
* Saad Zaghlul Pasha 1919 to 1927
* Mustafa el-Nahhas Pasha 1927 to 1952
Hizb al-Wafd see Wafd
Delegation Party see Wafd
Wafd (Hizb al-Wafd) (Delegation Party). Name of a political party organized in Egypt by Sa‘d Zaghlul (1857-1927). In 1918, Zaghlul led a delegation (in Arabic, wafd) which demanded that the British protectorate in Egypt be abolished. After much unrest, the British created some form of independence for Egypt in 1922, and the Wafd organized itself as a political party in 1923, calling for internal autonomy, constitutional government, civil rights, and Egyptian control of both the Sudan and the Suez Canal. After Egypt gained complete independence in 1936, Wafd governments were in constant conflict with the monarchy. In 1952, the Revolutionary Command Council under Nasser put an end to both the monarchy and the Wafd. But it was revived in 1978.
Wafd was the Egyptian nationalist political party that was the leading political organization of the country between World War I and the Nasser revolution (1918-1952), and central in the work for establishing Egyptian independence. The full name of the organization would be translated as “Egyptian delegation.”
On November 13, 1918, Wafd was organized by Sa’ad Zaghlul in response to the end of World War I. A delegation led by Zaghlul to the British high commissioner in Cairo demands a voice at the peace conferences following the World War, but this was refused. From then on, three years of demonstrations and riots followed. Through these years there were talks between the British and Wafd.
In March of 1919, the leaders of Wafd, Zaghlul, Ismail Sidqi and Hamid al-Basil were exiled for a short period.
In September of 1923, following the partial independence of 1922, Wafd established itself as a political party.
In February of 1924, Wafd won ninety percent of the seats in the First Chamber and formed a government.
In 1927, Zaghlul died, and the Egyptian nationalist movement was divided, into Wafd, now led by Mustafa Nahas Pasha, and King Fu’ad.
In 1931, the king sacked premier minister Nahas Pasha, and suspended the constitution of 1923.
In April of 1936, elections returned Wafd to power, and a Regency Council ruled on behalf of Egypt’s new king, Faruk. In August of 1936, Egypt became an independent kingdom.
In 1937, Wafd formed the League of Wafdist Youth, which developed into a para-military organization, called the Blueshirts.
In February of 1938, King Faruk was 18, and tensions between him and Wafd reach the same level as under his father. He had prime minister Nahas Pasha dismissed.
In February of 1942, during World War II, when King Faruk exercised Italian sympathies, the British forced him to elect Nahas Pasha for the job as prime minister. The authority of this Wafd government gave them the power to start talks with other Arab states about closer ties. This eventually led to establishment of the Arab League in 1945.
In January of 1950, Wafd won the general election with an overwhelming majority.
In October of 1951, Wafd unilaterally abrogated the treaty with the British of 1936, which gave the British control over foreign interests and the safety of national minorities. They also demanded a British withdrawal from the Suez Canal, and Wafd members took part in guerrilla attacks on their installations.
In January of 1952, King Faruk dismissed the Wafd government, following riots in Cairo.
In 1953, Wafd was dissolved together with all other parties by the Revolution Command Council.
In February of 1978, Wafd was reconstituted as a consequence of the legalization of political parties. The new party was referred to as Neo-Wafd.
Wafd proved to be far more effective than other political groups to get popular support against British presence in Egypt, and exercised their power through demonstrations and riots in addition to participation in normal elections. The core of Wafd’s supporters were the professional elite and the bourgeoisie.
Wafd called for the internal autonomy, constitutional government, civil rights and Egyptian control over the Sudan and the Suez Canal. Wafd was an important political factor in all fields of the society, by controlling four daily and four weekly newspapers.
Wafd formed the government of Egypt from 1924, and these governments were in constant conflicts with the ruling kings of Egypt, even after Egypt gained its independence in 1936. The fall of Wafd in the 1950's came from strong discontent among normal Egyptians as well as military leaders, for their inconclusive dealing with the continued British presence in Egypt.
Easily the greatest factor contributing to popular disillusionment with the Wafd was the party's failure to boycott the Farouk government after it acceded to the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 1936. The policies followed by the party during the Anglo-Egyptian crisis of the mid-1930s alienated many Egyptian nationalists - heretofore the single most reliable support bloc for the Wafd - and severed the party between its small but powerful accommodationist minority and its large but voiceless resistant majority. The failure of the Wafd to more aggressively oppose the continuation of the British presence left Egyptian politics devoid of a popularly legitimized leader or party.
The leaders of the Wafd were:
* Saad Zaghlul Pasha 1919 to 1927
* Mustafa el-Nahhas Pasha 1927 to 1952
Hizb al-Wafd see Wafd
Delegation Party see Wafd
Wafrani
Wafrani (Abu ‘Abd Allah Muhammad al-Wafrani) (Muhammad al-Ifrani) (Mohammed al-Ifrani) (Muhammad al-Saghir ibn al-hajj Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ifrani al-Marakkushi) (El Ifrani) (1669/1670-1727/1747). Moroccan biographer and historian. He is best known as the author of the great chronicle of the Sa‘di Sharifs of Morocco, covering the period from 1511 to the end of the seventeenth century.
Little is known about the life of El Ifrani. He was born in Marrakesh in 1669/1670, studied there and in Fez, and may have held a post in the entourage of Mulay Ismael Alawi, sultan of Morocco (1645-1727), on whose reign he wrote a now lost chronicle. Later in life, he became imam and khatib of the Ben Youssef Medrassa (also known as al-Yusufiyya) in Marrakesh. Certain sultans like Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah (1757-1790), were very strict in what the content of the education should be and even gave out manuals with regulations and works to be treated, but the teachers did as they pleased and that is how El Ifrani in the beginning of the 17th century wrote a work on the life of Ibn Sahl of Sevilla, an Andalusian poet of the 12th century while pretending to be teaching law and the hadith.
A number of the works of El Ifrani have survived, the most important of which is his biographical dictionary of men of the eleventh century of the hijra: Safwat man intashar min Akhbar Sulaha Al Qarn Al Hadi Ashar, briefly called "Safwat man intashar". This work contains the biographies of saints who lived in 17th century Morocco. It is the classic biographical dictionary of that time. Also famous is his history of the Saadi Dynasty, Nuzhat al-hadi bi-akhbar muluk al-qarn al-hadi, written shortly before 1724. The work, among others, relates the conquest of the Songhai Empire by the Saadian sultans.
Abu ‘Abd Allah Muhammad al-Wafrani see Wafrani
Muhammad al-Ifrani see Wafrani
Mohammed al-Ifrani see Wafrani
Muhammad al-Saghir ibn al-hajj Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ifrani al-Marakkushi see Wafrani
El Ifrani see Wafrani
Wafrani (Abu ‘Abd Allah Muhammad al-Wafrani) (Muhammad al-Ifrani) (Mohammed al-Ifrani) (Muhammad al-Saghir ibn al-hajj Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ifrani al-Marakkushi) (El Ifrani) (1669/1670-1727/1747). Moroccan biographer and historian. He is best known as the author of the great chronicle of the Sa‘di Sharifs of Morocco, covering the period from 1511 to the end of the seventeenth century.
Little is known about the life of El Ifrani. He was born in Marrakesh in 1669/1670, studied there and in Fez, and may have held a post in the entourage of Mulay Ismael Alawi, sultan of Morocco (1645-1727), on whose reign he wrote a now lost chronicle. Later in life, he became imam and khatib of the Ben Youssef Medrassa (also known as al-Yusufiyya) in Marrakesh. Certain sultans like Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah (1757-1790), were very strict in what the content of the education should be and even gave out manuals with regulations and works to be treated, but the teachers did as they pleased and that is how El Ifrani in the beginning of the 17th century wrote a work on the life of Ibn Sahl of Sevilla, an Andalusian poet of the 12th century while pretending to be teaching law and the hadith.
A number of the works of El Ifrani have survived, the most important of which is his biographical dictionary of men of the eleventh century of the hijra: Safwat man intashar min Akhbar Sulaha Al Qarn Al Hadi Ashar, briefly called "Safwat man intashar". This work contains the biographies of saints who lived in 17th century Morocco. It is the classic biographical dictionary of that time. Also famous is his history of the Saadi Dynasty, Nuzhat al-hadi bi-akhbar muluk al-qarn al-hadi, written shortly before 1724. The work, among others, relates the conquest of the Songhai Empire by the Saadian sultans.
Abu ‘Abd Allah Muhammad al-Wafrani see Wafrani
Muhammad al-Ifrani see Wafrani
Mohammed al-Ifrani see Wafrani
Muhammad al-Saghir ibn al-hajj Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah al-Ifrani al-Marakkushi see Wafrani
El Ifrani see Wafrani
Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah (Abu ‘Abd Allah Wahb ibn Munabbih) (Wahb ibn Munabbih) (Abu 'Abd Allah al-Ṣana'ani al-Dhimari) (Wahb ibn Munabbih ibn Kamil ibn Sirajud-Din Dhee Kibaar Abu-Abdullah al-Yamani al-San'ani) (654-725/728/737). Story teller of Persian descent from Yemen. He is celebrated for his Book of the Military Campaigns, describing the Prophet’s campaigns. He was also an authority on the traditions of Jews and Christians.
Wahb ibn Munabbih was a Muslim traditionist of Dhimar (two days' journey from Sanaa) in Yemen. He is counted among the Tabi‘in and narrated Isra'iliyat.
On his father's side he was descended from Persian knights, while his mother was a Himyarite.
His father, whose name was Munabbih ibn Kamil, had been converted to Islam in the lifetime of the Prophet, although a single authority, the "Al-Tibr al-Masluk", states that Wahb himself had turned from Judaism to Islam. His other biographers, however, including Al-Nawawi and Ibn Challikan, do not note that he was a Jew either in race or in religion. The fact that he was well versed in Jewish traditions, on which he wrote much, probably gave rise to the statement that he was a Jew, although he might have acquired his knowledge from his teacher Ibn 'Abbas.
Among Wahb's many writings may be mentioned his "Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiya'" ("Story of the Prophets") and "Kitab al-Isra'iliyat" ("Book of the Israelites," "Ḥajji Khalfa," iv. 518, v. 40). The former, which is believed to be his earliest literary work, is, as its title indicates, a collection of narratives concerning Biblical personages, the accounts being drawn from Jewish folk-lore though presented in Islamic guise. Thus, like Ibn 'Abbas and Ka'b al-Aḥbar, he was an authority for many legends narrated by Al-Ṭabari, Mas'udi, and others. The "Kitab al-Isra'iliyat," or "Book of Jewish Matters," is lost, but was apparently a collection of Jewish stories, many of them incorporated by a Jewish compiler into the "Arabian Nights." In the latter collection there are indeed many stories that bear the Jewish stamp, and some of them, such as the "Angel of Death," are ascribed to Wahb by the author of "Al-Tibr al-Masluk." There are also other stories which are attributed to Wahb, and many more which, from their Jewish character, may be traced to him. His Jewish learning may be illustrated by his opinion of the Shekinah (Arabic, "Sakinah") as stated by different Arabic authors.
Abu 'Abd Allah Wahb ibn Munabbih see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Abu 'Abd Allah al-Ṣana'ani al-Dhimari see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih ibn Kamil ibn Sirajud-Din Dhee Kibaar Abu-Abdullah al-Yamani al-San'ani see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah (Abu ‘Abd Allah Wahb ibn Munabbih) (Wahb ibn Munabbih) (Abu 'Abd Allah al-Ṣana'ani al-Dhimari) (Wahb ibn Munabbih ibn Kamil ibn Sirajud-Din Dhee Kibaar Abu-Abdullah al-Yamani al-San'ani) (654-725/728/737). Story teller of Persian descent from Yemen. He is celebrated for his Book of the Military Campaigns, describing the Prophet’s campaigns. He was also an authority on the traditions of Jews and Christians.
Wahb ibn Munabbih was a Muslim traditionist of Dhimar (two days' journey from Sanaa) in Yemen. He is counted among the Tabi‘in and narrated Isra'iliyat.
On his father's side he was descended from Persian knights, while his mother was a Himyarite.
His father, whose name was Munabbih ibn Kamil, had been converted to Islam in the lifetime of the Prophet, although a single authority, the "Al-Tibr al-Masluk", states that Wahb himself had turned from Judaism to Islam. His other biographers, however, including Al-Nawawi and Ibn Challikan, do not note that he was a Jew either in race or in religion. The fact that he was well versed in Jewish traditions, on which he wrote much, probably gave rise to the statement that he was a Jew, although he might have acquired his knowledge from his teacher Ibn 'Abbas.
Among Wahb's many writings may be mentioned his "Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiya'" ("Story of the Prophets") and "Kitab al-Isra'iliyat" ("Book of the Israelites," "Ḥajji Khalfa," iv. 518, v. 40). The former, which is believed to be his earliest literary work, is, as its title indicates, a collection of narratives concerning Biblical personages, the accounts being drawn from Jewish folk-lore though presented in Islamic guise. Thus, like Ibn 'Abbas and Ka'b al-Aḥbar, he was an authority for many legends narrated by Al-Ṭabari, Mas'udi, and others. The "Kitab al-Isra'iliyat," or "Book of Jewish Matters," is lost, but was apparently a collection of Jewish stories, many of them incorporated by a Jewish compiler into the "Arabian Nights." In the latter collection there are indeed many stories that bear the Jewish stamp, and some of them, such as the "Angel of Death," are ascribed to Wahb by the author of "Al-Tibr al-Masluk." There are also other stories which are attributed to Wahb, and many more which, from their Jewish character, may be traced to him. His Jewish learning may be illustrated by his opinion of the Shekinah (Arabic, "Sakinah") as stated by different Arabic authors.
Abu 'Abd Allah Wahb ibn Munabbih see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Abu 'Abd Allah al-Ṣana'ani al-Dhimari see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahb ibn Munabbih ibn Kamil ibn Sirajud-Din Dhee Kibaar Abu-Abdullah al-Yamani al-San'ani see Wahb ibn Munabbih, Abu ‘Abd Allah
Wahhabi
Wahhabi (Wahhabiya) (Wahabi). Arabic term which refers to a member of a fundamentalist Muslim sect founded by Muhammed ibn Abd al-Wahhab (Muhammad ‘Abd al-Wahhab). The Wahhabi is now the dominant sect in Saudi Arabia. The term Wahhabi has been used in West Africa to refer to militant anti-Western and anti-brotherhood movements, but it has no official tie to the Saudi doctrine.
Wahhabiya (Wahhabism) is an Arabic term which refers to a fundamentalist movement that took its name from Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (1703-1792), an Islamic reformer from the 18th century of the Christian calendar, who was born in Arabia. Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was influenced by Ibn Hanbal and Ibn Taymiyya. Having provoked negative reactions among his entourage, ‘Abd al-Wahhab sought refuge with Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud, the ruler of ‘Anaza from 1735 to 1765. The Saudi family, after taking power in Arabia, made Wahhabism the official state doctrine. Wahhabism is a fundamentalism that rejects all innovations, especially the brotherhoods and the cult of saints.
Although, the name “Wahhabiya” was given to the movement by its opponents, the adherents of the movement have preferred to call themselves “Unitarians” (muwahhidun), because of their fervid emphasis on the divine unity and their corresponding diligence in uncovering and rooting out all attitudes and acts which could be regarded as idolatry.
Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was born near Riyadh of a branch of the Tamim tribe and received a sound Islamic education. He traveled widely in search of learning and became expert in Sufi doctrine as well as in the more orthodox Islamic sciences. Gradually his leanings became thoroughly Hanbalite. Though he was often at the center of controversy, Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab’s uncompromisingly strict religious views were accepted by the tribal chief Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud of nearby Dar‘iya. Religious authority was assumed by Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, political and military power by Ibn Sa‘ud. This venture determined the future of the movement, which has continued to the present day as a powerful religio-political combination in Arabia, where the Sa‘udi dynasty and Wahhabi fundamentalism dominate absolutely.
Dar‘iya soon became a theocratic state and the center of an increasingly vast territory. Ibn Sa‘ud’s able son, ‘Abd al-‘Aziz, continued military conquests, with Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab as religious guide. After the reformer’s death the fortunes of the Sa‘udi dynasty continued to advance. Its territorial dominion eventually included all of the Hejaz and Najd, and much of the rest of the Arabian Peninsula from the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf. The Wahhabis even went beyond Arabia in attacks on Damascus in Syria and Najaf in Iraq. Later there was a significant branch of the movement in India.
The nineteenth century brought forth reversals to the Sa‘udi dynasty, and Ottoman punitive expeditions, under Egyptian command, finally overthrew the fires Wahhabi empire in 1818. But early in the present century the Sa‘udis regained their old position under the great ‘Abd al-‘Aziz II, who was crowned king of Hejaz and Najd in 1930. His descendants continue to rule the modern kingdom of Saudia Arabia.
Wahhabi reforms were aimed at excising all beliefs and behavior not soundly rooted in the pristine period of Islam, roughly the first three centuries. Thus, the Qur’an, the Sunna, and the four orthodox Sunni law schools -- fiqh -- were regarded as the normative sources for faith and order. All else was viewed as bid‘a -- heresy. Two classical figures had an especially forceful influence on the formation of Wahhabi doctrine: Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the founder of the most conservative law school, and Ibn Taymiyya, the activist Hanbalite jurist, who wrote scathing denunciations of the veneration of saints.
The central issue around which the Wahhabi reforms revolved was the popular cult of saints. The building of mausoleums, especially of the mosque-tomb type, and visiting them for veneration and blessings were declared to be shirk. Early Wahhabis ruthlessly destroyed many shrines and stamped out all activities associated with them. They scrutinized all aspects of their fellow believers’ behavior, to judge it as deviant or pure. In this they were reminiscent of the Kharijites of early Islam. They were particularly hostile toward Sufism in all forms, although ironically they resembled a Sufi order in the way in which they organized into cooperatives for work and, when necessary, holy warfare.
Centering all in absolute devotion to the one, transcendent, sovereign God, the Wahhabis declared that it is shirk to seek intercession of any creature with God (except for with Muhammad on the Last Day), or to utter any other than God’s name in prayer. It is unbelief to deny divine predestination in all things, to interpret the Qur’an allegorically, or to claim knowledge of religion based on anything other than the Qur’an, the Sunna, or the consensus of the early orthodox legists. Further, the rosary was forbidden in the meditation on the Divine Names (although the fingers could be used to keep count, as the Prophet is reported to have done.) Mosques were to be utterly simple and functional, with neither minarets nor decorations. Even celebration of the Prophet’s birthday -- mawlid -- was forbidden.
While the Wahhabis were relentless and at times cruel in their punishment of heresy -- and by their standards a very wide range of otherwise innocuous and commonplace attitudes and activities could be construed as such -- at bottom they were animated by an intense moral fervor which sought in all things to purify the total environment for the proper service of God. Arabian Islam had sunk to a low level, and both private and public behavior in the sacred pilgrimage centers of Mecca and Medina was frequently corrupt and unrestrained. The Wahhabi movement as reform movement began to revitalize Arabian Islam.
The Wahhabi movement is significant also because it was a thoroughly indigenous, pre-modern reform within the bosom of Islam and not a reaction to Western ideas and incursions, as was the case with later movements across the Muslim world.
In spite of its fanatical puritanism and early excesses, Wahhabism did inspire later reformers in widely dispersed regions to overcome the stagnating effects of blind conformity to outmoded views and to make new efforts in applying the Qur’an and the Sunna to changing times. In a sense, Wahhabism can be characterized as an imposing Muslim expression of the “Protestant principle,” which is “guardian against the attempts of the finite and conditional to usurp the place of the unconditional in thinking and acting.”
In more contemporary times, it is the Wahhabi movement which the oil riches of Saudi Arabia has allowed it to export to other lands. Thus, Wahhabism has taken root in Sudan, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, the disciples of Wahhabism, the group known as the taliban, succeeding in taking control of the country and, for a while, imposing Wahhabism throughout the land.
Wahhabi doctrine was introduced into India by Sayyid Ahmad Brelwi (1786-1831). He established a permanent center in Patna, marched against the Sikh cities of the Punjab and took Peshawar in 1830. His adherents started an insurrection in Lower Bengal. In 1870, the older Muslim communities of India, both Shi‘a and Sunni, dissociated themselves from the Wahhabi doctrine of Holy War.
The term wahhabism is not used by Wahhibis themselves. The term they use is muwahhidun. Wahhabism is a term given to them by their opponents, and is now used by both European scholars and most Arabs. The name wahhabims comes from their founder Abdul Wahhab. The term muwahhidun is Arabic, and means unitarians.
The muwahiduns started in 1912 to establish agricultural colonies, where people from different tribes lived together. The inhabitants of these colonies were known as “brothers” (Arabic, ikhwan). Each colony could house from 1,000 to 10,000 inhabitants.
The colonies were established near water sources, and were defended by arms. Mud huts were built in place of traditional tents.
The Prohibitions of Wahhabism are:
1. No other object for worship but God.
2. Holy men or women must not be used to win favors from God.
3. No other name than the names of Allah may enter a prayer.
4. No smoking of tobacco.
5. No shaving of beard.
6. No abusive language.
7. Rosaries are forbidden.
8. Mosques must be built without minarets and all forms of ornaments.
The Commandments of Wahhabism are:
1. All men must attend public prayer, salat.
2. Alms, zakat, must be paid from all income.
3. Butchers slaughtering animals according to halal must have their life styles scrutinized. It is not sufficient that they perform the basic rituals correctly.
The political fortunes of the Wahhābī were immediately allied to those of the Saʿūdī dynasty. By the end of the 18th century, they had brought all of Najd under their control, attacked Karbalāʾ, Iraq, a holy city of the Shīʿite branch of Islām, and occupied Mecca and Medina in western Arabia. The Ottoman sultan brought an end to the first Wahhābī empire in 1818, but the sect revived under the leadership of the Saʿūdī Fayṣal I. The empire was then somewhat restored until once again destroyed at the end of the 19th century by the Rashīdīyah of northern Arabia. The activities of Ibn Saʿūd in the 20th century eventually led to the creation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932 and assured the Wahhābī religious and political dominance on the Arabian Peninsula.
Members of the Wahhābī call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn, “Unitarians,” a name derived from their emphasis on the absolute oneness of God (tawhid). They deny all acts implying polytheism, such as visiting tombs and venerating saints, and advocate a return to the original teachings of Islām as incorporated in the Qurʾān and Ḥadīth (traditions of Muḥammad), with condemnation of all innovations (bidʿah). Wahhābī theology and jurisprudence, based, respectively, on the teachings of Ibn Taymīyah and on the legal school of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, stress literal belief in the Qurʿān and Ḥadīth and the establishment of a Muslim state based only on Islāmic law.
Wahhabiya see Wahhabi
Wahabi see Wahhabi
Wahhabi (Wahhabiya) (Wahabi). Arabic term which refers to a member of a fundamentalist Muslim sect founded by Muhammed ibn Abd al-Wahhab (Muhammad ‘Abd al-Wahhab). The Wahhabi is now the dominant sect in Saudi Arabia. The term Wahhabi has been used in West Africa to refer to militant anti-Western and anti-brotherhood movements, but it has no official tie to the Saudi doctrine.
Wahhabiya (Wahhabism) is an Arabic term which refers to a fundamentalist movement that took its name from Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (1703-1792), an Islamic reformer from the 18th century of the Christian calendar, who was born in Arabia. Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was influenced by Ibn Hanbal and Ibn Taymiyya. Having provoked negative reactions among his entourage, ‘Abd al-Wahhab sought refuge with Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud, the ruler of ‘Anaza from 1735 to 1765. The Saudi family, after taking power in Arabia, made Wahhabism the official state doctrine. Wahhabism is a fundamentalism that rejects all innovations, especially the brotherhoods and the cult of saints.
Although, the name “Wahhabiya” was given to the movement by its opponents, the adherents of the movement have preferred to call themselves “Unitarians” (muwahhidun), because of their fervid emphasis on the divine unity and their corresponding diligence in uncovering and rooting out all attitudes and acts which could be regarded as idolatry.
Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was born near Riyadh of a branch of the Tamim tribe and received a sound Islamic education. He traveled widely in search of learning and became expert in Sufi doctrine as well as in the more orthodox Islamic sciences. Gradually his leanings became thoroughly Hanbalite. Though he was often at the center of controversy, Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab’s uncompromisingly strict religious views were accepted by the tribal chief Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud of nearby Dar‘iya. Religious authority was assumed by Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, political and military power by Ibn Sa‘ud. This venture determined the future of the movement, which has continued to the present day as a powerful religio-political combination in Arabia, where the Sa‘udi dynasty and Wahhabi fundamentalism dominate absolutely.
Dar‘iya soon became a theocratic state and the center of an increasingly vast territory. Ibn Sa‘ud’s able son, ‘Abd al-‘Aziz, continued military conquests, with Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab as religious guide. After the reformer’s death the fortunes of the Sa‘udi dynasty continued to advance. Its territorial dominion eventually included all of the Hejaz and Najd, and much of the rest of the Arabian Peninsula from the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf. The Wahhabis even went beyond Arabia in attacks on Damascus in Syria and Najaf in Iraq. Later there was a significant branch of the movement in India.
The nineteenth century brought forth reversals to the Sa‘udi dynasty, and Ottoman punitive expeditions, under Egyptian command, finally overthrew the fires Wahhabi empire in 1818. But early in the present century the Sa‘udis regained their old position under the great ‘Abd al-‘Aziz II, who was crowned king of Hejaz and Najd in 1930. His descendants continue to rule the modern kingdom of Saudia Arabia.
Wahhabi reforms were aimed at excising all beliefs and behavior not soundly rooted in the pristine period of Islam, roughly the first three centuries. Thus, the Qur’an, the Sunna, and the four orthodox Sunni law schools -- fiqh -- were regarded as the normative sources for faith and order. All else was viewed as bid‘a -- heresy. Two classical figures had an especially forceful influence on the formation of Wahhabi doctrine: Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the founder of the most conservative law school, and Ibn Taymiyya, the activist Hanbalite jurist, who wrote scathing denunciations of the veneration of saints.
The central issue around which the Wahhabi reforms revolved was the popular cult of saints. The building of mausoleums, especially of the mosque-tomb type, and visiting them for veneration and blessings were declared to be shirk. Early Wahhabis ruthlessly destroyed many shrines and stamped out all activities associated with them. They scrutinized all aspects of their fellow believers’ behavior, to judge it as deviant or pure. In this they were reminiscent of the Kharijites of early Islam. They were particularly hostile toward Sufism in all forms, although ironically they resembled a Sufi order in the way in which they organized into cooperatives for work and, when necessary, holy warfare.
Centering all in absolute devotion to the one, transcendent, sovereign God, the Wahhabis declared that it is shirk to seek intercession of any creature with God (except for with Muhammad on the Last Day), or to utter any other than God’s name in prayer. It is unbelief to deny divine predestination in all things, to interpret the Qur’an allegorically, or to claim knowledge of religion based on anything other than the Qur’an, the Sunna, or the consensus of the early orthodox legists. Further, the rosary was forbidden in the meditation on the Divine Names (although the fingers could be used to keep count, as the Prophet is reported to have done.) Mosques were to be utterly simple and functional, with neither minarets nor decorations. Even celebration of the Prophet’s birthday -- mawlid -- was forbidden.
While the Wahhabis were relentless and at times cruel in their punishment of heresy -- and by their standards a very wide range of otherwise innocuous and commonplace attitudes and activities could be construed as such -- at bottom they were animated by an intense moral fervor which sought in all things to purify the total environment for the proper service of God. Arabian Islam had sunk to a low level, and both private and public behavior in the sacred pilgrimage centers of Mecca and Medina was frequently corrupt and unrestrained. The Wahhabi movement as reform movement began to revitalize Arabian Islam.
The Wahhabi movement is significant also because it was a thoroughly indigenous, pre-modern reform within the bosom of Islam and not a reaction to Western ideas and incursions, as was the case with later movements across the Muslim world.
In spite of its fanatical puritanism and early excesses, Wahhabism did inspire later reformers in widely dispersed regions to overcome the stagnating effects of blind conformity to outmoded views and to make new efforts in applying the Qur’an and the Sunna to changing times. In a sense, Wahhabism can be characterized as an imposing Muslim expression of the “Protestant principle,” which is “guardian against the attempts of the finite and conditional to usurp the place of the unconditional in thinking and acting.”
In more contemporary times, it is the Wahhabi movement which the oil riches of Saudi Arabia has allowed it to export to other lands. Thus, Wahhabism has taken root in Sudan, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, the disciples of Wahhabism, the group known as the taliban, succeeding in taking control of the country and, for a while, imposing Wahhabism throughout the land.
Wahhabi doctrine was introduced into India by Sayyid Ahmad Brelwi (1786-1831). He established a permanent center in Patna, marched against the Sikh cities of the Punjab and took Peshawar in 1830. His adherents started an insurrection in Lower Bengal. In 1870, the older Muslim communities of India, both Shi‘a and Sunni, dissociated themselves from the Wahhabi doctrine of Holy War.
The term wahhabism is not used by Wahhibis themselves. The term they use is muwahhidun. Wahhabism is a term given to them by their opponents, and is now used by both European scholars and most Arabs. The name wahhabims comes from their founder Abdul Wahhab. The term muwahhidun is Arabic, and means unitarians.
The muwahiduns started in 1912 to establish agricultural colonies, where people from different tribes lived together. The inhabitants of these colonies were known as “brothers” (Arabic, ikhwan). Each colony could house from 1,000 to 10,000 inhabitants.
The colonies were established near water sources, and were defended by arms. Mud huts were built in place of traditional tents.
The Prohibitions of Wahhabism are:
1. No other object for worship but God.
2. Holy men or women must not be used to win favors from God.
3. No other name than the names of Allah may enter a prayer.
4. No smoking of tobacco.
5. No shaving of beard.
6. No abusive language.
7. Rosaries are forbidden.
8. Mosques must be built without minarets and all forms of ornaments.
The Commandments of Wahhabism are:
1. All men must attend public prayer, salat.
2. Alms, zakat, must be paid from all income.
3. Butchers slaughtering animals according to halal must have their life styles scrutinized. It is not sufficient that they perform the basic rituals correctly.
The political fortunes of the Wahhābī were immediately allied to those of the Saʿūdī dynasty. By the end of the 18th century, they had brought all of Najd under their control, attacked Karbalāʾ, Iraq, a holy city of the Shīʿite branch of Islām, and occupied Mecca and Medina in western Arabia. The Ottoman sultan brought an end to the first Wahhābī empire in 1818, but the sect revived under the leadership of the Saʿūdī Fayṣal I. The empire was then somewhat restored until once again destroyed at the end of the 19th century by the Rashīdīyah of northern Arabia. The activities of Ibn Saʿūd in the 20th century eventually led to the creation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932 and assured the Wahhābī religious and political dominance on the Arabian Peninsula.
Members of the Wahhābī call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn, “Unitarians,” a name derived from their emphasis on the absolute oneness of God (tawhid). They deny all acts implying polytheism, such as visiting tombs and venerating saints, and advocate a return to the original teachings of Islām as incorporated in the Qurʾān and Ḥadīth (traditions of Muḥammad), with condemnation of all innovations (bidʿah). Wahhābī theology and jurisprudence, based, respectively, on the teachings of Ibn Taymīyah and on the legal school of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, stress literal belief in the Qurʿān and Ḥadīth and the establishment of a Muslim state based only on Islāmic law.
Wahhabiya see Wahhabi
Wahabi see Wahhabi
Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al- (Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab) (Abdul Wahhab) (b. 1703, ʿUyaynah, Arabia [now in Saudi Arabia] - d. 1792, Ad-Dirʿīyah). Born near Riyadh (in Uyayna) of a branch of the Tamim tribe and received a sound Islamic education. He studied in Medina with teachers of the Hanbali school, as defined by Ibn Taymiyya. He traveled widely in search of learning and became expert in Sufi doctrine as well as in the more orthodox Islamic sciences. He lived 4 years in Basra, 5 years in Baghdad, 1 year in Kurdish areas, 2 years in Hamadhan, and 1 year in Esfahan around the mid-1730s. Here he studied philosophy and Sufism before continuing to Qom. After Qom, ‘Abd al-Wahhab returned to Uyayna, and started to preach his message.
Gradually his leanings became thoroughly Hanbalite. ‘Abd al-Wahhab wrote the Book of Unity (Kitab al-Tawhid). This book met with more opposition than interest, and after some time there, he was forced to flee to the medium sized town of Dar‘iya, whose chieftain Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud, gave him protection. Though he was often at the center of controversy, Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab’s uncompromisingly strict religious views were accepted by the tribal chief Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud of nearby Dar‘iya. According to sources that were very close to the court of Ibn Sa‘ud, the two made an arrangement, where ‘Abd al-Wahhab would be religious leader, leaving the secular power in the hands of Ibn Sa‘ud. Thus, religious authority was assumed by Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, political and military power by Ibn Sa‘ud. This venture determined the future of the movement, which has continued to the present day as a powerful religio-political combination in Arabia, where the Sa‘udi dynasty and Wahhabi fundamentalism dominate absolutely.
In 1765, Ibn Sa‘ud died, but his successor, Abdul Aziz, also chose ‘Abd al-Wahhab as a religious guide. In 1766, the doctrines of ‘Abd al-Wahhab won recognition among the scholars of Mecca.
As the area under the power of Abdul Aziz increased, the number of doctrines from ‘Abd al-Wahhab also increased.
‘Abd al-Wahhab died a natural death at the age of 89.
Having completed his formal education in the holy city of Medina, in Arabia, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb lived abroad for many years. He taught for four years in Basra, Iraq, and in Baghdad he married an affluent woman whose property he inherited when she died. In 1736, in Iran, he began to teach against what he considered to be the extreme ideas of various exponents of Sufi doctrines. On returning to his native city, he wrote the Kitāb at-tawḥīd (“Book of Unity”), which is the main text for Wahhābī doctrines. His followers call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn, or “Unitarians”. The term Wahhābī is generally used by non-Muslims and opponents.
ʿAbd al-Wahhāb’s teachings have been characterized as puritanical and traditional, representing the early era of the Islamic religion. He made a clear stand against all innovations (bidʿah) in Islamic faith because he believed them to be reprehensible, insisting that the original grandeur of Islam could be regained if the Islamic community would return to the principles enunciated by the Prophet Muhammad. Wahhābī doctrines, therefore, do not allow for an intermediary between the faithful and Allah and condemn any such practice as polytheism. The decoration of mosques, the cult of saints, and even the smoking of tobacco were condemned.
When the preaching of these doctrines led to controversy, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb was expelled from ʿUyaynah in 1744. He then settled in Ad-Dirʿīyah, capital of Ibn Saʿūd, a ruler of the Najd (now in Saudi Arabia).
The spread of Wahhābīsm originated from the alliance that was formed between ʿAbd al-Wahhāb and Ibn Saʿūd, who, by initiating a campaign of conquest that was continued by his heirs, made Wahhābīsm the dominant force in Arabia since 1800.
Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Abdul Wahhab see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Wahhab, Abdul see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al- (Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab) (Abdul Wahhab) (b. 1703, ʿUyaynah, Arabia [now in Saudi Arabia] - d. 1792, Ad-Dirʿīyah). Born near Riyadh (in Uyayna) of a branch of the Tamim tribe and received a sound Islamic education. He studied in Medina with teachers of the Hanbali school, as defined by Ibn Taymiyya. He traveled widely in search of learning and became expert in Sufi doctrine as well as in the more orthodox Islamic sciences. He lived 4 years in Basra, 5 years in Baghdad, 1 year in Kurdish areas, 2 years in Hamadhan, and 1 year in Esfahan around the mid-1730s. Here he studied philosophy and Sufism before continuing to Qom. After Qom, ‘Abd al-Wahhab returned to Uyayna, and started to preach his message.
Gradually his leanings became thoroughly Hanbalite. ‘Abd al-Wahhab wrote the Book of Unity (Kitab al-Tawhid). This book met with more opposition than interest, and after some time there, he was forced to flee to the medium sized town of Dar‘iya, whose chieftain Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud, gave him protection. Though he was often at the center of controversy, Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab’s uncompromisingly strict religious views were accepted by the tribal chief Muhammad ibn Sa‘ud of nearby Dar‘iya. According to sources that were very close to the court of Ibn Sa‘ud, the two made an arrangement, where ‘Abd al-Wahhab would be religious leader, leaving the secular power in the hands of Ibn Sa‘ud. Thus, religious authority was assumed by Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, political and military power by Ibn Sa‘ud. This venture determined the future of the movement, which has continued to the present day as a powerful religio-political combination in Arabia, where the Sa‘udi dynasty and Wahhabi fundamentalism dominate absolutely.
In 1765, Ibn Sa‘ud died, but his successor, Abdul Aziz, also chose ‘Abd al-Wahhab as a religious guide. In 1766, the doctrines of ‘Abd al-Wahhab won recognition among the scholars of Mecca.
As the area under the power of Abdul Aziz increased, the number of doctrines from ‘Abd al-Wahhab also increased.
‘Abd al-Wahhab died a natural death at the age of 89.
Having completed his formal education in the holy city of Medina, in Arabia, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb lived abroad for many years. He taught for four years in Basra, Iraq, and in Baghdad he married an affluent woman whose property he inherited when she died. In 1736, in Iran, he began to teach against what he considered to be the extreme ideas of various exponents of Sufi doctrines. On returning to his native city, he wrote the Kitāb at-tawḥīd (“Book of Unity”), which is the main text for Wahhābī doctrines. His followers call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn, or “Unitarians”. The term Wahhābī is generally used by non-Muslims and opponents.
ʿAbd al-Wahhāb’s teachings have been characterized as puritanical and traditional, representing the early era of the Islamic religion. He made a clear stand against all innovations (bidʿah) in Islamic faith because he believed them to be reprehensible, insisting that the original grandeur of Islam could be regained if the Islamic community would return to the principles enunciated by the Prophet Muhammad. Wahhābī doctrines, therefore, do not allow for an intermediary between the faithful and Allah and condemn any such practice as polytheism. The decoration of mosques, the cult of saints, and even the smoking of tobacco were condemned.
When the preaching of these doctrines led to controversy, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb was expelled from ʿUyaynah in 1744. He then settled in Ad-Dirʿīyah, capital of Ibn Saʿūd, a ruler of the Najd (now in Saudi Arabia).
The spread of Wahhābīsm originated from the alliance that was formed between ʿAbd al-Wahhāb and Ibn Saʿūd, who, by initiating a campaign of conquest that was continued by his heirs, made Wahhābīsm the dominant force in Arabia since 1800.
Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Abdul Wahhab see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Wahhab, Abdul see Wahhab, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-
Wahid, Abdurrahman
Wahid, Abdurrahman (Abdurrahman Wahid) (Abdurrahman Addakhil) (Gus Dur) (b. September 7, 1940, Denanyar, East Java, Dutch East Indies [now Indonesia] - d. December 30, 2009, Jakarta, Indonesia). Member of the National Awakening Party (PKB) who was elected president of Indonesia on October 20, 1999, by an electoral assembly that voters had chosen in June. The election marked the end of political dominance by the Golkar Party, which supported the dictatorship of former President Suharto for 32 years. In May 1998, Suharto had resigned and installed B. J. Habibie as president.
Wahid offered the vice presidency to rival presidential candidate Megawati Sukarnoputri of the Indonesian Democracy Party-Struggle. Wahid’s health appeared frail in 1999 after allegedly suffering two strokes and many observers speculated that he might not complete his five-year term. Wahid’s government faced formidable challenges, including a severe recession and conflicts between pro-independence groups and pro-Indonesia militias in the province of East Timor.
Indonesians call Wahid “Gus Dur,” combining a Muslim title of respect with an abbreviation of his first name. Wahid was born in the Indonesian province of East Java. He studied at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, and earned a degree in 1970 from the University of Baghdad in Iraq. As the leader of Indonesia’s largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama Muslims, Wahid advocated an inclusive, tolerant form of Islam.
Wahid’s grandfathers were among the founders of the world’s largest Islamic organization, the 25-million-member Nahdatul Ulama (NU). Wahid studied the Qurʾān intensively at an East Javan pesantren (religious boarding school) founded by his paternal grandfather, Hasyim Asyʾari, and at institutes in Jakarta when his father was Indonesia’s first cabinet minister for religion. In 1965 Wahid earned a scholarship to study at the prestigious Al-Azhar University in Cairo, but he bristled against the traditionalism of its faculty, and, instead of studying more scripture, he devoured New Wave movies, read French and English books, and studied Marxism. Leaving without taking a degree, he moved to Baghdad, where he soon began attracting attention with his religious writings.
After returning to Indonesia in the late 1960s, Wahid became a scholar. He was elevated to the post of general chairman of the NU in 1984. The organization then severed its ties to a Muslim-based political party and concentrated on social work and education. The managers of 6,500 pesantren nationwide—the backbone of the NU’s support—opposed any anti-government moves. Wahid was nonetheless widely perceived to present a threat to political authority for his promotion of a vision for the NU that would, in his words, “move toward the transformation of society, socially and culturally.”
As NU chief, Wahid was one of the most respected figures in Indonesian Islam and the most politically active. He headed the political discussion group Forum Demokrasi, which welcomed dissidents and human rights advocates. Wahid spoke frankly on national issues to ministers, diplomats, journalists, and others who consulted him. Deviating from the positions held by the leaders of many Muslim countries, he suggested normalizing ties with Israel and contended that the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina was not religious. Many admired his defense of Indonesia’s Christian minority. Even the powerful military was keen to maintain good ties to a perceived bulwark against radical Islam. Honored in 1993 with the Magsaysay Award, Wahid was elected the following year to lead the World Council for Religion and Peace.
In 1990 Wahid declined to join the new Association of Muslim Intellectuals, accusing its chairman, B.J. Habibie, protégé of President Suharto and the country’s research and technology minister, of using Islam to gain power. Critics and even relatives conceded, however, that Wahid could not separate his own political stance from NU’s needs. In 1994 Suharto loyalists within the NU tried in vain to end Wahid’s chairmanship. In the wake of the Asian economic crisis (1997–98) that forced the resignations of Suharto and his successor Habibie, Wahid was elected president in 1999. He was the first candidate to win the presidency through a vote by the People’s Consultative Assembly (Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat; MPR), as opposed to the earlier, consensus-seeking process. Economic and political instability, coupled with a corruption crisis in which Wahid himself was implicated, led to his impeachment and removal from office in 2001. After leaving office, Wahid encouraged interfaith dialogue for the promotion of world peace.
Abdurrahman Wahid see Wahid, Abdurrahman
Gus Dur see Wahid, Abdurrahman
Abdurrahman Addakhil see Wahid, Abdurrahman
Wahid, Abdurrahman (Abdurrahman Wahid) (Abdurrahman Addakhil) (Gus Dur) (b. September 7, 1940, Denanyar, East Java, Dutch East Indies [now Indonesia] - d. December 30, 2009, Jakarta, Indonesia). Member of the National Awakening Party (PKB) who was elected president of Indonesia on October 20, 1999, by an electoral assembly that voters had chosen in June. The election marked the end of political dominance by the Golkar Party, which supported the dictatorship of former President Suharto for 32 years. In May 1998, Suharto had resigned and installed B. J. Habibie as president.
Wahid offered the vice presidency to rival presidential candidate Megawati Sukarnoputri of the Indonesian Democracy Party-Struggle. Wahid’s health appeared frail in 1999 after allegedly suffering two strokes and many observers speculated that he might not complete his five-year term. Wahid’s government faced formidable challenges, including a severe recession and conflicts between pro-independence groups and pro-Indonesia militias in the province of East Timor.
Indonesians call Wahid “Gus Dur,” combining a Muslim title of respect with an abbreviation of his first name. Wahid was born in the Indonesian province of East Java. He studied at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, and earned a degree in 1970 from the University of Baghdad in Iraq. As the leader of Indonesia’s largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama Muslims, Wahid advocated an inclusive, tolerant form of Islam.
Wahid’s grandfathers were among the founders of the world’s largest Islamic organization, the 25-million-member Nahdatul Ulama (NU). Wahid studied the Qurʾān intensively at an East Javan pesantren (religious boarding school) founded by his paternal grandfather, Hasyim Asyʾari, and at institutes in Jakarta when his father was Indonesia’s first cabinet minister for religion. In 1965 Wahid earned a scholarship to study at the prestigious Al-Azhar University in Cairo, but he bristled against the traditionalism of its faculty, and, instead of studying more scripture, he devoured New Wave movies, read French and English books, and studied Marxism. Leaving without taking a degree, he moved to Baghdad, where he soon began attracting attention with his religious writings.
After returning to Indonesia in the late 1960s, Wahid became a scholar. He was elevated to the post of general chairman of the NU in 1984. The organization then severed its ties to a Muslim-based political party and concentrated on social work and education. The managers of 6,500 pesantren nationwide—the backbone of the NU’s support—opposed any anti-government moves. Wahid was nonetheless widely perceived to present a threat to political authority for his promotion of a vision for the NU that would, in his words, “move toward the transformation of society, socially and culturally.”
As NU chief, Wahid was one of the most respected figures in Indonesian Islam and the most politically active. He headed the political discussion group Forum Demokrasi, which welcomed dissidents and human rights advocates. Wahid spoke frankly on national issues to ministers, diplomats, journalists, and others who consulted him. Deviating from the positions held by the leaders of many Muslim countries, he suggested normalizing ties with Israel and contended that the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina was not religious. Many admired his defense of Indonesia’s Christian minority. Even the powerful military was keen to maintain good ties to a perceived bulwark against radical Islam. Honored in 1993 with the Magsaysay Award, Wahid was elected the following year to lead the World Council for Religion and Peace.
In 1990 Wahid declined to join the new Association of Muslim Intellectuals, accusing its chairman, B.J. Habibie, protégé of President Suharto and the country’s research and technology minister, of using Islam to gain power. Critics and even relatives conceded, however, that Wahid could not separate his own political stance from NU’s needs. In 1994 Suharto loyalists within the NU tried in vain to end Wahid’s chairmanship. In the wake of the Asian economic crisis (1997–98) that forced the resignations of Suharto and his successor Habibie, Wahid was elected president in 1999. He was the first candidate to win the presidency through a vote by the People’s Consultative Assembly (Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat; MPR), as opposed to the earlier, consensus-seeking process. Economic and political instability, coupled with a corruption crisis in which Wahid himself was implicated, led to his impeachment and removal from office in 2001. After leaving office, Wahid encouraged interfaith dialogue for the promotion of world peace.
Abdurrahman Wahid see Wahid, Abdurrahman
Gus Dur see Wahid, Abdurrahman
Abdurrahman Addakhil see Wahid, Abdurrahman
wali
wali (waliy). Term which means “protector,” “benefactor,” “companion,” or “governor.” A wali is a friend of God -- a saint or a Sufi whose tomb is visited for its blessing. A wali is also a legal guardian of a minor, woman, or incapacitated person.
For the Arabs, the word wali is synonymous with “saint.” The companion word wilayat means “sainthood.” How the terms wali and wilayat first came to be applied to Sufis is not known, but from an early date it was explained that the Qur’anic verse: “{God} loves them and they love {God}” {see Sura 5:59} meant that God is their friend, and they are God’s friends. The Qur’an also contains repeated reference to “the friends of God” -- the awliya’ Allahi.
Saints are thought to constitute an invisible hierarchy, with a discrete cosmological ranking. In all there are perhaps forty thousand “friends of God,” including three hundred chosen (akhyar), forty deputies (abdal), seven pious (abrar), four pillars (awtad), three substitutes (nuqaba’), and one pole or nourisher (qutb, ghawth). The numbers in some categories vary, but the importance of this cosmological scheme for Sufi devotion cannot be overstated. The qutb saint, in particular, is posited as the axis around which the entire universe revolves. He is “the perfect man” (al-insan al-kamil), for the sake of whose perfection all the elements of nature, and even all other humans, have been brought into existence. Muhammad was the perfect man in his time, but since the world would cease to function without a qutb saint, others have come after Muhammad, though they lacked his prophetic mandate.
Sainthood and prophethood, therefore, overlapped as authoritative categories for mystically minded Muslims. The differentiation was as essential as it was problematic. On the one hand, the qutb saint was differentiated from the hidden imam of the Shi‘ites (though they shared a common theological mold as salvific mediators); at the same time, he was distinguished from the Prophet Muhammad -- usually on a temporal basis, implying that the qutb was doing the work of the Prophet in his generation. For some Sufi theorists, moreover, the distance of sainthood from prophethood was as slight as a single vowel: walayat meaning “lordship” was reserved for prophets, while wilayat or “friendship” was reserved for saints.
Wilayat also had a practical connotation. It defined the geographical area within which a particular saint was recognized as the preeminent spiritual leader for his generation. In populous urban centers or remote regions of Asia where more than one Sufi order had been introduced, conflicting wilayat claims were inevitable, but they were less frequent and less intense than might be expected. The Wahhabiya movement has been uncompromisingly opposed to the veneration of saints and has destroyed many shrines where the saints were venerated.
Walī (Arabic, plural Awliyā') is an Arabic word meaning "friend", "client", "kinsman", "patron". It generally denotes "friend of God" in the phrase walīyu 'llāh. In English, wali most often means a Muslim saint or holy person. It should not be confused with the word Wāli which is an administrative title that was used in the Muslim Caliphate, and still today in some Muslim countries, such as the Wali of Swat.
waliy see wali
wali (waliy). Term which means “protector,” “benefactor,” “companion,” or “governor.” A wali is a friend of God -- a saint or a Sufi whose tomb is visited for its blessing. A wali is also a legal guardian of a minor, woman, or incapacitated person.
For the Arabs, the word wali is synonymous with “saint.” The companion word wilayat means “sainthood.” How the terms wali and wilayat first came to be applied to Sufis is not known, but from an early date it was explained that the Qur’anic verse: “{God} loves them and they love {God}” {see Sura 5:59} meant that God is their friend, and they are God’s friends. The Qur’an also contains repeated reference to “the friends of God” -- the awliya’ Allahi.
Saints are thought to constitute an invisible hierarchy, with a discrete cosmological ranking. In all there are perhaps forty thousand “friends of God,” including three hundred chosen (akhyar), forty deputies (abdal), seven pious (abrar), four pillars (awtad), three substitutes (nuqaba’), and one pole or nourisher (qutb, ghawth). The numbers in some categories vary, but the importance of this cosmological scheme for Sufi devotion cannot be overstated. The qutb saint, in particular, is posited as the axis around which the entire universe revolves. He is “the perfect man” (al-insan al-kamil), for the sake of whose perfection all the elements of nature, and even all other humans, have been brought into existence. Muhammad was the perfect man in his time, but since the world would cease to function without a qutb saint, others have come after Muhammad, though they lacked his prophetic mandate.
Sainthood and prophethood, therefore, overlapped as authoritative categories for mystically minded Muslims. The differentiation was as essential as it was problematic. On the one hand, the qutb saint was differentiated from the hidden imam of the Shi‘ites (though they shared a common theological mold as salvific mediators); at the same time, he was distinguished from the Prophet Muhammad -- usually on a temporal basis, implying that the qutb was doing the work of the Prophet in his generation. For some Sufi theorists, moreover, the distance of sainthood from prophethood was as slight as a single vowel: walayat meaning “lordship” was reserved for prophets, while wilayat or “friendship” was reserved for saints.
Wilayat also had a practical connotation. It defined the geographical area within which a particular saint was recognized as the preeminent spiritual leader for his generation. In populous urban centers or remote regions of Asia where more than one Sufi order had been introduced, conflicting wilayat claims were inevitable, but they were less frequent and less intense than might be expected. The Wahhabiya movement has been uncompromisingly opposed to the veneration of saints and has destroyed many shrines where the saints were venerated.
Walī (Arabic, plural Awliyā') is an Arabic word meaning "friend", "client", "kinsman", "patron". It generally denotes "friend of God" in the phrase walīyu 'llāh. In English, wali most often means a Muslim saint or holy person. It should not be confused with the word Wāli which is an administrative title that was used in the Muslim Caliphate, and still today in some Muslim countries, such as the Wali of Swat.
waliy see wali
Walid I
Walid I (al-Walid I ibn ‘Abd al-Malik) (Al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik) (Al-Walid I) (Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān) (668 - 715, Damascus [now in Syria]). Umayyad caliph (r.705-715). He was the great builder of the Umayyad dynasty. In 706, he began the reconstruction of the basilica of St. John the Baptist at Damascus into a magnificent mosque. He also built the Great Mosques at Mecca and Medina. Other striking features of his reign were the arabization of the administration and the progress of conquests. During his reign, the Arab empire attained its greatest extent from Transoxiana to Spain.
Al-Walīd, the eldest son of the caliph ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān, was fervently orthodox in his religious views. He had a great interest in architecture. As caliph, he confiscated the Christian Basilica of St. John the Baptist in Damascus and had the Great Mosque (Umayyad Mosque) erected on the site. He also had mosques built at Medina and Jerusalem. During al-Walīd’s reign, areas in Central Asia, in coastal northern Africa, and in Spain were conquered and brought under the influence of Islam. Although al-Walīd did not actively direct this expansion, he did give support to capable subordinate officers and officials, allowing them great autonomy in the conduct of their affairs.
al-Walid I ibn ‘Abd al-Malik see Walid I
Al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik see Walid I
Al-Walid I see Walid I
Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān see Walid I
Walid I (al-Walid I ibn ‘Abd al-Malik) (Al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik) (Al-Walid I) (Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān) (668 - 715, Damascus [now in Syria]). Umayyad caliph (r.705-715). He was the great builder of the Umayyad dynasty. In 706, he began the reconstruction of the basilica of St. John the Baptist at Damascus into a magnificent mosque. He also built the Great Mosques at Mecca and Medina. Other striking features of his reign were the arabization of the administration and the progress of conquests. During his reign, the Arab empire attained its greatest extent from Transoxiana to Spain.
Al-Walīd, the eldest son of the caliph ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān, was fervently orthodox in his religious views. He had a great interest in architecture. As caliph, he confiscated the Christian Basilica of St. John the Baptist in Damascus and had the Great Mosque (Umayyad Mosque) erected on the site. He also had mosques built at Medina and Jerusalem. During al-Walīd’s reign, areas in Central Asia, in coastal northern Africa, and in Spain were conquered and brought under the influence of Islam. Although al-Walīd did not actively direct this expansion, he did give support to capable subordinate officers and officials, allowing them great autonomy in the conduct of their affairs.
al-Walid I ibn ‘Abd al-Malik see Walid I
Al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik see Walid I
Al-Walid I see Walid I
Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Walīd ibn ʿAbd al-Malīk ibn Marwān see Walid I
Walid II
Walid II (al-Walid II ibn Yazid II) (Walid ibn Yazid) (d. April 16, 744). Umayyad caliph (r.743-744). He was remarkably cultivated, but also a libertine. In 743, he sold Khalid al-Qasri, the former governor of Iraq, to the latter’s mortal enemy Yusuf ibn ‘Umar al-Thaqafi, which raised the Yemenis in Syria against him. Before being caliph, he had built the hunting lodge Qusayr ‘Amra, and as a caliph he began with the construction of al-Mushatta.
Al-Walid succeeded to the throne on the death of his uncle, Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, on February 6, 743. As al-Walid grew older, Hisham became more displeased with him and even urged him to step aside in favor of Hisham's son. Hisham spoke to al-Walid about his drinking and living a dissolute life. The caliph commanded al-Walid to send away his best drinking companion. He also cut off funds to the heir and strongly encouraged him to be more respectful in matters religious.
As heir, al-Walid was known for his open handedness. When he became caliph, he took special care of the crippled and blind. He increased the stipend. He named his two sons, al-Hakam and Uthman, to succeed him in that order. There's an eloquent letter on this theme dated May 21, 743 in at Tabari. At Tabari also quotes a number of al-Walid's poems.
Al-Walid at first confirmed Nasr ibn Sayyar as governor of Khurasan. However, bribed by Yusuf ibn Umar, the caliph dismissed Nasr. Al-Walid also appointed his uncle Yusuf ibn Muhammad governor of Medina. Yahya ibn Zayd was found in Khurasan. Nasr urged him to present himself to the caliph, bearing in mind the essential nature of Islamic unity. However, Yahya chose another path and after initial victory was slain.
Al-Walid put Sulayman ibn Hisham in prison. Such a deed, as well as his reputed drinking, singing and immorality aroused considerable opposition. Al-Walid was fond of versifying and he arranged horse races. The upright Yazid ibn al-Walid spoke against the new ruler's moral laxity. A group began plotting his assassination. When approached, Khalid ibn Abdallah declined to join in and even cautioned al-Walid. However, his vague warning aroused the ire of al-Walid who imprisoned Khalid and then gave him to Yusuf ibn Umar for an offer of fifty million dirhams. Yusuf tortured and killed Khalid. This intensely angered many of al-Walid's own relatives.
Hearing of the plot, Marwan ibn Muhammad wrote from Armenia urging a more prudent course of action, one more promising for the stability of the state and the preservation of the Umayyad house. This was disregarded and many armed men moved into Damascus. The caliph was besieged in a castle outside the city. He fought well, but on April 16, 744, at Al-Aghdaf [now in modern Jordan], he was defeated and killed by the forces of Sulayman ibn Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik. He was succeeded by his cousin Yazid III.
Walid II ibn Yazid II, al- see Walid II
Walid ibn Yazid see Walid II
Walid II (al-Walid II ibn Yazid II) (Walid ibn Yazid) (d. April 16, 744). Umayyad caliph (r.743-744). He was remarkably cultivated, but also a libertine. In 743, he sold Khalid al-Qasri, the former governor of Iraq, to the latter’s mortal enemy Yusuf ibn ‘Umar al-Thaqafi, which raised the Yemenis in Syria against him. Before being caliph, he had built the hunting lodge Qusayr ‘Amra, and as a caliph he began with the construction of al-Mushatta.
Al-Walid succeeded to the throne on the death of his uncle, Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik, on February 6, 743. As al-Walid grew older, Hisham became more displeased with him and even urged him to step aside in favor of Hisham's son. Hisham spoke to al-Walid about his drinking and living a dissolute life. The caliph commanded al-Walid to send away his best drinking companion. He also cut off funds to the heir and strongly encouraged him to be more respectful in matters religious.
As heir, al-Walid was known for his open handedness. When he became caliph, he took special care of the crippled and blind. He increased the stipend. He named his two sons, al-Hakam and Uthman, to succeed him in that order. There's an eloquent letter on this theme dated May 21, 743 in at Tabari. At Tabari also quotes a number of al-Walid's poems.
Al-Walid at first confirmed Nasr ibn Sayyar as governor of Khurasan. However, bribed by Yusuf ibn Umar, the caliph dismissed Nasr. Al-Walid also appointed his uncle Yusuf ibn Muhammad governor of Medina. Yahya ibn Zayd was found in Khurasan. Nasr urged him to present himself to the caliph, bearing in mind the essential nature of Islamic unity. However, Yahya chose another path and after initial victory was slain.
Al-Walid put Sulayman ibn Hisham in prison. Such a deed, as well as his reputed drinking, singing and immorality aroused considerable opposition. Al-Walid was fond of versifying and he arranged horse races. The upright Yazid ibn al-Walid spoke against the new ruler's moral laxity. A group began plotting his assassination. When approached, Khalid ibn Abdallah declined to join in and even cautioned al-Walid. However, his vague warning aroused the ire of al-Walid who imprisoned Khalid and then gave him to Yusuf ibn Umar for an offer of fifty million dirhams. Yusuf tortured and killed Khalid. This intensely angered many of al-Walid's own relatives.
Hearing of the plot, Marwan ibn Muhammad wrote from Armenia urging a more prudent course of action, one more promising for the stability of the state and the preservation of the Umayyad house. This was disregarded and many armed men moved into Damascus. The caliph was besieged in a castle outside the city. He fought well, but on April 16, 744, at Al-Aghdaf [now in modern Jordan], he was defeated and killed by the forces of Sulayman ibn Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik. He was succeeded by his cousin Yazid III.
Walid II ibn Yazid II, al- see Walid II
Walid ibn Yazid see Walid II
Walide Sultan
Walide Sultan (Valide Sultana). Title borne, in the Ottoman Empire, by the mother of the reigning sultan and only for the duration of her son’s reign.
Valide Sultana see Walide Sultan
Walide Sultan (Valide Sultana). Title borne, in the Ottoman Empire, by the mother of the reigning sultan and only for the duration of her son’s reign.
Valide Sultana see Walide Sultan
Walid ibn al-Mughira ibn ‘Abd Allah, al-
Walid ibn al-Mughira ibn ‘Abd Allah, al- (d. 622). Opponent of the Prophet. He was the head of the numerous and prosperous Banu Makhzum at Mecca.
Walid ibn al-Mughira ibn ‘Abd Allah, al- (d. 622). Opponent of the Prophet. He was the head of the numerous and prosperous Banu Makhzum at Mecca.
Wali Ullah, Shah
Wali Ullah, Shah (Shah Wali Ullah) (Shah Waliullah) (Shah Wali Allah) (Shah Waliullah Muhaddith Dehlvi) (b. February 21, 1703, Delhi [India] - d. August 20, 1762, Delhi [India]). Distinguished Muslim thinker of eighteenth century North India. Shah Wali Ullah was deeply influenced by a youthful stay in the Hijaz, where he encountered a newly vital commitment to the study of the recorded traditions (hadith) of the Prophet as a basis of intellectual renewal and a foundation for social well-being. His subsequent writings de-emphasized the teachings of the historic law schools in favor of study of the Qur’an (which he translated into Persian) and the hadith. Even more ambitiously, he tried to show the essential unity of the fruits of the epistemologically distinctive Islamic strands of reason (aql), tradition (naql), and the gnosis (ma’rifa) of the Sufis. His work took on urgency in the wake of the decline of the Mughal Empire and he sought out Muslim rulers who would work in consultation with scholars like himself in order to create conditions where Muslim law could flourish. Institutionally, he was the head of the Madrasa-i Rahimiyya, a school founded by his renowned father in Delhi. He was also a revered Sufi elder among the Naqshbandis. Later reformers in the subcontinent looked to him as an exemplar in personality and attainments, a guide to the study of the revealed sciences, a spokesman for an authoritative role for scholars in a properly ruled polity, and an opponent of intellectual and sectarian disunity.
Shāh Walī Allāh received a traditional Islamic education from his father and is said to have memorized the Qurʾān at the age of seven. In 1732 he made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and he then remained in the Hejaz (now in Saudi Arabia) to study religion with eminent theologians. He reached adulthood at a time of disillusionment following the death in 1707 of Aurangzeb, the last Mughal emperor of India. Because large areas of the empire had been lost to Hindu and Sikh rulers of the Deccan and the Punjab, Indian Muslims had to accept the rule of non-Muslims. This challenge occupied Walī Allāh’s adult life.
Walī Allāh believed that the Muslim polity could be restored to its former splendor by a policy of religious reform that would harmonize the religious ideals of Islam with the changing social and economic conditions of India. According to him, religious ideas were universal and eternal, but their application could meet different circumstances. The main tool of his policy was the doctrine of tatbīq, whereby the principles of Islam were reconstructed and reapplied in accordance with the Qurʾān and the Ḥadīth (the spoken traditions attributed to Muhammad). He thereby allowed the practice of ijtihād (independent thinking by theologians in matters relating to Islamic law), which hitherto had been curtailed. As a corollary, he reinterpreted the concept of taqdīr (determinism) and condemned its popularization, qismat (narrow fatalism, or absolute predetermination). Walī Allāh held that man could achieve his full potential by his own exertion in a universe that was determined by God. Theologically, he opposed the veneration of saints or anything that compromised strict monotheism. He was jurisprudentially eclectic, holding that a Muslim could follow any of the four schools of Islamic law on any point of dogma or ritual.
The best known of Walī Allāh’s voluminous writings was Asrār ad-dīn (“The Secrets of Belief”). His annotated Persian translation of the Qurʾān is still popular in India and Pakistan.
Walī Allāh received a traditional Islamic education from his father and is said to have memorized the Qurʾān at the age of seven. In 1732 he made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and he then remained in the Hejaz (now in Saudi Arabia) to study religion with eminent theologians. He reached adulthood at a time of disillusionment following the death in 1707 of Aurangzeb, the last Mughal emperor of India. Because large areas of the empire had been lost to Hindu and Sikh rulers of the Deccan and the Punjab, Indian Muslims had to accept the rule of non-Muslims. This challenge occupied Walī Allāh’s adult life.
Walī Allāh believed that the Muslim polity could be restored to its former splendor by a policy of religious reform that would harmonize the religious ideals of Islam with the changing social and economic conditions of India. According to him, religious ideas were universal and eternal, but their application could meet different circumstances. The main tool of his policy was the doctrine of tatbīq, whereby the principles of Islam were reconstructed and reapplied in accordance with the Qurʾān and the Ḥadīth (the spoken traditions attributed to Muhammad). He thereby allowed the practice of ijtihād (independent thinking by theologians in matters relating to Islamic law), which hitherto had been curtailed. As a corollary, he reinterpreted the concept of taqdīr (determinism) and condemned its popularization, qismat (narrow fatalism, or absolute predetermination). Walī Allāh held that man could achieve his full potential by his own exertion in a universe that was determined by God. Theologically, he opposed the veneration of saints or anything that compromised strict monotheism. He was jurisprudentially eclectic, holding that a Muslim could follow any of the four schools of Islamic law on any point of dogma or ritual.
The best known of Walī Allāh’s voluminous writings was Asrār ad-dīn (“The Secrets of Belief”). His annotated Persian translation of the Qurʾān is still popular in India and Pakistan.
Wali Allah was an Islamic scholar and reformer. He worked for the revival of Muslim rule and intellectual learning in South Asia, during a time of waning Muslim power. He despised the divisions and deviations within Islam and its practice in India and hoped to "purify" the religion and unify all Indian Muslims under the "banner of truth". He is also thought to have anticipated a number of progressive, social, economic, and political ideas of the modern era such as social reform, equal rights, labor protection, welfare entitlement of all to food, clothing, and housing.
Shah Wali Ullah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Waliullah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Wali Allah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Waliullah Muhaddith Dehlvi see Wali Ullah, Shah
Wali Ullah, Shah (Shah Wali Ullah) (Shah Waliullah) (Shah Wali Allah) (Shah Waliullah Muhaddith Dehlvi) (b. February 21, 1703, Delhi [India] - d. August 20, 1762, Delhi [India]). Distinguished Muslim thinker of eighteenth century North India. Shah Wali Ullah was deeply influenced by a youthful stay in the Hijaz, where he encountered a newly vital commitment to the study of the recorded traditions (hadith) of the Prophet as a basis of intellectual renewal and a foundation for social well-being. His subsequent writings de-emphasized the teachings of the historic law schools in favor of study of the Qur’an (which he translated into Persian) and the hadith. Even more ambitiously, he tried to show the essential unity of the fruits of the epistemologically distinctive Islamic strands of reason (aql), tradition (naql), and the gnosis (ma’rifa) of the Sufis. His work took on urgency in the wake of the decline of the Mughal Empire and he sought out Muslim rulers who would work in consultation with scholars like himself in order to create conditions where Muslim law could flourish. Institutionally, he was the head of the Madrasa-i Rahimiyya, a school founded by his renowned father in Delhi. He was also a revered Sufi elder among the Naqshbandis. Later reformers in the subcontinent looked to him as an exemplar in personality and attainments, a guide to the study of the revealed sciences, a spokesman for an authoritative role for scholars in a properly ruled polity, and an opponent of intellectual and sectarian disunity.
Shāh Walī Allāh received a traditional Islamic education from his father and is said to have memorized the Qurʾān at the age of seven. In 1732 he made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and he then remained in the Hejaz (now in Saudi Arabia) to study religion with eminent theologians. He reached adulthood at a time of disillusionment following the death in 1707 of Aurangzeb, the last Mughal emperor of India. Because large areas of the empire had been lost to Hindu and Sikh rulers of the Deccan and the Punjab, Indian Muslims had to accept the rule of non-Muslims. This challenge occupied Walī Allāh’s adult life.
Walī Allāh believed that the Muslim polity could be restored to its former splendor by a policy of religious reform that would harmonize the religious ideals of Islam with the changing social and economic conditions of India. According to him, religious ideas were universal and eternal, but their application could meet different circumstances. The main tool of his policy was the doctrine of tatbīq, whereby the principles of Islam were reconstructed and reapplied in accordance with the Qurʾān and the Ḥadīth (the spoken traditions attributed to Muhammad). He thereby allowed the practice of ijtihād (independent thinking by theologians in matters relating to Islamic law), which hitherto had been curtailed. As a corollary, he reinterpreted the concept of taqdīr (determinism) and condemned its popularization, qismat (narrow fatalism, or absolute predetermination). Walī Allāh held that man could achieve his full potential by his own exertion in a universe that was determined by God. Theologically, he opposed the veneration of saints or anything that compromised strict monotheism. He was jurisprudentially eclectic, holding that a Muslim could follow any of the four schools of Islamic law on any point of dogma or ritual.
The best known of Walī Allāh’s voluminous writings was Asrār ad-dīn (“The Secrets of Belief”). His annotated Persian translation of the Qurʾān is still popular in India and Pakistan.
Walī Allāh received a traditional Islamic education from his father and is said to have memorized the Qurʾān at the age of seven. In 1732 he made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and he then remained in the Hejaz (now in Saudi Arabia) to study religion with eminent theologians. He reached adulthood at a time of disillusionment following the death in 1707 of Aurangzeb, the last Mughal emperor of India. Because large areas of the empire had been lost to Hindu and Sikh rulers of the Deccan and the Punjab, Indian Muslims had to accept the rule of non-Muslims. This challenge occupied Walī Allāh’s adult life.
Walī Allāh believed that the Muslim polity could be restored to its former splendor by a policy of religious reform that would harmonize the religious ideals of Islam with the changing social and economic conditions of India. According to him, religious ideas were universal and eternal, but their application could meet different circumstances. The main tool of his policy was the doctrine of tatbīq, whereby the principles of Islam were reconstructed and reapplied in accordance with the Qurʾān and the Ḥadīth (the spoken traditions attributed to Muhammad). He thereby allowed the practice of ijtihād (independent thinking by theologians in matters relating to Islamic law), which hitherto had been curtailed. As a corollary, he reinterpreted the concept of taqdīr (determinism) and condemned its popularization, qismat (narrow fatalism, or absolute predetermination). Walī Allāh held that man could achieve his full potential by his own exertion in a universe that was determined by God. Theologically, he opposed the veneration of saints or anything that compromised strict monotheism. He was jurisprudentially eclectic, holding that a Muslim could follow any of the four schools of Islamic law on any point of dogma or ritual.
The best known of Walī Allāh’s voluminous writings was Asrār ad-dīn (“The Secrets of Belief”). His annotated Persian translation of the Qurʾān is still popular in India and Pakistan.
Wali Allah was an Islamic scholar and reformer. He worked for the revival of Muslim rule and intellectual learning in South Asia, during a time of waning Muslim power. He despised the divisions and deviations within Islam and its practice in India and hoped to "purify" the religion and unify all Indian Muslims under the "banner of truth". He is also thought to have anticipated a number of progressive, social, economic, and political ideas of the modern era such as social reform, equal rights, labor protection, welfare entitlement of all to food, clothing, and housing.
Shah Wali Ullah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Waliullah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Wali Allah see Wali Ullah, Shah
Shah Waliullah Muhaddith Dehlvi see Wali Ullah, Shah
Wana
Wana. Most Wana are not Muslim. However, as inhabitants of a remote interior region of Indonesia’s Central Sulawesi Province, the Wana offer a distinct perspective on Islamic culture. The view from the Wana hinterlands maybe unique in details, but it illustrates a pattern widespread in island Southeast Asia, namely, the development of an ethnic self-consciousness on the part of an interior upland population in response to a coastal Muslim presence.
Before Dutch authorities entered the region in the first decade of the twentieth century, some Wana were drawn into the spheres of small Islamic sultanates that once dotted the coasts of Sulawesi. In the last century, Wana in the southern reaches of the territory paid tribute in the form of beeswax to the Raja of Bungku, a principality located to the southwest of Wanaland. Likewise Wana in the north presented tiny bamboo tubes filled with uncooked rice to the Raja of Tojo, a sultanate to the northwest of the Wana area. Some Wana were appointed local representatives of these rajas and carried special titles. While Wana homage no doubt enhanced the stature of local sultans and may have conferred certain privileges on Wana middlemen, by no means did these demonstrations of vassalage imply that coastal rulers exercised thoroughgoing suzerainty over the Wana. Then, as now, Wana had the option of fading back into the interior forests when threatened or oppressed in their relations with coastal authorities. For their part, the rajas occupied themselves with issues of status and prestige at political centers, not with territorial concerns in the hinterlands. But through contact with these principalities, Wana adopted and reworked for their own purposes some key political and cosmological concepts basic to the Islamic sultanates, including the idea of baraka (magical powers associated with royalty), a tripartite social class system made up of nobles, commoner and slaves (unrealized in Wana social life, but nonetheless present in their thought) and an association of cosmic well-being and political order (a model that Indonesia’s Muslim kingdoms had in turn reworked from earlier Hindu-Buddhist constructions). And Wana, who attribute all power to sources external to their own society, claim that their legal code was obtained from the Raja of Bungku.
Wana. Most Wana are not Muslim. However, as inhabitants of a remote interior region of Indonesia’s Central Sulawesi Province, the Wana offer a distinct perspective on Islamic culture. The view from the Wana hinterlands maybe unique in details, but it illustrates a pattern widespread in island Southeast Asia, namely, the development of an ethnic self-consciousness on the part of an interior upland population in response to a coastal Muslim presence.
Before Dutch authorities entered the region in the first decade of the twentieth century, some Wana were drawn into the spheres of small Islamic sultanates that once dotted the coasts of Sulawesi. In the last century, Wana in the southern reaches of the territory paid tribute in the form of beeswax to the Raja of Bungku, a principality located to the southwest of Wanaland. Likewise Wana in the north presented tiny bamboo tubes filled with uncooked rice to the Raja of Tojo, a sultanate to the northwest of the Wana area. Some Wana were appointed local representatives of these rajas and carried special titles. While Wana homage no doubt enhanced the stature of local sultans and may have conferred certain privileges on Wana middlemen, by no means did these demonstrations of vassalage imply that coastal rulers exercised thoroughgoing suzerainty over the Wana. Then, as now, Wana had the option of fading back into the interior forests when threatened or oppressed in their relations with coastal authorities. For their part, the rajas occupied themselves with issues of status and prestige at political centers, not with territorial concerns in the hinterlands. But through contact with these principalities, Wana adopted and reworked for their own purposes some key political and cosmological concepts basic to the Islamic sultanates, including the idea of baraka (magical powers associated with royalty), a tripartite social class system made up of nobles, commoner and slaves (unrealized in Wana social life, but nonetheless present in their thought) and an association of cosmic well-being and political order (a model that Indonesia’s Muslim kingdoms had in turn reworked from earlier Hindu-Buddhist constructions). And Wana, who attribute all power to sources external to their own society, claim that their legal code was obtained from the Raja of Bungku.
Wanquli, Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani
Wanquli, Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani (Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani Wanquli). Sixteenth century Ottoman jurist from Van. His translation of the Arabic lexicon of Abu Nasr Jawhari was printed in 1728 by Ibrahim Muteferriqa, as one of the first books printed in Turkey.
Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani Wanquli see Wanquli, Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani
Wanquli, Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani (Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani Wanquli). Sixteenth century Ottoman jurist from Van. His translation of the Arabic lexicon of Abu Nasr Jawhari was printed in 1728 by Ibrahim Muteferriqa, as one of the first books printed in Turkey.
Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani Wanquli see Wanquli, Mehmed ibn Mustafa al-Wani
Waqidi, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al-
Waqidi, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al- (Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al-Waqidi) (747-822). Arab historian from Medina. A moderate Shi‘a, he owes his fame to the Book of the Campaigns (of the Prophet), the only one of his many writings that has survived as an independent work. His merit lies mainly in his transmission of a very large amount of material and in fixing its chronology.
Muhammad ibn 'Umar al-Waqidi
Wa see Waqidi, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al-
Waqidi, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al- (Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al-Waqidi) (747-822). Arab historian from Medina. A moderate Shi‘a, he owes his fame to the Book of the Campaigns (of the Prophet), the only one of his many writings that has survived as an independent work. His merit lies mainly in his transmission of a very large amount of material and in fixing its chronology.
Muhammad ibn 'Umar al-Waqidi
Wa see Waqidi, Muhammad ibn ‘Umar al-
Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad
Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad (Waraqah ibn Nawfal) (Waraqah ibn Nawfal ibn Assad ibn Abd al-Uzza ibn Qusayy Al-Qurashi) (d. c. 610). Cousin of Khadija, Muhammad’s wife. He is said to have belonged to the Meccan group of monotheists (in Arabic, hanif).
Waraqah ibn Nawfal was the parental cousin of Khadija, Muhammad's first wife. According to the Islamic sources, Waraqah was a Christian Ebionites priest living in Mecca, and had knowledge of the previous scriptures. When told of Muhammad's first revelation (when he received the first five verses of surat Al-Alaq), he immediately recognized him as a prophet. Contrariwise some non-Islamic critics believe that Waraqah was one of the sources of these revelations, insofar as Waraqah may have taught Muhammad about the Biblical ideas and stories which later were to be found in the Qur'an.
Waraqah ibn Nawfal see Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad
Waraqah ibn Nawfal ibn Assad ibn Abd al-Uzza ibn Qusayy Al-Qurashi see Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad
Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad (Waraqah ibn Nawfal) (Waraqah ibn Nawfal ibn Assad ibn Abd al-Uzza ibn Qusayy Al-Qurashi) (d. c. 610). Cousin of Khadija, Muhammad’s wife. He is said to have belonged to the Meccan group of monotheists (in Arabic, hanif).
Waraqah ibn Nawfal was the parental cousin of Khadija, Muhammad's first wife. According to the Islamic sources, Waraqah was a Christian Ebionites priest living in Mecca, and had knowledge of the previous scriptures. When told of Muhammad's first revelation (when he received the first five verses of surat Al-Alaq), he immediately recognized him as a prophet. Contrariwise some non-Islamic critics believe that Waraqah was one of the sources of these revelations, insofar as Waraqah may have taught Muhammad about the Biblical ideas and stories which later were to be found in the Qur'an.
Waraqah ibn Nawfal see Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad
Waraqah ibn Nawfal ibn Assad ibn Abd al-Uzza ibn Qusayy Al-Qurashi see Waraqa ibn Nawfal ibn Asad
War-Dyabi ibn Rabis
War-Dyabi ibn Rabis (War Jabi) (War Jaabi) (d. 1040/1041). Ruler of Takrur -- the first known West African kingdom to embrace Islam. According to the chronicler al-Bakri, it was War-Dyabi who first insisted that his subjects convert to Islam, demonstrating that Islam had reached western Sudan before the Almoravid conquest of Ghana in 1076/1077. After War-Dyabi’s death, his son allied with the Almoravids, and probably fought with them against Ghana.
War Jabi was the king of Tekrur in the 1030s. He converted to Islam. This conversion allowed Tekrur to justify its wars of expansion to the south.
War Jabi see War-Dyabi ibn Rabis
War Jaabi see War-Dyabi ibn Rabis
War-Dyabi ibn Rabis (War Jabi) (War Jaabi) (d. 1040/1041). Ruler of Takrur -- the first known West African kingdom to embrace Islam. According to the chronicler al-Bakri, it was War-Dyabi who first insisted that his subjects convert to Islam, demonstrating that Islam had reached western Sudan before the Almoravid conquest of Ghana in 1076/1077. After War-Dyabi’s death, his son allied with the Almoravids, and probably fought with them against Ghana.
War Jabi was the king of Tekrur in the 1030s. He converted to Islam. This conversion allowed Tekrur to justify its wars of expansion to the south.
War Jabi see War-Dyabi ibn Rabis
War Jaabi see War-Dyabi ibn Rabis
Washmgir
Washmgir (Wushmaghir ibn Ziyar Abu Talib) (Vushmgir) (d. 965/967) Ruler of the Ziyarid dynasty in Tabaristan and Gurgan (r. 935-965/967). Under his brother Mardawij (r. 927-935), he conquered Isfahan and drove from there ‘Ali ibn Buya, the founder of the Buyid dynasty, who had taken it when he was in Mardawij’s service. In 940, he was defeated by the Samanids who were in alliance with the Buyids. Later Washmgir fled to the Samanid Nuh I ibn Nasr, who assisted him against the Buyids, Tabaristan thus becoming a buffer state between the Samanids and the Buyids.
Vushmgir was a son of Ziyar. Vushmgir means "quail catcher" in the local Caspian Iranian dialects.
In 935, Vushmgir's brother Mardavij was murdered by his Turkish troops. Many of the Turks then defected. Some entered the service of the Buyid Hasan, while others traveled to the caliph in Baghdad. Hasan took advantage of this situation by stripping Isfahan from Ziyarid rule. The Dailamite and Gilite troops, however, pledged their support to Vushmgir, who was in Ray. That same year, he defeated a Samanid army, as well as the Dailamite Makan, which had together invaded Tabaristan. Vushmgir then wrested Gurgan from Samanid control.
Vushmgir soon decided to acknowledge Samanid supremacy, and in 936 he also turned over Gurgan to Makan. Turning against Hasan, he retook Isfahan in 938. In 939 or 940, the Samanid governor Abu 'Ali ibn Muhtaj attacked Gurgan. Vushmgir sent Makan aid, but the city fell after a long siege. Ibn Muhtaj then engaged Vushmgir in battle in Ray and defeated him, killing Makan in the process. Vushmgir fled to Tabaristan, but was faced there with a revolt by his governor of Sari, al-Hasan ibn al-Fairuzan, who was a cousin of Makan and blamed the Ziyarid for his death. Vushmgir defeated him, but al-Hasan convinced Ibn Muhtaj to invade Tabaristan. Vushmgir was forced to recognize Samanid authority again. Hasan furthered the Ziyarid's troubles by retaking Isfahan in 940.
When Ibn Muthaj left for Samanid Khurasan, Vushmgir retook control of Ray. He then lost it for good in 943, to the Buyid Hasan. Returning to Tabaristan, he was defeated there by al-Hasan, who had previously occupied Gurgan. Vushmgir fled to the Bavandids of the mountains in eastern Tabaristan, then to the court of the Samanid Nuh I. Al-Hasan meanwhile allied with Hasan, but when Ibn Muthaj took Ray from the Buyids in 945, he recognized Samanid authority. Still, in 945 Vushmgir captured Gurgan with Samanid support, but did not manage to retain his rule there. It was only in 947 when he was able to take Gurgan and Tabaristan from al-Hasan with the help of a large Samanid army.
In 948 Hasan (who after the Buyids' entrance into Baghdad in 945 had used the title Rukn al-Daula) invaded Tabaristan and Gurgan and took them from Vushmgir. While al-Hasan supported the Buyids, Vushmgir relied on his Samanid allies. Tabaristan and Gurgan changed hands several times until 955, when in a treaty with the Samanids, Rukn al-Daula promised to leave Vushmgir alone in Tabaristan. Peace between the two sides did not last long, however. In 958 Vushmgir briefly occupied Ray, which was Rukn al-Daula's capital. The Buyid struck back, temporarily taking Gurgan in 960, then taking both Tabaristan and Gurgan for a short time in 962. He may have also taken Tabaristan and Gurgan in 966, but did not hold on to them for long.
Vushmgir was killed by a boar during a hunt in 967, shortly after a Samanid army had arrived for a joint campaign against the Buyids. He was succeeded by his eldest son Bisutun, although the Samanid army attempted to put another son, Qabus, into power. A third son predeceased him in 964 in the fighting over Hausan.
Wushmaghir ibn Ziyar Abu Talib see Washmgir
Vushmgir see Washmgir
Quail Catcher see Washmgir
Washmgir (Wushmaghir ibn Ziyar Abu Talib) (Vushmgir) (d. 965/967) Ruler of the Ziyarid dynasty in Tabaristan and Gurgan (r. 935-965/967). Under his brother Mardawij (r. 927-935), he conquered Isfahan and drove from there ‘Ali ibn Buya, the founder of the Buyid dynasty, who had taken it when he was in Mardawij’s service. In 940, he was defeated by the Samanids who were in alliance with the Buyids. Later Washmgir fled to the Samanid Nuh I ibn Nasr, who assisted him against the Buyids, Tabaristan thus becoming a buffer state between the Samanids and the Buyids.
Vushmgir was a son of Ziyar. Vushmgir means "quail catcher" in the local Caspian Iranian dialects.
In 935, Vushmgir's brother Mardavij was murdered by his Turkish troops. Many of the Turks then defected. Some entered the service of the Buyid Hasan, while others traveled to the caliph in Baghdad. Hasan took advantage of this situation by stripping Isfahan from Ziyarid rule. The Dailamite and Gilite troops, however, pledged their support to Vushmgir, who was in Ray. That same year, he defeated a Samanid army, as well as the Dailamite Makan, which had together invaded Tabaristan. Vushmgir then wrested Gurgan from Samanid control.
Vushmgir soon decided to acknowledge Samanid supremacy, and in 936 he also turned over Gurgan to Makan. Turning against Hasan, he retook Isfahan in 938. In 939 or 940, the Samanid governor Abu 'Ali ibn Muhtaj attacked Gurgan. Vushmgir sent Makan aid, but the city fell after a long siege. Ibn Muhtaj then engaged Vushmgir in battle in Ray and defeated him, killing Makan in the process. Vushmgir fled to Tabaristan, but was faced there with a revolt by his governor of Sari, al-Hasan ibn al-Fairuzan, who was a cousin of Makan and blamed the Ziyarid for his death. Vushmgir defeated him, but al-Hasan convinced Ibn Muhtaj to invade Tabaristan. Vushmgir was forced to recognize Samanid authority again. Hasan furthered the Ziyarid's troubles by retaking Isfahan in 940.
When Ibn Muthaj left for Samanid Khurasan, Vushmgir retook control of Ray. He then lost it for good in 943, to the Buyid Hasan. Returning to Tabaristan, he was defeated there by al-Hasan, who had previously occupied Gurgan. Vushmgir fled to the Bavandids of the mountains in eastern Tabaristan, then to the court of the Samanid Nuh I. Al-Hasan meanwhile allied with Hasan, but when Ibn Muthaj took Ray from the Buyids in 945, he recognized Samanid authority. Still, in 945 Vushmgir captured Gurgan with Samanid support, but did not manage to retain his rule there. It was only in 947 when he was able to take Gurgan and Tabaristan from al-Hasan with the help of a large Samanid army.
In 948 Hasan (who after the Buyids' entrance into Baghdad in 945 had used the title Rukn al-Daula) invaded Tabaristan and Gurgan and took them from Vushmgir. While al-Hasan supported the Buyids, Vushmgir relied on his Samanid allies. Tabaristan and Gurgan changed hands several times until 955, when in a treaty with the Samanids, Rukn al-Daula promised to leave Vushmgir alone in Tabaristan. Peace between the two sides did not last long, however. In 958 Vushmgir briefly occupied Ray, which was Rukn al-Daula's capital. The Buyid struck back, temporarily taking Gurgan in 960, then taking both Tabaristan and Gurgan for a short time in 962. He may have also taken Tabaristan and Gurgan in 966, but did not hold on to them for long.
Vushmgir was killed by a boar during a hunt in 967, shortly after a Samanid army had arrived for a joint campaign against the Buyids. He was succeeded by his eldest son Bisutun, although the Samanid army attempted to put another son, Qabus, into power. A third son predeceased him in 964 in the fighting over Hausan.
Wushmaghir ibn Ziyar Abu Talib see Washmgir
Vushmgir see Washmgir
Quail Catcher see Washmgir
Washsha’, Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al-
Washsha’, Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al- (Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al-Washsha’). Arabic philologist and bel esprit of the tenth century. He wrote a handbook of rules of good society for the aristocrats of Baghdad.
Abu'l-Tayyib Muhammad al-Washsha' see Washsha’, Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al-
Washsha’, Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al- (Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al-Washsha’). Arabic philologist and bel esprit of the tenth century. He wrote a handbook of rules of good society for the aristocrats of Baghdad.
Abu'l-Tayyib Muhammad al-Washsha' see Washsha’, Abu’l-Tayyib Muhammad al-
Wasi’ ‘Alisi
Wasi’ ‘Alisi ( Wasi' ‘Ali) (d. 1543). Ottoman author, scholar and poet, stylist and calligrapher. His fame is based on his Turkish translation of the Persian version of the Kalila wa-Dimna.
'Alisi, Wasi' see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
Wasi' 'Ali see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
'Ali, Wasi' see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
Wasi’ ‘Alisi ( Wasi' ‘Ali) (d. 1543). Ottoman author, scholar and poet, stylist and calligrapher. His fame is based on his Turkish translation of the Persian version of the Kalila wa-Dimna.
'Alisi, Wasi' see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
Wasi' 'Ali see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
'Ali, Wasi' see Wasi’ ‘Alisi
Wasif, Ahmed
Wasif, Ahmed (Ahmed Wasif) (d.1806). Official historian of the Ottoman Empire. His four state chronicles, called appendices because they follow on to ‘Izzi’s work, cover the greater part of the period from 1783 to 1805. He also wrote an account of Bonaparte’s invasion of Egypt.
Ahmed Wasif see Wasif, Ahmed
Wasif, Ahmed (Ahmed Wasif) (d.1806). Official historian of the Ottoman Empire. His four state chronicles, called appendices because they follow on to ‘Izzi’s work, cover the greater part of the period from 1783 to 1805. He also wrote an account of Bonaparte’s invasion of Egypt.
Ahmed Wasif see Wasif, Ahmed
Wasil ibn ‘Ata’, Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal
Wasil ibn ‘Ata’, Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal (Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal Wasil ibn 'Ata') (699/700-748). Chief of the Mu‘tazila. He migrated to Basra where he belonged to the circle of Hasan al-Basri, and entered into friendly relations with Bashshar ibn Burd. His wife was a sister of ‘Amr ibn ‘Ubayd Abu ‘Uthman, next to himself the most celebrated of the earliest Mu‘tazila. His deviation from the views of Hasan al-Basri is said to have become the starting point of the Mu‘tazila. Four theses are ascribed to him; denial of God’s eternal qualities; the doctrine of free will, which he shared with the Qadarites; the doctrine that the Muslim who commits a mortal sin enters into a state intermediate between that of a Muslim and that of an unbeliever; the doctrine that one of the parties who took part in the murder of ‘Uthman, in the battle of the Camel and in that of Siffin, was wrong.
Wasil ibn Ata was a Muslim theologian, and by many accounts is considered to be the founder of the Mutazilite school of Islamic thought.
Born around the year 700 in the Arabian Peninsula, he initially studied under Abd-Allah ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyyah, the son of the famous fourth Caliph Ali ibn Abi Talib. Later he would travel to Basra in Iraq to study under Hasan al-Basri (one of the Tabi‘in). In Basra he began to develop the ideologies that would lead to the Mutazilite school. These stemmed from conflicts that many scholars had in resolving theology and politics. His main contribution to the Mutazilite school was in planting the seeds for the formation of its doctrine.
Wasil ibn Ata died in 748 in the Arabian Peninsula.
He was married to the sister of Amr ibn Ubayd.
Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal Wasil ibn 'Ata' see Wasil ibn ‘Ata’, Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal
Wasil ibn ‘Ata’, Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal (Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal Wasil ibn 'Ata') (699/700-748). Chief of the Mu‘tazila. He migrated to Basra where he belonged to the circle of Hasan al-Basri, and entered into friendly relations with Bashshar ibn Burd. His wife was a sister of ‘Amr ibn ‘Ubayd Abu ‘Uthman, next to himself the most celebrated of the earliest Mu‘tazila. His deviation from the views of Hasan al-Basri is said to have become the starting point of the Mu‘tazila. Four theses are ascribed to him; denial of God’s eternal qualities; the doctrine of free will, which he shared with the Qadarites; the doctrine that the Muslim who commits a mortal sin enters into a state intermediate between that of a Muslim and that of an unbeliever; the doctrine that one of the parties who took part in the murder of ‘Uthman, in the battle of the Camel and in that of Siffin, was wrong.
Wasil ibn Ata was a Muslim theologian, and by many accounts is considered to be the founder of the Mutazilite school of Islamic thought.
Born around the year 700 in the Arabian Peninsula, he initially studied under Abd-Allah ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyyah, the son of the famous fourth Caliph Ali ibn Abi Talib. Later he would travel to Basra in Iraq to study under Hasan al-Basri (one of the Tabi‘in). In Basra he began to develop the ideologies that would lead to the Mutazilite school. These stemmed from conflicts that many scholars had in resolving theology and politics. His main contribution to the Mutazilite school was in planting the seeds for the formation of its doctrine.
Wasil ibn Ata died in 748 in the Arabian Peninsula.
He was married to the sister of Amr ibn Ubayd.
Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal Wasil ibn 'Ata' see Wasil ibn ‘Ata’, Abu Hudhayfa al-Ghazzal
Wathiq bi-‘llah, Abu Ja‘far Harun al-
Wathiq bi-‘llah, Abu Ja‘far Harun al- (Abu Ja‘far Harun al-Wathiq bi-‘llah). ‘Abbasid caliph (r.842-847). His reign was marked by troubles caused by an alleged descendant of the Umayyads, named Abu Harb, usually called al-Mubarqa’. He also had to send the general Bugha al-Kabir to Medina in order to subdue the rebellious Bedouins around the town. The Kharijites and the Kurds were also causing trouble, al-Wathiq was an ardent Mu‘tazili.
Abu Ja‘far Harun al-Wathiq bi-‘llah see Wathiq bi-‘llah, Abu Ja‘far Harun al-
Wathiq bi-‘llah, Abu Ja‘far Harun al- (Abu Ja‘far Harun al-Wathiq bi-‘llah). ‘Abbasid caliph (r.842-847). His reign was marked by troubles caused by an alleged descendant of the Umayyads, named Abu Harb, usually called al-Mubarqa’. He also had to send the general Bugha al-Kabir to Medina in order to subdue the rebellious Bedouins around the town. The Kharijites and the Kurds were also causing trouble, al-Wathiq was an ardent Mu‘tazili.
Abu Ja‘far Harun al-Wathiq bi-‘llah see Wathiq bi-‘llah, Abu Ja‘far Harun al-
Wattasids
Wattasids (Wattassids) (Waṭāsīyūn) (Banu Wattas) (Banu Watas). Moroccan dynasty (r.1428-1547 [1554?]). In the thirteenth century, the Banu Wattas established themselves in the Rif of eastern Morocco. They became practically independent rulers when their relatives, the Marinids (Merinids), had replaced the Almohads. Their history is at first linked with that of the Marinids and afterwards closely connected with the Christian attempts to conquer territory in Morocco and with the accession of the Sa‘di Sharifs. The descendants of a branch of the nomadic Zanata on the northern edge of the Sahara, who settled in eastern Morocco and the Rif from the 13th century. Having come to prominence under their relatives, the Merinids, as viziers and governors they took over the regency for the Merinid child sultans (r. 1358-1374 and 1393-1458).
The founder of the dynasty Abu Zakariyya’ Yahya (r. 1428-1448) took control of Morocco as vizier after it had lapsed into anarchy following the assassination of the Marinid Abu Sa‘id ‘Uthman III (r. 1399-1420). He fought successfully the Portuguese who had landed on the Moroccan coasts. His son ‘Ali, however, could not prevent the fall of al-Qasr al-Saghir, and the third Wattasid vizier, Yahya, was assassinated in 1458 with most of his family. All but two brothers were slaughtered during the massacre. The last Marinid ruler Abu Muhammad ‘Abd al-Haqq II (r.1428-1465) then tried to govern directly, but he was killed in 1465. The surviving Wattasid Muhammad al-Sheikh al-Mahdi (Muhammad I al-Shaykh) (r.1472-1505), in Arzila since 1465, from his base there seized power in Fez in 1472 and installed his family’s rule.
In 1472, the Wattasid Muhammad I al-Shaykh was able to take Fez, now under Idrisid government, and was proclaimed sultan. His successors, Muhammad al-Burtugali (r. 1505-1524) and Abu’l-Abbas Ahmad (r. 1524-1550), had to struggle against the invading Portuguese and Spanish, to whom they lost broad coastal territories, and also against the advancing Sadites in the south. The last Wattasid ruler fell in 1554 during the fight against the Sadites.
The Wattassids were an Amazigh dynasty of Morocco. They followed the Marinids and were followed by the Saadis.
Like the Marinids, they were of Berber Zenata descent. The two families were related, and the Marinids recruited many viziers from the Wattasids. These viziers assumed the powers of the Sultans, seizing power when the last Marinid, Abu Muhammad Abd al-Haqq, who had massacred many of the Wattasids in 1459, was murdered during a popular revolt in Fez in 1465.
Abu Abd Allah al-Sheikh Muhammad ibn Yahya al-Mahdi was the first Wattasid Sultan, but controlled only the northern part of Morocco as the Wattasid sultanate, the south being dominated by the Saadi dynasty.
The Wattasids were finally replaced by the Saadis in 1554.
The Wattasid viziers were:
* 1420-1448 : Abu Zakariya Yahya
* 1448-1458 : Ali ibn Yusuf
* 1458-1459 : Yahya ibn Abi Zakariya Yahya
The Wattasid sultans were:
* 1472-1504 : Abu Abd Allah al-Sheikh Muhammad ibn Yahya
* 1504-1526 : Abu Abd Allah al-Burtuqali Muhammad ibn Muhammad
* 1526-1526 : Abu al-Hasan Abu Hasan Ali ibn Muhammad
* 1526-1545 : Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Muhammad
* 1545-1547 : Nasir ad-Din al-Qasri Muhammad ibn Ahmad
* 1547-1549 : Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Muhammad
* 1554-1554 : Abu al-Hasan Abu Hasun Ali ibn Muhammad
Banu Wattas see Wattasids
Waṭāsīyūn see Wattasids
Wattassids see Wattasids
Banu Watas see Wattasids
Wattasids (Wattassids) (Waṭāsīyūn) (Banu Wattas) (Banu Watas). Moroccan dynasty (r.1428-1547 [1554?]). In the thirteenth century, the Banu Wattas established themselves in the Rif of eastern Morocco. They became practically independent rulers when their relatives, the Marinids (Merinids), had replaced the Almohads. Their history is at first linked with that of the Marinids and afterwards closely connected with the Christian attempts to conquer territory in Morocco and with the accession of the Sa‘di Sharifs. The descendants of a branch of the nomadic Zanata on the northern edge of the Sahara, who settled in eastern Morocco and the Rif from the 13th century. Having come to prominence under their relatives, the Merinids, as viziers and governors they took over the regency for the Merinid child sultans (r. 1358-1374 and 1393-1458).
The founder of the dynasty Abu Zakariyya’ Yahya (r. 1428-1448) took control of Morocco as vizier after it had lapsed into anarchy following the assassination of the Marinid Abu Sa‘id ‘Uthman III (r. 1399-1420). He fought successfully the Portuguese who had landed on the Moroccan coasts. His son ‘Ali, however, could not prevent the fall of al-Qasr al-Saghir, and the third Wattasid vizier, Yahya, was assassinated in 1458 with most of his family. All but two brothers were slaughtered during the massacre. The last Marinid ruler Abu Muhammad ‘Abd al-Haqq II (r.1428-1465) then tried to govern directly, but he was killed in 1465. The surviving Wattasid Muhammad al-Sheikh al-Mahdi (Muhammad I al-Shaykh) (r.1472-1505), in Arzila since 1465, from his base there seized power in Fez in 1472 and installed his family’s rule.
In 1472, the Wattasid Muhammad I al-Shaykh was able to take Fez, now under Idrisid government, and was proclaimed sultan. His successors, Muhammad al-Burtugali (r. 1505-1524) and Abu’l-Abbas Ahmad (r. 1524-1550), had to struggle against the invading Portuguese and Spanish, to whom they lost broad coastal territories, and also against the advancing Sadites in the south. The last Wattasid ruler fell in 1554 during the fight against the Sadites.
The Wattassids were an Amazigh dynasty of Morocco. They followed the Marinids and were followed by the Saadis.
Like the Marinids, they were of Berber Zenata descent. The two families were related, and the Marinids recruited many viziers from the Wattasids. These viziers assumed the powers of the Sultans, seizing power when the last Marinid, Abu Muhammad Abd al-Haqq, who had massacred many of the Wattasids in 1459, was murdered during a popular revolt in Fez in 1465.
Abu Abd Allah al-Sheikh Muhammad ibn Yahya al-Mahdi was the first Wattasid Sultan, but controlled only the northern part of Morocco as the Wattasid sultanate, the south being dominated by the Saadi dynasty.
The Wattasids were finally replaced by the Saadis in 1554.
The Wattasid viziers were:
* 1420-1448 : Abu Zakariya Yahya
* 1448-1458 : Ali ibn Yusuf
* 1458-1459 : Yahya ibn Abi Zakariya Yahya
The Wattasid sultans were:
* 1472-1504 : Abu Abd Allah al-Sheikh Muhammad ibn Yahya
* 1504-1526 : Abu Abd Allah al-Burtuqali Muhammad ibn Muhammad
* 1526-1526 : Abu al-Hasan Abu Hasan Ali ibn Muhammad
* 1526-1545 : Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Muhammad
* 1545-1547 : Nasir ad-Din al-Qasri Muhammad ibn Ahmad
* 1547-1549 : Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Muhammad
* 1554-1554 : Abu al-Hasan Abu Hasun Ali ibn Muhammad
Banu Wattas see Wattasids
Waṭāsīyūn see Wattasids
Wattassids see Wattasids
Banu Watas see Wattasids
Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Watwat, Rashid al-Din (Rashid al-Din Watwat) (Rashid al-Din Vatvat) (Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt) (d. 1182). Persian poet. He left a Persian translation of the 100 sayings of ‘Ali, and a treatise on rhetoric.
Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt was a 12th century royal panegyrist and epistolographer of Persia.
Serving at the court of Khwarazmshah Kings, he is not to be mistaken for a later physician by the name Amin al-Din Rashid al-Din Vatvat.
He also composed qasidehs, but his rhetorical work Hadā'iq 'us-sihr ("The Gardens of Magic") is in prose.
Rashid al-Din Watwat see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Rashid al-Din Vatvat see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Watwat, Rashid al-Din (Rashid al-Din Watwat) (Rashid al-Din Vatvat) (Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt) (d. 1182). Persian poet. He left a Persian translation of the 100 sayings of ‘Ali, and a treatise on rhetoric.
Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt was a 12th century royal panegyrist and epistolographer of Persia.
Serving at the court of Khwarazmshah Kings, he is not to be mistaken for a later physician by the name Amin al-Din Rashid al-Din Vatvat.
He also composed qasidehs, but his rhetorical work Hadā'iq 'us-sihr ("The Gardens of Magic") is in prose.
Rashid al-Din Watwat see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Rashid al-Din Muhammad Umar-i Vatvāt see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Rashid al-Din Vatvat see Watwat, Rashid al-Din
Wayto
Wayto (Weyto). The Wayto of Lake Tana in north central Ethiopia are one of the rare remnants of the pre-agricultural African peoples (hunters, gatherers and fishermen) and constitute one of the few instances in the world of Muslim hunters. They live in scattered settlements on the Tana shore and dispersed among Amhara peoples further inland. Wayto in both locations may total as many as 2,000, but they are constantly “passing” and disappearing into the society of the Amhara peoples, the dominant people of Ethiopia. They spoke their own indigenous language and possessed an aboriginal religion in the late eighteenth century, but since at least the mid-nineteenth century the Wayto speak only Amharic (an Ethno-Semitic language) and profess to be Muslims.
The Weyto people were a group of hippopotamus hunters who once spoke the Weyto language. They lived in Ethiopia near Lake Tana. They were never a large community, but they were not always endangered. Their language is now an extinct language. Ninety-three percent (93%) of these people speak Amharic, the dominating language. Since Weyto has been extinct for quite some time, it is little known and considered an unclassified language.
Weyto see Wayto
Wayto (Weyto). The Wayto of Lake Tana in north central Ethiopia are one of the rare remnants of the pre-agricultural African peoples (hunters, gatherers and fishermen) and constitute one of the few instances in the world of Muslim hunters. They live in scattered settlements on the Tana shore and dispersed among Amhara peoples further inland. Wayto in both locations may total as many as 2,000, but they are constantly “passing” and disappearing into the society of the Amhara peoples, the dominant people of Ethiopia. They spoke their own indigenous language and possessed an aboriginal religion in the late eighteenth century, but since at least the mid-nineteenth century the Wayto speak only Amharic (an Ethno-Semitic language) and profess to be Muslims.
The Weyto people were a group of hippopotamus hunters who once spoke the Weyto language. They lived in Ethiopia near Lake Tana. They were never a large community, but they were not always endangered. Their language is now an extinct language. Ninety-three percent (93%) of these people speak Amharic, the dominating language. Since Weyto has been extinct for quite some time, it is little known and considered an unclassified language.
Weyto see Wayto
Wehbi, Sayyid
Wehbi, Sayyid (Sayyid Wehbi) (d. 1736). Ottoman Turkish poet. With Ahmed Nedim (d. 1730), Mehmed Emin Beligh (d. 1729) and ‘Abd al-Razzag Newres, he is reckoned among the most important representatives of the romantic group in the reign of Sultan Ahmed III.
Sayyid Wehbi see Wehbi, Sayyid
Wehbi, Sayyid (Sayyid Wehbi) (d. 1736). Ottoman Turkish poet. With Ahmed Nedim (d. 1730), Mehmed Emin Beligh (d. 1729) and ‘Abd al-Razzag Newres, he is reckoned among the most important representatives of the romantic group in the reign of Sultan Ahmed III.
Sayyid Wehbi see Wehbi, Sayyid
Wejihi, Husayn
Wejihi, Husayn (Husayn Wejihi) (d.1660). Ottoman poet and historian from the Crimea. His history comprises the years 1637 to 1656.
Husayn Wejihi see Wejihi, Husayn
Wejihi, Husayn (Husayn Wejihi) (d.1660). Ottoman poet and historian from the Crimea. His history comprises the years 1637 to 1656.
Husayn Wejihi see Wejihi, Husayn
Weysi
Weysi (Uways ibn Mehmed). Ottoman scholar and poet. He was one of the best prose writers of his time, using a particularly fine persianizing style. He wrote a biography of the Prophet, which only comes down to the battle of Badr.
Uways ibn Mehmed see Weysi
Weysi (Uways ibn Mehmed). Ottoman scholar and poet. He was one of the best prose writers of his time, using a particularly fine persianizing style. He wrote a biography of the Prophet, which only comes down to the battle of Badr.
Uways ibn Mehmed see Weysi
Widodo, Joko
Joko Widodo (b. June 21, 1961) is an Indonesian politician who became the governor of Jakarta. He was often better known by his nickname Jokowi. He was previously the mayor of Surakarta (often also known as Solo in Indonesia). He was nominated by his party, the Indonesian Democratic Party - Struggle (PDI-P), to run in the 2012 Jakarta gubernatorial election with Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (often known as Ahok) as his running mate. He was elected governor of Jakarta on September 20, 2012 after a second round runoff election in which he defeated the incumbent governor Fauzi Bowo. Jokowi's win was widely seen as reflecting popular voter support for "new" or "clean" leaders rather than the "old" style of politics in Indonesia, even though Jokowi was over 50 years old at the time.
Joko Widodo (b. June 21, 1961) is an Indonesian politician who became the governor of Jakarta. He was often better known by his nickname Jokowi. He was previously the mayor of Surakarta (often also known as Solo in Indonesia). He was nominated by his party, the Indonesian Democratic Party - Struggle (PDI-P), to run in the 2012 Jakarta gubernatorial election with Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (often known as Ahok) as his running mate. He was elected governor of Jakarta on September 20, 2012 after a second round runoff election in which he defeated the incumbent governor Fauzi Bowo. Jokowi's win was widely seen as reflecting popular voter support for "new" or "clean" leaders rather than the "old" style of politics in Indonesia, even though Jokowi was over 50 years old at the time.
Jokowi's popularity rose sharply after his election to the high-profile position of governor of Jakarta in 2012. During 2013 and early 2014, he was seen as a potential PDI-P candidate for the Indonesian presidential election in 2014.
Wilopo
Wilopo (b. 1908/1909, Purworejo, Central Java, Dutch East Indies - b. 1981). Indonesian nationalist politician. Wilopo trained as a lawyer and was active in both Taman Siswa and the nationalist Partindo and Gerindo. He helped found the postwar Partai Nasional Indonesia (PNI) and was a leading figure on its liberal-socialist wing. He was minister in the Hatta and Sukiman cabinets and from April 1952 to August 1953 headed a PNI-Masjumi coalition government that introduced austerity measures in the army and bureaucracy, prompting army sponsored agitation in October 1952 for the dissolution of Parliament. His cabinet fell over its handling of the shooting of squatters being removed by police from Dutch estates in East Sumatra.
Wilopo served as prime minister of Indonesia from April 1952 to August 1953.
Wilopo (b. 1908/1909, Purworejo, Central Java, Dutch East Indies - b. 1981). Indonesian nationalist politician. Wilopo trained as a lawyer and was active in both Taman Siswa and the nationalist Partindo and Gerindo. He helped found the postwar Partai Nasional Indonesia (PNI) and was a leading figure on its liberal-socialist wing. He was minister in the Hatta and Sukiman cabinets and from April 1952 to August 1953 headed a PNI-Masjumi coalition government that introduced austerity measures in the army and bureaucracy, prompting army sponsored agitation in October 1952 for the dissolution of Parliament. His cabinet fell over its handling of the shooting of squatters being removed by police from Dutch estates in East Sumatra.
Wilopo served as prime minister of Indonesia from April 1952 to August 1953.
Wolof
Wolof (Ouolof). Ethnic group and language of Senegal that became the principal national language of Senegal. The Wolof inhabit Senegambia in West Africa, from the river Senegal in the north to the river Gambia in the south. They form thirty-six percent of the population of Senegal and fifteen percent of the population of Gambia. The region is ethnically mixed and also includes Mandinka (Soose), Fulani (Fulbe) and Serer. The Wolof are the dominant element in the former states of Waalo (Oualo), Kahoor (Kayor), Jolof, Baol, Sin (Sine) and Saalum (Saloum) and were already occupying this portion of West Africa when the first Portuguese voyagers reached the coast in the middle of the fifteenth century.
Practically all Wolof are Muslim, with a small number of Christian Wolof found mainly in the coastal cities (Dakar, Goree, Banjul). Islam came to northern Senegal about the eleventh century, and the early Portuguese travellers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries mention that most Wolof rulers, even though they generally followed traditional ways, had religious teachers at their courts. One of the functions of such men was to provide supernatural protection against evil forces -- malicious spirits, witchcraft and the evil eye. However, Islam was slow in reaching the mass of the people, and Muslim converts often had to form separate communities of their own. It was not until the religious wars of the nineteenth century, particularly as a result of the jihad of El Hadj Omar, who was followed by such warriors as Ma Ba in southern Senegal, that widespread conversion took place. Muslim religious leaders were then engaged in a struggle both with traditional rulers, who were opposed to this new threat to their power, as well as with the French. Ironically, though the French were opposed to the expansion of Islam, the period of peace and improved communications that followed the success of the French conquest enabled religious teachers to move more freely, and Islam spread rapidly and widely. A Wolof usually belongs to one the three main brotherhoods: Tijani (brought by El Hadj Omar), to which about sixty percent of the Wolof owe allegiance; Mouridism, which includes thirty percent of the Wolof (a group founded by Ahmadou Bamba at Touba, where there is now one of the largest mosques in sub-Saharan Africa and which has become the center of an important annual pilgrimage); and Qadiri, to which about ten percent belong.
The Wolof are a Muslim people of Senegal and The Gambia who speak the Wolof language of the Atlantic branch of the Niger-Congo language family.
The typical rural community is small (about 100 persons). Most Wolof are farmers, growing peanuts (groundnuts) as a cash crop and millet and sorghum as staples. Many, however, live and work in Dakar and Banjul as traders, goldsmiths, tailors, carpenters, teachers, and civil servants. Traditional groups were characterized by a markedly hierarchical social stratification, including royalty, an aristocracy, a warrior class, commoners, slaves, and members of low-status artisan castes. At their head was a paramount chief.
In the past, the Wolof observed double descent; i.e., descent was traced through both the male and female lines. Islamic influence, however, has tended to make the male line dominant. A household unit may consist of a nuclear family (husband, wife, and minor children) or a polygynous family (a husband, his several wives, and their children). Other close kin, however, may sometimes be found together with the nuclear family. Wolof women are renowned for their elaborate hairstyles, abundant gold ornaments, and voluminous dresses.
Wolof (Ouolof). Ethnic group and language of Senegal that became the principal national language of Senegal. The Wolof inhabit Senegambia in West Africa, from the river Senegal in the north to the river Gambia in the south. They form thirty-six percent of the population of Senegal and fifteen percent of the population of Gambia. The region is ethnically mixed and also includes Mandinka (Soose), Fulani (Fulbe) and Serer. The Wolof are the dominant element in the former states of Waalo (Oualo), Kahoor (Kayor), Jolof, Baol, Sin (Sine) and Saalum (Saloum) and were already occupying this portion of West Africa when the first Portuguese voyagers reached the coast in the middle of the fifteenth century.
Practically all Wolof are Muslim, with a small number of Christian Wolof found mainly in the coastal cities (Dakar, Goree, Banjul). Islam came to northern Senegal about the eleventh century, and the early Portuguese travellers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries mention that most Wolof rulers, even though they generally followed traditional ways, had religious teachers at their courts. One of the functions of such men was to provide supernatural protection against evil forces -- malicious spirits, witchcraft and the evil eye. However, Islam was slow in reaching the mass of the people, and Muslim converts often had to form separate communities of their own. It was not until the religious wars of the nineteenth century, particularly as a result of the jihad of El Hadj Omar, who was followed by such warriors as Ma Ba in southern Senegal, that widespread conversion took place. Muslim religious leaders were then engaged in a struggle both with traditional rulers, who were opposed to this new threat to their power, as well as with the French. Ironically, though the French were opposed to the expansion of Islam, the period of peace and improved communications that followed the success of the French conquest enabled religious teachers to move more freely, and Islam spread rapidly and widely. A Wolof usually belongs to one the three main brotherhoods: Tijani (brought by El Hadj Omar), to which about sixty percent of the Wolof owe allegiance; Mouridism, which includes thirty percent of the Wolof (a group founded by Ahmadou Bamba at Touba, where there is now one of the largest mosques in sub-Saharan Africa and which has become the center of an important annual pilgrimage); and Qadiri, to which about ten percent belong.
The Wolof are a Muslim people of Senegal and The Gambia who speak the Wolof language of the Atlantic branch of the Niger-Congo language family.
The typical rural community is small (about 100 persons). Most Wolof are farmers, growing peanuts (groundnuts) as a cash crop and millet and sorghum as staples. Many, however, live and work in Dakar and Banjul as traders, goldsmiths, tailors, carpenters, teachers, and civil servants. Traditional groups were characterized by a markedly hierarchical social stratification, including royalty, an aristocracy, a warrior class, commoners, slaves, and members of low-status artisan castes. At their head was a paramount chief.
In the past, the Wolof observed double descent; i.e., descent was traced through both the male and female lines. Islamic influence, however, has tended to make the male line dominant. A household unit may consist of a nuclear family (husband, wife, and minor children) or a polygynous family (a husband, his several wives, and their children). Other close kin, however, may sometimes be found together with the nuclear family. Wolof women are renowned for their elaborate hairstyles, abundant gold ornaments, and voluminous dresses.
Woman’s Action Forum
Woman’s Action Forum (WAF) (Khavatin Mahaz-i 'Amal). Formed in 1981 in response to th government of Pakistan’s implementation of an Islamic penal code, the Women’s Action Forum (WAF; Khavatin Mahaz-i ‘Amal) sought the strengthening of women’s position in society. Members feared that many of the proposed laws being put forward by the martial law government of General Zia ul-Haq might be discriminatory against women and compromise their civil status, as they had seen with the promulgation of the Hudud Ordinances in 1979 when women were indicted after having been raped. Women, most from elite families, banded together on the principal of collective leadership in the three major cities of Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad to formulate policy statements and engage in political action to safeguard women’s legal position.
In its charter, the WAF asserts that it is “committed to protecting and promoting the rights of women by countering all forms of oppression” by being a consciousness-raising group and acting as a lobby and pressure group, in order to create a heightened awareness of women’s rights and mobilize support for promoting these rights and “counter adverse propaganda against women.” The WAF has played a central role in the public exposure of the controversy regarding various interpretations of Islamic law, its role in a modern state, and ways in which women can play a more active role in political matters.
The WAF’s first major political action was in early 1983 when members in Lahore and Karachi openly marched in protest against the Majlis-i Shura’s (Consultative Assembly) recommendation to President Zia that he promulgate the Qanun-i Shahadat (Law of Evidence). As initially proposed, the law would require oral testimony and attestation of either two male witnesses or that of one male and two females; the witness of two or more females without corroboration by a male would not be sufficient, and no testimony by a woman would be admissible in the most severe hudud cases (cases that require mandatory punishments for crimes against Allah) as stipulated in the sunnah. A revised evidence law, eventually promulgated in October 1984 following nearly two years of protests, modifies the one previously enacted during the British Raj.
WAF members used Islamic precepts as the basis of their protest. They argued that the proposed Qanun-i Shahadat was not the only acceptable evidence law in Islam, and that there is only one instance in the Qur’an (see Sura 2:282) in which two women are called to testify in the place of one man. But, they contended, the latter was in regard to a specific financial matter and the role of the second woman was to remind the first about points that she may have forgotten. The intent (niyah) of the law must be taken into consideration, as it was initially intended to help women and not discriminate against them. The protesters claimed that criteria for witnesses as stated in the Qur’an are possession of sight, memory and the ability to communicate; as long as witnesses have these, testimony should be equally weighed regardless of gender. They also argued that the rigid interpretation of the Qur’an that would support the Qanun-i Shahadat (reading “male” for the generic word “man”) would virtually exclude women from being members of the religion. Opponents of the evidence law also feared that women might be restricted from testifying in certain kinds of hudud cases at all, such as when a woman is the sole witness to her father’s or husband’s murder.
The final adopted version restricts to financial cases the testimony of two women being equal to that of one man. In other instances, acceptance of a single woman’s testimony has been left to the discretion of the judge. Even though the final evidence law was modified substantially from the initial proposal, the WAF held the position that the state’s declaring a woman’s evidence in financial cases unequal to that of a man’s would constrain women’s economic participation and was symbolic of an ideological perspective that could not perceive women as equal economic participants with men. They argued that for the first time in Pakistan’s history, the laws regard men and women as having different legal rights, and, despite the rhetoric that such laws were being promulgated to protect women, they were indeed constraining women’s power and participation in the larger society.
At protests in Lahore and Karachi in February 1983, women demonstrators were attacked by police, prompting much public outcry. The WAF’s lawyers countered the martial law government’s actions on Islamic grounds by claiming that the police, as unrelated men, had no right to physically touch the protesting women.
In fall 1983, the WAF and other women’s groups organized demonstrations throughout the country to protest both the Qanun-i Shahadat andt eh public flogging of women. The following year, in 1984, the now separate WAF groups mounted a campaign against the promulgation of the proposed Qisas and Diyat (Retaliation and Blood Money) Ordinance, which stated tht the compensation to the family of a female victim be only half that given to the family of a male victim.
In the aftermath of the lifting of martial law in December 1985, the WAF became instrumental in organizing protests (which included nearly thirty other groups) in the wake of the debate over the Shariat Bill and the Ninth Amendment. WAF argued that in their proposed forms, both negated principles of justice, democracy, and fundamental rights of citizens, and that their passage would give rise to sectarianism and serve to divide the nation. The remaining years of the Zia regime (until fall 1988) found WAF members focused on protesting against the Ninth Amendment, instituting legal aid cells for indigent women, opposing the gendered segregation of universities, and playing an active role in condemning the growing incidents of violence against women and bringing them to the attention of the public.
During the tenure of Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party’s first government (December 1988 - August 1990), the WAF was faced with the difficult task of transforming itself from a protest movement based on a collective moral conscience to an advocate, lobbying a more sympathetic government. With the displacement of that government, it then focused its activities on three goals: to secure women’s political representation in the parliament; to work to raise women’s consciousness, particularly in the realm of family planning; and to counter suppression and raise public awareness by taking stands and issuing statements on events as they occur.
Women's Action Forum (WAF) is a women's rights organization and has a presence in several cities in Pakistan. It is a non-partisan, non-hierarchical and non-funded organization. It is supportive of all aspects of women's rights and related issues, irrespective of political affiliations, belief system, or ethnicity.
Women's Action Forum came into being in Karachi in September 1981. The following year, the Lahore and then the Islamabad Chapters were formed. Some years later, the Peshawar chapter came into being. And in May 2008, a Chapter of WAF started in Hyderabad, in the Province of Sindh.
Women's Action Forum engaged in active lobbying and advocacy on behalf of women in Pakistan. It held demonstrations and public-awareness campaigns. It was committed to a just and peaceful society based on democracy. The issues picked up by WAF have included challenging discriminatory legislation against women, the invisibility of women in government plans and policies, the exclusion of women from media, sports and cultural activities, dress codes for women, violence against women and the seclusion of women. WAF's activism has led to the birth of many women's rights groups and resource centers thereby increasing its outreach. WAF considers all issues as "women's issues" and has taken positions on national and global developments. It allies itself with democratic and progressive forces in the country as well as linking its struggle with that of minorities and other oppressed peoples.
WAF see Woman’s Action Forum
Khavatin Mahaz-i 'Amal see Woman’s Action Forum
Woman’s Action Forum (WAF) (Khavatin Mahaz-i 'Amal). Formed in 1981 in response to th government of Pakistan’s implementation of an Islamic penal code, the Women’s Action Forum (WAF; Khavatin Mahaz-i ‘Amal) sought the strengthening of women’s position in society. Members feared that many of the proposed laws being put forward by the martial law government of General Zia ul-Haq might be discriminatory against women and compromise their civil status, as they had seen with the promulgation of the Hudud Ordinances in 1979 when women were indicted after having been raped. Women, most from elite families, banded together on the principal of collective leadership in the three major cities of Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad to formulate policy statements and engage in political action to safeguard women’s legal position.
In its charter, the WAF asserts that it is “committed to protecting and promoting the rights of women by countering all forms of oppression” by being a consciousness-raising group and acting as a lobby and pressure group, in order to create a heightened awareness of women’s rights and mobilize support for promoting these rights and “counter adverse propaganda against women.” The WAF has played a central role in the public exposure of the controversy regarding various interpretations of Islamic law, its role in a modern state, and ways in which women can play a more active role in political matters.
The WAF’s first major political action was in early 1983 when members in Lahore and Karachi openly marched in protest against the Majlis-i Shura’s (Consultative Assembly) recommendation to President Zia that he promulgate the Qanun-i Shahadat (Law of Evidence). As initially proposed, the law would require oral testimony and attestation of either two male witnesses or that of one male and two females; the witness of two or more females without corroboration by a male would not be sufficient, and no testimony by a woman would be admissible in the most severe hudud cases (cases that require mandatory punishments for crimes against Allah) as stipulated in the sunnah. A revised evidence law, eventually promulgated in October 1984 following nearly two years of protests, modifies the one previously enacted during the British Raj.
WAF members used Islamic precepts as the basis of their protest. They argued that the proposed Qanun-i Shahadat was not the only acceptable evidence law in Islam, and that there is only one instance in the Qur’an (see Sura 2:282) in which two women are called to testify in the place of one man. But, they contended, the latter was in regard to a specific financial matter and the role of the second woman was to remind the first about points that she may have forgotten. The intent (niyah) of the law must be taken into consideration, as it was initially intended to help women and not discriminate against them. The protesters claimed that criteria for witnesses as stated in the Qur’an are possession of sight, memory and the ability to communicate; as long as witnesses have these, testimony should be equally weighed regardless of gender. They also argued that the rigid interpretation of the Qur’an that would support the Qanun-i Shahadat (reading “male” for the generic word “man”) would virtually exclude women from being members of the religion. Opponents of the evidence law also feared that women might be restricted from testifying in certain kinds of hudud cases at all, such as when a woman is the sole witness to her father’s or husband’s murder.
The final adopted version restricts to financial cases the testimony of two women being equal to that of one man. In other instances, acceptance of a single woman’s testimony has been left to the discretion of the judge. Even though the final evidence law was modified substantially from the initial proposal, the WAF held the position that the state’s declaring a woman’s evidence in financial cases unequal to that of a man’s would constrain women’s economic participation and was symbolic of an ideological perspective that could not perceive women as equal economic participants with men. They argued that for the first time in Pakistan’s history, the laws regard men and women as having different legal rights, and, despite the rhetoric that such laws were being promulgated to protect women, they were indeed constraining women’s power and participation in the larger society.
At protests in Lahore and Karachi in February 1983, women demonstrators were attacked by police, prompting much public outcry. The WAF’s lawyers countered the martial law government’s actions on Islamic grounds by claiming that the police, as unrelated men, had no right to physically touch the protesting women.
In fall 1983, the WAF and other women’s groups organized demonstrations throughout the country to protest both the Qanun-i Shahadat andt eh public flogging of women. The following year, in 1984, the now separate WAF groups mounted a campaign against the promulgation of the proposed Qisas and Diyat (Retaliation and Blood Money) Ordinance, which stated tht the compensation to the family of a female victim be only half that given to the family of a male victim.
In the aftermath of the lifting of martial law in December 1985, the WAF became instrumental in organizing protests (which included nearly thirty other groups) in the wake of the debate over the Shariat Bill and the Ninth Amendment. WAF argued that in their proposed forms, both negated principles of justice, democracy, and fundamental rights of citizens, and that their passage would give rise to sectarianism and serve to divide the nation. The remaining years of the Zia regime (until fall 1988) found WAF members focused on protesting against the Ninth Amendment, instituting legal aid cells for indigent women, opposing the gendered segregation of universities, and playing an active role in condemning the growing incidents of violence against women and bringing them to the attention of the public.
During the tenure of Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party’s first government (December 1988 - August 1990), the WAF was faced with the difficult task of transforming itself from a protest movement based on a collective moral conscience to an advocate, lobbying a more sympathetic government. With the displacement of that government, it then focused its activities on three goals: to secure women’s political representation in the parliament; to work to raise women’s consciousness, particularly in the realm of family planning; and to counter suppression and raise public awareness by taking stands and issuing statements on events as they occur.
Women's Action Forum (WAF) is a women's rights organization and has a presence in several cities in Pakistan. It is a non-partisan, non-hierarchical and non-funded organization. It is supportive of all aspects of women's rights and related issues, irrespective of political affiliations, belief system, or ethnicity.
Women's Action Forum came into being in Karachi in September 1981. The following year, the Lahore and then the Islamabad Chapters were formed. Some years later, the Peshawar chapter came into being. And in May 2008, a Chapter of WAF started in Hyderabad, in the Province of Sindh.
Women's Action Forum engaged in active lobbying and advocacy on behalf of women in Pakistan. It held demonstrations and public-awareness campaigns. It was committed to a just and peaceful society based on democracy. The issues picked up by WAF have included challenging discriminatory legislation against women, the invisibility of women in government plans and policies, the exclusion of women from media, sports and cultural activities, dress codes for women, violence against women and the seclusion of women. WAF's activism has led to the birth of many women's rights groups and resource centers thereby increasing its outreach. WAF considers all issues as "women's issues" and has taken positions on national and global developments. It allies itself with democratic and progressive forces in the country as well as linking its struggle with that of minorities and other oppressed peoples.
WAF see Woman’s Action Forum
Khavatin Mahaz-i 'Amal see Woman’s Action Forum
Women in Islam
Women in Islam. The revelation of Muhammad that gave rise to Islam called for a massive restructuring of the social order. In Islam’s early years this effectively improved the status of women, placing new restraints on divorce and polygamy and requiring husbands to support their wives, as well as bringing women the right to inherit and retain control of their dowries. The Qur’an still taught, nonetheless, that “men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other.” {See Sura 4:34.}
To temper the dangers of sexual attraction and also to protect women followers of the faith from insult, the Qur’an called for modesty in the form of covering one’s inner dress and ornaments in public. In time, however, and under pressure of local custom, such teachings were cited to justify demands that women be veiled from head to foot in public. In some regions, and especially among the upper social classes, women were totally secluded in the home.
Muslim popular culture also preserved strict menstrual taboos; among other prohibitions, these excluded from the mosques both menstruating women and those who had recently given birth. Menstrual taboos also closed to women some religious offices, such as that of imam, or prayer leader.
As in Christianity, and in many other new religions that challenge repressive establishments, women such as Khadija and ‘A’isha were very prominent in the early Muslim community. In later centuries, some women became prominent scholars.
Women such as the mystic poetess Rabia were important to the Sufi orders. Indeed, a number of Sufi orders even had women’s branches and convents from very early times. Even though largely restricted to the home, many women of traditional Muslim countries have elaborated their own religious networks and practices, transmitting religious instruction and holding gatherings in their homes.
The study of women in Islam investigates the role status of women within the religion of Islam. The complex relationship between women and Islam is defined by both Islamic texts and the history and culture of the Muslim world.
Sharia (Islamic law) provides for differences between women's and men's roles, rights, and obligations. Majority Muslim countries give women varying degrees of rights without regards to marriage, divorce, civil rights, legal status, dress code, and education based on different interpretations. Scholars and other commentators vary as to whether they are just and whether they are a correct interpretation of religious imperatives. Conservatives argue that differences between men and women are due to different status while liberal Muslims, Muslim feminists, and others argue in favor of other interpretations. Despite the obstacles, some women have achieved high political office in Muslim majority states.
Women in Islam. The revelation of Muhammad that gave rise to Islam called for a massive restructuring of the social order. In Islam’s early years this effectively improved the status of women, placing new restraints on divorce and polygamy and requiring husbands to support their wives, as well as bringing women the right to inherit and retain control of their dowries. The Qur’an still taught, nonetheless, that “men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other.” {See Sura 4:34.}
To temper the dangers of sexual attraction and also to protect women followers of the faith from insult, the Qur’an called for modesty in the form of covering one’s inner dress and ornaments in public. In time, however, and under pressure of local custom, such teachings were cited to justify demands that women be veiled from head to foot in public. In some regions, and especially among the upper social classes, women were totally secluded in the home.
Muslim popular culture also preserved strict menstrual taboos; among other prohibitions, these excluded from the mosques both menstruating women and those who had recently given birth. Menstrual taboos also closed to women some religious offices, such as that of imam, or prayer leader.
As in Christianity, and in many other new religions that challenge repressive establishments, women such as Khadija and ‘A’isha were very prominent in the early Muslim community. In later centuries, some women became prominent scholars.
Women such as the mystic poetess Rabia were important to the Sufi orders. Indeed, a number of Sufi orders even had women’s branches and convents from very early times. Even though largely restricted to the home, many women of traditional Muslim countries have elaborated their own religious networks and practices, transmitting religious instruction and holding gatherings in their homes.
The study of women in Islam investigates the role status of women within the religion of Islam. The complex relationship between women and Islam is defined by both Islamic texts and the history and culture of the Muslim world.
Sharia (Islamic law) provides for differences between women's and men's roles, rights, and obligations. Majority Muslim countries give women varying degrees of rights without regards to marriage, divorce, civil rights, legal status, dress code, and education based on different interpretations. Scholars and other commentators vary as to whether they are just and whether they are a correct interpretation of religious imperatives. Conservatives argue that differences between men and women are due to different status while liberal Muslims, Muslim feminists, and others argue in favor of other interpretations. Despite the obstacles, some women have achieved high political office in Muslim majority states.
Xangoline
Xangoline. Muslim saint honored by Hausa slaves in Brazil.
Xangoline. Muslim saint honored by Hausa slaves in Brazil.
Yafi‘i, ‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al-
Yafi‘i, ‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al- (‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al-Yafi‘i) (1300-1367). Sufi author from Yemen. He compiled several biographical works on the lives of saints and Sufis.
'Abd Allah ibn As'ad al-Yafi'i see Yafi‘i, ‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al-
Yafi‘i, ‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al- (‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al-Yafi‘i) (1300-1367). Sufi author from Yemen. He compiled several biographical works on the lives of saints and Sufis.
'Abd Allah ibn As'ad al-Yafi'i see Yafi‘i, ‘Abd Allah ibn As‘ad al-
Ya‘furids
Ya‘furids (Hiwalids). Name of a dynasty which ruled in San‘a’ from 861 until the beginning of the tenth century. It was founded by Ya‘fur ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Hiwali.
Hiwalids see Ya‘furids
Ya‘furids (Hiwalids). Name of a dynasty which ruled in San‘a’ from 861 until the beginning of the tenth century. It was founded by Ya‘fur ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Hiwali.
Hiwalids see Ya‘furids
Yaghma Jandaqi
Yaghma Jandaqi (Abu’l-Hasan Rahim ibn Hajji Ibrahim Quli) (1782-1859). Persian poet. He wrote funeral chants and slanderous and obscene satires.
Jandaqi, Yaghma see Yaghma Jandaqi
Abu’l-Hasan Rahim ibn Hajji Ibrahim Quli see Yaghma Jandaqi
Yaghma Jandaqi (Abu’l-Hasan Rahim ibn Hajji Ibrahim Quli) (1782-1859). Persian poet. He wrote funeral chants and slanderous and obscene satires.
Jandaqi, Yaghma see Yaghma Jandaqi
Abu’l-Hasan Rahim ibn Hajji Ibrahim Quli see Yaghma Jandaqi
Yahya
Yahya (d. 1572). Turkish poet of Albanian origin. In Istanbul, he became a bitter enemy of the court poet Khayali Bey and wrote a satirical lament upon the Grand Vizier Rustem Pasha.
Yahya (d. 1572). Turkish poet of Albanian origin. In Istanbul, he became a bitter enemy of the court poet Khayali Bey and wrote a satirical lament upon the Grand Vizier Rustem Pasha.
Yahya ibn Adam ibn Sulayman
Yahya ibn Adam ibn Sulayman (757-818). Muslim student of religion from Kufa. He was primarily a traditionist and legist, and wrote a work on land tax (in Arabic, kharaj).
Yahya ibn Adam ibn Sulayman (757-818). Muslim student of religion from Kufa. He was primarily a traditionist and legist, and wrote a work on land tax (in Arabic, kharaj).
Yahya ibn ‘Ali
Yahya ibn ‘Ali (856-912). One of the best known theorists of music of the old Arabian school. His grandfather Yahya ibn Abi Mansur al-Munajjim (d. 831) was the famous astronomer at the court of the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Ma’mun, and his father ‘Ali ibn Yahya ibn Abi Mansur and his uncle Muhammad has particular skill in music. He wrote a Treatise on Music.
Yahya ibn ‘Ali (856-912). One of the best known theorists of music of the old Arabian school. His grandfather Yahya ibn Abi Mansur al-Munajjim (d. 831) was the famous astronomer at the court of the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Ma’mun, and his father ‘Ali ibn Yahya ibn Abi Mansur and his uncle Muhammad has particular skill in music. He wrote a Treatise on Music.
Yahya ibn Khalid
Yahya ibn Khalid (d. 805/806). Member of the Barmakid family. He was imprisoned by the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Hadi, but the Caliph Harun al-Rashid, whose tutor he had been, appointed him as vizier with unlimited power. In 803, his son Ja‘far ibn Yahya, the favorite of Harun al-Rashid, was suddenly executed, and Yahya imprisoned until his death.
Yahya ibn Khalid was a member of the powerful Persian Barmakids family, son of Khalid ibn Barmak. Around 765, he was appointed to Azerbaijan by the Caliph Al-Mansur. Yahya's son Al-Fadl was born at Ar-Reiy, at the same time as Caliph al-Mahdi's son Harun. Al-Mahdi entrusted Yahya in 778 with Harun's education.
When Al-Hadi was Caliph, Yahya dissuaded the Caliph several times from proclaiming his own son as heir instead of Harun. He eventually did so, and cast Yahya into jail, but died shortly afterwards. When Harun became Caliph as Harun al-Rashid, he made Yahya Vizier.
Under his influence, the Caliph invited to Baghdad many scholars and masters from India, especially Buddhists. A catalog of both Muslim and non-Muslim texts prepared at this time, Kitab al-Fihrist, included a list of Buddhist works. Among them was an Arabic version of the account of Buddha’s previous lives, Kitab al-Budd.
He had three sons, among which Jafar succeeded him as Vizier, Musa ruled Damascus, and Fadl was governor of Khurasan, then of Egypt.
In 803, his family fell into disgrace, and he was cast into prison, where he died in 806 (according to the story, because his son Jafar had an affair with Harun al-Rashid's sister, but most likely because the family had too much power).
Yahya ibn Khalid (d. 805/806). Member of the Barmakid family. He was imprisoned by the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Hadi, but the Caliph Harun al-Rashid, whose tutor he had been, appointed him as vizier with unlimited power. In 803, his son Ja‘far ibn Yahya, the favorite of Harun al-Rashid, was suddenly executed, and Yahya imprisoned until his death.
Yahya ibn Khalid was a member of the powerful Persian Barmakids family, son of Khalid ibn Barmak. Around 765, he was appointed to Azerbaijan by the Caliph Al-Mansur. Yahya's son Al-Fadl was born at Ar-Reiy, at the same time as Caliph al-Mahdi's son Harun. Al-Mahdi entrusted Yahya in 778 with Harun's education.
When Al-Hadi was Caliph, Yahya dissuaded the Caliph several times from proclaiming his own son as heir instead of Harun. He eventually did so, and cast Yahya into jail, but died shortly afterwards. When Harun became Caliph as Harun al-Rashid, he made Yahya Vizier.
Under his influence, the Caliph invited to Baghdad many scholars and masters from India, especially Buddhists. A catalog of both Muslim and non-Muslim texts prepared at this time, Kitab al-Fihrist, included a list of Buddhist works. Among them was an Arabic version of the account of Buddha’s previous lives, Kitab al-Budd.
He had three sons, among which Jafar succeeded him as Vizier, Musa ruled Damascus, and Fadl was governor of Khurasan, then of Egypt.
In 803, his family fell into disgrace, and he was cast into prison, where he died in 806 (according to the story, because his son Jafar had an affair with Harun al-Rashid's sister, but most likely because the family had too much power).
Yahya ibn Zayd al-Husayni
Yahya ibn Zayd al-Husayni. Regarded as Imam by the Zaydis. After his father’s death in 740 at Kufa, he fled to Khurasan but was imprisoned by the governor Nasr ibn Sayyar. Released at the order of the Umayyad Caliph al-Walid II, he defeated the commander of Nishapur but fell in the fight against Salm ibn Ahwaz, sent by Nasr. His death deeply affected the Shi‘a of Khurasan, and vengeance for him became the watchword of the followers of Abu Muslim, the leader of the ‘Abbasid movement in Khurasan.
Yahya ibn Zayd al-Husayni. Regarded as Imam by the Zaydis. After his father’s death in 740 at Kufa, he fled to Khurasan but was imprisoned by the governor Nasr ibn Sayyar. Released at the order of the Umayyad Caliph al-Walid II, he defeated the commander of Nishapur but fell in the fight against Salm ibn Ahwaz, sent by Nasr. His death deeply affected the Shi‘a of Khurasan, and vengeance for him became the watchword of the followers of Abu Muslim, the leader of the ‘Abbasid movement in Khurasan.
Yahya Khan
Yahya Khan (Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan) (b. February 4, 1917, Chakwal, British Raj (now Pakistan) - d. August 10, 1980, Rawalpindi, Pakistan). President of Pakistan (March 25, 1969 - December 20, 1971). Born into a prominent family of the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, he received his commission in the army from the Military Academy, Dehra Dun, India, in 1938. During World War II, he saw action in the Middle East and Italy. In 1947, he joined the Pakistan Army, becoming a full general and, in 1966, commander in chief. In 1969, when Ayub Khan’s government collapsed, Yahya Khan became president of Pakistan under martial law. His rule ended in 1971with the secession of East Pakistan and the defeat of the Pakistan army in war with India.
Yahya was born to a family that was descended from the elite soldier class of Nāder Shah, the Persian ruler who conquered Delhi in the 18th century. He was educated at Punjab University and later graduated first in his class from the Indian Military Academy at Dehra Dun. He served in Italy and the Middle East during World War II and, after the partition of India in 1947, organized the Pakistani Staff College.
After serving in the war with India over the Kashmir region, he became Pakistan’s youngest brigadier general at age 34 and its youngest general at 40. He became commander in chief in 1966. A protégé of President Mohammad Ayub Khan, Yahya was in command of the military when street riots erupted in the country. Ayub called on him to take over the direction of the government and preserve the integrity of Pakistan. He was appointed chief administrator of martial law, which he declared with the words “I will not tolerate disorder. Let everyone return to his post.”
Yahya Khan succeeded Ayub Khan as president when the latter resigned his office in March 1969. In 1971 a serious conflict erupted between the central government and the Awami Party of what was then East Pakistan, led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The East Pakistani leader demanded autonomy for his half of the geographically divided country, and Yahya Khan responded by ordering the army to suppress the Awami Party. The brutality with which his orders were carried out and the resulting influx of millions of East Pakistani refugees into India led to the Indian invasion of East Pakistan and the rout of its West Pakistani occupiers. East Pakistan became the independent country of Bangladesh, and with its loss Yahya Khan resigned (December 20, 1971).
He was replaced by his foreign minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who put him under house arrest. Shortly afterward he was paralyzed by a stroke and, after his release, played no further important political role.
Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan see Yahya Khan
Yahya Khan (Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan) (b. February 4, 1917, Chakwal, British Raj (now Pakistan) - d. August 10, 1980, Rawalpindi, Pakistan). President of Pakistan (March 25, 1969 - December 20, 1971). Born into a prominent family of the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, he received his commission in the army from the Military Academy, Dehra Dun, India, in 1938. During World War II, he saw action in the Middle East and Italy. In 1947, he joined the Pakistan Army, becoming a full general and, in 1966, commander in chief. In 1969, when Ayub Khan’s government collapsed, Yahya Khan became president of Pakistan under martial law. His rule ended in 1971with the secession of East Pakistan and the defeat of the Pakistan army in war with India.
Yahya was born to a family that was descended from the elite soldier class of Nāder Shah, the Persian ruler who conquered Delhi in the 18th century. He was educated at Punjab University and later graduated first in his class from the Indian Military Academy at Dehra Dun. He served in Italy and the Middle East during World War II and, after the partition of India in 1947, organized the Pakistani Staff College.
After serving in the war with India over the Kashmir region, he became Pakistan’s youngest brigadier general at age 34 and its youngest general at 40. He became commander in chief in 1966. A protégé of President Mohammad Ayub Khan, Yahya was in command of the military when street riots erupted in the country. Ayub called on him to take over the direction of the government and preserve the integrity of Pakistan. He was appointed chief administrator of martial law, which he declared with the words “I will not tolerate disorder. Let everyone return to his post.”
Yahya Khan succeeded Ayub Khan as president when the latter resigned his office in March 1969. In 1971 a serious conflict erupted between the central government and the Awami Party of what was then East Pakistan, led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The East Pakistani leader demanded autonomy for his half of the geographically divided country, and Yahya Khan responded by ordering the army to suppress the Awami Party. The brutality with which his orders were carried out and the resulting influx of millions of East Pakistani refugees into India led to the Indian invasion of East Pakistan and the rout of its West Pakistani occupiers. East Pakistan became the independent country of Bangladesh, and with its loss Yahya Khan resigned (December 20, 1971).
He was replaced by his foreign minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who put him under house arrest. Shortly afterward he was paralyzed by a stroke and, after his release, played no further important political role.
Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan see Yahya Khan
Yakan
Yakan. The Yakan are one of the Muslim groups of the southern Philippines who are part of the Sama people. They are practically all Sunni Muslims of the Shafi school. A homogeneous group which has only slight local variations in living and language, they live on the island of Basilan, predominantly in the interior. Information about them traces back only to the latter part of the nineteenth century and is scarce. Probably the Yakan were the original inhabitants of Basilan, but today they comprise less than one-half the population, now sharing the island with later arrivals: Christian Filipinos, mainly living in and around the two municipalities of Isabela and Lamitan, and the Muslim Tausug and Sama, mostly in the coastal villages.
The Yakan are one of the 13 Moro groups in the Philippines. They mainly reside in Basilan.
The Yakans are the traditional settlers of Basilan Island in the Southern Philippines, situated to the west of Zamboanga in Mindanao. It is said that their typical physical characteristics are strikingly different when compared to the other ethnic Filipino groups (relatively high-bridged noses and tall stature). Traditionally they wear colorful, handwoven clothes. The women wear tightfitting short blouses and both sexes wear narrowcut pants resembling breeches. Traditionally, the women covered themselves partly with a wrap-around material while the man wraps a sash-like cloth around the waist where he places his weapon - usually a long knife. Nowadays most of the Yakans wear western clothes and use their traditional clothes only for special festivals.
In the early seventies, some of the Yakan settled in Zamboanga City due to political unrest which led to armed conflicts between the militant Muslims and government solders. The Yakan village in Upper Calarian is famous among local and foreign tourists because of the Yakan art of weaving. Traditionally, they have used plants like pineapple and abaca converted into fibers as basic material for weaving. Using herbal extracts from leaves, roots and barks, the Yakans dyed the fibers and produced colorful combinations and intricate designs.
The seputangan is the most intricate design worn by the women around their waist or as a head cloth. The palipattang is patterned after the color of the rainbow while the bunga-sama, after the python. Almost every Yakan fabric can be described as unique since the finished materials are not exactly identical. Differences may be seen in the pattern or in the design or in the distribution of colors.
Contacts with Christian Filipinos and the American Peace Corps brought about changes in the art and style of weaving. Many resorted to the convenience of chemical dyes and they started weaving table runners, placemats, wall decor, purses and other items which are not present in a traditional Yakan house. In other words, the natives catered because of economic reason to the needs of their customers. New designs were introduced like kenna-kenna, patterned after a fish; dawen-dawen, after the leaf of a vine; pene mata-mata, after the shape of an eye or the kabang buddi, a diamond-shaped design.
Yakan. The Yakan are one of the Muslim groups of the southern Philippines who are part of the Sama people. They are practically all Sunni Muslims of the Shafi school. A homogeneous group which has only slight local variations in living and language, they live on the island of Basilan, predominantly in the interior. Information about them traces back only to the latter part of the nineteenth century and is scarce. Probably the Yakan were the original inhabitants of Basilan, but today they comprise less than one-half the population, now sharing the island with later arrivals: Christian Filipinos, mainly living in and around the two municipalities of Isabela and Lamitan, and the Muslim Tausug and Sama, mostly in the coastal villages.
The Yakan are one of the 13 Moro groups in the Philippines. They mainly reside in Basilan.
The Yakans are the traditional settlers of Basilan Island in the Southern Philippines, situated to the west of Zamboanga in Mindanao. It is said that their typical physical characteristics are strikingly different when compared to the other ethnic Filipino groups (relatively high-bridged noses and tall stature). Traditionally they wear colorful, handwoven clothes. The women wear tightfitting short blouses and both sexes wear narrowcut pants resembling breeches. Traditionally, the women covered themselves partly with a wrap-around material while the man wraps a sash-like cloth around the waist where he places his weapon - usually a long knife. Nowadays most of the Yakans wear western clothes and use their traditional clothes only for special festivals.
In the early seventies, some of the Yakan settled in Zamboanga City due to political unrest which led to armed conflicts between the militant Muslims and government solders. The Yakan village in Upper Calarian is famous among local and foreign tourists because of the Yakan art of weaving. Traditionally, they have used plants like pineapple and abaca converted into fibers as basic material for weaving. Using herbal extracts from leaves, roots and barks, the Yakans dyed the fibers and produced colorful combinations and intricate designs.
The seputangan is the most intricate design worn by the women around their waist or as a head cloth. The palipattang is patterned after the color of the rainbow while the bunga-sama, after the python. Almost every Yakan fabric can be described as unique since the finished materials are not exactly identical. Differences may be seen in the pattern or in the design or in the distribution of colors.
Contacts with Christian Filipinos and the American Peace Corps brought about changes in the art and style of weaving. Many resorted to the convenience of chemical dyes and they started weaving table runners, placemats, wall decor, purses and other items which are not present in a traditional Yakan house. In other words, the natives catered because of economic reason to the needs of their customers. New designs were introduced like kenna-kenna, patterned after a fish; dawen-dawen, after the leaf of a vine; pene mata-mata, after the shape of an eye or the kabang buddi, a diamond-shaped design.
Yalunka
Yalunka. The name “Yalunka” is interpreted by the Yalunka themselves to mean “people of the Yalun.” This means that they consider themselves to be the original inhabitants of the Futa Jalon plateau in West Africa. The Yalunka (Dialonke, Djalonke, Dyalonke, Jallonke, Jalunka) live in the northeastern corner of Sierra Leone and portions of the Republic of Guinea.
Knowledge of the pre-twentieth century history of the Yalunka is sketchy. Sporadic relations with the British at Freetown were established in the 1820s and continued throughout the nineteenth century. In the 1820s the Yalunka were strongly pagan and violently anti-Muslim. Although some were drawn to Islam in this period, between the 1820s and early 1880s Islam made only modest headway among them. Itinerant Muslim Quranic teachers, goldsmiths and gunsmiths were in the area from time to time.
In 1884, Solima was conquered by one of the armies of Samory Toure and incorporated into his empire. Toure, a Mandinka, was a great nineteenth century state builder and proponent of Islam. There was heroic resistance (the ruler of Falaha blew himself up rather than surrender), but after Toure’s conquest all the survivors were forcibly converted to Islam. By 1892, the British and French had driven Toure from the Yalunka area, and with the creation of the Sierra Leone Guinea border, Solima was divided into two colonial spheres. (The territories of the other former Yalunka polities are entirely in Guinea.)
With the departure of Toure’s troops and the imposition of colonial rule, most Yalunka lapsed into pagan ways, although some remained Muslim. In addition, more Muslims came from what was now Guinea into the Yalunka region of Sierra Leone. A Christian mission (Church Missionary Society) was started in the 1890s but had collapsed by the early 1900s. In the 1950s, another Christian mission (Missionary Church Society) was begun, but it met with only modest success. Throughout this period Islam gained steadily, and by the 1960s over ninety percent of the Yalunka were Muslim, the remainder being Christian (the last elderly pagan Yalunka died in the 1950s.)
The Yalunka are a Mande people who were one of the original inhabitants of Futa Jallon (or Fouta Djalon), a mountainous region in Guinea, West Africa, and they are a branch of the Mandinka people of West Africa. Today, the Yalunka are concentrated mostly in Guinea and Sierra Leone. Most of the Mandinka in both Guinea and Sierra Leone are considered ethnic Mandinka primarily because of the similarities in costume and languages.
Small communities also live in Senegal and Mali. The Yalunka are also known as the Dialonke or Jallonke, which literally means "inhabitants of the Jallon (mountains)." In the eighteenth century, many of the Yalunka were dispersed from the Futa Jallon by the Fulani, another vast people group in the region.
The language of the Yalunka, also called Yalunka, belongs to the Mande branch of the Niger-Congo language family. Yalunka is partially understood by those who speak Susu, another Mande language. In fact, the Yalunka often refer to themselves as the ancestors of the Soso, and some scholars see the two as one group. The Yalunka region has tall grass with a few trees and some bush areas. The country is hilly, and most of it is 1,000 to 2,000 feet above sea level.
Yalunka. The name “Yalunka” is interpreted by the Yalunka themselves to mean “people of the Yalun.” This means that they consider themselves to be the original inhabitants of the Futa Jalon plateau in West Africa. The Yalunka (Dialonke, Djalonke, Dyalonke, Jallonke, Jalunka) live in the northeastern corner of Sierra Leone and portions of the Republic of Guinea.
Knowledge of the pre-twentieth century history of the Yalunka is sketchy. Sporadic relations with the British at Freetown were established in the 1820s and continued throughout the nineteenth century. In the 1820s the Yalunka were strongly pagan and violently anti-Muslim. Although some were drawn to Islam in this period, between the 1820s and early 1880s Islam made only modest headway among them. Itinerant Muslim Quranic teachers, goldsmiths and gunsmiths were in the area from time to time.
In 1884, Solima was conquered by one of the armies of Samory Toure and incorporated into his empire. Toure, a Mandinka, was a great nineteenth century state builder and proponent of Islam. There was heroic resistance (the ruler of Falaha blew himself up rather than surrender), but after Toure’s conquest all the survivors were forcibly converted to Islam. By 1892, the British and French had driven Toure from the Yalunka area, and with the creation of the Sierra Leone Guinea border, Solima was divided into two colonial spheres. (The territories of the other former Yalunka polities are entirely in Guinea.)
With the departure of Toure’s troops and the imposition of colonial rule, most Yalunka lapsed into pagan ways, although some remained Muslim. In addition, more Muslims came from what was now Guinea into the Yalunka region of Sierra Leone. A Christian mission (Church Missionary Society) was started in the 1890s but had collapsed by the early 1900s. In the 1950s, another Christian mission (Missionary Church Society) was begun, but it met with only modest success. Throughout this period Islam gained steadily, and by the 1960s over ninety percent of the Yalunka were Muslim, the remainder being Christian (the last elderly pagan Yalunka died in the 1950s.)
The Yalunka are a Mande people who were one of the original inhabitants of Futa Jallon (or Fouta Djalon), a mountainous region in Guinea, West Africa, and they are a branch of the Mandinka people of West Africa. Today, the Yalunka are concentrated mostly in Guinea and Sierra Leone. Most of the Mandinka in both Guinea and Sierra Leone are considered ethnic Mandinka primarily because of the similarities in costume and languages.
Small communities also live in Senegal and Mali. The Yalunka are also known as the Dialonke or Jallonke, which literally means "inhabitants of the Jallon (mountains)." In the eighteenth century, many of the Yalunka were dispersed from the Futa Jallon by the Fulani, another vast people group in the region.
The language of the Yalunka, also called Yalunka, belongs to the Mande branch of the Niger-Congo language family. Yalunka is partially understood by those who speak Susu, another Mande language. In fact, the Yalunka often refer to themselves as the ancestors of the Soso, and some scholars see the two as one group. The Yalunka region has tall grass with a few trees and some bush areas. The country is hilly, and most of it is 1,000 to 2,000 feet above sea level.
Yambio
Yambio (Mbio) (c. 1820s-1905). One of the most powerful of the late nineteenth century Zande rulers (1869-1905).
Yambio’s father was the chief of the Gbudwe branch of the Zande in southwestern Sudan. Yambio succeeded to the chieftainship on his father’s death in 1869, but by then the state had already been informally partitioned among his brothers. Arab slavers penetrating Zande country attempted to play Yambio’s family factions off against each other. Yambio himself consistently refused to collaborate with outsiders and strove to consolidate the Zande unaided.
In 1870, Yambio drove an Arab slave caravan out of his territory. Shortly afterwards, Yambio rebuffed an attempted conquest by the powerful merchant prince, al-Zubayr Rahma Mansur.
The Egyptian administration being established, at that time, in Sudan eased the problem of the slavers, but it too had designs on Zande territory. In 1881, Yambio defeated an Egyptian force only to be attacked by a stronger army the next year.
Yambio was captured and held prisoner until 1884, when the Mahdists troops of Muhammed ‘Ahmad freed him. The Mahdists, who were then sweeping through Sudan, wished to use Yambio as an ally in their drive towards the Congo basin. Yambio refused to co-operate and, instead, returned home to re-assert his authority over the Zande.
Meanwhile, the Mahdists withdrew to consolidate their hold on central Sudan and Yambio was left to live in relative peace and prosperity for over a decade.
Yambio’s peace was shattered by Mahdist raids in 1897, but he repelled their assaults. Two years later, the Mahdist state fell to the British-Egyptian government, and Zande country became the focus of aggressive imperial rivalry between the British from the northeast and Belgians from the southwest.
Once again, Yambio struggled to remain independent while neighboring chiefs and relatives aligned themselves with the Europeans. In 1903 and 1904, Yambio spurned British attempts to negotiate an accommodation while Leopold’s forces massed against him along his southwestern border.
Late in 1904, Yambio led a costly and futile attack on the Belgian positions. Terribly outmanned, Yambio was forced to fall back to await his fate.
Early in 1905, Yambio’s demoralized troops crumbled before a combined British-Sudanese onslaught in which Yambio was killed.
On his death, Yambio’s kingdom, which fell into British hands, was partitioned among his sons.
Mbio see Yambio
Yambio (Mbio) (c. 1820s-1905). One of the most powerful of the late nineteenth century Zande rulers (1869-1905).
Yambio’s father was the chief of the Gbudwe branch of the Zande in southwestern Sudan. Yambio succeeded to the chieftainship on his father’s death in 1869, but by then the state had already been informally partitioned among his brothers. Arab slavers penetrating Zande country attempted to play Yambio’s family factions off against each other. Yambio himself consistently refused to collaborate with outsiders and strove to consolidate the Zande unaided.
In 1870, Yambio drove an Arab slave caravan out of his territory. Shortly afterwards, Yambio rebuffed an attempted conquest by the powerful merchant prince, al-Zubayr Rahma Mansur.
The Egyptian administration being established, at that time, in Sudan eased the problem of the slavers, but it too had designs on Zande territory. In 1881, Yambio defeated an Egyptian force only to be attacked by a stronger army the next year.
Yambio was captured and held prisoner until 1884, when the Mahdists troops of Muhammed ‘Ahmad freed him. The Mahdists, who were then sweeping through Sudan, wished to use Yambio as an ally in their drive towards the Congo basin. Yambio refused to co-operate and, instead, returned home to re-assert his authority over the Zande.
Meanwhile, the Mahdists withdrew to consolidate their hold on central Sudan and Yambio was left to live in relative peace and prosperity for over a decade.
Yambio’s peace was shattered by Mahdist raids in 1897, but he repelled their assaults. Two years later, the Mahdist state fell to the British-Egyptian government, and Zande country became the focus of aggressive imperial rivalry between the British from the northeast and Belgians from the southwest.
Once again, Yambio struggled to remain independent while neighboring chiefs and relatives aligned themselves with the Europeans. In 1903 and 1904, Yambio spurned British attempts to negotiate an accommodation while Leopold’s forces massed against him along his southwestern border.
Late in 1904, Yambio led a costly and futile attack on the Belgian positions. Terribly outmanned, Yambio was forced to fall back to await his fate.
Early in 1905, Yambio’s demoralized troops crumbled before a combined British-Sudanese onslaught in which Yambio was killed.
On his death, Yambio’s kingdom, which fell into British hands, was partitioned among his sons.
Mbio see Yambio
Yamin, Muhammad
Yamin, Muhammad (Muhammad Yamin) (1903 - October 17,1962). Indonesian lyric poet. Yamin’s Tanah Air (“Fatherland”), published in 1922 was the first collection of modern Malay verse to be published. The “fatherland” to which Yamin there referred was Sumatra, not Indonesia. Another volume of verse, Indonesia, Tumpah Darahku (“Indonesia, My Homeland”) appeared on October 28, 1928, the day Muhammad Yamin and his fellow nationalists resolved to revere a single -- Indonesian -- homeland, race and language. Muhammad Yamin’s play on a Javanese historical subject -- Ken Arok dan Ken Dedes -- also appeared in 1928. Although a pioneer in literary form, his language remains much closer to classical Malay than that of younger writers.
Muhammad Yamin was born in Talawi, Sawahlunto, in the heartland of the Minangkabau on the island of Sumatra, Indonesia. He was the son of Oesman Gelar Baginda Khatib (1856-1924) the Penghulu ("Head of sub-district") of Indrapura. Oesman had five wives with whom he had sixteen children who make up a veritably influential, but incohesive, political and intellectual family in early modern Indonesian history. Other well known sons of Oesman are Muhammad Yaman, the eldest, an educator; Djamaluddin, a renowned journalist, who later in life added to his name his nom de plume, Adinegoro; and Ramana Oesman (1924-1992), a pioneer of the Indonesian diplomatic corps.
4, Dian Yamin's widow, "Tuti" Yamin donated all of Muhammad Yamin's papers to the National Archives in Jakarta.
Muhammad Yamin see Yamin, Muhammad
Yamin, Muhammad (Muhammad Yamin) (1903 - October 17,1962). Indonesian lyric poet. Yamin’s Tanah Air (“Fatherland”), published in 1922 was the first collection of modern Malay verse to be published. The “fatherland” to which Yamin there referred was Sumatra, not Indonesia. Another volume of verse, Indonesia, Tumpah Darahku (“Indonesia, My Homeland”) appeared on October 28, 1928, the day Muhammad Yamin and his fellow nationalists resolved to revere a single -- Indonesian -- homeland, race and language. Muhammad Yamin’s play on a Javanese historical subject -- Ken Arok dan Ken Dedes -- also appeared in 1928. Although a pioneer in literary form, his language remains much closer to classical Malay than that of younger writers.
Muhammad Yamin was born in Talawi, Sawahlunto, in the heartland of the Minangkabau on the island of Sumatra, Indonesia. He was the son of Oesman Gelar Baginda Khatib (1856-1924) the Penghulu ("Head of sub-district") of Indrapura. Oesman had five wives with whom he had sixteen children who make up a veritably influential, but incohesive, political and intellectual family in early modern Indonesian history. Other well known sons of Oesman are Muhammad Yaman, the eldest, an educator; Djamaluddin, a renowned journalist, who later in life added to his name his nom de plume, Adinegoro; and Ramana Oesman (1924-1992), a pioneer of the Indonesian diplomatic corps.
4, Dian Yamin's widow, "Tuti" Yamin donated all of Muhammad Yamin's papers to the National Archives in Jakarta.
Muhammad Yamin see Yamin, Muhammad
Yao
Yao (Wayao) (Wahyao) (Veiao) (Adjao). Known by a variety of names -- Wayao, Wahyao, Veiao, Adjao -- that no doubt reflect their mobility over the past centuries, the Yao live in Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania. Three other peoples are sufficiently close culturally and linguistically to be grouped with the Yao. They are the Mwera, Makua and Makonde, most of whom live in Tanzania; an unknown number live in Mozambique. The majority -- as many as seventy-five percent -- of the Yao claim to be Sunni Muslim of the Shafi school.
The Yao claim that their traditional homeland was between the Lujenda and Rovuma rivers east of Lake Malawi. For at least two centuries before the colonial intrusion of the late nineteenth century the Yao were active as traders bartering ivory, slaves, beeswax and tobacco for guns, gunpowder, cloth and beads. The suppliers of these commodities were the Arab and Swahili people on the coast, who did not themselves make any major penetration into the interior until the early nineteenth century. Not only were the Yao active in the slave trade, but slaves were also an integral part of their economic and political system before the coming of Europeans. The rapid spread of Islam among the Yao seems to have been due partly to their long association with Arabs but much more to their suspicion of Europeans and Christian missionaries as being antagonistic to their way of life.
Before the colonial conquest the Yao lived in autonomous villages, each with a headman. Several villages were grouped under a chief of a district. Because of the possession of slaves a workers and their value for trade, the chiefs were very powerful and only submitted to colonial rule by force of arms. Divested of their slaves, their economic power was undermined, and until recently a headman or chief lived in a manner little different from anyone else.
The average Yao village consisted of only about a dozen houses, but it was a highly important unit of social organization. The headman was politically powerful and belonged to the dominant matrilineage. Matrilineal descent was the rule and produced conflicts of interest for the headman. Whereas many men married matrilocally, the headmen often could not move and so his wives came to him. His responsibilities to his matrikin were supposed to be preeminent, but his emoticonal links to his children sometimes conflicted with these.
In 1967, Tanzania adopted “The Arusha Declaration” with the objective of building a Socialist society. This policy envisaged the voluntary formation of villages based on the principles of ujamaa (familyness), which is used to translate the English term “African socialism.” By 1974, lack of enthusiasm for the policy prompted the government to pass the Villagization Act, which required that all inhabitants of the rural areas be gathered into villages. In the case of the Yao, much larger agglomerations than had been customary were formed, in some cases involving the compulsory settlement together of Muslims and Christians and of peoples practicing both matrilineal and patrilineal descent. The social effect of these new groupings is hard to estimate, but the combination of radically changed patterns of settlement, land tenure and authority coupled with universal primary education for boys and girls cannot but have had profound effects.
By 1800, the Yao had become known as traders plying between the inland tribes and the Arabs on the east coast. Much of this trade was in slaves, which led eventually to clashes with European powers who were establishing control over former Yao territory in the 19th century. The Yao were never united but lived as small groups ruled by chiefs who were predominantly military and commercial leaders. By 1900 all Yao chiefdoms had come under German, Portuguese, or British rule.
The Yao are an agricultural people using slash-and-burn techniques to cultivate their staples, corn (maize) and sorghum. Fish provide protein in areas near lakes or larger rivers. In Malaŵi they cultivate tobacco as an important cash crop.
The Yao live in compact villages of 75 to 100 persons under traditional headmen. These headmen, like the chiefs, succeed matrilineally, the office usually going to the eldest sister’s firstborn son. On marriage the man leaves his village to live in that of his wife, so that villages are composed basically of groups of women related through the female line, together with their spouses. Yao social life features annual initiation ceremonies involving circumcision for boys. Originally, these ceremonies were closely connected with the worship of ancestor spirits, but through Arab contact most Yao are Muslims, and the rites incorporate Islamic elements.
Wayao see Yao
Wahyao see Yao
Veiao see Yao
Adjao see Yao
Yao (Wayao) (Wahyao) (Veiao) (Adjao). Known by a variety of names -- Wayao, Wahyao, Veiao, Adjao -- that no doubt reflect their mobility over the past centuries, the Yao live in Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania. Three other peoples are sufficiently close culturally and linguistically to be grouped with the Yao. They are the Mwera, Makua and Makonde, most of whom live in Tanzania; an unknown number live in Mozambique. The majority -- as many as seventy-five percent -- of the Yao claim to be Sunni Muslim of the Shafi school.
The Yao claim that their traditional homeland was between the Lujenda and Rovuma rivers east of Lake Malawi. For at least two centuries before the colonial intrusion of the late nineteenth century the Yao were active as traders bartering ivory, slaves, beeswax and tobacco for guns, gunpowder, cloth and beads. The suppliers of these commodities were the Arab and Swahili people on the coast, who did not themselves make any major penetration into the interior until the early nineteenth century. Not only were the Yao active in the slave trade, but slaves were also an integral part of their economic and political system before the coming of Europeans. The rapid spread of Islam among the Yao seems to have been due partly to their long association with Arabs but much more to their suspicion of Europeans and Christian missionaries as being antagonistic to their way of life.
Before the colonial conquest the Yao lived in autonomous villages, each with a headman. Several villages were grouped under a chief of a district. Because of the possession of slaves a workers and their value for trade, the chiefs were very powerful and only submitted to colonial rule by force of arms. Divested of their slaves, their economic power was undermined, and until recently a headman or chief lived in a manner little different from anyone else.
The average Yao village consisted of only about a dozen houses, but it was a highly important unit of social organization. The headman was politically powerful and belonged to the dominant matrilineage. Matrilineal descent was the rule and produced conflicts of interest for the headman. Whereas many men married matrilocally, the headmen often could not move and so his wives came to him. His responsibilities to his matrikin were supposed to be preeminent, but his emoticonal links to his children sometimes conflicted with these.
In 1967, Tanzania adopted “The Arusha Declaration” with the objective of building a Socialist society. This policy envisaged the voluntary formation of villages based on the principles of ujamaa (familyness), which is used to translate the English term “African socialism.” By 1974, lack of enthusiasm for the policy prompted the government to pass the Villagization Act, which required that all inhabitants of the rural areas be gathered into villages. In the case of the Yao, much larger agglomerations than had been customary were formed, in some cases involving the compulsory settlement together of Muslims and Christians and of peoples practicing both matrilineal and patrilineal descent. The social effect of these new groupings is hard to estimate, but the combination of radically changed patterns of settlement, land tenure and authority coupled with universal primary education for boys and girls cannot but have had profound effects.
By 1800, the Yao had become known as traders plying between the inland tribes and the Arabs on the east coast. Much of this trade was in slaves, which led eventually to clashes with European powers who were establishing control over former Yao territory in the 19th century. The Yao were never united but lived as small groups ruled by chiefs who were predominantly military and commercial leaders. By 1900 all Yao chiefdoms had come under German, Portuguese, or British rule.
The Yao are an agricultural people using slash-and-burn techniques to cultivate their staples, corn (maize) and sorghum. Fish provide protein in areas near lakes or larger rivers. In Malaŵi they cultivate tobacco as an important cash crop.
The Yao live in compact villages of 75 to 100 persons under traditional headmen. These headmen, like the chiefs, succeed matrilineally, the office usually going to the eldest sister’s firstborn son. On marriage the man leaves his village to live in that of his wife, so that villages are composed basically of groups of women related through the female line, together with their spouses. Yao social life features annual initiation ceremonies involving circumcision for boys. Originally, these ceremonies were closely connected with the worship of ancestor spirits, but through Arab contact most Yao are Muslims, and the rites incorporate Islamic elements.
Wayao see Yao
Wahyao see Yao
Veiao see Yao
Adjao see Yao
Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah (Yaqut al-Rumi) (Shihab al-Din Abu ‘Abd Allah) (Yaqut al-Hamawi) (Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi) (1179-1229). Arab encyclopedist. Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah was a Greek born in Asia Minor. Yaqut was captured as a child and sold as a slave in Baghdad to a merchant who had him educated, and who later sent him as his agent to the Persian Gulf and to Syria. Yaqut was freed in 1199 and became a scribe and bookseller.
In 1213, Yaqut set out again to travel to Syria, Egypt, Iraq and Khurasan (northeast Persia). Yaqut spent two years working in libraries at Merv, in Central Asia. In 1218, he went on to Khiva, but had to leave, in order to escape the Mongol invasion. He arrived in Mosul destitute, but was given assistance in reaching Aleppo.
Yaqut returned to Mosul two years later in order to finish his Geographical Dictionary (Lexicon of the Countries). The work on the Geograpical Dictionary lasted until 1224.
While he was in Damascus, Yaqut narrowly escaped death at the hands of the Shi‘ite Muslims for his Sunnite views.
As a trader in the Persian Gulf, Yaqut travelled widely and ransacked libraries wherever he went. He wrote on the Arab genealogies and composed a work containing biographies of men of letters. His fame rests upon his Geographical Dictionary, which contains not only geographical information but also, under each place name, astrological and historical data, quotations from poems and a list of eminent natives of the place.
Yaqut’s other great book is his Dictionary of Learned Men. The Dictionary of Learned Men contains biographies of all those who were in any way connected with Arabic literature. Some sections are now lost.
Yaqut’s works, like those of most Arab compilers, are full of anecdotes and digressions. For example, in the Dictionary of Learned Men, there is a long discussion between a Christian philosopher and a Muslim theologian.
Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi was a Syrian biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "Al-Rumi" ("from Rûm") refers to his Greek (Byzantine) descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah. The word yaqut means ruby.
Yaqut was sold as a slave to someone who later moved to Baghdad, Iraq. Upon recognizing his abilities, Yaqut's purchaser provided him with a good education. He was later freed and traveled a great deal. Yaqut also earned a living copying and selling manuscripts.
The works of Yaqut include:
* Kitab mu'jam al-buldan ("Dictionary of Countries")
* Mu'jam al-udaba' , ("Dictionary of Writers") written in 1226.
* al-Mushtarak wadh'a wa al-Muftaraq Sa'qa.
Yaqut al-Rumi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Shihab al-Din Abu ‘Abd Allah see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut al-Hamawi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah (Yaqut al-Rumi) (Shihab al-Din Abu ‘Abd Allah) (Yaqut al-Hamawi) (Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi) (1179-1229). Arab encyclopedist. Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah was a Greek born in Asia Minor. Yaqut was captured as a child and sold as a slave in Baghdad to a merchant who had him educated, and who later sent him as his agent to the Persian Gulf and to Syria. Yaqut was freed in 1199 and became a scribe and bookseller.
In 1213, Yaqut set out again to travel to Syria, Egypt, Iraq and Khurasan (northeast Persia). Yaqut spent two years working in libraries at Merv, in Central Asia. In 1218, he went on to Khiva, but had to leave, in order to escape the Mongol invasion. He arrived in Mosul destitute, but was given assistance in reaching Aleppo.
Yaqut returned to Mosul two years later in order to finish his Geographical Dictionary (Lexicon of the Countries). The work on the Geograpical Dictionary lasted until 1224.
While he was in Damascus, Yaqut narrowly escaped death at the hands of the Shi‘ite Muslims for his Sunnite views.
As a trader in the Persian Gulf, Yaqut travelled widely and ransacked libraries wherever he went. He wrote on the Arab genealogies and composed a work containing biographies of men of letters. His fame rests upon his Geographical Dictionary, which contains not only geographical information but also, under each place name, astrological and historical data, quotations from poems and a list of eminent natives of the place.
Yaqut’s other great book is his Dictionary of Learned Men. The Dictionary of Learned Men contains biographies of all those who were in any way connected with Arabic literature. Some sections are now lost.
Yaqut’s works, like those of most Arab compilers, are full of anecdotes and digressions. For example, in the Dictionary of Learned Men, there is a long discussion between a Christian philosopher and a Muslim theologian.
Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi was a Syrian biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "Al-Rumi" ("from Rûm") refers to his Greek (Byzantine) descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah. The word yaqut means ruby.
Yaqut was sold as a slave to someone who later moved to Baghdad, Iraq. Upon recognizing his abilities, Yaqut's purchaser provided him with a good education. He was later freed and traveled a great deal. Yaqut also earned a living copying and selling manuscripts.
The works of Yaqut include:
* Kitab mu'jam al-buldan ("Dictionary of Countries")
* Mu'jam al-udaba' , ("Dictionary of Writers") written in 1226.
* al-Mushtarak wadh'a wa al-Muftaraq Sa'qa.
Yaqut al-Rumi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Shihab al-Din Abu ‘Abd Allah see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut ibn-'Abdullah al-Rumi al-Hamawi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yaqut al-Hamawi see Yaqut ibn ‘Abdullah
Yarbu’
Yarbu’. Name of an important group of the tribe of Tamim, whose territory stretched between al-Yamama to below the Euphrates. On the death of the Prophet, they were the first to rebel, the prophetess Sajah being one of them. They lent considerable support to the Kharijites, and counted a number of remarkable poets.
Yarbu’. Name of an important group of the tribe of Tamim, whose territory stretched between al-Yamama to below the Euphrates. On the death of the Prophet, they were the first to rebel, the prophetess Sajah being one of them. They lent considerable support to the Kharijites, and counted a number of remarkable poets.
Ya‘rub ibn Qahtan ibn Hud
Ya‘rub ibn Qahtan ibn Hud. Grandson of the prophet Hud, who is regarded as the ancestor of the Himyar kings.
Ya‘rub ibn Qahtan ibn Hud. Grandson of the prophet Hud, who is regarded as the ancestor of the Himyar kings.
Ya‘rubids
Ya‘rubids. Dynasty of Oman (r. 1624-1741). They are named after their ancestor Ya‘rub ibn Malik and ruled in al-Rustaq, Yabrin and al-Ham. They were followed by the Al Bu Sa‘id.
Ya‘rubids. Dynasty of Oman (r. 1624-1741). They are named after their ancestor Ya‘rub ibn Malik and ruled in al-Rustaq, Yabrin and al-Ham. They were followed by the Al Bu Sa‘id.
Yasawi, Ahmad
Yasawi, Ahmad (Ahmad Yasawi) (Khoja Ahmed Yasavi) (Khoja Ahmat Yassawi) (Khoja Ahmat Yssawi) (Qoja Axmet Yassawi) (Xoja Ahmad Yassivi) (Ahmet Yasevi) (Ahmed Yesevi) (Ata Yesevi) (b. 1093, Sayram [Kazakhstan] - d. 1166, Hazrat-e Turkestan [Kazakhstan]). Muslim saint from Turkestan. He is regarded as having converted the Turks to Islam. Timur erected a splendid mausoleum in his honor in the town of Turkestan.
Ahmad Yasawi was a Turkic poet and Sufi (Muslim mystic), an early mystic who exerted a powerful influence on the development of mystical orders throughout the Turkic-speaking world. Yasawi is currently the earliest known Turkic poet who composed poetry in a Turkic dialect. He was a pioneer of popular mysticism, founded the first Turkic tariqah (order), the Yasaviyya (Yeseviye), which very quickly spread over the Turkic-speaking areas.
Yasawi made considerable efforts to spread Islam throughout Central Asia and had numerous students in the region. Yasawi's poems created a new genre of religious folk poetry in Central Asian Turkic literature and influenced many religious poets. Yasawi made the city of Yasi into the major center of learning for the Kazakh steppes, then retired to a life of contemplation at the age of 63. He dug himself an underground cell where he spent the rest of his life.
A mausoleum was later built on the site of his grave by Tamerlane the Great in the city (today called Türkistan). The Yasaviyya Tariqah which he founded continued to be influential for several centuries afterwards, with the Yasavi Sayyid Ata Sheikhs holding a prominent position at the court of Bukhara into the 19th century. In the Yasaviyya Sufis one comes across the greatest number of the shamanistic elements compared to other Sufi Orders.
The first Turkish-Kazakh university, Ahmet Yesevi University, and lyceum, Hoca Ahmed Yesevi Lisesi, were named in his honor.
Ahmad Yasawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmed Yasavi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmat Yassawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmat Yssawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Qoja Axmet Yassawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Xoja Ahmad Yassivi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Yasawi, Ahmad (Ahmad Yasawi) (Khoja Ahmed Yasavi) (Khoja Ahmat Yassawi) (Khoja Ahmat Yssawi) (Qoja Axmet Yassawi) (Xoja Ahmad Yassivi) (Ahmet Yasevi) (Ahmed Yesevi) (Ata Yesevi) (b. 1093, Sayram [Kazakhstan] - d. 1166, Hazrat-e Turkestan [Kazakhstan]). Muslim saint from Turkestan. He is regarded as having converted the Turks to Islam. Timur erected a splendid mausoleum in his honor in the town of Turkestan.
Ahmad Yasawi was a Turkic poet and Sufi (Muslim mystic), an early mystic who exerted a powerful influence on the development of mystical orders throughout the Turkic-speaking world. Yasawi is currently the earliest known Turkic poet who composed poetry in a Turkic dialect. He was a pioneer of popular mysticism, founded the first Turkic tariqah (order), the Yasaviyya (Yeseviye), which very quickly spread over the Turkic-speaking areas.
Yasawi made considerable efforts to spread Islam throughout Central Asia and had numerous students in the region. Yasawi's poems created a new genre of religious folk poetry in Central Asian Turkic literature and influenced many religious poets. Yasawi made the city of Yasi into the major center of learning for the Kazakh steppes, then retired to a life of contemplation at the age of 63. He dug himself an underground cell where he spent the rest of his life.
A mausoleum was later built on the site of his grave by Tamerlane the Great in the city (today called Türkistan). The Yasaviyya Tariqah which he founded continued to be influential for several centuries afterwards, with the Yasavi Sayyid Ata Sheikhs holding a prominent position at the court of Bukhara into the 19th century. In the Yasaviyya Sufis one comes across the greatest number of the shamanistic elements compared to other Sufi Orders.
The first Turkish-Kazakh university, Ahmet Yesevi University, and lyceum, Hoca Ahmed Yesevi Lisesi, were named in his honor.
Ahmad Yasawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmed Yasavi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmat Yassawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Khoja Ahmat Yssawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Qoja Axmet Yassawi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Xoja Ahmad Yassivi see Yasawi, Ahmad
Yaya
Yaya. Turkish term which refers to the infantryman in the Ottoman army.
Yaya. Turkish term which refers to the infantryman in the Ottoman army.
Yazdi, Ibrahim
Ibrahim Yazdi, or Ebrahim Yazdi, (Persian: ابراهیم یزدی; b. September 26, 1931, Qazvin, Iran – d. August 27, 2017, Izmir, Turkey) was an Iranian politician and diplomat who served as deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs in the interim government of Mehdi Bazargan, until his resignation in November 1979, in protest at the Iran hostage crisis. From 1995 until 2017, he headed the Freedom Movement of Iran.
Ibrahim Yazdi, or Ebrahim Yazdi, (Persian: ابراهیم یزدی; b. September 26, 1931, Qazvin, Iran – d. August 27, 2017, Izmir, Turkey) was an Iranian politician and diplomat who served as deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs in the interim government of Mehdi Bazargan, until his resignation in November 1979, in protest at the Iran hostage crisis. From 1995 until 2017, he headed the Freedom Movement of Iran.
Yazdi studied pharmacology at the University of Tehran. Then he received a master's degree in philosophy again from the University of Tehran.
After the military coup of 1953, which deposed the government of Mohammad Mossadegh, Yazdi joined the underground National Resistance Movement of Iran, and was active in this organization from 1953 to 1960. This organization opposed to the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Yazdi traveled to the United States in 1961 to continue his education and in the United States, continued his involvement in political activities against the Shah.
Yazdi was co-founder of the Freedom Movement of Iran, Abroad, along with Mostafa Chamran, Ali Shariati, and Sadegh Qotbzadeh in 1961. They were all part of the radical external wing of the group. In 1963, Yazdi, Chamran and Ghotbzadeh went to Egypt and met the authorities to establish an anti-Shah organization in the country, which was later called SAMA, special organization for unity and action. Chamran was chosen as its military head before returning to the United States. In 1966, Yazdi moved the headquarters of SAMA to Beirut. In 1967, he enrolled at Baylor University and received a Ph.D. in biochemistry. Yazdi became a naturalized United States citizen in Houston in 1971.
Yazdi worked as a research assistant of pathology and research instructor of pharmacology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston until 1977. He also worked at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Houston.
In 1975, Yazdi was tried in absentia in an Iranian military court and condemned to ten years imprisonment, with orders issued for his arrest upon return to Iran. Because of his activities, he was unable to return to Iran and remained in the United States until July 1977. When Ayatollah Khomeini moved to Neauphle-le-Chateau, a Parisian suburb from Iraq in 1978, Yazdi also went to Neauphle-le-Château and began to serve as an advisor to the Ayatollah. He was also his spokesperson in Paris.
In 1978, he joined Ayatollah Khomeini in Paris where the latter had been in exile and became one of his advisors. He translated the reports of Khomeini into English in a press conference on February 3, 1979 in Tehran. He was the deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs in the interim government of Mehdi Barargan, until November 6, 1979. Yazdi proposed to celebrate 'Jerusalem Day' and his suggestion was endorsed by Khomeini in August 1979. In May 1980, he was appointed by Khomeini as head of the Kayhan newspaper.
On November 4, 1979, the United States embassy was taken over for a second time, this time by a group calling itself "Students Following the Line of the Imam (i.e. Ayatollah Khomeini)” and led by Mohammad Mousavi Khoeiniha, who had closer ties to certain revolutionary leaders.
As before, Yazdi was asked to go to the embassy and resolve the crisis. He asked and received permission of Khomeini to expel the occupiers, but shortly thereafter found out Khomeini had changed his mind and appeared on state television openly endorsing the takeover of the embassy. The entire cabinet of the interim government, including Yazdi and Prime Minister Mehdi Bazargan, resigned in protest the next day. They stated that they opposed the embassy takeover as “contrary to the national interest of Iran”.
The embassy takeover is considered to have been motivated in part by an internal struggle between various factions within the revolutionary leadership, with Yazdi and Bazargan on one side, and more radical clergy on the other. The embassy attackers, in subsequent statements indicated that one of their primary objectives in the takeover of the United States embassy in November 1979 was to force the resignation of Yazdi, Bazargan, and the entire cabinet.
Among the areas of conflict between the two factions was the behavior of the Revolutionary Courts and the Revolutionary Committees. Yazdi and Bazargan supported a general amnesty for all members of the Shah’s regime, provided that they cease to act against the revolution. They publicly opposed the secret trials and the summary executions carried out by the Revolutionary Courts, led by Ayatollah Sadegh Khalkhaali. Bazargan and other members of the interim government called for fair and open trials for those accused of crimes committed under the Shah’s regime. The radical clerics, on the other hand, stated that the rapid trials and executions were essential to protect the revolution.
After resignation from office, Yazdi and other members of the Freedom Movement of Iran ran in elections for the first post-revolutionary Islamic Consultative Assembly or parliament. Yazdi, Bazargan, and four other members of the Freedom Movement, namely Mostafa Chamran, Ahmad Sadr, Hashem Sabbaghian, and Yadollah Sahabi, were elected. They served in the parliament from 1980 to 1984.
After the Iraqi invasion of Iran in September 1980, Yazdi fully supported the Iranian war effort against the invasion, but opposed the continuation of the war after the Iranian victory in Khorramshahr in 1982. The war continued for an additional six years. During these six years, Yazdi and others in the Freedom Movement issued several open letters to Ayatollah Khomeini opposing the continuation of the war. These letters and other public statements resulted in the firebombing of Yazdi’s residence in Tehran in 1985, and the arrest and imprisonment of several members of the Freedom Movement.
In subsequent elections in Iran for president, parliament, and city councils, Yazdi and other members of the Freedom Movement filed for candidacy but were barred from running by the Guardian Council, because of their opposition to policies and actions of the government.
After the death of Bazargan in January 1995, Yazdi was elected as leader of Freedom Movement of Iran. Under pressure from the revolutionary court prosecutor, Yazdi offered his resignation as FMI Leader on March 20, 2011 to the leadership council of the FMI. By the time of Yazdi's death the leadership council had yet to accept his resignation and Yazdi continued to function as the leader of the Freedom Movement of Iran.
Yazdi was arrested in December 1997 for "desecrating religious sanctities" and was freed on December 26 on bail. Even after his release, he was barred from leaving the country for many years, and was summoned on a regular basis to answer questions before the revolutionary council, with his lawyer, Nobel Prize–winning Shirin Ebadi.
On June 17, 2009, during the 2009 Iranian election protests, it was reported that Yazdi was arrested while undergoing tests at the Tehran hospital according to the Freedom Movement of Iran website. On June 22, Yazdi was released back to the hospital for a medical procedure. On December 28, 2009, Yazdi was arrested again in the wake of renewed protests, according to the Jaras reformist website.
Yazdi and several others were arrested on October 1, 2010 in Isfahan for participating in an "illegal Friday prayer." All others were freed within days. Ibrahim Yazdi remained in "temporary custody" — first in Evin prison and then in a "secure" facility under the control of Iran's security forces until March 2011. He was released in April 2011.
On August 27, 2017, Yazdi died of pancreatic cancer in Izmir, Turkey, where he was under treatment. His body transferred to Iran and was buried in Behesht-e Zahra.
Yazid I ibn Mu‘awiya
Yazid I ibn Mu‘awiya (Yazīd I) (Yazīd ibn Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān) (b. c. 645, Arabia — d. 683, Damascus), Umayyad Caliph (r.680-683). As a prince he had commanded the Arab army at the siege of Constantinople. At his accession to the throne, al-Husayn ibn ‘Ali and ‘Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr refused to recognize him and took refuge in Mecca. From there al-Husayn left for Iraq, where in 680 he met his death at Karbala’. At Medina, Yazid was declared deposed when the town was taken by Muslim ibn ‘Uqba. Yazid is described as a generous patron, who was a poet himself, and fond of music. Alone among the caliphs he earned the title of “water engineer.” He completed his father’s administrative organization, and reorganized the finances.
Yazīd I was particularly noted for his suppression of a rebellion led by Ḥusayn, the son of ʿAlī. The death of Ḥusayn at the Battle of Karbalāʾ (680) made him a martyr and made permanent a division in Islam between the party of ʿAlī (the Shīʿites) and the majority Sunnis.
As a young man, Yazīd commanded the Arab army that his father, Muʿāwiyah, sent to lay siege to Constantinople. Soon afterward he became caliph, but many of those whom his father had kept in check rebelled against him.
Although presented in many sources as a dissolute ruler, Yazīd energetically tried to continue the policies of Muʿāwiyah and kept many of the men who had been in his father’s service. He strengthened the administrative structure of the empire and improved the military defenses of Syria. The financial system was reformed. He lightened the taxation of some Christian groups and abolished the tax concessions granted to the Samaritans as a reward for aid they had rendered in the days of the Arab conquests. He concerned himself with agricultural matters and improved the irrigation system of the Damascus oasis.
Yazid I ibn Mu‘awiya (Yazīd I) (Yazīd ibn Muʿāwiyah ibn Abī Sufyān) (b. c. 645, Arabia — d. 683, Damascus), Umayyad Caliph (r.680-683). As a prince he had commanded the Arab army at the siege of Constantinople. At his accession to the throne, al-Husayn ibn ‘Ali and ‘Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr refused to recognize him and took refuge in Mecca. From there al-Husayn left for Iraq, where in 680 he met his death at Karbala’. At Medina, Yazid was declared deposed when the town was taken by Muslim ibn ‘Uqba. Yazid is described as a generous patron, who was a poet himself, and fond of music. Alone among the caliphs he earned the title of “water engineer.” He completed his father’s administrative organization, and reorganized the finances.
Yazīd I was particularly noted for his suppression of a rebellion led by Ḥusayn, the son of ʿAlī. The death of Ḥusayn at the Battle of Karbalāʾ (680) made him a martyr and made permanent a division in Islam between the party of ʿAlī (the Shīʿites) and the majority Sunnis.
As a young man, Yazīd commanded the Arab army that his father, Muʿāwiyah, sent to lay siege to Constantinople. Soon afterward he became caliph, but many of those whom his father had kept in check rebelled against him.
Although presented in many sources as a dissolute ruler, Yazīd energetically tried to continue the policies of Muʿāwiyah and kept many of the men who had been in his father’s service. He strengthened the administrative structure of the empire and improved the military defenses of Syria. The financial system was reformed. He lightened the taxation of some Christian groups and abolished the tax concessions granted to the Samaritans as a reward for aid they had rendered in the days of the Arab conquests. He concerned himself with agricultural matters and improved the irrigation system of the Damascus oasis.
Yazidi
Yazidi (Yazidiyya) (Yezidi) (Êzidî). Name of a Kurdish tribal group and of their peculiar religion. They are found in the districts of Mosul, Diyarbakr, Aleppo and in Armenia. Their religion includes pagan, Zoroastrian, Jewish, and Muslim elements, but also features from Christian sects, especially the Nestorians, from Sufism, from the Sabaeans and from the Shamans. They possess two Sacred Books: The Book of Revelation and The Black Book. God is only the Creator, not the Preserver of the world. The active organ of the divine will is Malak Tawus or “the peacock angel,” who is the denial of evil. Satan is the fallen angel who has been restored to God’s favor. The Yazidis do not believe in hell, but they do accept transmigration. Their most concrete expressions are the figures of peacocks, called sanajiq, who are seven in number, corresponding to the seven angels who took part in the creation of the world. They consider themselves completely separated from the rest of mankind and have a high level of morality. The annual pilgrimage to the tomb of Shaykh ‘Adi, located north of Mosul, is a strict religious duty. Marriage is endogamous, and as a rule monogamous, except for the amir. They practice baptism and circumcision, and have burial ceremonies of their own. The structure of Yazidi society is theocratic, consisting of laity and clergy, which is divided into six different classes. Muslim theologians hold the view that the Yazidis at one time were Muslims. They have withstood numerous attempts at conversion and extermination by Turkish pashas and Kurdish tribes.
Yazidis belong to Yazidism, a religion with around 700,000 members world wide. The largest group of Yazidis live in Iraq, near Mosul, but there are small communities in Syria, Turkey, Georgia, and Armenia. Researchers believe that the Yazidi creed has elements from Zoroastrianism, Manicheism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The two religious books of the Yazidis have Arabic text: Book of Revelation and Black Book. The Yazidis call themselves Dasin, while the term Yazidism probably comes from the Persian word ized – “angel.” The name Yazidism is moreover connected to the sixth caliph, Yazid (680-683) from Shi‘a point of view one of world history’s most hated men, and highly disliked by most Sunnis as well. However, there is little evidence showing what role Yazid have played in the founding, or development of Yazidism.
The Yazidi pantheon has God on top, but God is only the Creator, and is no longer an acting force. The acting forces is represented by Malak Ta’us and Shaykh Adil. Shaykh Adil can have been caliph Yazid (there are many theories here), a man risen to divinity through transmigration, and is now an acting and good deity.
Shaykh Adil is acting in a coopertion with Malak Ta’us, the peacock angel that has fallen into disgrace, but who repents. Malak Ta’us filled seven jars of tears through 7,000 years. His tears were used to extinguish the fire in hell. Therefore, there is no hell in Yazidism. Yazidism has six minor deities, which are also honored.
The prayer in Yazidism must be performed in good distance from non-Yazidis, twice a day, and in the direction of the sun. The prayer is dedicatedc to Malak Ta’us. Saturday is the day of rest, but it is Wednesday that is the holy day. In December, a three day fast is performed.
There is an annual pilgrimage to the tomb of Shaykh Adil, north of Mosul in Iraq, through six days in late August. This pilgrimage is the most important ritual of Yazidism. Central to this celebration are bathing in the river, washing of figures of Malak Ta’us, processions, music, hymns, ecstatic songs, and dances performed by the priests. Other elements are lighting of hundreds of oil lamps at the tombs of Shaykh Adil and other saints’ tombs, offerings of special foods and cooking of a sacrificed ox. Important parts of the rituals here have never been seen by outsiders, and are therefore unknown.
Childhood baptism is important, and is performed by a Shayky, a religious leader. Circumcision for boys is performed soon after the baptism, but is not compulsory. Burials are done immediately after death, and the hands are crossed, pointing in an eastern direction.
The Yazidis are organized much like the Kurds, with tribes headed by a chief. There are very stron ties between the laity and the religious leaders. Almost all Yazidis speak Kurdish. The Yazidis practice no intermarriage with other Kurds, and have no communion with them.
The Yazidis believe that they are the descendants of Adam only, while the rest of the world are descendants of Eve, hence inferior. It is impossible to convert to Yazidism, you must be born one. The strongest punishment among Yazidis is expulsion, which means that your soul is lost forever. Monogamy is practiced, but the chief has the right to take several wives. Divorce is difficult to get, as this only comes from adultery, and three witnesses are needed. But if a husband stays abroad for more than a year, he is automatically divorced from his wife, and also looses the right to remarry inside the Yazidi community.
The reason for the Yazidis reputation of being devil worshippers is connected to the other name of Malak Ta’us, Shaytan, the same name as the Qur’an’s for Satan. But there is little suggesting that the Yazidis worships Malak Ta’us as if he was equal to the Qur’an’s or the Bible’s devil. The Yazidis have never been regarded as Ahl al-Kitab, “people of the book,” and they have suffered much hardship from their Muslim neighbors.
The Yazidi ) are members of a Kurdish religion with ancient Indo-European roots. They are primarily a Kurdish-speaking people living in the Mosul region of northern Iraq, with additional communities in Transcaucasia, Armenia, Turkey, and Syria. The traditional Yazidi communities have been in decline since the 1990s seeing many of the Yazidis emigrating to Europe, especially to Germany. Their religion, Yazidism, is a branch of Yazdânism, and is seen as a highly syncretic complex of local Kurdish beliefs and Islamic Sufi doctrine introduced to the area by Sheikh Adi ibn Musafir in the 12th century. The Yazidi believe in God as creator of the world, which he placed under the care of seven holy beings or angels, the chief of whom is Melek Taus, the Peacock Angel.
Yazidiyya see Yazidi
Yezidi see Yazidi
Ezidi see Yazidi
Yazidi (Yazidiyya) (Yezidi) (Êzidî). Name of a Kurdish tribal group and of their peculiar religion. They are found in the districts of Mosul, Diyarbakr, Aleppo and in Armenia. Their religion includes pagan, Zoroastrian, Jewish, and Muslim elements, but also features from Christian sects, especially the Nestorians, from Sufism, from the Sabaeans and from the Shamans. They possess two Sacred Books: The Book of Revelation and The Black Book. God is only the Creator, not the Preserver of the world. The active organ of the divine will is Malak Tawus or “the peacock angel,” who is the denial of evil. Satan is the fallen angel who has been restored to God’s favor. The Yazidis do not believe in hell, but they do accept transmigration. Their most concrete expressions are the figures of peacocks, called sanajiq, who are seven in number, corresponding to the seven angels who took part in the creation of the world. They consider themselves completely separated from the rest of mankind and have a high level of morality. The annual pilgrimage to the tomb of Shaykh ‘Adi, located north of Mosul, is a strict religious duty. Marriage is endogamous, and as a rule monogamous, except for the amir. They practice baptism and circumcision, and have burial ceremonies of their own. The structure of Yazidi society is theocratic, consisting of laity and clergy, which is divided into six different classes. Muslim theologians hold the view that the Yazidis at one time were Muslims. They have withstood numerous attempts at conversion and extermination by Turkish pashas and Kurdish tribes.
Yazidis belong to Yazidism, a religion with around 700,000 members world wide. The largest group of Yazidis live in Iraq, near Mosul, but there are small communities in Syria, Turkey, Georgia, and Armenia. Researchers believe that the Yazidi creed has elements from Zoroastrianism, Manicheism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The two religious books of the Yazidis have Arabic text: Book of Revelation and Black Book. The Yazidis call themselves Dasin, while the term Yazidism probably comes from the Persian word ized – “angel.” The name Yazidism is moreover connected to the sixth caliph, Yazid (680-683) from Shi‘a point of view one of world history’s most hated men, and highly disliked by most Sunnis as well. However, there is little evidence showing what role Yazid have played in the founding, or development of Yazidism.
The Yazidi pantheon has God on top, but God is only the Creator, and is no longer an acting force. The acting forces is represented by Malak Ta’us and Shaykh Adil. Shaykh Adil can have been caliph Yazid (there are many theories here), a man risen to divinity through transmigration, and is now an acting and good deity.
Shaykh Adil is acting in a coopertion with Malak Ta’us, the peacock angel that has fallen into disgrace, but who repents. Malak Ta’us filled seven jars of tears through 7,000 years. His tears were used to extinguish the fire in hell. Therefore, there is no hell in Yazidism. Yazidism has six minor deities, which are also honored.
The prayer in Yazidism must be performed in good distance from non-Yazidis, twice a day, and in the direction of the sun. The prayer is dedicatedc to Malak Ta’us. Saturday is the day of rest, but it is Wednesday that is the holy day. In December, a three day fast is performed.
There is an annual pilgrimage to the tomb of Shaykh Adil, north of Mosul in Iraq, through six days in late August. This pilgrimage is the most important ritual of Yazidism. Central to this celebration are bathing in the river, washing of figures of Malak Ta’us, processions, music, hymns, ecstatic songs, and dances performed by the priests. Other elements are lighting of hundreds of oil lamps at the tombs of Shaykh Adil and other saints’ tombs, offerings of special foods and cooking of a sacrificed ox. Important parts of the rituals here have never been seen by outsiders, and are therefore unknown.
Childhood baptism is important, and is performed by a Shayky, a religious leader. Circumcision for boys is performed soon after the baptism, but is not compulsory. Burials are done immediately after death, and the hands are crossed, pointing in an eastern direction.
The Yazidis are organized much like the Kurds, with tribes headed by a chief. There are very stron ties between the laity and the religious leaders. Almost all Yazidis speak Kurdish. The Yazidis practice no intermarriage with other Kurds, and have no communion with them.
The Yazidis believe that they are the descendants of Adam only, while the rest of the world are descendants of Eve, hence inferior. It is impossible to convert to Yazidism, you must be born one. The strongest punishment among Yazidis is expulsion, which means that your soul is lost forever. Monogamy is practiced, but the chief has the right to take several wives. Divorce is difficult to get, as this only comes from adultery, and three witnesses are needed. But if a husband stays abroad for more than a year, he is automatically divorced from his wife, and also looses the right to remarry inside the Yazidi community.
The reason for the Yazidis reputation of being devil worshippers is connected to the other name of Malak Ta’us, Shaytan, the same name as the Qur’an’s for Satan. But there is little suggesting that the Yazidis worships Malak Ta’us as if he was equal to the Qur’an’s or the Bible’s devil. The Yazidis have never been regarded as Ahl al-Kitab, “people of the book,” and they have suffered much hardship from their Muslim neighbors.
The Yazidi ) are members of a Kurdish religion with ancient Indo-European roots. They are primarily a Kurdish-speaking people living in the Mosul region of northern Iraq, with additional communities in Transcaucasia, Armenia, Turkey, and Syria. The traditional Yazidi communities have been in decline since the 1990s seeing many of the Yazidis emigrating to Europe, especially to Germany. Their religion, Yazidism, is a branch of Yazdânism, and is seen as a highly syncretic complex of local Kurdish beliefs and Islamic Sufi doctrine introduced to the area by Sheikh Adi ibn Musafir in the 12th century. The Yazidi believe in God as creator of the world, which he placed under the care of seven holy beings or angels, the chief of whom is Melek Taus, the Peacock Angel.
Yazidiyya see Yazidi
Yezidi see Yazidi
Ezidi see Yazidi
Yazid ibn al-Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra al-Azdi
Yazid ibn al-Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra al-Azdi (672-720). Governor of Khurasan. He had strained relations with his brother-in-law al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, who had him imprisoned in 705. In 708, he found support with the future Caliph Suleiman (Sulayman) at al-Ramla. In 715, he was appointed governor of Iraq. Yazid made himself generally hated by his extortions, and was arrested at the orders of the Caliph ‘Umar II ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz. In 720, he preached open war on the Umayyads, seized Wasit but was defeated by Maslamah ibn ‘Abd al-Malik.
In 698, al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf (al-Hajjaj bin Yousef) appointed al-Muhallab Khurasan's governor. In 702, al-Muhallab's son Mughirah died and al-Muhallab sent Yazid to replace him. Soon afterwards al-Muhallab died and al-Hajjaj appointed Yazid governor of Khurasan (Khorasan). There Yazid confronted external and internal enemies, including some rebels entering his province who were supporters of 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Muhammad ibn al-Ash'ath. Yazid defeated them. Yazid seized Nizak's fortress and made peace with him.
In 705, al-Hajjaj replace Yazid, naming al-Mufaddal governor of Khurasan. Various reasons are suggested, including that al-Hajjaj encountered a prophecy that his successor would be named Yazid and al-Hajjaj considered this Yazid the only one threatening enough to worry about. Al-Hajjaj imprisoned and tortured Yazid. In 708, Yazid, disguised, escaped and made his way to Palestine where he was granted refuge by Suleiman ibn 'Abd al-Malik. Al-Hajjaj pressed Caliph al-Walid I who commanded his brother (Suleiman) to send him Yazid in chains. Suleiman had his own son chained to Yazid approach the caliph and speak favoring Yazid's safety. Al-Walid accepted this and told al-Hajjaj to desist. Yazid returned to Suleiman and the two became very close to each other.
When Suleiman came to the throne in 715, he appointed Yazid to govern Iraq. The next year Suleiman appointed Yazid governor of Khurasan. Yazid fought in Jurjan and Tabaristan, personally engaging in combat. In 718, the new caliph Umar ibn 'Abd al-Aziz dismissed Yazid. Yazid was captured on his way to Basra and brought before Umar who intensely disliked him. Umar imprisoned Yazid. In 720, when Umar fell ill, Yazid escaped. Umar died.
Yazid marched on Basra. Many joined him. He refused to swear allegiance to the new caliph, Yazid II. He attacked those holding his brothers, defeated them and freed his brothers. His son Khalid was arrested in Kufah and sent to Damascus where he remained in prison until he died. Yazid was advised to head east, but he declined to follow this advice. In 721, Maslamah ibn 'Abd al-Malik and al-Abbas ibn al-Walid led forces against him. On August 25, Maslamah's troops advanced to battle, frightening some of Yazid's men who fled. Yazid had these men beheaded. He then rode directly at Maslamah. Maslamah's cavalry intercepted him and cut him down.
Fighting continued. In Wasit, Yazid's son Mu'awiyah, on news of his father's death, executed some prisoners, including Adi ibn Artat, the Basran governor who had sent Yazid to Umar in 718. Mu'awiyah and other surviving members of Yazid's family sailed to Bahrain, then near Kirman. They advanced to Qandabil where they were denied entrance. There was a battle in which all but two died, those two making their way to Zabulistan. Some captured boys were sent to Yazid II who beheaded them.
Yazid ibn al-Muhallab ibn Abi Sufra al-Azdi (672-720). Governor of Khurasan. He had strained relations with his brother-in-law al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, who had him imprisoned in 705. In 708, he found support with the future Caliph Suleiman (Sulayman) at al-Ramla. In 715, he was appointed governor of Iraq. Yazid made himself generally hated by his extortions, and was arrested at the orders of the Caliph ‘Umar II ibn ‘Abd al-‘Aziz. In 720, he preached open war on the Umayyads, seized Wasit but was defeated by Maslamah ibn ‘Abd al-Malik.
In 698, al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf (al-Hajjaj bin Yousef) appointed al-Muhallab Khurasan's governor. In 702, al-Muhallab's son Mughirah died and al-Muhallab sent Yazid to replace him. Soon afterwards al-Muhallab died and al-Hajjaj appointed Yazid governor of Khurasan (Khorasan). There Yazid confronted external and internal enemies, including some rebels entering his province who were supporters of 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Muhammad ibn al-Ash'ath. Yazid defeated them. Yazid seized Nizak's fortress and made peace with him.
In 705, al-Hajjaj replace Yazid, naming al-Mufaddal governor of Khurasan. Various reasons are suggested, including that al-Hajjaj encountered a prophecy that his successor would be named Yazid and al-Hajjaj considered this Yazid the only one threatening enough to worry about. Al-Hajjaj imprisoned and tortured Yazid. In 708, Yazid, disguised, escaped and made his way to Palestine where he was granted refuge by Suleiman ibn 'Abd al-Malik. Al-Hajjaj pressed Caliph al-Walid I who commanded his brother (Suleiman) to send him Yazid in chains. Suleiman had his own son chained to Yazid approach the caliph and speak favoring Yazid's safety. Al-Walid accepted this and told al-Hajjaj to desist. Yazid returned to Suleiman and the two became very close to each other.
When Suleiman came to the throne in 715, he appointed Yazid to govern Iraq. The next year Suleiman appointed Yazid governor of Khurasan. Yazid fought in Jurjan and Tabaristan, personally engaging in combat. In 718, the new caliph Umar ibn 'Abd al-Aziz dismissed Yazid. Yazid was captured on his way to Basra and brought before Umar who intensely disliked him. Umar imprisoned Yazid. In 720, when Umar fell ill, Yazid escaped. Umar died.
Yazid marched on Basra. Many joined him. He refused to swear allegiance to the new caliph, Yazid II. He attacked those holding his brothers, defeated them and freed his brothers. His son Khalid was arrested in Kufah and sent to Damascus where he remained in prison until he died. Yazid was advised to head east, but he declined to follow this advice. In 721, Maslamah ibn 'Abd al-Malik and al-Abbas ibn al-Walid led forces against him. On August 25, Maslamah's troops advanced to battle, frightening some of Yazid's men who fled. Yazid had these men beheaded. He then rode directly at Maslamah. Maslamah's cavalry intercepted him and cut him down.
Fighting continued. In Wasit, Yazid's son Mu'awiyah, on news of his father's death, executed some prisoners, including Adi ibn Artat, the Basran governor who had sent Yazid to Umar in 718. Mu'awiyah and other surviving members of Yazid's family sailed to Bahrain, then near Kirman. They advanced to Qandabil where they were denied entrance. There was a battle in which all but two died, those two making their way to Zabulistan. Some captured boys were sent to Yazid II who beheaded them.
Yaziji, al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al-
Yaziji, al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al- (al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al-Yaziji) (1800-1871). Arab poet and philologist from Lebanon. He contributed to the popularity of al-Mutanabbi in Syria, and obtained fame as the last representative of the Session genre. He also exercised great influence on modern Arabic literature. His sons Ibrahim (1847-1906) and Khalil (1858-1889), and his daughter Warda (1838-1924) also contributed to the revival of the Arabic language.
Shaykh Nasif ibn 'Abd Allah al-Yaziji, al- see Yaziji, al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al-
Yaziji, al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al- (al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al-Yaziji) (1800-1871). Arab poet and philologist from Lebanon. He contributed to the popularity of al-Mutanabbi in Syria, and obtained fame as the last representative of the Session genre. He also exercised great influence on modern Arabic literature. His sons Ibrahim (1847-1906) and Khalil (1858-1889), and his daughter Warda (1838-1924) also contributed to the revival of the Arabic language.
Shaykh Nasif ibn 'Abd Allah al-Yaziji, al- see Yaziji, al-Shaykh Nasif ibn ‘Abd Allah al-
Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed (Ahmed Bijan) (d.c. 1456). Turkish poet, brother of the Mehmed Yaziji-oghlu. He was the author of several much esteemed mystical works.
Ahmed, Yaziji-oghlu see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Ahmed Bijan see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Bijan, Ahmed see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed (Ahmed Bijan) (d.c. 1456). Turkish poet, brother of the Mehmed Yaziji-oghlu. He was the author of several much esteemed mystical works.
Ahmed, Yaziji-oghlu see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Ahmed Bijan see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Bijan, Ahmed see Yaziji-oghlu Ahmed
Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed
Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed (Yaziji-zade) (d.1451). Turkish poet. He is known as the author of a long didactic poem, which contains a lengthy expression of the doctrines and traditions of Islam based on the Qur’an and hadith.
Mehmed, Yaziji-oghlu see Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed
Yaziji-zade see Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed
Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed (Yaziji-zade) (d.1451). Turkish poet. He is known as the author of a long didactic poem, which contains a lengthy expression of the doctrines and traditions of Islam based on the Qur’an and hadith.
Mehmed, Yaziji-oghlu see Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed
Yaziji-zade see Yaziji-oghlu Mehmed
Yazuri, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan
Yazuri, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan (Abu Muhammad al-Hasan Yazuri). Vizier and chief judge of the Fatimid Caliph al-Mustansir bi-‘llah. When the Zirid al-Mu‘izz ibn Badis rebelled against the Fatimids in 1051, Yazuri sent the Banu Hilal and the Banu Sulaym to ravage Ifriqiya. In the east Yazuri gave considerable financial assistance to the Turkish military leader Arslan al-Basasiri in hi rebellion against the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Qa’im.
Abu Muhammad al-Hasan Yazuri see Yazuri, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan
Yazuri, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan (Abu Muhammad al-Hasan Yazuri). Vizier and chief judge of the Fatimid Caliph al-Mustansir bi-‘llah. When the Zirid al-Mu‘izz ibn Badis rebelled against the Fatimids in 1051, Yazuri sent the Banu Hilal and the Banu Sulaym to ravage Ifriqiya. In the east Yazuri gave considerable financial assistance to the Turkish military leader Arslan al-Basasiri in hi rebellion against the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Qa’im.
Abu Muhammad al-Hasan Yazuri see Yazuri, Abu Muhammad al-Hasan
Yoruba
Yoruba. The term “Yoruba” is used to identify a people having, with considerable dialectic variation, a common language (of the Kwa group of the Niger-Congo family) and a common culture, which is remarkably persistent in spite of great political, geographical and religious differences that have arisen over the past three centuries. The language and culture are found as far from their West African origin as Brazil and Cuba, while substantial Yoruba communitiesare found in most West African states, especially in Sierra Leone and Ghana. The greatest number are in southwestern Nigeria, adjacent areas of Benin and beyond in Togo. Nearly one-half are Muslim, largely Sunni.
Recent interpretations of Yoruba traditions of origin agree in identifying Yoruba as a Sudanic people who successfully imposed their rule on an indigenous population in the forest belt of present day Nigeria. All traditions confirm Ile-Ife as the first city of the Yoruba and the Ooni of Ife as the spiritual head from whom all other Yoruba kings derive their sanction to rule. Urbanization among Yoruba is both basic and traditional, they have “always” lived in cities. Prior to the wars of the nineteenth century, farming communities extended out from the cities, and hunters served as guardians of boundaries while establishing and maintaining routes for trade. Fulani pressures from the north and colonial changes in the south forced the creation of strategic and defensible towns, such as Ibadan and Abeokuta, as well as the shifting of major cities to the south, notably Oyo. These new cities were built in patterns which can be seen today, substantially walled, largely windowless, large family compounds with internal courtyards, the whole built along intricate access paths.
Although some Yoruba felt the influence of Islam in earlier centuries, it was not until the early nineteenth century, following the Fulani jihad in the north, that old Oyo came within Muslim influence and Ilorin fell to Muslim rule under a line of emirs that persists to the present. By the time Fulani military pressure forced the resettlement of Oyo to the south, Islam was firmly entrenched in the Yoruba savannas -- as far, indeed, as the horse could safely go. Thereafter, the advance of Islam in Yoruba country was peaceful. By the 1830s, Hausa traders, some of whom were also religious teachers, had established themselves in the new city of Ibadan. As British colonial influence grew, freedom of trade movement further facilitated proselytization. During the second quarter of the present century, British “indirect rule,” which reinforced powers of emirs and obas (kings), led to Islamic domination in the north and a consequent rapid growth in the south. In the forty years between 1913 and 1953, the proportion of professed Muslims in Ibadan alone increased from thirty-five to sixty percent. Simultaneously, Christian missionaries -- many of them returned slaves from America -- were active in the south, and eventually it could be said without great exaggeration that throughout the Yoruba territories fewer than one-seventh of the people remained professed traditionalists, while the remainder divided fairly equally between Islam and Christianity.
The Yoruba numbered more than 20 million at the turn of the 21st century. They speak a language of the Benue-Congo branch of the Niger-Congo language family. Most Yoruba men are farmers, growing yams, corn (maize), and millet as staples and plantains, peanuts (groundnuts), beans, and peas as subsidiary crops. Cocoa is a major cash crop. Others are traders or craftsmen. Women do little farm work but control much of the complex market system—their status depends more on their own position in the marketplace than on their husbands’ status. The Yoruba have traditionally been among the most skilled and productive craftsmen of Africa. They worked at such trades as blacksmithing, weaving, leatherworking, glassmaking, and ivory and wood carving. In the 13th and 14th centuries Yoruba bronze casting using the lost-wax (cire perdue) method reached a peak of technical excellence never subsequently equaled in western Africa. Yoruba women engage in cotton spinning, basketry, and dyeing.
The Yoruba have shared a common language and culture for centuries but were probably never a single political unit. They seem to have migrated from the east to their present lands west of the lower Niger River more than a millennium ago. They eventually became the most urbanized Africans of precolonial times. They formed numerous kingdoms of various sizes, each of which was centered on a capital city or town and ruled by a hereditary king, or oba. Their towns became densely populated and eventually grew into the present-day cities of Oyo, Ile-Ife, Ilesha, Ibadan, Ilorin, Ijebu-Ode, Ikere-Ekiti, and others. Oyo developed in the 17th century into the largest of the Yoruba kingdoms, while Ile-Ife remained a town of potent religious significance as the site of the earth’s creation according to Yoruba mythology. Oyo and the other kingdoms declined in the late 18th and 19th centuries owing to disputes among minor Yoruba rulers and invasions by the Fon of Dahomey (now Benin) and the Muslim Fulani. The traditional Yoruba kingships still survive, but with only a hint of their former political power.
In a traditional Yoruba town the large and elaborate palace of the oba lies at the center, and grouped around it are the compounds of the patrilineages. The palace and the compounds are now often modern structures.
There is much diversity in social and political organization among the Yoruba, but they share many basic features. Inheritance and succession are based on patrilineal descent; members of the patrilineage live together under the authority of a headman, share certain names and taboos, worship their own deity, and have rights in lineage lands. The Yoruba also have several kinds of voluntary associations, including the egbe, a male recreational association; the aro, a mutual-aid association of farmers; and the esusu, whose members contribute a fixed amount of money and from which they can receive loans. Political authority is vested in the oba and a council of chiefs. Constituent towns each have their own ruler, who is subordinate to the oba. The oba is also a ritual leader and is considered sacred.
Many Yoruba are now Christians or Muslims, but aspects of their traditional religion survive. The traditional Yoruba religion has an elaborate hierarchy of deities, including a supreme creator and some 400 lesser gods and spirits, most of whom are associated with their own cults and priests. The Yoruba language has an extensive literature of poetry, short stories, myths, and proverbs.
Yoruba. The term “Yoruba” is used to identify a people having, with considerable dialectic variation, a common language (of the Kwa group of the Niger-Congo family) and a common culture, which is remarkably persistent in spite of great political, geographical and religious differences that have arisen over the past three centuries. The language and culture are found as far from their West African origin as Brazil and Cuba, while substantial Yoruba communitiesare found in most West African states, especially in Sierra Leone and Ghana. The greatest number are in southwestern Nigeria, adjacent areas of Benin and beyond in Togo. Nearly one-half are Muslim, largely Sunni.
Recent interpretations of Yoruba traditions of origin agree in identifying Yoruba as a Sudanic people who successfully imposed their rule on an indigenous population in the forest belt of present day Nigeria. All traditions confirm Ile-Ife as the first city of the Yoruba and the Ooni of Ife as the spiritual head from whom all other Yoruba kings derive their sanction to rule. Urbanization among Yoruba is both basic and traditional, they have “always” lived in cities. Prior to the wars of the nineteenth century, farming communities extended out from the cities, and hunters served as guardians of boundaries while establishing and maintaining routes for trade. Fulani pressures from the north and colonial changes in the south forced the creation of strategic and defensible towns, such as Ibadan and Abeokuta, as well as the shifting of major cities to the south, notably Oyo. These new cities were built in patterns which can be seen today, substantially walled, largely windowless, large family compounds with internal courtyards, the whole built along intricate access paths.
Although some Yoruba felt the influence of Islam in earlier centuries, it was not until the early nineteenth century, following the Fulani jihad in the north, that old Oyo came within Muslim influence and Ilorin fell to Muslim rule under a line of emirs that persists to the present. By the time Fulani military pressure forced the resettlement of Oyo to the south, Islam was firmly entrenched in the Yoruba savannas -- as far, indeed, as the horse could safely go. Thereafter, the advance of Islam in Yoruba country was peaceful. By the 1830s, Hausa traders, some of whom were also religious teachers, had established themselves in the new city of Ibadan. As British colonial influence grew, freedom of trade movement further facilitated proselytization. During the second quarter of the present century, British “indirect rule,” which reinforced powers of emirs and obas (kings), led to Islamic domination in the north and a consequent rapid growth in the south. In the forty years between 1913 and 1953, the proportion of professed Muslims in Ibadan alone increased from thirty-five to sixty percent. Simultaneously, Christian missionaries -- many of them returned slaves from America -- were active in the south, and eventually it could be said without great exaggeration that throughout the Yoruba territories fewer than one-seventh of the people remained professed traditionalists, while the remainder divided fairly equally between Islam and Christianity.
The Yoruba numbered more than 20 million at the turn of the 21st century. They speak a language of the Benue-Congo branch of the Niger-Congo language family. Most Yoruba men are farmers, growing yams, corn (maize), and millet as staples and plantains, peanuts (groundnuts), beans, and peas as subsidiary crops. Cocoa is a major cash crop. Others are traders or craftsmen. Women do little farm work but control much of the complex market system—their status depends more on their own position in the marketplace than on their husbands’ status. The Yoruba have traditionally been among the most skilled and productive craftsmen of Africa. They worked at such trades as blacksmithing, weaving, leatherworking, glassmaking, and ivory and wood carving. In the 13th and 14th centuries Yoruba bronze casting using the lost-wax (cire perdue) method reached a peak of technical excellence never subsequently equaled in western Africa. Yoruba women engage in cotton spinning, basketry, and dyeing.
The Yoruba have shared a common language and culture for centuries but were probably never a single political unit. They seem to have migrated from the east to their present lands west of the lower Niger River more than a millennium ago. They eventually became the most urbanized Africans of precolonial times. They formed numerous kingdoms of various sizes, each of which was centered on a capital city or town and ruled by a hereditary king, or oba. Their towns became densely populated and eventually grew into the present-day cities of Oyo, Ile-Ife, Ilesha, Ibadan, Ilorin, Ijebu-Ode, Ikere-Ekiti, and others. Oyo developed in the 17th century into the largest of the Yoruba kingdoms, while Ile-Ife remained a town of potent religious significance as the site of the earth’s creation according to Yoruba mythology. Oyo and the other kingdoms declined in the late 18th and 19th centuries owing to disputes among minor Yoruba rulers and invasions by the Fon of Dahomey (now Benin) and the Muslim Fulani. The traditional Yoruba kingships still survive, but with only a hint of their former political power.
In a traditional Yoruba town the large and elaborate palace of the oba lies at the center, and grouped around it are the compounds of the patrilineages. The palace and the compounds are now often modern structures.
There is much diversity in social and political organization among the Yoruba, but they share many basic features. Inheritance and succession are based on patrilineal descent; members of the patrilineage live together under the authority of a headman, share certain names and taboos, worship their own deity, and have rights in lineage lands. The Yoruba also have several kinds of voluntary associations, including the egbe, a male recreational association; the aro, a mutual-aid association of farmers; and the esusu, whose members contribute a fixed amount of money and from which they can receive loans. Political authority is vested in the oba and a council of chiefs. Constituent towns each have their own ruler, who is subordinate to the oba. The oba is also a ritual leader and is considered sacred.
Many Yoruba are now Christians or Muslims, but aspects of their traditional religion survive. The traditional Yoruba religion has an elaborate hierarchy of deities, including a supreme creator and some 400 lesser gods and spirits, most of whom are associated with their own cults and priests. The Yoruba language has an extensive literature of poetry, short stories, myths, and proverbs.
Yoruba slaves
Yoruba slaves. The Yoruba Kingdom was an ancient black kingdom located in central western Nigeria, apparently originating in the northern fringes of the forest. Before the Europeans arrived, it was already a highly urbanized and industrialized state, experienced in the art of working iron, copper, and glassware. It traded with the Mediterranean cities across the Sahara. The slave trade in the area reached a high development when the Portuguese reached the Guinea or Gold Coast around 1510. Yoruba slaves were brought in great numbers to the New World, especially to Cuba and Brazil, where they were known as Lucumi in Cuba and Nagos in Brazil. They were usually exported through the port of Lagos on the Slave Coast. In Brazil, they were thought to be robust, courageous, hard-working, and better tempered than other races, and they were noted for their intelligence. In 1826, the Yoruba slaves of Bahia set up a quilombo in the hinterland at Urubu, not far from the city. They fought valiantly against the government troops but were ultimately subdued.
A significant percentage of Africans enslaved during the Atlantic slave trade in the Americas managed to maintain the Yoruba tradition of 'Orisha' (also spelt, 'Orisa') veneration, as well as their continual belief in God, the Supreme Being, who they refer to under different names such as 'Olorun', 'Olodumare', 'Eleda', 'Olofin-Orun' and 'Eledumare'.
During the 19th century, the term 'Yoruba ' or 'Yariba' came into wider use, first confined to the Ọyọ. The term is often believed to be derived from a Hausa ethnonym for the populous people to their south, but this has not been substantiated by historians.
As an ethnic description, the word 'Yoruba' first appeared in a treatise written by the Songhai scholar Ahmed Baba (1500s) and is likely to derive from the indigenous ethnonyms Ọyọ (Oyo) or Yagba, two Yoruba-speaking groups along the northern borders of their territory. However, it is likely that the ethnonym was popularized by Hausa usage and ethnography written in Arabic and Ajami. Under the influence of Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther, a Creole (of Aku origin) clergyman, subsequent missionaries extended the term to include all speakers of related dialects.
Aside from "Yoruba" and its variant "Yariba", this ethnic group was in different times and places known by a variety of other names, including "Yorubo", "Akú", "Okun", "Nago", "Anago" and "Ana" and "Lucumi".
Before the abolition of the slave trade, some Yoruba groups were known among Europeans as Akú, a name derived from the first words of Yoruba greetings such as Ẹ kú àárọ? 'good morning' and Ẹ kú alẹ? 'good evening.' A variant of this group is also known as the "Okun", Okun being also a form of "A ku". These are Yorubas found in parts of the states of Kogi - the "Yagba", Ekiti and Kabba.
The terms "Nago", "Anago" and "Ana" were widely used in Spanish and Portuguese documents to describe all speakers of the language. They derive from the name of a coastal Yoruba sub-group in present-day Benin. Yoruba in Francophone West Africa are still sometimes known by this ethnonym today.
In Cuba and Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking America, the Yoruba were called "Lucumi" after the phrase "O luku mi", meaning "my friend" in some dialects. This term is at present used mainly to refer to an Afro-Caribbean religion derived from the traditional Yoruba religion, more often known as Santería now becoming popular in the United States.
The origin of the Yoruba, who often refer to themselves as "Omo O'odua" (Children of Oduduwa), revolves around a man called Oduduwa who became the first Oba (meaning 'king' or 'leader' in the Yoruba language) at the Yoruba kingdom of Ile-Ife (also known as Ife), under the title of the Ooni of Ife. It was from Ile-Ife that the descendants of Oduduwa went on to find other Yoruba kingdoms such as Oyo and Ketou. One of them even managed to rule over a famous non-Yoruba-speaking kingdom towards the east of Ife as the Oba of Ile-Ibinu, which later became known as Ubini, the Edo, and finally Benin (not to be confused with the country called the Republic of Benin which was previously known as Dahomey).
Yoruba slaves. The Yoruba Kingdom was an ancient black kingdom located in central western Nigeria, apparently originating in the northern fringes of the forest. Before the Europeans arrived, it was already a highly urbanized and industrialized state, experienced in the art of working iron, copper, and glassware. It traded with the Mediterranean cities across the Sahara. The slave trade in the area reached a high development when the Portuguese reached the Guinea or Gold Coast around 1510. Yoruba slaves were brought in great numbers to the New World, especially to Cuba and Brazil, where they were known as Lucumi in Cuba and Nagos in Brazil. They were usually exported through the port of Lagos on the Slave Coast. In Brazil, they were thought to be robust, courageous, hard-working, and better tempered than other races, and they were noted for their intelligence. In 1826, the Yoruba slaves of Bahia set up a quilombo in the hinterland at Urubu, not far from the city. They fought valiantly against the government troops but were ultimately subdued.
A significant percentage of Africans enslaved during the Atlantic slave trade in the Americas managed to maintain the Yoruba tradition of 'Orisha' (also spelt, 'Orisa') veneration, as well as their continual belief in God, the Supreme Being, who they refer to under different names such as 'Olorun', 'Olodumare', 'Eleda', 'Olofin-Orun' and 'Eledumare'.
During the 19th century, the term 'Yoruba ' or 'Yariba' came into wider use, first confined to the Ọyọ. The term is often believed to be derived from a Hausa ethnonym for the populous people to their south, but this has not been substantiated by historians.
As an ethnic description, the word 'Yoruba' first appeared in a treatise written by the Songhai scholar Ahmed Baba (1500s) and is likely to derive from the indigenous ethnonyms Ọyọ (Oyo) or Yagba, two Yoruba-speaking groups along the northern borders of their territory. However, it is likely that the ethnonym was popularized by Hausa usage and ethnography written in Arabic and Ajami. Under the influence of Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther, a Creole (of Aku origin) clergyman, subsequent missionaries extended the term to include all speakers of related dialects.
Aside from "Yoruba" and its variant "Yariba", this ethnic group was in different times and places known by a variety of other names, including "Yorubo", "Akú", "Okun", "Nago", "Anago" and "Ana" and "Lucumi".
Before the abolition of the slave trade, some Yoruba groups were known among Europeans as Akú, a name derived from the first words of Yoruba greetings such as Ẹ kú àárọ? 'good morning' and Ẹ kú alẹ? 'good evening.' A variant of this group is also known as the "Okun", Okun being also a form of "A ku". These are Yorubas found in parts of the states of Kogi - the "Yagba", Ekiti and Kabba.
The terms "Nago", "Anago" and "Ana" were widely used in Spanish and Portuguese documents to describe all speakers of the language. They derive from the name of a coastal Yoruba sub-group in present-day Benin. Yoruba in Francophone West Africa are still sometimes known by this ethnonym today.
In Cuba and Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking America, the Yoruba were called "Lucumi" after the phrase "O luku mi", meaning "my friend" in some dialects. This term is at present used mainly to refer to an Afro-Caribbean religion derived from the traditional Yoruba religion, more often known as Santería now becoming popular in the United States.
The origin of the Yoruba, who often refer to themselves as "Omo O'odua" (Children of Oduduwa), revolves around a man called Oduduwa who became the first Oba (meaning 'king' or 'leader' in the Yoruba language) at the Yoruba kingdom of Ile-Ife (also known as Ife), under the title of the Ooni of Ife. It was from Ile-Ife that the descendants of Oduduwa went on to find other Yoruba kingdoms such as Oyo and Ketou. One of them even managed to rule over a famous non-Yoruba-speaking kingdom towards the east of Ife as the Oba of Ile-Ibinu, which later became known as Ubini, the Edo, and finally Benin (not to be confused with the country called the Republic of Benin which was previously known as Dahomey).
Yoruk
Yoruk (Yuruk). The Yoruk of Turkey are a distinct ethnic-tribal grouping, found widely throughout Turkey but primarily along the Aegean and Mediterranean coastlines. Unlike many groups with a unique cultural heritage in the Middle East, the Yoruk are not linguistically distinct from most of the rural populations among whom they live. They speak the Western Turkish dialect standard in Anatolia.
The Yoruk are Sunni of the Hanafi school of law. What distinguishes the Yoruk is their recognition of a common history in the form of membership in, or descent from, an assortment of Turkic tribes which are presumed to have moved to Anatolia from Iran or Central Asia in the eleventh century.
As early as the reign of Bayazid I, there are accounts of Yoruk tribes in Macedonia, Thrace and elsewhere in the Balkans. Following the conquest of Cyprus by Selim II, Yoruk groups moved to that island, where they may be found today as settled villagers. Most historians regard the Yoruk as closely related to Turkmen tribes who came in large numbers after the Battle of Manzikert in 1071, but it is also likely that indigenous nomadic pastoral populations along the coast became Turkified during the early period of Islamic rule in Anatolia.
The term “Yoruk” is often thought to be derived from yurumek, “to walk.” The Yoruk themselves do not make this the case, but regardless of the merits of the etymology, it is a fitting image for a nomadic people moving with their flocks of sheep and goats.
During the Ottoman period, Yoruk tribes were important politically since they were recognized by the government for purposes of taxation, the raising of military levies and local administration. Tribal leaders, for example, supplied 52,000 troops in the eighteenth century. Today Yoruk people contine to speak of tribes, and most of the 88 listed in 1898 as then living in Aydin and Smyrna (Izmir) provinces still can be located readily. However, the Turkish government now does not recognize tribes or tribal leaders for administrative purposes.
Yuruk see Yoruk
Yoruk (Yuruk). The Yoruk of Turkey are a distinct ethnic-tribal grouping, found widely throughout Turkey but primarily along the Aegean and Mediterranean coastlines. Unlike many groups with a unique cultural heritage in the Middle East, the Yoruk are not linguistically distinct from most of the rural populations among whom they live. They speak the Western Turkish dialect standard in Anatolia.
The Yoruk are Sunni of the Hanafi school of law. What distinguishes the Yoruk is their recognition of a common history in the form of membership in, or descent from, an assortment of Turkic tribes which are presumed to have moved to Anatolia from Iran or Central Asia in the eleventh century.
As early as the reign of Bayazid I, there are accounts of Yoruk tribes in Macedonia, Thrace and elsewhere in the Balkans. Following the conquest of Cyprus by Selim II, Yoruk groups moved to that island, where they may be found today as settled villagers. Most historians regard the Yoruk as closely related to Turkmen tribes who came in large numbers after the Battle of Manzikert in 1071, but it is also likely that indigenous nomadic pastoral populations along the coast became Turkified during the early period of Islamic rule in Anatolia.
The term “Yoruk” is often thought to be derived from yurumek, “to walk.” The Yoruk themselves do not make this the case, but regardless of the merits of the etymology, it is a fitting image for a nomadic people moving with their flocks of sheep and goats.
During the Ottoman period, Yoruk tribes were important politically since they were recognized by the government for purposes of taxation, the raising of military levies and local administration. Tribal leaders, for example, supplied 52,000 troops in the eighteenth century. Today Yoruk people contine to speak of tribes, and most of the 88 listed in 1898 as then living in Aydin and Smyrna (Izmir) provinces still can be located readily. However, the Turkish government now does not recognize tribes or tribal leaders for administrative purposes.
Yuruk see Yoruk
Young Egypt Party
Young Egypt Party (Hizb Misr El-Fatah) (Misr El-Fatah Party). Egyptian nationalist movement having strong Fascist leanings.
The Young Egypt Party is a small Egyptian political party. The Party platform calls for:
* Establishing a parliamentary/presidential ruling system.
* Enhancing the Egyptian-Arab ties.
* Achieving integration with African countries.
* Adopting non-alignment policies.
* Establishing the so-called socialist Islamic economic system and boosting the role of the private sector.
The Party fielded seven candidates to run for the 2000 legislative elections.
The Party was formed October 1933 by its leader Ahmed Husayn. During the 1930s the fascist Young Egypt Party had a youth movement name the "Green Shirts" who had some violent confrontations with the Wafd party's "blue shirts". One member even tried to assassinate Mustafa el-Nahas Pasha in November 1937. Under government pressure, the Green Shirts were disbanded in 1938. The group was renamed the Nationalist Islamic Party in 1940, when it took on a more religious, as well as, anti-British tone. After the war it was renamed yet again, now the Socialist Party of Egypt. The groups one electoral success came when it sent Ibrahim Shukri, its vice-president to parliament in 1951. However, the military government that came to power in the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 disbanded it, and all other parties, in 1953.
Ibriham Shukri formed a group, the Socialist Labor Party in 1978, despite its name it took much of the populistic and nationalistic ideology of the Young Egypt Party. Its organ (publication) was Al-Sha'ab (The People).
Another Young Egypt group, this one keeping the original name, was founded in 1990. It was led by Abdallah Rushdi.
Hizb Misr El-Fatah see Young Egypt Party
Misr El-Fatah Party see Young Egypt Party
Young Egypt Party (Hizb Misr El-Fatah) (Misr El-Fatah Party). Egyptian nationalist movement having strong Fascist leanings.
The Young Egypt Party is a small Egyptian political party. The Party platform calls for:
* Establishing a parliamentary/presidential ruling system.
* Enhancing the Egyptian-Arab ties.
* Achieving integration with African countries.
* Adopting non-alignment policies.
* Establishing the so-called socialist Islamic economic system and boosting the role of the private sector.
The Party fielded seven candidates to run for the 2000 legislative elections.
The Party was formed October 1933 by its leader Ahmed Husayn. During the 1930s the fascist Young Egypt Party had a youth movement name the "Green Shirts" who had some violent confrontations with the Wafd party's "blue shirts". One member even tried to assassinate Mustafa el-Nahas Pasha in November 1937. Under government pressure, the Green Shirts were disbanded in 1938. The group was renamed the Nationalist Islamic Party in 1940, when it took on a more religious, as well as, anti-British tone. After the war it was renamed yet again, now the Socialist Party of Egypt. The groups one electoral success came when it sent Ibrahim Shukri, its vice-president to parliament in 1951. However, the military government that came to power in the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 disbanded it, and all other parties, in 1953.
Ibriham Shukri formed a group, the Socialist Labor Party in 1978, despite its name it took much of the populistic and nationalistic ideology of the Young Egypt Party. Its organ (publication) was Al-Sha'ab (The People).
Another Young Egypt group, this one keeping the original name, was founded in 1990. It was led by Abdallah Rushdi.
Hizb Misr El-Fatah see Young Egypt Party
Misr El-Fatah Party see Young Egypt Party
Young Ottomans
Young Ottomans (Yeni Osmanlilar). The libertarian movement known as the Young Ottomans (Yeni Osmanlilar) developed the first constitutionalist ideology to appear in the Ottoman Empire. It was influential from around 1860 to 1876. In the first half of the nineteenth century Ottoman officials embarked on a policy of reforms that came to be known as the Tanzimat (Regulation). The first political expressions of this reform policy were contained in two documents: the Hatt-i Humayun of Gulhane (1839), a semi-constitutional charter that promised security of person and property to all Ottoman subjects, and the Reform Edict of 1856, which covered a more diverse catalog of rights and made a special point of guaranteeing protection to the non-Muslim population of the empire. The Reform Edict had extensive negative repercussions among Ottoman Muslims; one of its outcomes was the so-called Kuleli Conspiracy (1859). The leader of the conspiracy was a Naqshbandi (in Turkish, Naksibendi) shaykh, and some younger officials took part in it. This alliance of disgruntled clerics and young officials shifted during the 1860s into a more clearly liberal constitutionalist stance inspired by Western liberalism. At that time the religious component was relegated to a secondary role, possibly because the democratic ideals expressed in recently founded journals by the young officials could reach a wider audience through their use of demotic Turkish, although at least one newspaper represented the conservative strain.
In 1865, some young civil officials in Istanbul established a secret society, the Patriotic Alliance. With one foot in officialdom and another in journalism, these men began systematically to criticize the policy of the architects of the Tanzimat. Among their targets were two Ottoman officials, Ali Pasa and Fuad Pasa, who had shared the direction of Ottoman internal and foreign policy. These statesmen were accused of using westernization to establish the autocratic rule of a bureaucratic elite, of undermining Ottoman culture through their neglect of Islam as a guideline for social and political values, and of having failed to defend the interests of the Ottoman Empire against the encroachments of Western powers. Two leaders of the Young Ottoman movement, the poet Mehmet Namuk Kemal and the administrator Ziya Bey (later Pasa), eventually had to flee from Istanbul into exile in 1867. They organized an opposition movement in Paris and London, funded by an Ottoman-Egyptian prince who expected to use the movement for his own narrower aims. The exiles were joined by the cleric Ali Suavi, who represented the earlier Islamic reaction to the Tanzimat and who seemed to support constitutionalism.
Kemal and Ziya soon perceived that Suavi’s ideas of democracy had a very different foundtion from theirs; Ziya himself was more conservative than Kemal. The newspaper they published, Hurriyet (Freedom), boldly expressed democratic ideals in Turkish, but it soon had to cease publication owing to conflicts among the movement’s leaders. After 1870, the Young Ottoman leaders returned to Turkey and continued their defense of libertarian ideals, with repeated interruptions by censorship and exile. Their ideas were partially instrumental in inspiring civilian and military officials to dethrone Sultan Abdulaziz (r. 1861-1876), although the Young Ottomans themselves had never opposed the monarchic principle in theory.
The Young Ottomans were in part responsible for the elaboration of the first Ottoman Constitution (1876) and the short-lived Ottoman parliament it created. Namuk Kemal’s impassioned defense of liberty as well as his fiery patriotism -- both strongly influenced by European Romanticism -- continued to be an inspiration for the Young Turks who emerged in the 1890s.
A forerunner of other Turkish nationalist groups (see Young Turks), the Young Ottomans favored converting the Turkish-dominated multi-national Ottoman Empire into a more purely Turkish state and called for the creation of a constitutional government. By 1867 the Young Ottomans had expanded from the original six (6) members to 245, including the noted poets Namık Kemal and Ziya Paşa. They were further supported financially and materially by the Egyptian prince Mustafa Fazıl and had attracted the attention of the Ottoman princes Murad and Abdülhamid.
Exiled for revolutionary activities by the grand vizier Âli Paşa in 1867, the society established itself in Paris. There it made European contacts and began publishing Hürriyet (“Freedom”), an inflammatory newspaper, subsequently smuggled into Turkey, calling on the Turkish people to demand a constitution. The return to Istanbul of Mustafa Fazıl and Namık Kemal weakened the Young Ottomans, and in 1871–72, during the amnesty declared after the death of Âli Paşa, most of them returned to Turkey. The movement, however, had lost its impetus and, except for the isolated activity of such individuals as Namık Kemal, ceased to be a factor in national affairs.
The failure of the "Young Ottoman" policies (Ottomanism) in reverting the decline of the Ottoman Empire led groups of intellectuals to search for other means. One of these groups was the Young Turks, which brought the Empire to the Second Constitutional Era and then to World War I, with the policies developed under the Three Pashas.
Yeni Osmanlilar see Young Ottomans
Young Ottomans (Yeni Osmanlilar). The libertarian movement known as the Young Ottomans (Yeni Osmanlilar) developed the first constitutionalist ideology to appear in the Ottoman Empire. It was influential from around 1860 to 1876. In the first half of the nineteenth century Ottoman officials embarked on a policy of reforms that came to be known as the Tanzimat (Regulation). The first political expressions of this reform policy were contained in two documents: the Hatt-i Humayun of Gulhane (1839), a semi-constitutional charter that promised security of person and property to all Ottoman subjects, and the Reform Edict of 1856, which covered a more diverse catalog of rights and made a special point of guaranteeing protection to the non-Muslim population of the empire. The Reform Edict had extensive negative repercussions among Ottoman Muslims; one of its outcomes was the so-called Kuleli Conspiracy (1859). The leader of the conspiracy was a Naqshbandi (in Turkish, Naksibendi) shaykh, and some younger officials took part in it. This alliance of disgruntled clerics and young officials shifted during the 1860s into a more clearly liberal constitutionalist stance inspired by Western liberalism. At that time the religious component was relegated to a secondary role, possibly because the democratic ideals expressed in recently founded journals by the young officials could reach a wider audience through their use of demotic Turkish, although at least one newspaper represented the conservative strain.
In 1865, some young civil officials in Istanbul established a secret society, the Patriotic Alliance. With one foot in officialdom and another in journalism, these men began systematically to criticize the policy of the architects of the Tanzimat. Among their targets were two Ottoman officials, Ali Pasa and Fuad Pasa, who had shared the direction of Ottoman internal and foreign policy. These statesmen were accused of using westernization to establish the autocratic rule of a bureaucratic elite, of undermining Ottoman culture through their neglect of Islam as a guideline for social and political values, and of having failed to defend the interests of the Ottoman Empire against the encroachments of Western powers. Two leaders of the Young Ottoman movement, the poet Mehmet Namuk Kemal and the administrator Ziya Bey (later Pasa), eventually had to flee from Istanbul into exile in 1867. They organized an opposition movement in Paris and London, funded by an Ottoman-Egyptian prince who expected to use the movement for his own narrower aims. The exiles were joined by the cleric Ali Suavi, who represented the earlier Islamic reaction to the Tanzimat and who seemed to support constitutionalism.
Kemal and Ziya soon perceived that Suavi’s ideas of democracy had a very different foundtion from theirs; Ziya himself was more conservative than Kemal. The newspaper they published, Hurriyet (Freedom), boldly expressed democratic ideals in Turkish, but it soon had to cease publication owing to conflicts among the movement’s leaders. After 1870, the Young Ottoman leaders returned to Turkey and continued their defense of libertarian ideals, with repeated interruptions by censorship and exile. Their ideas were partially instrumental in inspiring civilian and military officials to dethrone Sultan Abdulaziz (r. 1861-1876), although the Young Ottomans themselves had never opposed the monarchic principle in theory.
The Young Ottomans were in part responsible for the elaboration of the first Ottoman Constitution (1876) and the short-lived Ottoman parliament it created. Namuk Kemal’s impassioned defense of liberty as well as his fiery patriotism -- both strongly influenced by European Romanticism -- continued to be an inspiration for the Young Turks who emerged in the 1890s.
A forerunner of other Turkish nationalist groups (see Young Turks), the Young Ottomans favored converting the Turkish-dominated multi-national Ottoman Empire into a more purely Turkish state and called for the creation of a constitutional government. By 1867 the Young Ottomans had expanded from the original six (6) members to 245, including the noted poets Namık Kemal and Ziya Paşa. They were further supported financially and materially by the Egyptian prince Mustafa Fazıl and had attracted the attention of the Ottoman princes Murad and Abdülhamid.
Exiled for revolutionary activities by the grand vizier Âli Paşa in 1867, the society established itself in Paris. There it made European contacts and began publishing Hürriyet (“Freedom”), an inflammatory newspaper, subsequently smuggled into Turkey, calling on the Turkish people to demand a constitution. The return to Istanbul of Mustafa Fazıl and Namık Kemal weakened the Young Ottomans, and in 1871–72, during the amnesty declared after the death of Âli Paşa, most of them returned to Turkey. The movement, however, had lost its impetus and, except for the isolated activity of such individuals as Namık Kemal, ceased to be a factor in national affairs.
The failure of the "Young Ottoman" policies (Ottomanism) in reverting the decline of the Ottoman Empire led groups of intellectuals to search for other means. One of these groups was the Young Turks, which brought the Empire to the Second Constitutional Era and then to World War I, with the policies developed under the Three Pashas.
Yeni Osmanlilar see Young Ottomans
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