Khalil Allah But-Shikan (1374-1460). Persian mystic of Kirman who was active in South India.
But-Shikan, Khalil Allah see Khalil Allah But-Shikan
Shikan, Khalil Allah But- see Khalil Allah But-Shikan
Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din
Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din (al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din Khalil) (al-Ashraf Khalil) (Al-Malik al-Ashraf Salāh al-Dīn Khalil ibn Qalawūn) (b. c. 1262, Cairo - d. December 14, 1293, Kom Turuga). Mameluke sultan (r.1290-1293). His fame rests upon his conquest of Acre in 1291, which put an end to Christian domination of Palestine. He was assassinated in December 1293 in Turuga. Besides being remembered as the conqueror of Acre, he is remembered as an intelligent sultan who was fond of reading and writing.
Al-Ashraf Salāh al-Dīn Khalil was the eighth Mameluke sultan of Egypt from 1290 until his assassination in December, 1293. He is most famous for conquering the last of the Crusader states in Palestine.
Al-Ashraf Ṣalāḥ ad-Dīn Khalīl completed his father Qalāʾūn’s (Qalawun's) campaign to drive the Franks from Syria. He captured Acre (now ʿAkko, Israel) in the spring of 1291, and the remaining crusader fortresses were surrendered by the end of the year. He was murdered by his emirs, who were alarmed by his ambition.
Al-Ashraf Khalil, the 8th Kipchak Turkic Sultan of Egypt was the son of Sultan Qalawun. He became heir to the Sultanate and was named co-sultan with his father shortly after the sudden death of his older brother as-Salih Ali in 1288. During the investiture, Khalil faced a formal problem as the succession document was not signed by his late father. According to the ceremony judge, Fath ad-Din Abdul Zahir, his father refused to sign the document before his death saying: "Fath ad-Din, I can not let Khalil rule the Muslims". When Khalil saw the document without his father's signature he said: "Fath ad-Din, the sultan declined to give it to me, but God gave it to me" and he was inaugurated. Qalawun's vice-Sultan, Hosam ad-Din Turuntay and Emir Kitbugha, were arrested by Khalil and Turuntay was executed as he led a conspiracy to kill him but Kitbugha was later released. While Baydara al-Mansuri became the new Vice-Sultan, Hosam ad-Din Lajin became the deputy of the Sultan in Syria and Ibn al-Salus was granted the post of vizier. After Khalil liquidated his opponents and secured his position he was ready to complete the work which his father did not finish, namely the recapturing of the last strongholds of the Franks situated on the Syrian coast.
Qalawun, father of Khalil, conquered the County of Tripoli in 1289, and in 1290 marched on Acre, the capital of the remnant of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but, to the relief of the Franks of Acre, he died in November before launching the attack. He was succeeded by Khalil who decided to continue the attack. Khalil sent a message to William of Beaujeu, the Master of the Temple, telling him about his intentions to attack Acre and urging him not to send messengers or gifts. But a delegation from Acre led by Sir Philip Mainebeuf, arrived in Cairo with gifts and appealed to Khalil not to attack Acre. Khalil did not accept the request and imprisoned the Frank messengers.
Al-Ashraf Khalil assembled the forces of Egypt and Syria, which included a great number of volunteers and siege engines from everywhere at Hisn al-Akrad. Some of Khalil's catapults were huge and had such names as "Al Mansuri" and "The Furious" in addition to lighter, but potent, mangonels called "Black Bulls". Four armies from Damascus (led by Lajin), Hama (led by al-Muzaffar Taqai ad-Din), Tripoli (led by Bilban) and Al Kark (led by Baibars al-Dewadar) marched to Acre to join the Egyptian army of Khalil. In addition to the historian Baibars al-Dewadar who led the army of Al Karak, Abu al-Fida was another prominent historian who accompanied al-Ashraf in his Levantine expedition.
The Franks of Acre were for some time aware of the seriousness of the situation. They asked for help from Europe which resulted in nothing significant. A small group of knights, among them the Swiss Otto de Grandison, were sent by Edward I of England. Burchard of Schwanden, the Grand Master of the German Teutonic Knights, resigned and was replaced by Konrad von Feuchtwangen who suddenly left Acre for Europe. The only noteworthy reinforcement came from Henry II of Cyprus who fortified the walls and sent forces led by his brother Amalric to defend the city. Acre was well defended by two lines of thick walls and had Twelve towers which were built by European kings and rich pilgrims.
On April 5, 1291, Khalil's forces stood in front of Acre. The army of Hama took its position on front of the Templars' tower, while the Egyptian army stretched out from the end of the wall of Montmusard up to the Gulf of Acre. The Dihliz (red tent of the Sultan and the headquarters) stood on a small hill near the shore on front of the Tower of the Legate. On April 6, the catapults began to hurl stones and fire over the walls of Acre. For eight days the walls were hurled and both armies engaged in occasional clashes. At the end of the eight days the Muslims set up barricades and began to move further towards the city, using wicker screens, till in the end they reached the edge of the wall. Carabohas were brought up and parts of the wall were mined out. Despite the continual arrival of reinforcements from Cyprus to Acre by sea, the Franks became convinced of their lack of strength against Khalil's army. On April 15, under moonlight, the Templars, led by Jean Grailly and Otto de Grandison, launched a sudden attack against the camp of the contingent of Hama but their horses got their legs tangled in the ropes of the Muslims' tents and were caught and many were killed. Another attack, after a few days and this time under cover of darkness, by the Hospitallers also ended badly.
On May 5, some hope was revived when Henry II of Cyprus arrived with forces transported by 40 ships. But soon Henry, too, became convinced of his helplessness. The Franks sent messengers to Al-Ashraf Khalil who saluted him on their knees. Khalil asked them whether they brought him the keys of the city, but they replied that the city could not be surrendered so easily and that they only came to plea for mercy for the poor inhabitants and that the Franks were willing to discuss any injustice done by them earlier to the Muslims and to restore the truce signed by them and the Muslims. Khalil promised the messengers to spare the life of everyone if the Franks handed him Acre peacefully but the messengers refused his offer. While the messengers were still there a huge catapult stone launched from the city struck the ground near the sultan's tent. Khalil, believing that the crusaders were negotiating in bad faith, reacted furiously and wanted to kill the two messengers but Emir Sanjar al-Shuja' pleaded for them and they were sent back to the city.
From May 8, Acre's towers began to cave in one after one. On May 18, early in the morning at sunrise, the Sultan gave his order to launch an all-out attack on all points, accompanied by sound of trumpets and drums carried on 300 camels. The Muslim forces advanced towards a great tower that was called the Accursed Tower and forced the Frankish garrison to retreat to the side of the Gate of St. Anthony. Muslim standards were placed on the walls. All counter-attacks and attempts made by the Hospitallers and the Templars to recapture the tower were in vain. King Henry II and the Master of the Hospital boarded their galleys and fled from Acre. William of Beaujeu, the Master of the Temple, and Matthew of Clermont were killed. By capturing these positions, the Muslim forces were now inside the city fighting the Franks in the streets and alleys of Acre, which turned into a terrifying chaos as the inhabitants were fleeing towards the sea. How many inhabitants perished on land and in sea is unknown. Before night, Acre, after being in the hands of the Franks for 100 years, was in the hands of Al-Ashraf Khalil and his army after a siege of 43 days, with exception of the huge headquarters of the Templars which stood on the west side of the city seashore. After a week, Al-Ashraf Khalil negotiated with Peter de Severy, who was in charge of the Templars, and it was agreed that the Templars and everyone inside the fortress would have free passage to Cyprus, but the Sultan's men who were sent to the fortress to supervise the evacuation appeared not to be disciplined enough to handle the matter and were massacred by the Templars. Under the cover of darkness, Theobald Gaudin, the new Master of the Temple, left the fortress for Sidon with a few people and the fortune of the Templars. In the morning, Peter de Severy went to the Sultan to settle a new negotiation but he was arrested with his followers and they were executed in retaliation for the Sultan's men who were massacred earlier by the Templars inside the fortress. When the besieged Templars in the fortress saw what happened to Peter de Severy, they continued the fight. On May 28, after a wide breach was made under the fortress, the Sultan sent about 2000 men to take it. The Frankish fortress collapsed killing everyone inside, including the Sultan's men.
The news of the conquest of Acre reached Damascus and Cairo. Al-Ashraf Khalil entered the decorated city of Damascus with Franks chained at the feet and the captured crusader standards which were carried upside-down as a sign of their defeat. After celebrating his victory in Damascus, Khalil left for Cairo which was also decorated and celebrating. Upon arriving at Cairo, he ordered the release of Philip Mainebeuf and the men who accompanied him to Cairo earlier.
The port of Tyre was one of the most protected strongholds of the Franks on the Syrian coast. Saladin failed twice to capture it. Tyre was passed from Margaret of Lusignan to her nephew Amalric shortly before the capture of Acre by Al-Ashraf Khalil. On May 19, Al-Ashraf, while still in Acre, sent a group of men, led by Emir Sanjar al-Shuja'i, to examine the situation in Tyre. Having a small garrison and seeing the fleeing refugees from Acre, Adam of Cafran, the Bailli of Tyre, panicked and fled to Cyprus. Tyre was taken by the Muslims without a fight.
A month after the capture of Acre, Al-Ashraf Khalil sent a force led by Emir al-Shuja'i to Sidon. The Knights Templar, as their fortune had been brought to Sidon earlier by Theobald Gaudin, the new Master of the Temple, decided to take refuge inside a castle that was built on an isle about 90 meters from the shore. Gaudin took the fortune and left for Cyprus after he promised his followers to send reinforcement from Cyprus. But Gaudin never sent anything and his followers had to fight till they fled by sea, in the night, to Tartous after they saw the Muslims building a bridge. Emir al-Shuja'i ordered the destruction of the sea castle on July 14.
After the capture of Sidon, al-Shuja'i marched to Beirut. Beirut, which had a small garrison, was an important trading seaport for the Crusaders. Eschiva of Ibelin, the Lady of Beirut, thought she was secure because she had a truce with al-Ashraf Khalil's father Qalawun. Al-Shuja'i summoned the commanders of the garrison and arrested them. Seeing the commanders arrested, everyone fled by sea. Beirut was taken by the Muslims on July 31. Al-Shuja'i ordered the razing of its walls and castles and turned its Cathedral to a Mosque.
Haifa was captured on July 31, with little resistance. Tartus was besieged by Emir Bilban and the crusaders had to flee to the nearby island of Arwad and was captured on August 3, followed by Atlit on August 14. Nothing was left for the Franks except the Island of Arwad which was captured by an Egyptian army later in 1302.
In 1292, Al-Ashraf Khalil accompanied by his Vizier Ibn al-Salus arrived to Damascus and left - via Aleppo - to besiege the castle of Qal'at ar-Rum (Hromgla in Armenian). Qal'at ar-Rum, which was the seat of the Patriarch of Armenia, was besieged by more than 30 catapults and was captured after 30 days by Khalil, who renamed it Qal'at al-Muslimin (Castle of the Muslims). Khalil left Emir al-Shaja'i at the castle and returned to Damascus with prisoners. The population of Damascus bid farewell to the victorious Sultan on his way to Cairo at night with thousands of lighted candles. The Sultan entered Cairo from the Victory Gate (Bab al-Nasr) and was greeted by the celebrating population, also with thousands of lighted candles.
The Sultan returned to Damascus and assembled an army to invade Sis, the capital of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, but Armenian messengers arrived in Damascus and appealed to him not to attack Sis. Til Hemdun, Marash and Behesni were given to the Sultan in exchange for peace. On the other hand, Khalil had good relations with the Kingdom of Cyprus, the Kingdom of Aragon, and the Kingdom of Sicily, who had commercial and military treaties with him.
The process of conquering the crusader kingdom, begun by Saladin in 1187, was finally completed by Khalil who was described on some of his monuments as Alexander. Al-Ashraf was also planning to attack Cyprus and the Mongols in Baghdad.
The Crusaders were shocked. Their 200 years of effort had gone in vain. The crusaders' kingdom of Jerusalem had already been destroyed by Saladin, Baibars and Qalawun, and Louis IX's Seventh Crusade against Egypt ended in a complete failure, but the crusaders tried to keep their strongholds on the Syrian coast intact, hoping to be able one day to recapture what they had lost. Pope Nicholas IV tried to act but he died in 1292, and the European kings, who became involved in internal conflicts and struggles, became unable to organize new effective crusades. As for the Templars, they were accused of heresy in Europe and badly persecuted by King Philip IV of France and Pope Clement V.
Militarily, Al-Ashraf Khalil possessed the vigor and capability of two of his predecessors, Baibars and his father Qalawun. But many Emirs disliked him. He started his reign by executing and imprisoning a few prominent Emirs of his father, among them the vice-Sultan Turuntay. During the battle for Acre he arrested Hosam ad-Din Lajin and later, after he returned to Cairo, he executed Sunqur al-Ashqar and a few Emirs. Khalil continued his father's policy of replacing Turkish Mamelukes with Circassians, a policy which contributed to the intensification of the rivalry among the Mamelukes. After his victories against the Franks, arrogance took hold of al-Ashraf Khalil. He treated the Emirs roughly and began to sign messages and documents with the letter "KH" only. In addition, his Vizier Ibn al-Salus was envied by many Emirs and by the vice-Sultan Baydara in particular. Ibn al-Salus who, originally, was neither a Mameluke nor an Emir but a merchant from Damascus, became the most influential official during the reign of Khalil. While Al-Ashraf was rough on the Emirs, he was very generous towards Ibn al-Salus who did not treat the Emirs with respect. Ibn al-Salus was involved in the unjust persecution of the supreme judge of Egypt, Ibn Bint al-A'az, as he was involved in provoking the Sultan against Baydara on several occasions.
In December 1293, Al-Ashraf Khalil accompanied by Ibn al-Salus, Baydara and other Emirs went to Turug in northern Egypt on a bird-hunting expedition. He sent Ibn Al-Salus to the nearby city of Alexandria to bring materials and to collect the taxes. Arriving at Alexandria, Ibn Al-Salus found out that the deputies of Baydara had already taken everything. On receiving a message from Ibn Al-Salus with this news, Al-Ashraf summoned Baydara to his Dihlis and insulted and threatened him in the presence of other Emirs. The distressed Baydar left the Dihlis and called Lajin, Qara Sunqur and other Emirs and together they decided to kill the Sultan. On December 14, while the Sultan was walking with his friend Emir Shihab ad-Din Ahmad he was attacked and assassinated by Baydara and his followers. The Emirs who struck the Sultan after Baydara were Hosam ad-Din Lajin and Bahadir Ras Nubah followed by other Emirs. After the assassination of Al-Ashraf Khalil, Baydara and his followers went to the Dihliz and proclaimed Baydara the new Sultan. But Baydara was soon arrested by the Sultani Mamelukes and Emirs. Baydara was killed by the Sultani Emirs led by Kitbugha and Baibars al-Jashnikir and his head was sent to Cairo. Ibn al-Salus was arrested in Alexandria and was sent to Cairo where he was mistreated and at last beaten to death. The Emirs who were involved in the assassination of Al-Ashraf Khalil were severely punished and executed. Lajin and Qara Sunqur fled and disappeared.
After the death of Al-Ashraf Khalil, the Emirs decided to install his 9-year-old brother Al-Nasir Muhammad as the new Sultan with Kitbugha as vice-Sultan and al-Shaja'i as the new Vizier. But the death of Al-Ashraf Khalil was concealed for sometime. While Al-Ashraf was dead, his brother Al-Nasir Muhammad was proclaimed Vice-Sultan and heir. A message from Egypt to the Syrian Emirs said: "I appointed my brother al-Malik al-Nasir Muhammad as my Vicegerent and heir so that when I go to fight the enemy he replaces me ". As soon as everything was under control, the death of Al-Ahraf Khalil was revealed to the public in Egypt and Syria.
Al-Ashraf Khalil ruled about three years and two months. He had two daughters. Besides being remembered as the conqueror of Acre, he was remembered by Muslim historians as an intelligent Sultan who was fond of reading and learning.
Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din Khalil, al- see Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din
Khalil, al-Ashraf see Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din
Ashraf Khalil, al- see Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din
Al-Malik al-Ashraf Salāh al-Dīn Khalil ibn Qalawūn see Khalil, al-Malik al-Ashraf Salah al-Din
Khalil ibn Ahmad, al-
Abu 'Abd Ar-Rahman Khalīl ibn Ahmad Al Farāhīdi was a philologist from southern Arabia (modern day Oman). His best known contributions are Kitab al-'Ayn (considered the first dictionary of the Arabic language), the current standard for Harakat (vowel marks in Arabic script), and the invention al-'arud (the study of Arabic prosody). He moved to Basra, Iraq where he converted from the Ibadi sect of Islam to become a Sunni. He died in Basra some time between 777 and 791. Sibawayh and Al-Asma'i were among his students.
The Kitab al-Ayn (Ayn is the deepest letter in Arabic, al-Ayn also means a water source in the desert), while started by Khalil ibn Ahmad was probably completed by one of his students, Al-Layth ibn Al-Muzaffar. It was titled "The source" because the goal of its author was to clarify those words which composed the original or source Arabic vocabulary. The dictionary was not arranged alphabetically but rather by phonetics, following the pattern of pronunciation of the Arabic alphabet from the deepest letter of the throat (ayn) to the last letter pronounced by the lips, that being (mìm).
Abu 'Abd Ar-Rahman Khalīl ibn Ahmad Al Farāhīdi see Khalil ibn Ahmad, al-
Farahidi, al- see Khalil ibn Ahmad, al-
Khalil ibn Ishaq (Ibn al-Jundi) (Khalil ibn Ishaq ibn al-Jundi) (d. c. 1365). Maliki jurist of Egypt who taught in Medina and Cairo. His compendium of Maliki law is the most renowned manual in the Muslim West especially among North and West African Muslims.
Khalil ibn Ishaq al-Jundi was an Egyptian jurisprudent in Maliki Islamic law who taught in Medina and Cairo. His Mukhtasar, known as the "Mukhtasar of Khalil", is considered an epitome of shariah law according to the Maliki madhhab, and is regarded as the most authoritative legal manual by North and West African Muslims.
Ibn al-Jundi see Khalil ibn Ishaq
Khalil ibn Ishaq ibn al-Jundi see Khalil ibn Ishaq
Jundi, Khalil ibn Ishaq ibn al- see Khalil ibn Ishaq
Khalil Mutran (Sha'ir al Qutrayn) (July 1, 1872- June 1, 1949). Lebanese poet and journalist often called the Sha'ir al-Qutrayn -- the "Poet of Two Countries." He is remembered for his lyrical and narrative poems. Although he called himself "Poet of the Arab Countries," his literary influence was most felt in Egypt and Lebanon.
Khalil Mutran, also known by the sobriquet Sha’ir al Qutrayn (the poet of the two countries) was a noted Arabic poet and journalist.
He was born at Baalbek in Lebanon to Abdu Yusuf Mutrân (Moutran) and Malaka Sabbag from Haifa. Nakhlé Moutran, pasha of Baalbek, was his cousin. Khalil's mother Malaka was descended from a large Palestinian family. Malaka's father was among the most respected persons in Haifa and her grandfather was an advisor of Ahmed al-Jazzar, pasha of Saint John d'Acre, who successfully resisted the siege of this town by the troops of Napoleon Bonaparte.
Khalil attended the Greek Catholic School in Beirut, where one of his teachers was Nasif al-Yaziji. There he learned Arabic and French languages. In 1890, he left Lebanon for France. Although he planned to immigrate to Chile, he actually settled in Egypt in 1892. There he found his first job at Al-Ahram. He also contributed to Al-Mu’yyad and Al-Liwa. In 1900, he founded his own fortnightly magazine, Al-Majalla al-misriyya (1900-2, 1909). He published some of his own works and also of Mahmud Sami al-Barudi in this magazine. In 1903, he started publishing a daily newspaper Al-Jawaib al-misriyya (1903-5), which supported Mustafa Kamil’s nationalist movement. He collaborated with Hafez Ibrahim in translating a French book on political economy. He also translated a number of plays of Shakespeare, Corneille, Racine, Victor Hugo and Paul Bourget into Arabic.
In 1912, Khalil translated Shakespeare’s drama Othello into Arabic as Utayl, which is the most celebrated and best-known translation of the drama into Arabic. His translation was not based on the original, but on a French version of it by Georges Duval. Other dramas of Shakespeare translated into Arabic by him are Hamlet, Macbeth, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, Richard III, King Lear and Julius Caeser. He also translated Corneille’s Le Cid, Cinna and Polyeucte and Victor Hugo’s Hernani. He later took a post as secretary to the Agricultural Syndicate and helped to found Banque Misr in 1920. In 1924, he made a long journey through Syria and Palestine, after which he claimed himself as a poet of the Arab countries. After the death of Ahmed Shawqi in 1932, he chaired the Apollo literary group until his death. In 1935, he became director of the Al-Firqa al-Qawmiyya (National Company) of the Egyptian theater. He died in Cairo in 1949.
An anthology of his poems, the Diwan-al-Khalil was published in four volumes during his lifetime, the first volume of which was published in 1908. In his poems, Hourani feels, “traditional forms and language were used not for their own sake but to give precise expression to a reality, whether in the external world or in the author’s feelings”.
Mutran, Khalil see Khalil Mutran
Poet of Two Countries see Khalil Mutran
Poet of the Arab Countries see Khalil Mutran
Sha'ir al-Qutrayn see Khalil Mutran
Khalil Pasha Hajji Arnawud (c. 1655-1733). Ottoman Grand Vizier under Sultan Ahmed I. In 1717, he was defeated near Belgrade by Prince Eugene of Savoy.
Arnawud, Khalil Pasha Hajji see Khalil Pasha Hajji Arnawud
Khaljis (Khiljis -- "Swordsmen"). Indo-Muslim dynasty which ruled in Delhi (r.1290-1320). It was founded by Jalal al-Din Firuz Shah II (r. 1290-1296) of the Khalaj, a Turkish people inhabiting eastern Afghanistan, who took power from the last Mu‘izzi or Slave King. The Khaljis were followed by the Tughluqids. The Khaljis were one of the five dynasties of the Delhi sultanate. Jalal ud-Din Firuz (r. 1290-1296) founded the dynasty, Ala ud-Din (r. 1296-1316) consolidated and glorified it, and with Qutb ud-Din Mubarak (r. 1316-1320) it perished in the Baradu Revolt. The Khaljis brought about a change in the nature of the polity by converting the Turkish state into an Indo-Muslim state. They admitted non-Turks and Indian Muslims into the governing class and initiated an expansionist policy that brought Rajasthan, Gujarat, and even the Deccan within the orbit of their authority. To suppress a potentially recalcitrant nobility, Ala ud-Din incorporated revenue-free lands into crown land, controlled social interaction among nobles, and enforced prohibition of alcohol consumption. State share of land revenue was assessed at 50 percent based on type of crop and measurement of land under tillage. Ala ud-Din established direct contact with the peasantry by suppressing the rights of intermediaries, and he attempted to regulate the market in grain, cloth, horses, and slaves by fixing prices according to production or maintenance costs. Strict vigilance and severe punishments assured success. Both philanthropic and militaristic motives are ascribed to these measures. Their area of operation is debatable. The famous Ilkhanid wazir Rashid ud-Din Faz-ullah came to Ala ud-Din’s court as an envoy. The Khaljis were great builders and patrons of the arts and letters (e.g., the works of Amir Khusrau).
The Khaljis were the second Muslim dynasty to rule the Delhi Sultanate of India. The Khalji dynasty, like the previous Slave dynasty, was of Turkish origin, though the Khaljī tribe had long been settled in Afghanistan. Its three kings were noted for their faithlessness, their ferocity, and their penetration of the Hindu south.
The first Khaljī sultan, Jalāl al-Dīn Fīrūz Khaljī, was established by a noble faction on the collapse of the last feeble Slave king, Kay-Qubādh. Jalāl al-Dīn was already elderly, and for a time he was so unpopular, because his tribe was thought to be Afghan, that he dared not enter the capital. His nephew Jūnā Khan led an expedition into the Hindu Deccan, captured Ellichpur and its treasure, and returned to murder his uncle in 1296.
With the title of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Khaljī, Jūnā Khan reigned for 20 years. He captured Ranthambhor (1301) and Chitor (1303), conquered Mandu (1305), and annexed the wealthy Hindu kingdom of Devagiri. He also repelled Mongol raids. ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn’s lieutenant, Malik Kāfūr, was sent on a plundering expedition to the south in 1308, which led to the capture of Warangal, the overthrow of the Hoysala dynasty south of the Krishna River, and the occupation of Madura in the extreme south. Malik Kāfūr returned to Delhi in 1311, laden with spoils. Thereafter the fortunes of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn and the dynasty declined.
The sultan died in early 1316. Malik Kāfūr’s attempted usurpation ended with his own death. The last Khaljī, Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shah, was murdered in 1320 by his chief minister, Khusraw Khan, who was in turn replaced by Ghiyāṣ al-Dīn Tughluq, the first ruler of the Tughluq dynasty.
The Khalji Sultans of Delhi (1290-1320) were:
* Jalal ud din Firuz Khilji (1290-1296)
* Ala ud din Khilji (1296-1316)
* Qutb ud din Mubarak Shah (1316-1320)
Khiljis see Khaljis
Swordsmen see Khaljis
Khallal, Ahmad ibn Muhammad al- (Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Khallal) (Abu Bakr al-Khallal) (d. 923). Transmitter of traditions, legal scholar and theologian, and an outstanding figure in the history of Hanbalism. He is remembered and honored for collecting the responsa of Imam Ahmad from his students, who were scattered across the Muslim world.
Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Khallal see Khallal, Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-
Abu Bakr al-Khallal see Khallal, Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-
Khallal, Abu Bakr al- see Khallal, Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-
Khalq (Khalqis -- "Masses"). A political party of Afghanistan which was the largest faction that split from the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) in 1967. Noor Mohammed Taraki and Hafizollah Amin, Afghanistan’s first and second communist presidents, belonged to this faction. Khalq had more support among Pakhtuns and favored more radical economic reforms than other PDPA groups. In 1977, Khalq united with the other major communist faction, Percham, to overthrow the regime. After the 1978 coup, Khalq dominated the government and eliminated the Perchamis. The Khalqis carried out major reforms and moved Afghanistan closer to the Soviets. The government ran into increasing domestic opposition, which it sought to suppress forcefully. Khalqi tactics only fueled further opposition, which in turn caused problems within the regime. In September 1979 a power struggle resulted in the elimination of Taraki by Amin, who himself was later killed by the Soviets. Even though Khalqis were retained in the government after the Soviet invasion, the Perchamis were the dominant faction.
Khalq ("Masses") was a faction of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA). Its historical leaders were Presidents Nur Mohammed Taraki and Hafizullah Amin. It was also the name of the leftist newspaper produced by the same movement. It was supported by the USSR and was formed in 1965 when the PDPA was born. The Khalqist wing of the party was made up primarily of Pashtuns from non-elite classes. However, their Marxism was often a vehicle for tribal resentments.
Bitter resentment between the Khalq and Parcham factions eventually led to the failure of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan that was formed as a result of the Saur Revolution. It was also responsible for the radical reforms that encouraged the resistance of the people of Afghanistan, and eventually, to the creation of the Mujahideen.
Their radicalism was also responsible for the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan on December 1979.
The People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan held its First Congress on January 1, 1965. Twenty-seven men gathered at Nur Mohammed Taraki's house in Kabul, elected Taraki PDPA Secretary General, Babrak Karmal as Deputy Secretary General, and chose a five-member Central Committee (or Politburo).
Finally, Hafizullah Amin was the only Khalqi member of the PDPA to be elected to Parliament in 1969.
The party was weakened by bitter, and sometimes violent, internal rivalries. Especially on the ideological level, Karmal and Taraki differed in their perceptions of Afghanistan’s revolutionary potential:
* Taraki believed that revolution could be achieved in the classical Leninist fashion by building a tightly disciplined working-class party.
* Karmal felt that Afghanistan was too undeveloped for a Leninist strategy and that a national democratic front of patriotic and anti-imperialist forces had to be fostered in order to bring the country a step closer to socialist revolution.
The newspaper was highly successful, especially among students. Its first edition sold 20,000 copies, and later editions numbered around 10,000 (there were only six editions altogether). On May 23, 1966, the authorities closed Khalq on the grounds that it was anti-Islamic, anticonstitutional, and antimonarchical.
Karmal’s faction founded Parcham, a weekly magazine that he published between March 1968 and July 1969. Parcham was shut down in June 1969 on the eve of parliamentary elections.
Khalq was excluded from the government because of its lack of good political connections and its go-it-alone policy on non-cooperation. Taraki advocated a united front briefly after Daoud's takeover in an attempt to gain places in the government for his followers, but this effort was unsuccessful.
The Khalqis claimed to be more leftist and more independent of the Soviet Union than Parcham, but their base of support was not strong among the masses, and much stronger in the military. Because of this, Khalq abandoned his party's traditional emphasis on working-class recruitment and sought to build his own power base within the officer corps. Khalq's influence at Kabul University was also limited.
In 1973, the Khalq faction energetically began to encourage military personnel to join them. Taraki had been in charge of Khalq activity in the military. In 1973 he passed his recruitment duties to Amin. This move was highly successful: by the time of the communist coup, in April 1978, Khalq outnumbered Parcham by a factor of two or three to one.
The Moscow-sponsored union of Parcham and Khalq may have been in preparation for his peaceful passage from the scene in the near future. The merger of Parcham and Khalq rapidly became unglued. However, Mir Akbar Khyber, a prominent leftist, was killed by the government and his associates.
Although the government issued a statement deploring the assassination, the PDPA leaders feared that Daoud was planning to exterminate them all. In this way, both Khalq and Parcham forgot their internal rivalries and worked to overthrow the government.
On the eve of the communist coup, Hafizullah Amin was the only member of the Central Committee that was not arrested. The police did not send him to immediate imprisonment, as it did with Politburo members of the PDPA on April 25, 1978.
Amin was the last person to be arrested, his imprisonment was postponed for five hours, during which time Amin, without having the authority and while the Politburo members were in prison, instructed the Khalqi army officers to overthrow the government.
The Khalqist Army cells prepared for a massive uprising. On April 27 the Khalqist military leaders began the revolution by proclaiming to the cells in the armed forces that the time for revolution had arrived.
Khalqist Colonel Mohammad Aslam Watanjar was the Army commander on the ground during the Coup, and his troops gained control of Kabul. Colonel Abdul Qadir, the leader of the Air Force squadrons, also launched a major attack on the Royal Palace, in the course of which President Mohammad Daoud Khan was killed.
The Saur Revolution, as the new government labeled its coup d'état (after the month in the Islamic calendar in which it occurred), was almost entirely the achievement of the Khalq faction of the PDPA.
Khalq's victory was partially due to Daoud's miscalculation that Parcham was the more serious threat. Khalq's success gave it effective control over the armed forces, a great advantage over its Parchami rival. During the first months of the revolution, Cabinet membership was split eleven to ten, with Khalq in the majority.
However, the initial, moderate, approach to Islam taken by the PDPA was quickly abandoned as the Khalqists sought to consolidate their hold on power. Khalq dominated the Revolutionary Council, which was to serve as the ruling body of the government.
The Khalq leadership ran the country by issuing a series of eight edicts. They suspended all laws except those on civil matters. Another exception was the criminal law of the Daoud period, retained as a repressive instrument.
They also embarked on a campaign of radical land reform accompanied by mass repression in the countryside that resulted in the arrest and summary execution of tens of thousands.
The Khalqi policy of encouraging the education of girls, for example, aroused deep resentment in the villages. By putting Afghanistan on the revolutionary road, the Khalq wing of the PDPA stirred the countryside into revolt.
President Nur Mohammad Taraki refused to tolerate any Parchamis in the military and insisted that all officers affiliate with Khalq. By June 1978 an estimated 800 Parchami military personnel were forced to quit the armed forces.
Shortly after, the Khalqist wing in the Army initiated a purge of Parchamis. They accomplished this performing the elimination of the opposition and removal of any restraints posed by the Parchamis.
Hafizullah Amin took over as prime minister in March 1979, retaining the position of field marshal and becoming vice-president of the Supreme Defense Council. Taraki remained President and in control of the Army, though now he reportedly devoted a lot of his time at the Royal Palace, which had been renamed the People's Palace.
Events also tended to sub-divide the protagonists. The intense rivalry between Taraki and Amin within the Khalq faction heated up. In September 1979, Taraki's followers, with Soviet complicity, had made several attempts on Amin's life.
The final attempt backfired. Amin's murder of Taraki divided the Khalqis. Rival military cliques divided the Khalqis further.
In late October, Amin made a military sweep against the insurgents, victoriously driving 40,000 people - mostly non-combatants - across the border into Pakistan. At the end of 1979 there were 400,000 Afghan refugees, mostly in Pakistan.
The USSR attempted to temper the Khalqis' radicalism, urging attendance at mosques, inclusion of Parchamis and non-communists in the government, and a halt to the unpopular land reform movement. Most of this advice was ignored.
The last Khalq President, Hafizullah Amin, was assassinated after Soviet intelligence forces took control of the government and installed Babrak Karmal, a Parchami, in his place.
Khalqi-Parchami differences began to rend the military as Khalqi leaders, fearful that the Parchamis retained their cellular organization within the military, mounted massive purges of Parchamis. Thanks to Amin's efforts in the 1970s, the officer corps consisted largely of Khalqis.
The Army was also not immune to antigovernment sentiment. Soldiers began to desert and mutiny. Herat was the site of an uprising in March 1979 in which a portion of the town's military garrison joined. The rebels butchered Soviet citizens as well as Khalqis.
The purging of Parchamis had left the military forces so dominated by Khalqis that the Soviets had no choice but to rely upon Khalqi officers to rebuild the army. Khalq officers and men expressed bitterness over the preferential treatment given their Parcham rivals by the Parcham dominated regime.
Disaffected Khalqis often assisted the Mujahideen. Khalqis in the armed forces often accused their Parchami officers of using them as cannon fodder and complained that young Parchami men were exempted from compulsory military service.
A show of this was that, in 1980, at the April military parade celebrating the Saur Revolution, many Tank Corps continued to display the Red Flag of Khalq, instead of the new national flag adopted by Babrak Karmal.
After the 40th Soviet Army left the country, President Najibullah suffered, to a lesser degree, the same disadvantage that Karmal had when he was installed as General Secretary of the PDPA by the Soviets.
This fact was shown by the fierceness of the resistance to Najibullah's appointment within the Parcham faction. This split persisted, forcing President Najibullah to straddle his politics between whatever Parchami support he could maintain and alliances he could win from the Khalqists.
In December 1989, 127 Khalqist military officers were arrested for an attempted coup. Twenty-seven officers escaped and later showed up at a press conference with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in Peshawar. Former Minister of Tribal Affairs, Bacha Gul Wafadar and Minister of Civil Aviation Hasan Sharq were among the conspirators.
In March 1990, once again the Mujahideen leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar cooperated in a coup attempt, this time led by the Khalqist Defense minister Shahnawaz Tanai. Tanai was apparently also supported by those important Khalqist who remained in the Politburo, Assadullah Sarwary and Mohammad Gulabzoi, respectively their country’s envoys to Aden and Moscow.
They were said to have been intimately connected with the coup and with Gral Tanai. However, Tanai had no direct control of troops inside Kabul. The plot misfired and failed because of faulty communications.
At the end, however, the former Khalqists either joined or allied themselves with the Taliban or other Mujahideen warlords after the collapse of President Najibullah's Government in April, 1992.
A perfect example of this was that, once Kabul was captured, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar gained the support of some Khalqi (and mostly Pashto) hardliners, including the Minister of Internal Affairs Raz Mohammad Paktin and then Defense Minister Mohammad Aslam Watanjar.
Another example of this is the fact that Gral Tanai has (according to western diplomatic sources) acted as an agent for ISI by providing the Taliban a skilled cadre of military officers.
In this way, the Khalqi faction were once again involved in the war, using his pilots to fly the Mig-23 and Sukhoi fighters of what was left of the Afghan Air Force, driving Soviet Tanks and using Soviet Artillery. With no central government and fighting for different groups, Khalq was merely a pawn in the Afghan Civil War between the Afghan Northern Alliance and the Taliban.
Other Khalqists have developed fairly close relations with the current regime, after the defeat of the Taliban and the ascendance of Hamid Karzai in 2002.
* General Babrak Shinwari, former head of the youth affairs section of the PDPA under Taraki and Amin, who migrated to Peshawar in Pakistan in the winter of 1992. He later helped found the Afghanistan-Pakistan People Friendship Society and was elected member of the Loya Jirga by a council of elders from Nazyan Shinwari area of Nangarhar province.
* Another former Khalqist general who has enjoyed the protection of powerful politicians in the current Afghan government is the former PDPA governor of Kandahar, Nur al-Haq Olumi, who enjoys the patronage of Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim.
* The National Unity Party (Motahed-e Melli Hezb) was established on 2003. In this way, the Khalqi faction of the Homeland Party is once again attempting to participate in Afghan politics. It is now led by former Khalqist General Noorul Haq Uloomi.
Prominent Khalq members include:
* Nur Mohammad Taraki
* Hafizullah Amin
* Shahnawaz Tanai
* Mohammad Aslam Watanjar
Khalqis see Khalq
Masses see Khalq
Khalwatiyah (Khalwatiyya) (Halvetiyye). Widespread mystical order, founded either by ‘Umar al-Khalwati (d. 1397) or by Muhammad ibn Nur al-Balisi.
This Sufi tariqah derives its name from khalwah (“periodic retreat”) which is an important feature in most branches of the Khalwatiyah. It is significant that the order derives its name from an institution rather than from an eponym, because the tariqa does not trace its origin to one founder. Originating in Central Asia, the Khalwatiyah entered the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth century. Within a century it had become the most widespread Sufi order in the empire, although it experienced periods of stagnation, regression, and revival.
As a shari‘a oriented tariqa, the Khalwatiyah stressed the combination of knowledge (‘ilm) and practice (‘amal). It also required the tying of the heart (rabt al-qalb) of a disciple (murid) to that of his master (shaykh or pir) so that the relationship between the two should be stronger than that between a father and his son. Other features, in addition to the khalwah are silence (samt), vigil (sahar), participation in the dhikr (the chanting of God’s names), and the communal recital of wird al-sattari, composed by Yahya al-Shirwani in the fifteenth century, which is the center of the Khalwati ritual.
The revival of the Khalwatiyah was initiated by Mustafa ibn Kamal al-Din al-Bakri (1688-1748), a native of Syria who lived most of his life in Jerusalem. However, it was in Egypt that the Khalwatiyah experienced a radical change through al-Bakri’s disciple Muhammad ibn Salim al-Hifni (1689-1768). In the middle of the eighteenth century, the Khalwatiyah rose from a marginal group to become the dominant order in Egypt. In the words of al-Jabarti, it was “the best of the Sufi orders (khayr al-turuq).” For eighty years (1757-1838) all but one of those who held the office of shaykh of al-Azhar were Khalwatis.
Three elements in al-Bakri’s teaching probably contributed to the resurgence of the Khalwatiyah: the demand for an exclusive affiliation to the tariqah, and stricter discipline in the performance of the litanies; a larger scope for the participation of common people in the rituals of the tariqah; and adherence to the shari‘a. Inspired by al-Bakri, al-Hifni made the Khalwatiyah in Egypt into a cohesive, shari‘a-oriented order that accommodated leading scholars but also reached out to the common people.
Scholars from the Maghrib, mainly pilgrims on their way to Mecca, visited Cairo in the eighteenth century in growing numbers, where they were deeply influenced by al-Hifni and by the Khalwati shaykhs who succeeded him, like Mahmud al-Kurdi (1715-1786). Subsequently two new orders developed in the Maghrib as offshoots of the Khalwatiyah. Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Azhari (1713-1793), who had been initiated into the Khalwatiyah by al-Hifni, spread the Khalwatiyah in Algeria, where the new branch became known after him as the Rahmaniyah. It was al-Azhari who initiated Sidi Ahmad al-Tijani into the Khalwatiyah. Al-Tijani learned additional secrets from Mahmud al-Kurdi in Cairo and from Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Karim al-Samman in Medina. The latter had been initiated by Mustafa al-Bakri during one of his pilgrimages.
Two of al-Samman’s disciples spread a tariqah called al-Sammaniyah to Sumatra and to the Sudan. One was ‘Abd al-Samad al-Palimbani (c. 1703-1788), who spent most of his working life in Arabia and initiated students from Sumatra into the Sammaniyah. The Sammaniyah was introduced into the Sudan by Ahmad al-Tayyib ibn al-Bashir (d. 1823), who had been initiated by al-Samman in Medina. The Sammaniyah, organized on a wider geographical and societal scale with a central hierarchical authority, expanded in the Sudan at the expense of the two older tariqahs, the Qadiriyah and the Shadhiliyah, which had been adapted to the local parochial pattern of holy families.
In the nineteenth century these three extensions of the Khalwatiyah gave rise to militant movements in different parts of Africa. The Rahmaniyah led the revolt against the French in Algeria in 1871; al-Hajj ‘Umar al-Futi initiated a jihad of the Tijaniyah in West Africa; and the Mahdi of the Sudan, Muhammad Ahmad, had been a member of the Sammaniyah for ten years (1861-1871).
In Egypt, the activities of the Khalwatiyah, together with other Sufi orders, were regulated and brought under close government supervision by a decree of Muhammad ‘Ali in 1812. Almost a century and a half later, another authoritarian government, that of Gamal Abdel Nasser, further reduced the influence and economic resources of the Sufi orders. In a list of Sufi orders in Egypt prepared in 1964, ten branches of the Khalwatiyah were recorded, although most of them were inactive. In 1988, Gideon Weigert visited the zawaya of two branches of the Khalwatiyah in Cairo, the Demirdashiyah and the Shabrawiyah, which were physically in a state of neglect and ruin, and spiritually without a shaykh.
In Turkey, the Sufi orders were declared illegal in 1925 as a part of the Kemalist reform programs. However, the orders continued in clandestine form and began to reemerge in public life by the late 1950s. The Khalwatiyah was a part of this process but did not assume a highly visible role in the Islamic resurgence of the late twentieth century. In the Balkans, some Khalwatiyah centers continued to be active, especially in Albania, where the order survived in the official atheism of the Communist era.
Khalwatiyya see Khalwatiyah
Halvetiyye see Khalwatiyah
Khan. As a title, khan has traditionally designated leaders of tribally organized nomads from Central Asia to Northern India, Iran, Anatolia/Turkey, and Southern Russia. The title became widely spread following Jenghiz Khan’s Mongol unification in the thirteenth century. Khan was not used in the Arabic speaking world, except in the Persian Gulf region. It is commonly found in Il-khanid and post-Il-khanid sources in Persian where its plural form is khavinin, an Arabic broken-plural pattern, rather than khanan, which would be in accordance with most Persian human plurals. In colloquial Persian, however, khan with the suffix –ha is heard.
The etymology of khan (leader) is obscure and probably Turkic. However, there is also the possibility of an etymological link with Korean and ultimately with Chinese (or possibly proto-Mongolian and then Chinese), but a link with Persian is generally rejected. Khan, among the Avars in the context of the Byzantine Empire, like that of Mongol usage, is linked with the titles khaqan (Persian); hakan (Turkish); and qayan or khaghan (Mongolian), which are used to designate a holder of an office higher than khan, such as a great khan or emperor. In addition, khaqan was used in Arabic as early as the seventh century to designate a rank such as emperor. The thirteenth century Secret History of the Mongols makes the distinction between rulers of nomadic confederations (khans) and the emperor of China (khaqan) (great khan or emperor), which became the form for successors in the Chinggisid lineage. Furthermore, the Mongols called Beijing “Khanbaliq” – Turkish for “City of the Khan” – after they moved there from Karakorum. Khan consequently signifies a title, an office, a form of address, membership in the ruling Mongol lineage and Mongol successor states and thus an attribute of rulership.
Similar usage of khan, and even khaqan in terms of universal lordship, was followed by the Ottomans and the Safavids, Afshars, and Qajars of Iran and by nomads tribally organized in Central Asia and Iran, even Persian speaking ones, such as the Bakhtiyari. Khan followed the Ottoman sultan’s name in his tughra (imperial monogram) on official documents, and Ottoman sultans often styled themselves as “khaqan al-barrayn wa-al-bahrayn” (“ruler of the two lands and the two seas”). For rulers in all of these dynasties, the use of khan identified them with a tribally organized nomadic past and the Mongol tradition of rule constituted an element in their legitimacy.
Khan was also used as an administrative title and then as an honorific and form of address. In Safavid Iran, khan designated a governor of lesser rank than the beylerbeyi (governor general) but higher than sultan, and in Mughal India its use was limited to nobles and courtiers. In eighteenth century Iran, khan was a rank that could be bestowed by the shah on administrators and military and tribal leaders. In the case of Karim Khan Zand (r. 1758-1779), founder of the Zand dynasty who never assumed the title of shah, khan even stood in place of shah. In the Bakhtiyari confederation, khan gradually displaced the Turkish term aqa (elder, leader) as a general male honorific in the nineteenth century, and its use was no longer restricted to the ruling Bakhtiyari lineage. Husayn Quli Khan (d. 1882), the first Bakhtiyari Il-khani, or confederation leader, appropriated khaqan as his title in a stone-carved inscription (c. 1880).
In the twentieth century, khan as an honorific and form of address fell from general use except for tribal leaders, and after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the formation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, its use even in the tribal context, with the implications of hierarchy and subordination, was discouraged. In Pakistan, however, khan has survived as a surname. Khan continues today as part of the title for the Isma‘ili spiritual leader, the Aga Khan, not unlike khaqan, with a universal lordship in meaning.
Khan, Abdul Ghaffar (Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan) (Badshah Khan) (Sarhaddi Gandhi) (b. 1890, Utmanzai, India — d. January 20, 1988, Peshawar, Pakistan). Also known as Badshah Khan ("King of Kings"), leader of the Pakhtun (Pathan) nationalists in India’s North-West Frontier Province. He participated in the Rowlatt agitation and the Hijrat movement and served from 1920 to 1921 as the president of the Frontier Khilafat Committee. He was a founding member in 1929 of the Afghan Jirga and its volunteers, the Khuda’i Khidmatgars, and played a leading role in organizing the civil disobedience campaigns of 1930 and 1931 to 1932. He was instrumental in bringing his party into the Indian National Congress in 1931 and served as a member of the Congress’ central leadership from 1931 to 1947. Following independence, he helped to found the Awami League and the National Awami Party of Pakistan. On several occasions, he was arrested or forced to live in exile as a result of his advocacy of Pakhtun autonomy within Pakistan. A life long pacifist, a devout Muslim, and a follower of Mohandes (Mahatma) Gandhi, Abdul Ghaffar Khan was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985, and in 1987, he became the first non-citizen to be awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award.
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan was a Pashtun political and spiritual leader known for his non-violent opposition to British Rule in India. A lifelong pacifist, a devout Muslim,[ and a follower of Mahatma Gandhi, he was also known as Badshah Khan (also Bacha Khan, Pashto: lit., "King Khan"), and Sarhaddi Gandhi (Urdu, Hindi lit., "Frontier Gandhi").
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan was initially encouraged by his family to join the British Indian Army. However, the treatment of a British Raj officer towards a native offended him, and a family decision for him to study in England was put off after his mother's intervention.
Having witnessed the repeated failure of revolts against the British Raj, he decided social activism and reform would be more beneficial for Pashtuns. This ultimately led to the formation of the Khudai Khidmatgar movement (Servants of God). The movement's success triggered a harsh crackdown against him and his supporters and he was sent into exile. It was at this stage in the late 1920s that he formed an alliance with Gandhi and the Indian National Congress. This alliance was to last until the 1947 partition of India.
After partition, Ghaffar Khan was frequently arrested by the Pakistani government in part because of his association with India and his opposition to authoritarian moves by the government. He spent much of the 1960s and 1970s either in jail or in exile.
In 1985 he was nominated for the Nobel peace prize. In 1987 he became the first person not holding the citizenship of India to be awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award. Upon his death in 1988, he was buried in Jalalabad, despite the heavy fighting at the time, both sides in the Afghan war declared a ceasefire to allow his burial.
Ghaffar Khan met Gandhi and entered politics in 1919 during agitation over the Rowlatt Acts, which allowed the internment of political dissidents without trial. In the following year he joined the Khilafat movement, which sought to strengthen the spiritual ties of Indian Muslims to the Turkish sultan, and in 1921 he was elected president of a district Khilafat committee in his native North-West Frontier Province.
Soon after attending an Indian National Congress (Congress Party) gathering in 1929, Ghaffar Khan founded the Red Shirt movement (Khudai Khitmatgar) among the Pashtuns. It espoused nonviolent nationalist agitation in support of Indian independence and sought to awaken the Pashtuns’ political consciousness. By the late 1930s, Ghaffar Khan had become a member of Gandhi’s inner circle of advisers, and the Khudai Khitmatgar actively aided the Congress Party cause up to the partition of India in 1947.
Ghaffar Khan, who had opposed the partition, chose to live in Pakistan, where he continued to fight for the rights of the Pashtun minority and for an autonomous Pushtunistan (also called Pakhtunistan or Pathanistan; an independent state in the border areas of West Pakistan). He paid dearly for his principles, spending many years in jail and afterward residing in Afghanistan. Ghaffar Khan returned to Pakistan in 1972. His memoirs, My Life and Struggle, were made public in 1969.
Abdul Ghaffar Khan see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Badshah Khan see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Khan, Badshah see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Khan, Khan Abdul Ghaffar see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Sarhaddi Gandhi see Khan, Abdul Ghaffar
Khan, Abdul Qadeer
Abdul Qadeer Khan (b. April 1, 1936, Bhopal, Bhopal State, British India – d. October 10, 2021, Islamabad, Pakistan), known as A. Q. Khan, was a Pakistani nuclear physicist and metallurgical engineer who is colloquially known as the "father of Pakistan's atomic weapons program".
An emigre from India who migrated to Pakistan in 1952, Khan was educated in the metallurgical engineering departments of Western European technical universities where he pioneered studies in phase transitions of metallic alloys, uranium metallurgy, and isotope separation based on gas centrifuges. After learning of India's "Smiling Buddha" nuclear test in 1974, Khan joined his nation's clandestine efforts to develop atomic weapons when he founded the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL) in 1976 and was both its chief scientist and director for many years.
In January 2004, Khan was subjected to a debriefing by the Musharraf administration over evidence of nuclear proliferation handed to them by the Bush administration of the United States. Khan admitted his role in running the proliferation network – only to retract his statements in later years when he levelled accusations at the former administration of Pakistan's Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in 1990, and also directed allegations at President Musharraf over the controversy in 2008.
Khan was accused of selling nuclear secrets illegally and was put under house arrest in 2004, when he confessed to the charges and was pardoned by then President Pervez Musharraf. After years of house arrest, Khan successfully filed a lawsuit against the Federal Government of Pakistan at the Islamabad High Court whose verdict declared his debriefing unconstitutional and freed him on February 6, 2009. The United States reacted negatively to the verdict and the Obama administration issued an official statement warning that Khan still remained a "serious proliferation risk".
Abdul Qadeer Khan was born on April 1, 1936 in Bhopal, a city then in the erstwhile British Indian princely state of Bhopal State, and now the capital city of Madhya Pradesh. His family is of Pashtun origin. His father, Abdul Ghafoor, was a schoolteacher who once worked for the Ministry of Education, and his mother, Zulekha, was a housewife with a very religious mindset. His older siblings, along with other family members, had emigrated to Pakistan during the bloody partition of India (splitting off the independent state of Pakistan) in 1947. His siblings would often write to Khan's parents about the new life they had found in Pakistan.
After his matriculation from a local school in Bhopal, in 1952 Khan emigrated from India to Pakistan on the Sind Mail train, partly due to the reservation politics at that time, and religious violence in India during his youth had left an indelible impression on his world view. Upon settling in Karachi with his family, Khan briefly attended the D. J. Science College before transferring to the University of Karachi, where he graduated in 1956 with a Bachelor of Science (BSc) in physics with a concentration on solid-state physics.
From 1956 to 1959, Khan was employed by the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (city government) as an Inspector of weights and measures, and applied for a scholarship that allowed him to study in West Germany. In 1961, Khan departed for West Germany to study material science at the Technical University in West Berlin, where he academically excelled in courses in metallurgy, but left West Berlin when he switched to the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands in 1965.
In 1962, while on vacation in The Hague, he met Henny – a British passport holder who had been born in South Africa to Dutch expatriates. She spoke Dutch and had spent her childhood in Africa before returning with her parents to the Netherlands where she lived as a registered foreigner. In 1963, he married Henny in a modest Muslim ceremony at Pakistan's embassy in The Hague. Khan and Henny together had two daughters.
In 1967, Khan obtained an engineer's degree in materials technology – an equivalent to a Master of Science (MS) offered in English-speaking nations such as Pakistan – and joined the doctoral program in metallurgical engineering at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium. Khan worked under Belgian professor Martin J. Brabers at Leuven University, who supervised his doctoral thesis which Khan successfully defended, and graduated with a Doctor of Engineering degree in metallurgical engineering in 1972. His thesis included fundamental work on martensite and its extended industrial applications in the field of graphene morphology.
In 1972, Khan joined the Physics Dynamics Research Laboratory, an engineering firm based in Amsterdam, from Brabers's recommendation. The FDO was a subcontractor for the Urenco Group which was operating a uranium enrichment plant in Almelo and employed a gaseous centrifuge method to assure a supply of nuclear fuel for nuclear power plants in the Netherlands. Soon after, Khan left FDO when Urenco offered him a senior technical position, initially conducting studies on the uranium metallurgy.
Uranium enrichment is an extremely difficult process because uranium in its natural state is composed of just 0.71% of uranium-235 (U235), which is a fissile material, 99.3% of uranium-238 (U238), which is non fissile, and 0.0055% of uranium-234 (U234), a decay product which is also a non fissile. The Urenco Group utilized the Zippe-type of centrifugal method to electromagnetically separate the isotopes U234, U235, and U238 from sublimed raw uranium by rotating the uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas at up to ~100,000 revolutions per minute (rpm). Khan, whose work was based on physical metallurgy of the uranium metal, eventually dedicated his investigations on improving the efficiency of the centrifuges by 1973–74.
Upon learning of India's surprise nuclear test, 'Smiling Buddha', in May 1974, Khan wanted to contribute to efforts to build an atomic bomb and met with officials at the Pakistani Embassy in The Hague, who dissuaded him by saying it was "hard to find" a job in PAEC (Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission) as a "metallurgist". In August 1974, Khan wrote a letter which went unnoticed, but he directed another letter through the Pakistani ambassador to the Prime Minister's Secretariat in September 1974.
Unbeknownst to Khan, his nation's scientists were already working towards the development of an atomic bomb under a secretive crash weapons program since January 20, 1972, that was being directed by Munir Ahmad Khan, a reactor physicist. After reading his letter, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had his military secretary run a security check on Khan, who was unknown at that time, for verification and asked PAEC to dispatch a team under Bashiruddin Mahmood that met Khan at his family home in Almelo and gave him Bhutto's letter to meet him in Islamabad. Upon arriving in December 1974, Khan took a taxi straight to the Prime Minister's Secretariat. He met with Prime Minister Bhutto in the presence of Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Agha Shahi, and Mubashir Hassan where he explained the significance of highly enriched uranium, with the meeting ending with Bhutto's remark: "He seems to make sense."
The next day, Khan met with Munir Ahmad and other senior scientists where he focused the discussion on production of highly enriched uranium (HEU), against weapon-grade plutonium, and explained to Bhutto why he thought the idea of "plutonium" would not work. Later, Khan was advised by several officials in the Bhutto administration to remain in the Netherlands to learn more about centrifuge technology but continue to provide consultation on the Project-706 enrichment program led by Mahmood. By December 1975, Khan was given a transfer to a less sensitive section when Urenco Group became suspicious of his indiscreet open sessions with Mahmood to instruct him on centrifuge technology. Khan began to fear for his safety in the Netherlands, ultimately insisting on returning home.
In April 1976, Khan joined the atomic bomb program and became part of the enrichment division, initially collaborating with Khalil Qureshi -- a physical chemist. Calculations performed by Khan were valuable contributions to centrifuges and a vital link to nuclear weapon research, but Khan continued to push for his ideas for development of weapon-grade uranium even though it had a low priority, with most efforts still aimed to produce military-grade plutonium. Because of his interest in uranium metallurgy and his frustration at having been passed over for director of the uranium division (the job was instead given to Bashiruddin Mahmood), Khan refused to engage in further calculations and caused tensions with other researchers. Khan became highly unsatisfied and bored with the research led by Mahmood – finally, he submitted a critical report to Bhutto, in which he explained that the "enrichment program" was nowhere near success.
Upon reviewing the report, Bhutto sensed a great danger as the scientists were split between military-grade uranium and plutonium and informed Khan to take over the enrichment division from Mahmood, who separated the program from PAEC by founding the Engineering Research Laboratories (ERL). The ERL functioned directly under the Army's Corps of Engineers, with Khan being its chief scientist, and the army engineers located the national site at isolated lands in Kahuta for the enrichment program as an ideal site for preventing accidents.
The PAEC did not forgo its electromagnetic isotope separation program, and a parallel program was led by G. D. Alam at the Air Research Laboratories (ARL) located at Chaklala Air Force Base, even though Alam had not seen a centrifuge, and only had a rudimentary knowledge of the Manhattan Project. During this time, Alam accomplished a great feat by perfectly balancing the rotation of the first generation of centrifuge to ~30,000 rpm and was immediately dispatched to ERL which was suffering from many setbacks in setting up its own program under Khan's direction based on centrifuge technology dependent on Urenco's methods. Khan eventually committed to work on problems involving the differential equations concerning the rotation around fixed axis to perfectly balance the machine under influence of gravity and the design of first generation of centrifuges became functional after Khan and Alam succeeded in separating the 235U and 238U isotopes from raw natural uranium.
In the military circles, Khan's scientific ability was well recognized and he was often known by his moniker "Centrifuge Khan" and the national laboratory was renamed after him upon the visit of President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq in 1983. In spite of his role, Khan was never in charge of the actual designs of the nuclear devices, their calculations, and eventual weapons testing which remained under the directorship of Munir Ahmad Khan and the PAEC.
The PAEC's senior scientists who worked with him and under him remember him as "an egomaniacal lightweight" given to exaggerating his scientific achievements in centrifuges. At one point, Munir Khan said that, "most of the scientists who work on the development of atomic bomb projects were extremely 'serious'. They were sobered by the weight of what they don't know; Abdul Qadeer Khan is a showman." During the timeline of the bomb program, Khan published papers on the analytical mechanics of balancing of rotating masses and thermodynamics with mathematical rigor to compete, but still failed to impress his fellow theorists at PAEC, generally in the physics community. In later years, Khan became a staunch critic of Munir Khan's research in physics, and on many occasions tried unsuccessfully to belittle Munir Khan's role in the atomic bomb projects. Their scientific rivalry became public and widely popular in the physics community and seminars held in the country over the years.
Many of Khan's theorists were unsure that military-grade uranium would be feasible on time without the centrifuges, since Alam had notified PAEC that the "blueprints were incomplete" and "lacked the scientific information needed even for the basic gas-centrifuges." Calculations by Tasneem Shah, and confirmed by Alam, showed that Khan's earlier estimation of the quantity of uranium needing enrichment for the production of weapon-grade uranium was possible, even with the small number of centrifuges deployed.
Khan stole the designs of the centrifuges from Urenco Group. However, they were riddled with serious technical errors, and while he bought some components for analysis, they were broken pieces, making them useless for quick assembly of a centrifuge. Its separative work unit (SWU) rate was extremely low, so that it would have to be rotated for thousands of RPMs at the cost of millions of taxpayers money, Alam maintained. Though Khan's knowledge of copper metallurgy greatly aided the innovation of centrifuges,it was the calculations and validation that came from his team of fellow theorists, including mathematician Tasneem Shah and Alam, who solved the differential equations concerning rotation around a fixed axis under the influence of gravity, which led Khan to come up with the innovative centrifuge designs.
Scientists have said that Khan would have never got any closer to success without the assistance of Alam and others. The issue is controversial. Khan maintained to his biographer that when it came to defending the "centrifuge approach" and really putting work into it, both Shah and Alam refused.
Khan was also very critical of PAEC's concentrated efforts towards developing a plutonium "implosion-type" nuclear devices and provided strong advocacy for the relatively simple "gun-type" device that only had to work with high-enriched uranium – a design concept of gun-type device he eventually submitted to the Ministry of Energy (MoE) and the Ministry of Defense (MoD). Khan downplayed the importance of plutonium despite many of the theorists maintaining that "plutonium and the fuel cycle has its significance", and he insisted on the uranium route to the Bhutto administration when France's offer for an extraction plant was in the offing.
Though he had helped to come up with the centrifuge designs, and had been a long-time proponent of the concept, Khan was not chosen to head the development project to test his nation's first nuclear-weapons (his reputation of a thorny personality likely played a role in this) after India conducted its series of nuclear tests, "Pokhran-II" in 1998. Intervention by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Jehangir Karamat, allowed Khan to be a participant and eye-witness his Pakistan's first nuclear test, "Chagai-I" in 1998. At a news conference, Khan confirmed the testing of the boosted fission devices while stating that it was KRL's highly enriched uranium (HEU) that was used in the detonation of Pakistan's first nuclear devices on May 28, 1998.
Many of Khan's colleagues were irritated that he seemed to enjoy taking full credit for something he had only a small part in, and in response, he authored an article, "Torch-Bearers", which appeared in The News International, emphasizing that he was not alone in the weapon's development. He made an attempt to work on the Teller-Ulam design for the hydrogen bomb, but the military strategists had objected to the idea as it went against the government's policy of minimum credible deterrence.
In the 1970s, Khan had been very vocal about establishing a network to acquire imported electronic materials from the Dutch firms and had very little trust of PAEC's domestic manufacturing of materials, despite the government accepting PAEC's arguments for the long term sustainability of the nuclear weapons program. At one point, Khan reached out to the People's Republic of China for acquiring the uranium hexafluoride (UF6) when he attended a conference there – the Pakistani Government sent it back to the People's Republic of China, asking KRL to use the UF6 supplied by PAEC.
In 1982, an unnamed Arab country reached out to Khan for the sale of centrifuge technology. Khan was very receptive to the financial offer, but one scientist alerted the Zia administration which investigated the matter, only for Khan to vehemently deny such an offer was made to him. The Zia administration tasked Major-General Ali Nawab, an engineering officer, to keep surveillance on Khan, which he did until 1983 when he retired from his military service, and Khan's activities went undetected for several years after.
In 1979, the Dutch government eventually probed Khan on suspicion of nuclear espionage but he was not prosecuted due to lack of evidence. However, the Dutch government did file a criminal complaint against him in a local court in Amsterdam, which sentenced him in absentia in 1985 to four years in prison. Upon learning of the sentence, Khan filed an appeal through his attorney, S. M. Zafar, who teamed up with the administration of Leuven University, and successfully argued that the technical information requested by Khan was commonly found and taught in undergraduate and doctoral physics at the university. The court subsequently exonerated Khan by overturning his sentence on a legal technicality. Reacting to the suspicions of espionage, Khan stressed that: "I had requested for it as we had no library of our own at KRL, at that time. All the research work [at Kahuta] was the result of our innovation and struggle. We did not receive any technical 'know-how' from abroad, but we cannot reject the use of books, magazines, and research papers in this connection."
In 1979, the Zia administration, which was making an effort to keep their nuclear capability discreet to avoid pressure from the Reagan administration of the United States, nearly lost its patience with Khan when he reportedly attempted to meet with a local journalist to announce the existence of the enrichment program. During the Indian Operation Brasstacks military exercise in 1987, Khan gave another interview to local press and stated: "the Americans had been well aware of the success of the atomic quest of Pakistan", allegedly confirming the speculation of technology export. At both instances, the Zia administration sharply denied Khan's statement and a furious President Zia met with Khan and used a "tough tone", promising Khan severe repercussions had he not retracted all of his statements, which Khan immediately did by contacting several news correspondents.
In 1996, Khan again appeared on his country's news channels and maintained that "at no stage was the program of producing 90% weapons-grade enriched uranium ever stopped", despite Benazir Bhutto's administration reaching an understanding with the United States Clinton administration to cap the program to three percent (3%) enrichment in 1990.
The innovation and improved designs of centrifuges were marked as classified for export restriction by the Pakistan government, though Khan was still in possession of earlier designs of centrifuges from when he worked for Urenco Group in the 1970s. In 1990, the United States alleged that highly sensitive information was being exported to North Korea in exchange for rocket engines. On multiple occasions, Khan levelled accusations against Benazir Bhutto's administration of providing secret enrichment information, on a compact disc (CD), to North Korea; these accusations were denied by Benazir Bhutto's staff and military personnel.
Between 1987 and 1989, Khan secretly leaked knowledge of centrifuges to Iran without notifying the Pakistan Government, although this issue is a subject of political controversy. In 2003, the European Union pressured Iran to accept tougher inspections of its nuclear program and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) revealed an enrichment facility in the city of Natanz, Iran, utilizing gas centrifuges based on the designs and methods used by the Urenco Group. The IAEA inspectors quickly identified the centrifuges as P-1 types, which had been obtained "from a foreign intermediary in 1989", and the Iranian negotiators turned over the names of their suppliers, which identified Khan as one of them.
In 2003, Libya negotiated with the United States to roll back its nuclear program to have economic sanctions lifted, effected by the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act, and shipped centrifuges to the United States that were identified as P-1 models by the American inspectors. Ultimately, the Bush administration launched its investigation of Khan, focusing on his personal role, when Libya handed over a list of its suppliers.
Starting in 2001, Khan served as an adviser on science and technology in the Musharraf administration and became a public figure who enjoyed much support from his country's political conservative sphere. In 2003, the Bush administration reportedly turned over evidence of a nuclear proliferation network that implicated Khan's role to the Musharraf administration. Khan was dismissed from his post on January 31, 2004. On February 4, 2004, Khan appeared on Pakistan Television (PTV) and confessed to running a proliferation ring, and transferring technology to Iran between 1989 and 1991, and to North Korea and Libya between 1991 and 1997. The Musharraf administration avoided arresting Khan but launched security hearings on Khan who confessed to the military investigators that former Chief of Army Staff General Mirza Aslam Beg had given authorization for technology transfer to Iran.
On February 5, 2004, President Pervez Musharraf issued a pardon to Khan as he feared that the issue would be politicized by his political rivals. Despite the pardon, Khan, who had strong conservative support, had badly damaged the political credibility of the Musharraf administration and the image of the United States which was attempting to win the hearts and minds of local populations during the height of the insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. While the local television news media aired sympathetic documentaries on Khan, the opposition parties in the country protested so strongly that the United States Embassy in Islamabad was compelled to point out to the Bush administration that the successor to Musharraf could be less friendly towards the United States. This revelation restrained the Bush administration from applying further direct pressure on Musharraf due to a strategic calculation that it might cause the loss of Musharraf as an ally.
In December 2006, the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission (WMDC), headed by Hans Blix, stated that Khan could not have acted alone "without the awareness of the Pakistan Government". Blix's statement was also reciprocated by the United States government, with one anonymous American government intelligence official quoted by independent journalist and author Seymour Hersh: "Suppose if Edward Teller had suddenly decided to spread nuclear technology around the world. Could he really do that without the American government knowing?".
In 2007, United States and European Commission politicians as well as IAEA officials made several strong calls to have Khan interrogated by IAEA investigators, given the lingering skepticism about the disclosures made by Pakistan. However, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, who remained supportive of Khan and spoke highly of him, strongly dismissed the calls by terming it as "case closed".
In 2008, the security hearings were officially terminated by Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Tariq Majid who marked the details of debriefings as "classified". In 2008, in an interview, Khan laid the whole blame on former President Pervez Musharraf, and labelled Musharraf as the "Big Boss" for proliferation deals. In 2012, Khan also implicated Benazir Bhutto's administration in proliferation matters, pointing to the fact as she had issued "clear directions in thi[s] regard."
Khan's strong advocacy for nuclear sharing of technology eventually led to his ostracization by much of the scientific community. Nevertheless, Khan was still quite welcome in his country's political and military circles. After leaving the directorship of the Khan Research Laboratories in 2001, Khan briefly joined the Musharraf administration as a policy adviser on science and technology on a request from President Musharraf. In this capacity, Khan promoted increased defense spending on his nation's missile program to counter the perceived threats from the Indian missile program and advised the Musharraf administration on space policy. He presented the idea of using the Ghauri missile system as an expendable launch system to launch satellites into space.
At the height of the proliferation controversy in 2007, Khan was paid tribute by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on state television. While commenting in the last part of his speech, Aziz stressed: "The services of [nuclear] scientist ... Dr. [Abdul] Qadeer Khan are "unforgettable" for the country".
In the 1990s, Khan secured a fellowship with the Pakistan Academy of Sciences – he served as its president in 1996–97. Khan published two books on material science and started publishing his articles from KRL in the 1980s. Gopal S. Upadhyaya, an Indian metallurgist who attended Khan's conference and met him along with Kuldip Nayar, reportedly described Khan as being a proud Pakistani who wanted to show the world that scientists from Pakistan are inferior to no one in the world. Khan also served as project director of Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology and briefly served as a tenured professor of physics before joining the faculty of the Hamdard University; where he remained on the board of directors of the university until his death in 2021. Later, Khan helped established the A. Q. Khan Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering at Karachi University.
In 2012 Khan announced the formation of a conservative political advocacy group, Tehreek-e-Tahaffuz-e-Pakistan (Movement for the Protection of Pakistan). It was subsequently dissolved in 2013.
In August 2021, Khan was admitted to Khan Research Laboratories Hospital after testing positive for COVID-19. Khan died on October 10, 2021, at the age of 85 after being transferred to a hospital in Islamabad with lung problems. He was given a state funeral at the Faisal Mosque before being buried at the H-8 graveyard in Islamabad.
The Prime Minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan, expressed grief over his death in a tweet, adding that "for the people of Pakistan he was a national icon". President of Pakistan Arif Alvi also expressed sadness adding that "a grateful nation will never forget his services".
During his time in the atomic bomb project, Khan pioneered research in the thermal quantum field theory and condensed matter physics, while he co-authored articles on chemical reactions of the highly unstable isotope particles in the controlled physical system. He maintained his stance on the use of controversial technological solutions to both military and civilian problems, including the use of military technologies for civilian welfare. Khan also remained a vigorous advocate for a nuclear testing program and defense strength through nuclear weapons. He justified Pakistan's nuclear deterrence program as sparing his country the fate of Iraq or Libya. In an interview in 2011, Khan maintained his stance on peace through strength and vigorously defended the nuclear weapons program as part of the deterrence policy:
During his work on the nuclear weapons program and onwards, Khan faced heated and intense criticism from his fellow theorists, most notably Pervez Hoodbhoy who contested his scientific understanding in quantum physics. In addition, Khan's false claims that he was the "father" of the atomic bomb project since its inception and his personal attacks on Munir Ahmad Khan caused even greater animosity from his fellow theorists, and most particularly, within the general physics community, such as the Pakistan Physics Society.
Nevertheless, in spite of the proliferation controversy and his volatile personality, Khan remained a popular public figure and has been as a symbol of national pride with many in Pakistan who see him as a national hero. While Khan was bestowed with many medals and honors by the federal government and universities in Pakistan, Khan also remains the only citizen of Pakistan to have been honored twice with the Nishan-e-Imtiaz. the highly restricted and prestigious award roughly equivalent to the Presidential Medal of Freedom (United States) and the Order of the British Empire (United Kingdom).
Khan, Jiah
Jiah Khan, born Nafisa Rizvi Khan, (b. February 20, 1988, New York City, New York – June 3, 2013, Juhu, Mumbai, India) was an American born British Indian actress, model and singer who appeared in Bollywood films. She made her film debut in the 2007 film Ram Gopal Verma's Nishabd for which she was nominated for Filmfare Best Female Debut Award. She was later noted for portraying modern, independent women in Ghajini which was the highest-grossing Bollywood film of 2008. Her performance in the latter earned her significant acclaim. She last appeared in Sajid Khan's film Housefull which was the second highest-grossing Bollywood film of 2010.
On June 4, 2013, Jiah Khan was found dead in her apartment in her residence in the Sagar Sangeet building in Juhu, Mumbai. She had apparently committed suicide by hanging herself.
The filmography of Jiah Khan reads as follows:
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007 | Nishabd | Jia | Nominated, Filmfare Best Female Debut Award |
| 2008 | Ghajini | Sunita | |
| 2010 | Housefull | Devika |
Khan, Hashim
Khan settled in Denver, Colorado, and continued to appear in veterans' matches at the British Open. The Denver Athletic Club continues to hold a Hashim Khan squash tournament in his honor every year.
Khan, Mohamed
Khansa’, al- (Tumadir bint ‘Amr) (Tumāḍir bint ʿAmr ibn al-Ḥarth ibn al-Sharīd al-Sulamīyah) (c. 575-c. 640). Arab poetess. She is famous for her elegies for her two brothers Mu‘awiya and Sakhr, killed in skirmishes. Hadith made her welcome Islam, but her poetry is wholly pagan in feeling.
Tumāḍir bint ʿAmr ibn al-Ḥarth ibn al-Sharīd al-Sulamīyah, usually simply referred to as al-Khansā’ (translated from Arabic as either 'gazelle' or 'short-nosed'), was a 7th century Arabic poet. She was born and raised in the Najd region (the central region of modern-day Saudi Arabia). She was a contemporary of Muhammad, and eventually converted to Islam.
In her time, the role of a female poet was to write elegies for the dead and perform them for the tribe in public oral competitions. Al-Khansa’ won respect and fame in these competitions with her elegies for her brothers, Ṣakhr and Muʿāwiyah, who had died in battle. She is the best known female poet in Arabic literature.
Al-Khansa’ was born into a rich family of Najd.
In 612, her brother Muʿawiyah was killed by members of another tribe. Al-Khansa’ insisted that her brother, Sakhr, avenge Muʿawiyah's death, which he did. However, Sakhr was wounded in the process and died of his wounds a year later. Al-Khansa’ mourned his death in poetry and gained fame for her elegiac compositions.
Al-Khansa' met the Prophet Muhammad in 629 and converted to Islam. He is said to have been very impressed by her poetry. She had four sons: Yazīd, Muʿāwiyah, ʿAmr, and ʿAmrah, all of whom converted to Islam. She earned respect when she went with her sons who fought in the Battle of Qadisiyah, where all four were killed.
When she received the news, she allegedly did not grieve, but said, "Praise be to Allah who honored me with their martyrdom. And I have hope from my Lord that he will reunite me with them in the abode of his mercy."
Tumadir bint 'Amr see Khansa’, al-
Tumāḍir bint ʿAmr ibn al-Ḥarth ibn al-Sharīd al-Sulamīyah see Khansa’, al-
Khan, Sikandar Hayat (Sikandar Hayat Khan) (Sikandar Hyat-Khan) (June 5, 1892 in Multan – December 25/26, 1942). Politician in the Indian province of the Punjab. He entered the provincial legislature in 1924 after careers in the Indian Army and business and rose to be the chief minister of the province from 1937 to his death. In 1937, he reached an agreement with Mohammad Ali Jinnah under which his party, the Unionists, allied with the All-India Muslim League. Sikandar Hayat Khan opposed the Quit India Movement of 1942 and supported the anti-Axis powers during World War II. He opposed Jinnah and the Pakistan Movement, partly because he foresaw that the creation of an independent Pakistan could only occur with the partition of the Punjab.
Sikander Hayat Khan led the Unionist Party, an all-Punjab political party formed to represent the concerns and issues of India's Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus. He had taken over leadership of this group from Fazli Husein. Khan led his party in the 1937 elections, held under the Government of India Act 1935. He governed the Punjab as premier in coalition with the Sikh Akali Dal and the Indian National Congress.
Khan opposed the Quit India Movement of 1942, and supported the Allied powers during World War II. Khan believed in politically cooperating with the British for the independence of India and the unity of Punjab.
In 1937, Jinnah signed the Sikander-Jinnah pact in support of the Lahore Resolution, written by Khan, calling for an independent Pakistan.
Khan died in 1942. He is buried at the footsteps of the Badshahi Masjid in Lahore, commemorated for his contributions to Islam by having restored and revitalized the grand mosque.
Sikandar Hayat Khan see Khan, Sikandar Hayat
Sikandar Hyat-Khan see Khan, Sikandar Hayat
Sultan Khan (commonly referred to with honorifics as Mir Sultan Khan or Mir Malik Sultan Khan, b. March 13, 1903, Mitha Tiwana, Khushab District, British India - d. April 25, 1966, Sargodha, Punjab, Pakistan) was a Punjabi chess player, and later a citizen farmer in Pakistan, who is thought to have been the strongest chess master of his time from Asia.
The son of a Muslim landlord and preacher, he travelled with Colonel Nawab Sir Umar Hayat Khan (Sir Umar), to Britain, where he took the chess world by storm. In an international chess career of less than five years (1929–33), he won the Brtitish Championship three times in four tries (1929, 1932, 1933), and had tournament and match results that placed him among the top ten players in the world.
Sir Umar then brought him back to his homeland, where he gave up chess and returned to cultivate his ancestral farmlands in the area which became Pakistan. He would live on these lands for the rest of his life, as a proud citizen of Sargodha.
Sultan Khan perhaps the greatest natural player of modern times. However, although he was one of the world's top players in the early 1930s, FIDE, the World Chess Federation, never awarded him any title (such as Grandmaster of International Master).
Sultan Khan was born on March 13, 1903 in Mitha Tiwana, Khushab, Sargodha which today is in Pakistan. He was born into to a Muslim Awan family of pirs and landlords. He learned Indian chess from his father at the age of nine. By the time he was 21, he was considered the strongest player in Punjab.
At that time, Sir Umar took him into his household with the idea of teaching him the European version of the game and introducing him to European master chess.
In 1928, Sultan Khan won the all-India championship, scoring eight wins, one draw, and no losses.
In the spring of 1929, Sir Umar took Sultan Khan to London, where a training tournament was organized for his benefit. Due to his inexperience with European chess and lack of theoretical knowledge, he did poorly, tying for last place with H. G. Conde, behind William Winter and Frederick Yates. After the tournament, Winter and Yates trained with Sultan Khan to help prepare him for the British Chess Championship to be held that summer. To everyone's surprise, Sultan Khan won. Soon afterwards, he went back to India with Sir Umar.
Returning to Europe in May 1930, Sultan Khan began an international chess career that included wins over many of the world's leading players. H is best results were second to Savielly Tartakower at Liege 1930; third at Hastings 1930–31 (+5−2=2) behind future World Champion Max Euwe and former World Champion Jose Raul Capablanca; fourth at Hastings 1931–32; fourth at Bern 1932 (+10−3=2); and a tie for third with Isaac Kashdan at London 1932, behind World Champion Alexander Alekhine and Salo Flohr. Sultan Khan again won the British Championship in 1932 and 1933.
In matches, Sultan Khan narrowly defeated Tartakower in 1931 (+4−3=5) and narrowly lost to Flohr in 1932 (+1−2=3).
Sultan Khan thrice played first board for England at Chess Olympiads. At Hamburg 1930, there was still no rule that teams must put their best player on the top board, and some teams, unconvinced of his strength, matched their second or even third-best player against him. He scored nine wins, four draws, and four losses (64.7%).
At Prague 1931, Sultan Khan faced a much stronger field. He had an outstanding result, scoring eight wins, seven draws, and two losses (67.6%). This included wins against Flohr and Akiba Rubinstein and draws with Alekhine, Kashdan, Ernst Grunfeld, Gideon Stahlberg, and Efim Bogolynbov.
At Folkestone 1933, Sultan Khanhad his worst result, an even score, winning four games, drawing six, and losing four. Once again, his opponents included the world's best players, such as Alekhine, Flohr, Kashdan, Tartakower, Grünfeld, Ståhlberg, and Lajos Steiner.
In December 1933, Sir Umar took Sultan Khan back to India. In 1935, Sultan Khan won a match against V. K. Khadilkar, yielding just one draw in ten games. However, after this match, Sultan Khan retreated to his farm in Sargodha and the chess world never heard from him again.
Ghulam Fatima, a chess player who alsoworked for Sir Umar in his household in London and who won the British Ladies Championship in 1933 by a remarkable three point margin, scoring ten wins, one draw, and no losses, told Hooper and Whyld for their book about Sultan Khan that Khan, on leaving England, “felt that he had been freed from prison.” Apparently, in the damp English climate, Sultan Khan had been continually afflicted with malaria, colds, influenza, and throat infections, often arriving to play with his neck swathed in bandages. Sir Umar died in 1944.
Mir Sultan Khan lived for the rest of his life with his family in Sargodha. Ather Sultan, his eldest son, recalled that he would not coach his children at chess, telling them that they should do something more useful with their lives.
Sultan Khan died of tuberculosis in Sargodha, Pakistan (the same district where he had been born) on April 25, 1966.
In his brief but meteoric career, Sultan Khan rose to the top of the chess world, playing on even terms with the world's best players. By Arpad Elo's calculation, his playing strength during his five-year peak was equivalent to an Elo rating of 2530, the rating score for an International Grandmaster designation. However, in 1950, when FIDE first awarded the titles of International Grandmaster and International Master, Sultan Khan had not played for 15 years. Although FIDE awarded titles to some long-retired players who had distinguished careers earlier in their lives, such as Rubinstein and Carlos Torre, FIDE never awarded any title to Sultan Khan.
Hooper and Whyld, Sultan Khan's biographers, wrote of him:
Tikka Khan (July 7, 1915 - March 28, 2002). Pakistani general who served in the Indo-Pakistan wars of 1965 to 1971. As the chief martial law administrator and governor of East Pakistan, he directed the crackdown on the Awami League movement in March 1971. Under Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, he served as the Pakistan Army chief of staff. After Bhutto’s fall, he joined the opposition to Zia-ul Haq’s government.
Tikka Khan was Pakistan's Chief of Army Staff from March 3, 1972 to March 1, 1976. He was also a military Governor of erstwhile East Pakistan (later, Bangladesh) and architect of Operation Searchlight.
Raja Tikka Khan was born in a Narma Rajput family in the village of Jochha Mamdot in Kahuta Tehsil near Rawalpindi, in 1915 (in what was then British India). He was a graduate of the Indian Military Academy at Dehradun, and was commissioned on December 22, 1940.
He fought in World War II as part of the Indian Army. After his return from World War II, Khan was an instructor at the Indian Military Academy at Dehradun for some time. During the independence, Major Tikka Khan remained in what is now Pakistan, and became an officer in the Pakistan Army.
After Independence, he served in only one Artillery Regiment of Royal Pakistan Artillery, where he raised and commanded the first post partition Medium Regiment of Royal Pakistan Artillery, i.e., 12 Medium Regiment Artillery.
He was promoted to the rank of Major General in 1962.
Tikka Khan was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-General in August 1969. He was then posted as commander IV Corps at Lahore, where he stayed until March 1971. By virtue of Yahya Khan's martial law, Tikka Khan was also the Martial Law Administrator, Zone A (West Pakistan). He had replaced Lieutenant General Attiqur Rahman as the MLA and left the post to Lieutenant General Bahadur Sher in March 1971. Lahore's Fortess Stadium was constructed under General Tikka Khan's tenure as corps commander.
Tikka Khan left for Dhaka in March 1971, where he was to take charge as the commander of the Eastern Command, Martial Law Administrator, Zone B (East Pakistan), and Governor of East Pakistan.
The 1970 elections in East Pakistan and West Pakistan resulted in a situation where Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's Awami League won 160 of the 162 seats in East Pakistan, whereas Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) won 81 seats out of 138 in West Pakistan. Although, as the leader of the majority party, Mujib was supposed to be the next Prime Minister of Pakistan, Bhutto was not ready to accept and refused to sit in the National Assembly as opposition party. General Yahya Khan, President of Pakistan, influenced by Bhutto to keep the Bengalis from rising to power, postponed the National Assembly session. Mujib, in a public rally in Dhaka on March 7, called upon the Bengalis to launch a movement against the Pakistan regime. In this circumstance, Tikka was sent out to put down the unrest swelling in East Pakistan. Tikka took over Eastern Command (equivalent to a Corps) on March 7, 1971 after the previous commander Lieutenant General Sahabzada Yaqub Khan resigned. Tikka directed the military crackdown (officially known as Operation Searchlight) on March 25 with the help of Major General Rao Forman Ali and other Army generals that stunned the Bengalis with gross violence.
Tikka Khan was the leading commander of the II Corps responsible for the defense on the Western front of the War in 1971. After a brief stay in East Pakistan, he was then posted as the first commander II Corps at Multan and commanded through the actual Indo-Pakistan conflict in December 1971.
Tikka Khan’s tenure ended in March 1976, and he was later appointed Defense Minister by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq's July 1977 coup led to the arrest of both Bhutto and General Tikka Khan. Bhutto was executed in 1979, after which General Tikka Khan emerged as one of the leaders of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), becoming its Secretary General, during a time when many party stalwarts abandoned it.
General Tikka was imprisoned numerous times for his political activities during the late 1970s and 1980s, until Zia-ul-Haq died in August 1988 in an airplane explosion over Bahawalpur. Despite Tikka's political inclinations, many of Tikka's army proteges such as Sawar Khan, Iqbal Khan and Rahimuddin Khan were promoted to Full General and remained on deferential terms with him. General Tikka Khan was appointed the Governor of Pakistan’s largest province, the Punjab, in December 1988. His tenure as the Governor was cut short by the dismissal of the Benazir Bhutto government in August 1990, after which he retired from active politics.
General Tikka Khan died on March 28, 2002 after several years of illness. He received a state burial with full military honors and his funeral was attended by thousands of people, including the entire top brass of the Pakistan Army.
Tikka Khan see Khan, Tikka
Khaqan. Title meaning “(supreme) ruler.” It was applied by the heathen Turks and the medieval Muslim geographers and historians to the heads of the various Turkish confederations, but also to other non-Muslim rulers such as the Emperor of China. In the form qa’an it was borne by the successors of Jenghiz Khan, the Mongol Great Khans in Karakorum and Peking. The Ottoman sultans again carried the title khaqan. Early medieval chroniclers in Europe refer to it with the term kaganus.
Supreme Ruler see Khaqan.
Kaganus see Khaqan.
Khaqani, Afdal al-Din Ibrahim (Afdal al-Din Ibrahim Khaqani) (Afzaladdin Badil ibn Ali Nadjar) (Khaghani) (b. 1121/1122 in Shirvan - d. 1190 in Tabriz). Persian poet from Shirwan. He is known for having created a new type of qasida for his panegyrics, but above all for his ascetic Sufi poetry.
Khaghani, a great Persian poet and a master of panegyric qasida was born into the family of a carpenter in Melgem, a village near Shamakhy. Khaghani lost his father at an early age and was brought up by his uncle, Kafi-eddin Umar Shervani, a doctor and astronomer at the Shirvanshah’s court, who for seven years (until his death) acted "both as nurse and tutor" to Khaghani. Khaghani's mother, originally of Nestorian faith, later accepted Islam. The poet himself had a remarkable knowledge of Christianity and his poetry is profused with Christian imagery and symbols. He was also taught by his cousin (son of Kafi-eddin Umar) in philosophy. His master in poetry was the famous Abul-Ala Ganjavi who introduced him to the court of Khaqan Manuchehr Shirvanshah and Khaqani got his title from this king. He also married the daughter of Abul-Ala.
In his youth, Khaghani wrote under the pen-name Haqai'qi ("Seeker"). After he had been invited to the court of the Shirvanshah Abu'l Muzaffar Khaqan-i-Akbar Manuchiher the son of Faridun, he assumed the pen-name of Khaghani ("regal"). The na'at (a specific type of poetry) written at the time when his literary talent had reached its peak, procured him the title Hassān'l-A'jam (The Persian Hassān). Hassan ibn Thabit being a famous Arabic poet, Khaqani's title is reference to the fact that he was the Persian Hassan.
As well as Diwān, Khāqāni left some letters and a lesser known 'Ajaibu l-Gharyib (Curious Rarities). The life of a court poet palled on him. He fled from the iron cage and set off on a journey about the Middle East. His travels gave him material for his famous poem Tohfat-ul Iraqein (A Gift from the Two Iraqs), the two Iraqs being 'Persian Iraq' (western Iran) and 'Arabic Iraq' (Mesopotamia). This book supplies us with a good deal of material for his biography in which he described his impressions of the Middle East. He also wrote his famous qasida The Arch of Madain, beautifully painting his sorrow and impression of the remains of Sassanid's Palace near the Ctesiphon.
On return home, Khaghani broke off with the court of the Shirvanshah’s, and Shah Akhsitan gave order for his imprisonment. It was in prison that Khaghani wrote one of his most powerful anti-feudal poems called Habsiyye (Prison Poem). Upon release he moved with his family to Tabriz where fate dealt with him one tragic blow after another: first his young son died, then his daughter and then his wife. Khagani was left all alone, and he soon too died in Tabriz. He was buried at the Poet’s Cemetery in Surkhab Neighbourhood of Tabriz.
Khaghani left a remarkable Persian-language heritage which includes some magnificent odes-distiches of as many as three hundred lines with the same rhyme, melodious ghazals, dramatic poems protesting against oppression and glorifying reason and toil, and elegies lamenting the death of his children, his wife and his relatives.
Afdal al-Din Ibrahim Khaqani see Khaqani, Afdal al-Din Ibrahim
Khaghani see Khaqani, Afdal al-Din Ibrahim
Afzaladdin Badil ibn Ali Nadjar see Khaqani, Afdal al-Din Ibrahim
Kharijites. “Seceders” who in 658 [659?] C.C. left Ali’s army at Harura, near Kufa, to form their own military force. They opposed Ali after Ali accepted the arbitration of the Battle of Siffin in 657. They accused Ali of compromising with the supporters of wrongdoers in ceasing to fight against Mu‘awiya, the first Caliph of the Umayyads. They in fact “departed” from the battle (in Arabic, kharaja) which facilitated Mu‘awiya’s victory over ‘Ali, and later that of the ‘Abbasids over the Umayyads.
Most of the early seceders were wiped out by Ali’s forces, but their movement was spread by a handful of survivors, one of whom assassinated Ali in 661. The Kharijites were the first sect in Islam to raise issues concerning the qualifications for leadership of the Muslim community -- the umma -- and the relationship between faith and works. Their significance lies in their insistence on the possibility of a righteous umma based on the Qur’an. The term Kharijite also describes an anarchist group which believed that any sinless Muslim could be caliph.
The Kharijites constitute the earliest of the religious sects of Islam. From the point of view of the development of dogma, their importance lies particularly in the formulation of questions relative to the theory of the caliphate and to justification by faith or by works. From the point of view of political history, they disturbed, by means of continual insurrections which often ended in the temporary conquest of entire provinces, the peace of the eastern part of the Muslim empire.
Kharijism, along with Shi‘ism, became one of the two great schisms in the Muslim world. The movement appeared after the battle of Siffin as ‘Ali was consenting to a compromise with the Umayyads. The early adherents of Kharijism believed that the Caliph should be elected by the community. Kharijism moved away from the central caliphates and adopted rigorous sectarian views. In its ‘Ibadi form, this movement still exists in certain parts of North Africa and Oman.
Today, the Kharijites comprise the smallest of the three orientations in Islam, counting for less than one percent of all Muslims. Sunni Islam counts for about ninety percent and Shi'a Islam accounts for about nine percent.
The Kharijites broke with the majority of Muslims in 658 of the Christian calendar. The Kharijites did not accept that the Muslims had agreed upon setting down two arbitrators that should decide on the legitimacy of the actions that among other things had resulted in the death of Caliph Uthman in 656. The Kharijites could not accept that man should be judge over the divine word.
The Kharijis soon appeared with very strict proclamations, as well as violent acts. Everyone else were called infidels and they killed many of their opponents. The Kharijis grew slowly in strength by joining up with other groups.
The Kharijis are known for strict rules on morals and contact with strangers. Their creed says that anyone can be the leader of Islam, and not just the descendants of Muhammad as the Shi'a believe.
The Kharijis believed strongly in the equality between all races, an important factor to understanding the success they had in Islam’s early days, when many of the non-Arab Muslims felt that they were treated as inferior to the Arabs.
In modern times, one finds Kharijis in Oman (where it is dominating), and as small groups in northwestern Libya, on Jerba in Tunisia, in southern Algeria and in East Africa. These Kharijis belong to the moderate branch established by Abdullah ibn Iban around 700 of the Christian calendar.
"Seceders" see Kharijites.
Kharraz, Abu Sa‘id al- (Abu Sa‘id al-Kharraz) (d. 899). Mystic of the school of Baghdad. He strove to combine a doctrine of ecstatic mysticism with orthodox support of shari'a.
Abu Sa'id al-Kharraz see Kharraz, Abu Sa‘id al-
Kharus, Banu (Banu Kharus). Tribe which has played an important role in the history of the Ibadiyya in Oman. Sa‘id ibn Khalfan al-Khalil al-Kharusi was largely instrumental in the choice of ‘Azzan ibn Qays of the Al Bu Sa‘id, the only Ibadi Imam elected in the nineteenth century.
Banu Kharus see Kharus, Banu
Khashabiyya. The Arabic word means “men armed with clubs” and was used for the followers of al-Mukhtar ibn Abi ‘Ubayd al-Thaqafi in Kufa. It was also another name for the Kaysaniyya.
The Khashabiyya Shia (named for their exclusive use of pieces of wood as weapons in their revolt against the Ummayads under the leadership of Al-Mukhtar) are an extinct subsect of the Zaidi branch of Shia Islam, even though they originated as followers of Al-Mukhtar and hence would have been expected to be categorized under the Kaysanite Shia sect. The Khashabiyya Shia were later known in Khurasan as the Surkhabiyya (named for their leader Surkhab al-Tabari).
The Khashabiyya Shia had the following beliefs:
* They believed that Ali was the legatee of Muhammad and not an Imam, but merely the executor (Wasi) of the Imamate that Muhammad had deposited with him until he could pass it on to his son Hasan.
* The Imamate will remain only among the descendents of Hasan ibn Ali and Husayn ibn Ali.
* The Imamate may reside in any one of the descendents of Hasan and Husayn who rises in revolt.
* The “Imam” can be knowledgeable or ignorant, the most excellent or of lesser qualities, righteous or immoral, just or tyrannical.
* The “Imam” must be fully obeyed and never opposed, no matter who he is.
* If two people claim the Imamate at the same time or two of them fight one another, no one should take sides in the struggle between them or provide any assistance to one of them against the other, regardless of whether they are both tyrannical, or both just, or mutual opposites.
Kaysaniyya see Khashabiyya.
"Men Armed with Clubs" see Khashabiyya.
Surkhabiyya see Khashabiyya.
Khatami, Mohammed (Mohammad Khatami) (Muḥammad Khātamī) (Seved Mohammad Khatami) (b. September 29/October 14, 1943, Ardakān, Iran). Iranian political leader, who was president of Iran (1997–2005). He served as the fifth President of Iran from August 2, 1997 to August 3, 2005. He also served as Iran's Minister of Culture in both the 1980s and 1990s..
The son of a well-known religious teacher, Khatami studied at a traditional madrasah (religious school) in the holy city of Qom, where he later taught. However, he also received degrees in philosophy from Eṣfahān University and the University of Tehrān, both secular institutions, a somewhat unusual accomplishment for a member of Iran’s Shīʿite clergy. Khatami held the title hojatoleslām, signifying his position as a cleric, and, as a direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, he wore a black turban.
During the 1960s and ’70s Khatami gained a reputation as an opponent of the rule of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. In 1978 he was appointed head of the Islamic Center Hamburg in Germany, and after the 1979 Islamic revolution he was elected to the Majlis, the Iranian national assembly. Khatami held several positions in the Iranian government during the 1980s, including that of minister of culture and Islamic guidance, which he held again in the early 1990s before being forced to resign in 1992 amid allegations that he permitted too much un-Islamic sentiment. He then became the director of the National Library and served as an adviser to President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
In the 1997 elections Khatami was one of four candidates to run for the presidency and was the most moderate on social issues. With strong support from the country’s youth, women, and intellectuals, he was elected by almost 70 percent of the vote. Some of the moderates he appointed to the cabinet were controversial but nonetheless were approved by Iran’s conservative Majlis. Tension between the president and conservatives grew, however, and, beginning in 1998, a number of key Khatami supporters were prosecuted and harassed as a result. He advocated increased contact with the United States, but his domestic opponents hindered rapprochement between the two countries. Khatami was re-elected in 2001 by an overwhelming majority of the vote. Constitutionally barred from a third consecutive term as president, he left office in 2005. In February 2009 he announced his candidacy in the presidential election set for later that year, although he reversed his decision the following month in order to strengthen the chances of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, a reformist candidate expected to have a better chance at victory.
During Khatami’s regime, Iran opened up to the West, and political, cultural and economical ties were improved. On home ground, Khatami eased religious sanctions on life styles and cultural activities and opened up Iranian society for more freedom of speech. Khatami was active in Islamic revolutionary work, and was, for many years, one of the active members of the revolutionary movement headed by Khomeini.
Khatami is known for his proposal of Dialogue Among Civilizations. The United Nations proclaimed the year 2001 as the United Nations' Year of Dialogue Among Civilizations, on Khatami's suggestion.
On October 2009, Mohammad Khatami along with Dariush Shayegan was awarded 2009 Global Dialogue Prize, one of the world’s largest awards for research in the humanities. The award is given biannually "for excellence in research and research communication on the conditions and content of a global intercultural dialogue on values".
Mohammad Khatami see Khatami, Mohammed
Muḥammad Khātamī see Khatami, Mohammed
Seved Mohammad Khatami see Khatami, Mohammed
Khath‘am. An Arab tribe which inhabited the mountainous territory between al-Ta’if and Najran. They played a part in Abraha’s expedition against Mecca and, after initial hostility, recognized the Prophet’s mission.
Khatib al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Ahmad al- (Abu Bakr Ahmad al-Khatib al-Baghdadi) (Abu Bakr Ahmad ibn `Ali ibn Thabit ibn Ahmad ibn Mahdi al-Shafi`i) (May 10, 1002 - 1071). Biographer and critical systematizer of hadith methodology. His fame is based on his biographical encyclopedia of more than 7,800 scholars and other personalities connected with the cultural and political life of Baghdad.
Al-Khatib al-Baghdadi, or the lecturer from Baghdad, was a Sunni Muslim scholar and historian.
Al-Khatib al-Baghdadi was born on May 10, 1002 in Hanikiya, a village south of Baghdad. He was the son of a preacher of Darzidjan and he began studying at an early age with his father and other shaykhs. Over time he studied other sciences but his primary interest was hadith. There is not a lot of information available about what he did while he was studying under his father. At the age of 20, his father died and he went to Basra to search for hadith. In 1024, he set out on a second journey to Nishapur and he collected more hadith in Rayy and Isfahan. It is unclear how long he traveled but his own accounts put him back in Baghdad in 1028. While he was an authority on hadith it was his preaching that gave him fame that would help him later in life. One biographer, Al-Dhahabi, says that teachers and preachers of tradition usually submitted what they had collected to Al-Baghdadi before they used them in their lectures or sermons.
Al-Baghdadi was born Hanbali but switched his view to Shafi'i because of theological opinions. This change in philosophy caused Imam Hanbal's followers to become disenchanted with him and there was a certain hostility between them and al-Baghdadi. Despite the problems that existed, al-Baghdadi had protection under Caliph Al-Qa'im and Ibn al-Muslima and, under that protection, he presented a lot of lectures on hadith in the Mansur Mosque. Al-Baghdadi used these opportunities to make malicious insinuations against Hanbal and his followers. Later generations would view this open attack as a form of legal and theological bias from the courts but that is uncertain as al-Baghdadi did not enter into situations with the courts until after a journey in search of hadith in 1053.
In 1059 Basasiri's rebellion was successful and he overthrew Ibn Muslima for control of Baghdad. This loss of protection caused al-Baghdadi to go to Damascus. He spent eight years lecturing in the Umayyad Mosque before some type of mishap took place. There is a controversy surrounding what that mishap was exactly. Biographers Yaqut, Sibt ibn al-Jawzi, al-Dhahabi, as-Safadi, and Ibn Taghribirdi all contend that the mishap involved al-Baghdadi frequenting a youth which naturally caused a problem in Damascus. Sibt ibn al-Jawzi contends that the youth in question came along with al-Baghdadi from Baghdad. Yaqut goes on to explain that the story reached the ruler of Damascus who was Rafidi who, in turn, ordered his chief of police to kill al-Baghdadi. The police chief was a Sunni and he advised al-Baghdadi to gain the protection of Shari ibn Abi al-Hasan al-'Alawi. The reason, from what we know, that the police gave him the advice was because al-Baghdadi was an important person and killing him would lead to a retaliation against the Shi'i. Al-Baghdadi took the advice and fled to Sur, Lebanon. He stayed there for about a year before he returned to Baghdad where he died on September 5, 1071. He was buried next to Bishr al-Hafi.
Another major controversy associated with al-Baghdadi is the validity of his writings. Biographers Yaqut, Sibt ibn al-Jawzi, Ibn Kathir, and Ibn Taghribirdi believe that al-Baghdadi only finished the work of an author named as-Suri. While Yaqut contends that al-Baghdadi took the work from as-Suri's sister and claimed them as his own, Ibn Kathir believes that the works in question were borrowed from as-Suri's wife but he does not give an opinion as to the authenticity of them. Al-Baghdadi was also accused of being dishonest in relation to the hadiths by Ibn al-Jawzi.
The following is a short list of some of al-Baghdadi's works. Some accounts have him authoring over 80 titles.
* Ta'rikh Baghdad: The History of Baghdad
* al-Kifaya fi ma'rifat usul 'ilm al-riwaya: an early work dealing with Hadith terminology, which Ibn Hajar praised as influential in the field;
* al-Djami' li-akhlak al-rawi wa-adab al-sami
* Takyid al-'ilm: Questions whether putting traditions into writing is forbidden
* Sharaf ashab al-hadith: Centers around the significance of traditionalists;
* al-Sabik wa 'l-lahik: dealing with hadith narrators of a particular type;
* al-Mu'tanif fi takmilat al-Mu'talif wa 'l-mukhtalif: Correct spelling and pronunciation of names
* al-Muttafik wa 'l-muftarik
* Talkhis al-mutashabih fi 'l-rasm wa-himayat ma ashkala minhu min nawadir al-tashif wa 'l-wahm
* al-Asma' al-mubhama fi 'l-anba' al-muhkama: identifying unnamed individuals mentioned in hadith
* al-Rihla fi talab al-hadith
* Iktida' al-'ilm al-'amal
Abu Bakr Ahmad al-Khatib al-Baghdadi see Khatib al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Ahmad al-
Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Ahmad al-Khatib al- see Khatib al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Ahmad al-
Abu Bakr Ahmad ibn `Ali ibn Thabit ibn Ahmad ibn Mahdi al-Shafi`i see Khatib al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Ahmad al-
Khatmiyah. Sufi order (tariqah) which was introduced into the Sudan in 1817 by its founder Muhammad ‘Uthman al-Mirghani. The founder’s family, the Mirghani, is thought to have come to Mecca from Central Asia and claimed descent from the prophet Muhammad. The founder was educated in Mecca as a pupil of the reformist teacher Ahmad ibn Idris al-Fasi (1760-1837) and was initiated into the Qadiriyah, Shadhiliyah, Naqshbandiyah, Junaydiyah, and Mirghaniyah Sufi orders. He asserted that the Khatmiyah was the “seal” (khatm) of all Sufi orders, whose secret (sirr) became the prerogative of the Mirghani family. Al-Hasan (1819-1869), the founder’s son, whose mother was Sudanese, was responsible for the spread of the order in the Sudan and for the founding of the Khatmiyah town in Kasala province, which became an important seat of the order. The Khatmiyah spread its influence among the river communities of northern Sudan and the nomadic and settled peoples of eastern Sudan. Some followers are also found in Eritrea, Egypt, and western Sudan.
The Khatmiyah prescribes devotion and quiet contemplation of al-nur al-Muhammadiyah (the light of the prophet Muhammad), as well as the performance of a twice weekly ritual in which the mawlid, the poetic biography of the prophet Muhammad written by Muhammad ‘Uthman, is recited. The mawlid is performed on various secular and religious occasions to give spiritual rejuvenation and reaffirm belief. Recitation of litanies (award) written by the founder and some of his descendants is also recommended. The Khatmiyah Youth organization brings young men into the order, but its influence has declined with the spread of secular education. Urban dwellers maintain affiliation, and educated members are especially active politically. Allegiance to the Khatmiyah cuts across tribal and geographic boundaries, bringing together its followers through a loosely organized religio-political structure.
Under Turco-Egyptian rule (1820/21-1885) the Khatmiyah assumed the role of intermediary between its followers and the authorities. During the establishment of the Mahdist state (1885-1898), the Khatmiyah refused to join the Mahdists, and the order’s head went to Egypt. With the collapse of the Mahdist state in 1898, the Khatmiyah regained its prominence during the Anglo-Egyptian condominium (1898-1956). Its religious status remained unchanged, and it joined other political forces – including those of its rival, the Mahdiyah (commonly known as the Ansar) – in the years before Sudan’s independence. Recognizing the cultural and religious diversity of Sudan, it saw the necessity for such political dialogue.
‘Ali al-Mirghani (1878-1968), the great-grandson of the founder, played an important role in the nationalist movement for independence. Under his leadership, the Khatmiyah’s political wing, the People’s Democratic Party, was formed in 1958. He later agreed to its merger in 1967 with the National Unionist Party, and the combined forces came to be known as the Democratic Unionist Party. ‘Ali’s son Muhammad ‘Uthman (b. 1936), the head of the order in the early 1990s, took a more direct political role, and his brother Ahmad (b. 1941) accepted the chairmanship of the Council of State in 1986. This overt political activity aroused some criticism.
Since independence the Khatmiyah has played an important role in government, either in coalition, sometimes with Ansar, or in opposition. Successive military regimes (1958-1964, 1969-1985, and since 1989) have tried to weaken its political influence, but with limited success. The failure of military rule and the one-party system strengthened the position of the Khatmiyah. Muhammad ‘Uthman was praised for concluding an agreement with the leadership of the Sudan People’s Liberartion Army in Addis Ababa in 1988 in an attempt to resolve the civil war in southern Sudan. However, this came too late to prevent a military coup in 1989.
Khattabiyya. Extremist Shi‘a sect in Kufa, founded by Abu’l-Khattab al-Asadi.
Khattala, Ahmed Abu
On the weekend of June 14 to June 15, 2014, U.S. Special Forces captured Abu Khattala in a covert mission in Libya. Khattala is one of the suspected leaders of the 2012 Benghazi attack.
Khawarij. See Kharijites.
Kharijites see Khawarij.
Khawlani, Abu Idris al- (Abu Idris al-Khawlani) (629-699). Muslim of the first generation after the Prophet’s time, judge and transmitter of hadith.
Abu Idris al-Khawlani see Khawlani, Abu Idris al-
Khawlani, Abu Muslim al- (Abu Muslim al-Khawlani) (d. 684). Muslim of the first generation after the Prophet’s time, famous for his asceticism. He was a prominent religious figure in Damascus, Syria, and he was one of the Eight Ascetics.
Abu Muslim Al-Khawlani was a well known tabi'i and a very prominent religious figure in Damascus, Syria. He was one of the 'Eight Ascetics,' who included (usual list) Amir ibn Abd al-Qays, Abu Muslim al-Khawlani, Uways al-Qarani, Al-Rabi ibn Khuthaym, al-Aswad ibn Yazid, Masruq ibn al-Ajda', Sufyan al-Thawrt ibn Said and Hasan al-Basri.
Abu Muslim al-Khawlani see Khawlani, Abu Muslim al-
Khayr al-Din
Khayr al-Din (Khidr Pasha) (Barbarossa) (Hayreddin Barbarossa) (Redbeard) (Yakupoglu Hizir) (c. 1478- July 4, 1546). Turkish corsair and Grand Admiral. In his fight against the Spanish, he sought help from the Ottoman sultan, whose suzerainty over Algeria was recognized in 1520. From the island of the Jerba, he ravaged the coasts of the western Mediterranean, and in 1529, took the island of Penon facing Algiers and still in the hands of the Spanish. In 1534, he conquered Tunis, from where he was driven away by Charles V in 1535. In 1537, the fleet which had been put together by the Emperor, the Pope and Venice, under the command of Andrea Doria, retreated after some skirmishing with Khayr al-Din’s fleet. His mausoleum in Istanbul was built by the architect Sinan.
Barbarossa was a Barbary pirate and later admiral of the Ottoman fleet, by whose initiative Algeria and Tunisia became part of the Ottoman Empire. For three centuries after his death, Mediterranean coastal towns and villages were ravaged by his pirate successors.
Khayr al-Din was one of four sons of a Turk from the island of Lesbos. Hatred of the Spanish and Portuguese who attacked North Africa between 1505 and 1511 encouraged Khiḍr and his brother ʿArūj to intensify their piracy. They hoped, with the aid of Turks and Muslim emigrants from Spain, to wrest an African domain for themselves and had begun to succeed in this design when ʿArūj was killed by the Spanish in 1518. Khiḍr, who had been his brother’s lieutenant, then assumed the title Khayr ad-Dīn. Fearing he would lose his possessions to the Spanish, he offered homage to the Ottoman sultan and in return was granted the title beylerbey and sent military reinforcements (1518). With this aid Khayr ad-Dīn was able to capture Algiers in 1529 and make it the great stronghold of Mediterranean piracy. In 1533, he was appointed admiral in chief of the Ottoman Empire, and the next year he conquered the whole of Tunisia for the Turks, Tunis itself becoming the base of piracy against the Italian coast. The Holy Roman emperor Charles V led a crusade that captured Tunis and Goletta in 1535, but Barbarossa defeated Charles V’s fleet at the Battle of Preveza (1538), thereby securing the eastern Mediterranean for
Khidr Pasha see Khayr al-Din
Barbarossa see Khayr al-Din
Din, Khayr al- see Khayr al-Din
Hayreddin Barbarossa see Khayr al-Din
Redbeard see Khayr al-Din
Yakupoglu Hizir see Khayr al-Din
Khayr al-Din (Ustad Isa) ("Master Isa") ("Master Jesus"). Ottoman architect, popularly considered as the founder of Turkish architecture during the sixteenth century. He built complexes of religious and educational buildings in Amasya, Edirne and Istanbul. He may also have participated in the construction of the Taj Mahal.
Ustad Isa see Khayr al-Din
Isa, Ustad see Khayr al-Din
Din, Khayr al- see Khayr al-Din
Master Isa see Khayr al-Din
Master Jesus see Khayr al-Din
Khayr al-Din Pasha (1822-1890). Prime minister of Tunisia (1873 - 1877) and grand vizier of the Ottoman Empire (1878 - 1879). Tunisian and Ottoman statesman from the Caucasian tribe of the Abkhaz. In 1839, he went to Tunis and became, in 1857, Minister of the Navy. He was a vigorous proponent of the modernization of the Tunisian political system and a firm supporter of close links between the Tunisian Bey’s official suzerain, the Ottoman sultan, and Tunis. He was made Grand Vizier in 1878 but was dismissed in 1879.
Khayr al-Din, a Circassian from the Caucasus Mountains, was sold as a slave in Istanbul at a young age. He was then resold to an agent of the bey of Tunis. As a teenager he arrived as a Mameluke at the court of Ahmad Bey. After receiving an education at the military school established by Ahmad Bey, Khayr al-Din rose through the military ranks to cavalry commander (fariq). He spent the years 1853 - 1857 in Paris arguing Tunisia's position against Mahmud ibn Ayad, who had defrauded the government of millions of dinars. Under Ahmad Bey's successor, Muhammad Bey, Khayr al-Din served as minister of marine (wazir al-bahr) from 1857 to 1859. He later presided over the Majlis al-Akbar (Great Council), a parliamentary body established in 1860.
In conflict with Prime Minister Mustafa Khaznader (his father-in-law), whose ruinous policy of incurring foreign loans was just beginning, Khayr al-Din resigned in 1862 and spent the next seven years in Europe. In response to his European experience, and in hopes of reforming the political system in Tunisia, he wrote The Surest Path to Knowledge Concerning the Condition of Countries (1868). In it, he discussed the economic superiority of the West and offered a practical guide for improving the political system in Tunisia. He saw the ulama as the key guarantors of the political system who would ensure that the shura ideal of Islam would be upheld, and urged them to fulfill this role.
Khayr al-Din returned to Tunisia in 1869 in order to preside over the International Debt Commission. In his new political capacity, he conspired to discredit and replace Khaznader as prime minister. Faced with mounting pressures from foreign consuls and the disastrous state of Tunisia's finances, the bey retired Khaznader in 1873 and made Khayr al-Din prime minister. As prime minister, Khayr al-Din had to contend with the machinations of foreign consuls (particularly those of France, Britain, and Italy), the press campaign of his father-in-law to discredit him, his Mameluke rivals, and the economic downturn of the mid-1870s. Furthermore, he had lost faith in the pact of security of 1857 and the constitution of 1861. He realized that these liberal reforms were merely camouflage behind which Khaznader had been able to hide his ambition to become the wealthiest and most powerful member of the bey's government, and that they had been implemented to enhance foreign influence in Tunisia. Having witnessed firsthand Europe's aggressive intentions toward Africa, as well as the machinations of the foreign consuls in Tunis, Khayr al-Din had come to perceive that Europe was the paramount threat to Tunisia's existence and that the reincorporation of Tunisia into the Ottoman Empire was perhaps the country's one hope to avoid being occupied.
Khayr al-Din's disillusionment with constitutionalism led him to conclude that reforms should be directed to a wise elite in cooperation with an enlightened ulama. These two groups could limit the arbitrariness of absolutist rule and implement principles of justice and freedom according to the shariʿa (Islamic religious law). He then advocated a selective incorporation of those elements of Western civilization compatible with Islam. His final goal was the implementation of the Islamic concept of maslaha (the public good).
To help him introduce his reforms, Khayr al-Din appointed his Circassian and military school colleagues to positions of authority. He was also supported by Muhammad Bayram V, whom he appointed to direct the Hubus Administration, the government press, and al-Raʾid al-Tunisi, the official gazette of the government.
Khayr al-Din tackled administrative, financial, and tax reform, and ended the expensive mahalla military taxation expeditions against the tribes. To improve the country's economy, he expanded land under cultivation from 60,000 to 1 million hectares (132,000 - 2.2 million acres), reformed the customs system to protect Tunisia's handicraft and other industries, and launched public works projects such as paving the streets of Tunis. He founded Sadiqi College in 1875, and established a public library (al-Abdaliya). He briefly instituted a complaint box for citizens and sought to introduce a mixed judicial system to prevent foreign efforts to protect minorities in Tunisian courts. In his attempts to limit tyranny, he tried to persuade the bey to acquiesce to Ottoman claims of sovereignty and to restrictions on his arbitrary rule.
Khayr al-Din's efforts turned Muhammad al-Sadiq Bey against his reformist minister. Khayr al-Din's support of the Ottomans in the Russian - Turkish War of 1877 provided the bey with an excuse to dismiss him. Complicating his pro-Ottoman stance and loss of the bey's confidence were economic and financial difficulties, intrigues of foreign consuls and of the bey's favorite, Mustafa ibn Ismaʿil, and Khaznader's vilification campaign. All of these factors finally forced Khayr al-Din to resign on July 2, 1877. He went into self-imposed exile in Istanbul, where, because of his pro-Ottoman viewpoint, he was rewarded with a brief appointment as Ottoman grand vizier in 1878 and 1879. After his removal as grand vizier, Khayr al-Din retired to private life and spent his final years in Istanbul, where he died.
Khayr al-Din's legacy in Tunisia proved an inspiration for later reformers such as the Young Tunisians. Sadiqi College was the most enduring of his accomplishments. Young Tunisians and later Tunisian nationalists, including Habib Bourguiba, were educated there.
Khayyam, Omar (“Omar, the tentmaker") (Ghiyas od-Din Abol Fath Omar ibn Ebrahim Khayyam Neyshaburi) (born May 18, 1048, Neyshābūr [also spelled Nīshāpūr], Khorāsān [now Iran]—died December 4, 1131, Neyshapur, Iran) . One of the most elusive and important figures of Iranian cultural history. A prominent scholar and scientist from Nishapur, Khayyam was connected with the court of the Seljuk Malikshah and was appointed by the vizier Nizam al-Mulk to reform the calendar system. He is credited with the institution and refinement of the solar calendar and with a number of scientific works in Arabic. His works in algebra and geometry also gave him an elevated position during his own time.
In 1077, Khayyam issued an important work that solved problems with the mathematics of Euclid, problems mathematicians in Europe would not manage to solve until some 500 to 600 years later. From 1074 to 1079, Khayyam worked on a reform of the calendar system. The revised calendar would be used in Persia (Iran) until 1925.
Omar Khayyam's Ruba’iyyat (“quatrains”) enjoy a great status in the body of Persian poetry; over a thousand have been attributed to him, although in recent reliable editions they number between 140 (Hidayat) and 250 (Arberry). The authorship of this or any poetry at all by Khayyam is engulfed in an enduring controversy; so, too, is his philosophical orientation. The facts as well as the legendary accounts of Khayyam’s life, however, point to a highly gifted man well capable of producing the complex but brilliantly lucid quatrains. An inspired, if at times arbitrarily free, translation of the Ruba’iyyat (Rabayat) by Edward Fitzgerald (1859) introduced Khayyam to the West, creating an almost cultish interest in “Oriental” poetry.
Omar Khayyam was born in all likelihood in Nishapur, which was then a major city in the northeastern corner of Iran. At his birth, a new Turkish dynasty from Central Asia called the Seljuks was in the process of establishing control over the whole Iranian plateau. In 1055, when their leader, Toghril Beg (Toghril I), entered Baghdad, the Seljuks became masters of the Muslim caliphate and empire. Of Omar’s family and education, few specifics are known. His given name indicates that he was a Sunni Muslim, for his namesake was the famous second caliph under whose reign (634-644) the dramatic Islamic expansion throughout the Middle East and beyond had begun. The name Khayyam means “tentmaker,” possibly designating the occupation of his forbears. Omar received a good education, including study of Arabic, the Qur’an, the various religious sciences, mathematics, astronomy, astrology, and literature.
At Toghril Beg’s death, his nephew Alp Arslan succeeded to the Seljuk throne, in part through the machinations of Nizam al-Mulk (1020-1092), another famous man from Nishapur, who was to serve the Seljuks for more than thirty years as a vizier. Alp Arslan, who ruled from 1063 to 1072, was succeeded by his son Malik Shah, who ruled until 1092.
During this period of rule, Omar Khayyam studied first in Nishapur, then in Balkh, a major eastern city in today’s Afghanistan. From there, he went farther northeast to Samarkand. There, under the patronage of the chief local magistrate, he wrote a treatise in Arabic on algebra, classifying types of cubic equations and presenting systematic solutions to them. Recognized by historians of science and mathematics as a significant study, it is the most important of Khayyam’s extant works (which comprise about ten short treatises). None of them, however, offers glimpses into Khayyam’s personality, except to affirm his importance as a mathematician and astronomer whose published views were politically and religiously orthodox.
From Samarkand, Omar Khayyam proceeded to Bukhara and was probably still in the royal court there when peace was concluded between the Qarakhanids and the Seljuks in 1073 and 1074. At this time, he presumably entered the service of Malik-Shah, who had become Seljuk sultan in 1072.
Two of Malik-Shah’s projects on which Khayyam presumably worked were the construction of an astronomy observatory in the Seljuk capital at Esfahan in 1074 and the reform of the Persian solar calendar. Called Maleki after the monarch, the new calendar proved more accurate than the Gregorian system created centuries later.
Khayyam was one of Malik-Shah’s favorite courtiers, but after the latter’s death Khayyam apparently never again held important positions under subsequent Seljuk rulers. In the mid-1090's, he made the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca and then returned to private life and teaching in Nishapur. It is known that Khayyam was in Balkh in 1112 or 1113. Several years later, he was in Merv, where a Seljuk ruler had summoned him to forecast the weather for a hunting expedition. After 1118, the year of Sanjar’s accession, no record exists of anything Khayyam did. He died in his late seventies.
Some of the meager information available today regarding Khayyam was recorded by an admirer named Nizami ‘Aruzi (fl. 1110-1161) in a book called Chahar Maqala (c. 1155). Nizami tells of visiting Khayyam’s gravesite in 1135 or 1136. Surprisingly, given Khayyam’s reputation as a poet, the anecdotes regarding him appear in Nizami’s “Third Discourse: On Astrologers,” and no mention of him is made in the “Second Discourse: On Poets.” In other words, though in the the West Omar Khayyam is known for his poetry, no evidence in Persian suggests that he was a professional court poet or that he ever was more involved with poetry than through the occasional, perhaps extemporaneous, composition of quatrains (ruba‘i or roba‘i, plural rubaiyat. Because the quatrains first attributed to Khayyam are thematically of a piece and are distinct from panegyric, love, and Sufi quatrains, they can be usefully designated as “Khayyamic” even if authorship of many individual quatrains is impossible to determine definitively.
In the centuries following Khayyam’s death, increasing numbers of quatrains attributed to him appeared in manuscripts. Several of these manuscripts came to the attention of Edward FitzGerald (1809-1883), a serious student of Persian, who found them particularly appealing. His study of them inspired him to compose The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the first edition of which consisted of seventy-five quatrains and appeared in 1859. A second edition, expanded to 110 quatrains, appeared in 1868. The third edition in 1872 and the fourth in 1879 contained 101 quatrains, and the latter is the standard text. By FitzGerald’s death, Khayyam's work had begun to receive favorable critical attention, but its extraordinary fame, making it the single most popular poem of the Victorian Age, did not commence until later. A comparison of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam with the Khayyamic Persian quatrains which FitzGerald had read and studied reveals that the themes, tone, and imagery of his poem are very close to those in the Persian quatrains, but that FitzGerald’s poem is not a translation in any sense. It was the worldwide popularity of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam that drew scholarly attention to Khayyam as a poet, so that he now is recognized as a leading figure in the Persian literary pantheon, along with Firdausi (c. 940- c.1020), Jalal al-Din Rumi (1207-1273), Sa’di (c.1200-c.1291), and Hafiz (c.1320-c.1390).
The Persian quatrains attributed to Omar Khayyam express the point of view of a rationalist intellectual who sees no reason to believe in a human soul or an afterlife. The speaker would like to live a springtime gardern life, but his continuing awareness of his own mortality and his inability to find answers in either science or religion lead him to a modified carpe diem stance: In this far-from-perfect world, in which human beings do not have a decent chance at happiness, one should nevertheless endeavor to make the best of things. Some slight consolation is offered in appreciating the fact that human beings have faced this situation from the beginning of time.
In the orthodox Seljuk age, Khayyamic quatrains constituted a bold, individualistic voicing of skepticism. Because literary Iranians throughout history have admired individualist and free spirits, Omar Khayyam has been mythologized into a figure quite different from what the known facts about his biography imply. For example, he was a hero and inspiration to Sadiq Hidayat, Iran’s most accliamed twentieth century author, in whose novel Buf-i kur (The Blind Owl -- 1941) are palpable Khayyamic echoes.
Regardless of the historical facts, the view of Hidayat and many others is that Khayyam bucked the tide of religious orthodoxy and dared to say what many secular-minded people believe: that religion, science, and government fail to give an adequate explanation of the mystery of the individual lives of human beings.
Omar, the tentmaker see Khayyam, Omar
Omar Khayyam see Khayyam, Omar
Ghiyas od-Din Abol Fath Omar ibn Ebrahim Khayyam Neyshaburi see Khayyam, Omar
Khayyat, Abu ‘Ali Yahya al- (Abu ‘Ali Yahya al-Khayyat). Arab astrologer, known in the West as Albohali.
Abu 'Ali Yahya al-Khayyat see Khayyat, Abu ‘Ali Yahya al-
Albohali see Khayyat, Abu ‘Ali Yahya al-
Khayyat, Abu’l-Husayn al- (Abu’l-Husayn al-Khayyat) (c. 835-c.913). Theologian and jurist. He was a foremost representative of the Baghdad school of the Mu‘tazila.
Abu'l-Husayn al-Khayyat see Khayyat, Abu’l-Husayn al-
Khayzuran bint ‘Ata’ al-Jurashiyya, al (Al-Khayzuran bint Atta) (d. c. 789). Former slave of Yemeni origin who came to be married to the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Mahdi, to whom she bore the future caliphs al-Hadi and Harun al-Rashid, the most famous of the 'Abbasids.
Al-Khayzuran was kidnapped from her home by a Bedouin who then sold her in a slave market near Mecca to al-Mahdi during his pilgrimage. .Later the caliph fell in love with her and married her. Al-Khayzuran was a woman of strong personality. She was able to persuade her husband to appoint her sons as the next caliphs over his sons by other wives. At the court, she was an ally of the Barmakids. She greatly influenced both of her sons and the affairs of the empire to the extent that her son al-Hadi attempted to have her killed by poisoning her. Al-Khayzuran was subsequently suspected of involvement in al-Hadi's death.
Al-Khayzuran and her personality is believed by many historians to be the inspiration for the literary heroine, Scheherezade of The Arabian Nights. Many of the stories that appear in The Arabian Nights were also inspired by the fabulous court of Harun al-Rashid, the son of al-Khayzuran.
Al-Khayzuran bint Atta was the wife of the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mahdi and mother of both Caliphs Al-Hadi and Harun al-Rashid, the most famous of the Abbasids. She was from Jorash, Yemen.
Al-Khayzuran bint Atta see Khayzuran bint ‘Ata’ al-Jurashiyya, al
Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan (Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan Khaz ‘al Khan) (Khaz'al Khan ibn Haji Jabir Khan) (Muaz us-Sultana) (Sardar-e-Aqdas -- "Most Sacred Officer of the Imperial Order of the Aqdas") (Khazal Khan) (August 18, 1863 - May 24/May 27, 1936). Shaykh of Muhammara, now Khurramshahr, in Iran. As leader of the Muhasayn tribe, he objected strongly against the proposal of the Persian government to introduce Belgian customs officials into ‘Arabistan. He received support from the British diplomatic mission in Tehran, but later lost it. His power was subsequently extinguished by Reza Khan (later Shah) Pahlavi.
Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan Khaz'al Khan see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Khaz'al Khan ibn Haji Jabir Khan see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Muaz us-Sultana see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Sardar-e-Aqdas see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Most Sacred Officer of the Imperial Order of the Aqdas see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Khazal Khan see Khaz ‘al Khan, Ibn Hajji Jabir Khan
Khazars. Nomadic people in the South Russian steppes who flourished in the early Islamic period. Khazar also refers to a Turkic tribe north of the Caspian which converted to Judaism in the eighth century. The term khazar appears to be linked to a Turkic verb meaning "wandering."
In the seventh century of the Christian calendar, the Khazars founded an independent khanganate in the Northern Caucasus along the Caspian Sea. Although the Khazars were initially shamanists, many of them converted to Christianity, Islam, and other religions. During the eighth or ninth century, the state religion became Judaism.
Khazar, a member of a confederation of Turkic-speaking tribes that in the late 6th century of the Christian calendar established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia. Although the origin of the term Khazar and the early history of the Khazar people are obscure, it is fairly certain that the Khazars were originally located in the northern Caucasus region and were part of the western Turkic empire (in Turkistan). The Khazars were in contact with the Persians in the mid-6th century, and they aided the Byzantine emperor Heraclius (reigned 610–641) in his campaign against the Persians.
By the beginning of the 7th century, the Khazars had become independent of the Turkic empire to the east. But by the middle of that century, the expanding empire of the Arabs had penetrated as far northward as the northern Caucasus, and from then on until the mid-8th century the Khazars engaged in a series of wars with the Arab empire. The Arabs initially forced the Khazars to abandon Derbent (661), but around 685 the Khazars counterattacked, penetrating southward of the Caucasus into present-day Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The Khazars and Arabs fought each other directly in Armenia in the 720s, and, though victory passed repeatedly from one side to the other, Arab counterattacks eventually compelled the Khazars to permanently withdraw north of the Caucasus. The Khazars’ initial victories were important, though, since they had the effect of permanently blocking Arab expansion northward into eastern Europe. Having been compelled to shift the center of their empire northward, the Khazars after 737 established their capital at Itil (located near the mouth of the Volga River) and accepted the Caucasus Mountains as their southern boundary.
During the same period, however, they expanded westward. By the second half of the 8th century, their empire had reached the peak of its power—it extended along the northern shore of the Black Sea from the lower Volga and the Caspian Sea in the east to the Dnieper River in the west. The Khazars controlled and exacted tribute from the Alani and other northern Caucasian peoples (dwelling between the mountains and the Kuban River); from the Magyars (Hungarians) inhabiting the area around the Donets River; from the Goths; and from the Greek colonies in the Crimea. The Volga Bulgars and numerous Slavic tribes also recognized the Khazars as their overlords.
Although basically Turkic, the Khazar state bore little resemblance to the other Turkic empires of central Eurasia. It was headed by a secluded supreme ruler of semi-religious character called a khagan—who wielded little real power—and by tribal chieftains, each known as a beg. The state’s military organization also seems to have lacked the forcefulness of those of the greater Turkic-Mongol empires. The Khazars seem to have been more inclined to a sedentary way of life, building towns and fortresses, tilling the soil, and planting gardens and vineyards. Trade and the collection of tribute were major sources of income. But the most striking characteristic of the Khazars was the apparent adoption of Judaism by the khagan and the greater part of the ruling class in about 740. The circumstances of the conversion remain obscure, the depth of their adoption of Judaism difficult to assess; but the fact itself is undisputed and unparalleled in central Eurasian history. A few scholars have even asserted that the Judaized Khazars were the remote ancestors of many eastern European and Russian Jews. Whatever the case may be, religious tolerance was practiced in the Khazar empire, and paganism continued to flourish among the population.
The prominence and influence of the Khazar state was reflected in its close relations with the Byzantine emperors: Justinian II (704) and Constantine V (732) each had a Khazar wife. The main source of revenue for the empire stemmed from commerce and particularly from Khazar control of the east-west trade route that linked the Far East with Byzantium and the north-south route linking the Arab empire with northern Slavic lands. Income that was derived from duties on goods passing through Khazar territory, in addition to tribute paid by subordinate tribes, maintained the wealth and the strength of the empire throughout the 9th century. But by the 10th century the empire, faced with the growing might of the Pechenegs to their north and west and of the Russians around Kiev, suffered a decline. When Svyatoslav, the ruler of Kiev, launched a campaign against the Khazars (965), Khazar power was crushed. Although the Khazars continued to be mentioned in historical documents as late as the 12th century, by 1030 their political role in the lands north of the Black Sea had greatly diminished. Despite the relatively high level of Khazar civilization and the wealth of data about the Khazars that is preserved in Byzantine and Arab sources, not a single line of the Khazar language has survived.
Khazraj, al- (Banu Khazraj). One of the main Arab tribes in Medina before and at the time of the rise of Islam. They seem to have been more numerous and more enthusiastic Muslims than the al-Aws.
In pre-Islamic Arabia, the Banu Khazraj and the Banu Aws were often in conflict with each other. Muhammad was invited to Medina to mediate the conflict between the Banu Khazraj and the Banu Aws. Muhammad resolved the conflict by absorbing both tribes into the Muslim community and by prohibiting blood from being shed among Muslims. Soon afterwards, the Banu Khazraj and others became known as the Ansar.
Banu Khazraj see Khazraj, al-
Khazraji, Diya’ al-Din al- (Diya’ al-Din al-Khazraji). Thirteenth century poet from al-Andalus. He wrote a didactic poem which contains a versified treatise on Arabic metres.
Diya' al-Din al-Khazraji see Khazraji, Diya’ al-Din al-
Khedives (Hidiv). Dynasty of the viceroys of Egypt (under Ottoman rule) (r.1867-1914). Their main capital was Cairo. Having inherited from Muhammad Ali (r. 1805-1849) and his successors extensive cultural independence in Egypt, his grandson, Khedive Isma‘il (r. 1863-1879), was able to enforce de facto autonomy in 1867, developed by his son Tawfiq (r. 1879-1892) and his grandson, Abbas Hilmi (r. 1892-1914). From 1876, financial risk taking and involvement in ambitious projects (e.g., the Suez Canal) were supported by loans from the major European powers. Egypt was occupied by the British in 1882 and became a British protectorate in 1914, leading to the deposition of the Khedive following national uprisings. His successors were his uncle (Tawfiq’s brother), Husain Kamil (r.1914-1917), and Ahmed Fuad (r. 1922-1936). The rule of the monarchy in Egypt ended with his son Faruk (r. 1936-1952).
The term Khedive (Turkish: Hıdiv) is a title largely equivalent to the English word viceroy. It was first used, without official recognition, by Muhammad Ali Pasha (Turkish: Kavalalı Mehmet Ali Paşa), the Ottoman Wāli of Egypt and Sudan. The initially self-declared title was officially recognized also by the Ottoman government in 1867 and subsequently used by Ismail Pasha and his dynastic successors until 1914.
Following the French invasion of Egypt in 1798 and Napoleon's defeat of the Ottoman Egyptian forces which largely consisted of the descendants of the local Mameluke chieftains, the Ottoman Empire dispatched troops from Rumelia (the Balkan provinces of the Ottoman Empire) under the command of Muhammad Ali Pasha to restore the Empire's authority in what had hitherto been an Ottoman province. However, upon the French defeat and departure, Muhammad Ali seized control of the province and declared himself ruler of Egypt, quickly consolidating an independent local powerbase. After repeated failed attempts to remove and kill him, in 1805, the Porte officially recognized Muhammad Ali as Pasha and Wāli (Governor) of Egypt. However, demonstrating his grander ambitions, he claimed for himself the higher title of Khedive (Viceroy), as did his successors, Ibrahim Pasha, Abbas I, and Sa'id I.
The Muhammad Ali Dynasty’s use of the title Khedive was not sanctioned by the Ottoman Empire until 1867 when Sultan Abdülaziz officially recognized it as the title of Ismail Pasha. Moreover, the Porte accepted Ismail's alteration of the royal line of succession to go from father to son, rather than brother to brother, as was the tradition in the Ottoman Empire and in the Arab dynasties. In May 1879, the British Empire and France began pressuring the Ottoman Sultan Abdülhamid II to depose Ismail Pasha, and this was done on June 26, 1879. The more pliable Tewfik Pasha, Ismail's son, was made his successor as the new Khedive. Ismail Pasha left Egypt and initially went into exile to Naples, but was eventually permitted by Sultan Abdülhamid II to retire to his Palace of Emirgan on the Bosporus in Istanbul. There he remained, more or less a state prisoner, until his death. He was later buried in Cairo.
After the nationalist Urabi Revolt of 1882, Britain invaded Egypt in support of Tewfik Pasha, and would continue to occupy and dominate the country for decades. During this period, the Muhammad Ali Dynasty under Tewfik Pasha and his son Abbas Hilmi Pasha continued to rule Egypt and Sudan using the title Khedive, whilst still nominally (de jure) under Ottoman sovereignty until 1914.
With the outbreak of the First World War, Abbas Hilmi Pasha sided with the Ottoman Empire, which had joined the war on the side of the Central Powers, and was subsequently deposed by the British, who declared Egypt a protectorate while he was on a visit to Vienna. His uncle Hussein Kamel was declared Sultan of Egypt by the British, who severed the nominal ties of Egypt and Sudan to the Ottoman Empire and brought an end to the use of the title of Khedive. Hussein Kamel and later Fuad I issued a series of restrictive orders to strip Abbas Hilmi Pasha, their nephew, of property in Egypt and Sudan, and even forbade contributions to him. These also barred Abbas Hilmi Pasha from entering Egyptian territory and stripped him of the right to sue in Egyptian courts. Abbas Hilmi Pasha finally accepted the new order of things and formally abdicated on May 12, 1931. He retired to Switzerland, where he died in Geneva on December 19, 1944.
With "Article 17" of the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, Turkey formally ceded all remaining claims and rights in Egypt and Sudan.
Hidiv see Khedives
Mwinyi Kheri (c. 1820-1885). Arab trader and ruler of Ujiji. Born on the Tanzanian coast, he was among the first Arab traders to open trading stations at Lake Tanganyika during the 1840s. There the Arabs established the town of Ujiji among the Ha people and supervised a large trading network. Mwinyi Kheri amassed a personal fortune and rose to leadership of the community by the 1870s. He pioneered trade routes north of the lake and exercised a nominal suzerainty over neighboring chiefs, who relied on Ujiji for imports. When European missionaries arrived in 1878, he co-operated with them tacitly, allowing their enterprises to expire of their own accord. In 1881, he accepted the formal title of governor of Ujiji under the Zanzibari Sultan Barghash, but continued to run his affairs very much as before.
Kheri, Mwinyi see Mwinyi Kheri
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