Ashraf Ali Thanwi

Ashraf Ali Thanwi (1863–1943), known as Hakimul Ummat ("the physician of the umma"), was an Indian Hanafi jurist of the Deobandi school and a Chishti Sufi guide from Thana Bhawan in Muzaffarnagar district. ^{1 2 3} He graduated from Darul Uloom Deoband in the early 1880s, taught fourteen years at Kanpur, then in 1315 AH returned to his home town, where he revived the khanqah of his master Imdadullah Muhajir Makki and founded the Madrasa Ashrafiya; students and questioners came to him from across India, and he remained there, teaching and guiding, until his death. ^{4 2}

His works number some eight hundred books and treatises, the best known being his Urdu commentary on the Qur'an, Bayan-ul-Qur'an, Behishti Zewar — the manual of belief, worship and daily life read by women across South Asia — and his fatwa collection Imdad al-Fatawa. ^{2 3} The Oxford encyclopedias of Islam treat him as one of the leading Sunni authorities of his age in South Asia, and the English article reports Muhammad Iqbal's judgement that on Rumi's teachings he held Thanwi to be the greatest living authority. ⁴

Ashraf Ali was born at Thana Bhawan on 19 August 1863 according to the English article, the Arabic article's infobox and Wikidata; the Urdu biography gives his birth as 5 Rabi' al-Thani 1280 AH, which converts to about 19 September 1863 — the sources agree on the Hijri year 1280 and differ by a month. ^{4 2 5} His father — the English article names him Munshi Abdul Haq — was a prosperous man of property in the town, accomplished in Persian composition, who took care to raise his son away from bad company. ^{4 2}

His first schooling was at Meerut, where he read the elementary Persian books and memorised the Qur'an under Hafiz Husain Dehlvi; back in Thana Bhawan he read the beginnings of Arabic and most of the Persian books under Mawlana Fateh Muhammad. ² In Dhu al-Qa'da 1295 AH he entered Darul Uloom Deoband and studied there five years — the English article dates his graduation to 1883, the Arabic article to 1299 AH/1882, and the Urdu biography's five-year course ends in 1301 AH. ^{2 4 1} TDV details his Deoband teachers: logic, philosophy, fiqh and usul al-fiqh under Mahmud Hasan Deobandi; mathematics and the law of inheritance under Sayyid Ahmad Dehlvi; hadith and tafsir under Ya'qub b. Mamluk Ali — Muhammad Yaqub Nanautawi — in whose company the Urdu biography says he spent most of his free time as a student; the English and Arabic articles' apparatus likewise files him among Mahmud Hasan Deobandi's students. ^{3 2}

With his father's and teachers' permission he went to Kanpur and taught at the Madrasa Faiz-e-Aam for fourteen years — TDV names the Kanpur school Jami' al-Ulum — spreading knowledge there. ^{4 3} During the Kanpur years his concern turned to the inner life: he performed the Hajj with his father and at Mecca took bay'ah (allegiance) from Haji Imdadullah Muhajir Makki; returning to him in 1310 AH he stayed six months and received the khilafa (authorisation to guide others), with Imdadullah's counsel to sit at Thana Bhawan and not be hasty under hardship. ^{2 3}

In 1315 AH he left Kanpur and returned to Thana Bhawan — TDV dates the final return to 1897 — where he revived his shaykh Imdadullah's khanqah and founded an institution named Madrasa Ashrafiya, devoting the rest of his life to teaching, spiritual purification, social reform and answering the questions that reached him by letter from all over India. ^{4 2} On his return Imdadullah wrote to him: "It is better that you have moved to Thana Bhawan. I hope that many people will benefit from you, both outwardly and inwardly. You will restore our madrasa and mosque anew. I pray for you at all times." ⁴

The English article counts around a thousand trainees whom he authorised for bay'ah, and among his famous students and disciples were Sulaiman Nadvi, Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, Zafar Ahmad Usmani, Abdul Hai Arifi, Athar Ali Bengali, Abdul Majid Daryabadi, Muhammad Shafi and Muhammad Tayyib Qasmi — many of them leading figures of India and Pakistan after him. ⁴

Bayan-ul-Qur'an. His Urdu translation and commentary on the Qur'an, in twelve volumes according to TDV; the English article dates the work to 1908, and it was printed at Delhi and Thana Bhawan. ^{3 4}

Behishti Zewar. A teaching manual of beliefs, worship and the rules of daily life, prepared originally for girl students, in ten parts according to TDV; it was translated into English as Requisites of Islam (Delhi, 1972) and remains among the most reprinted books of South Asia. ^{3 4}

His other works include Imdad al-Fatawa, the collection of his fatwas; Nashr al-Tib fi Zikr al-Nabi al-Habib (1912); Hifz al-Iman, a theological treatise on creed and the status of prophethood; Adab al-Mu'asharat, on etiquette and social conduct; Hayat al-Muslimin; Islah al-Rusum, on reforming un-Islamic customs; Kalid-e-Mathnawi, his guide to Rumi's Masnavi; al-Qawl al-Jalil, on spiritual guidance; and al-Masalih al-Aqliyya li'l-Ahkam al-Naqliyya, on reason and revealed law. ⁴ He also wrote the Islah-i Tarjuma-i Dehlviyya, a critique of Nazir Ahmad Dehlvi's Qur'an translation. ⁶

The count of his works is itself a small conflict: the Urdu biography, TDV and the Arabic article put them at about eight hundred books and treatises — some twelve of them in Arabic, per the Arabic article — while the English article, citing the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World, says he wrote over a thousand works. ^{2 3 1 4}

This section sets out different positions as reported in the sources. It is not a verdict by the museum.

Thanwi was a strong supporter of the All-India Muslim League: the English article records his correspondence with its leadership, including Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the groups of scholars he sent to advise and remind Jinnah, and his resignation from Darul Uloom Deoband's management committee over its pro-Congress stance, at a time when many Deobandi ulama of the 1940s supported the Congress; his disciples Zafar Ahmad Usmani and Shabbir Ahmad Usmani were key players in the religious support for the creation of Pakistan. ⁴

The Oxford entries reported in the English article describe his training as qualifying him to become "a leading Sunni authority" among the scholars of Deoband, and sketch the Muslim community he projected as collective, patriarchal, hierarchical and compassion-based — the characterisation of Abdessamad Belhaj in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science and Technology in Islam. ⁴ TDV, for its part, records his lifelong effort to prevent what he saw as the harmful effect of non-Muslim ways on Muslim life, in which it judges him largely successful, together with his insistence that Muslims should benefit from non-Muslims' knowledge and that knowledge and religion do not conflict. ³

He died at Thana Bhawan on 20 July 1943 according to the English and Urdu articles and Wikidata — the Urdu article pairs the day with 16 Rajab 1362 AH — and his disciple Zafar Ahmad Usmani led his funeral prayer; he was buried in the town's cemetery. TDV gives his death as 6 Rajab 1362, which it converts to 9 July 1943, and the Arabic article's infobox prints 4 July 1943, against its own lead's plain 1362 AH. ^{4 2 5 3 1}

• The defined source entities cited above, recorded in data/source/.
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