ISaint
Imam Abdullah b. Alawi al-Haddad
Scholar, Sufi and poet of the Ba 'Alawi family of Hadramawt; an order named the Haddadiyya is attributed to him. His full name was 'Abd Allah b. 'Alawi b. Muhammad al-Haddad al-Yamani . He was born on 4 Safar 1044 (30 July 1634) in the town of Tarim in Hadramawt. Later a man of Tarim composed a chronogram on his birth with the words "wulida bi-Tarim imamun karim" ("a noble imam was born in Tarim"). Because his lineage reaches al-Husayn through the chain of Ja'far al-Sadiq, Muhammad al-Baqir and Zayn al-'Abidin, he is known by the title "sayyid"; like some of his relatives he is known by the epithet Haddad or the nisba Haddadi. His family, called Ba 'Alawi and similar names after 'Alawi, son of 'Abd Allah b. Ahmad, who migrated from Basra to Hadramawt in the IV (X) century, was known for its learning and piety, its writing and teaching, and the mosques and scholarly institutions it founded. At the age of four he caught smallpox and lost his sight; yet thanks to his strong memory and bright intelligence he pursued his education successfully. After completing his memorisation of the Qur'an and his first schooling he concentrated on jurisprudence, studying it with teachers among whom was Sahl b. Ahmad Ba Hasan. By corresponding with Sayyid Muhammad b. 'Alawi al-Saqqaf he acquired a taste for Sufism, and he also trained himself in spiritual guidance. According to his pupil Muhammad b. Zayn he reached the rank of "absolute mujtahid" in jurisprudence and could bring very rich interpretations to the Qur'an. He had mosques and charitable institutions built in and around Tarim. The reports that on his pilgrimage, made at the age of thirty-six, and on his other journeys he was received with interest by scholars and notables wherever he went and played an active role in settling disputes between various groups show that he was a respected scholar from a young age. The sources speak of many miracles of his; but he disliked having miracles attributed to him. Indeed, he removed the section on his miracles from a book about his life written by one of his friends in 1108 (1696). In a section added to a copy of al-Durr al-manzum it is recorded that he said he had taken initiation directly from the Prophet, and that thereby he was able to learn the soundness of a hadith directly from the Messenger of God. The same work also states that he wrote poems condemning the invasions and oppressive movements of his time. He himself migrated to Hawi because of the oppression of the Yafi'is and died there on 7 Dhu al-Hijja 1132 (10 October 1720); his body was brought to Tarim and buried there. His Circle of Influence — Many people from various regions of the Islamic world came to Tarim to benefit from his learning and his Sufi training. Many scholars studied with him, such as his sons Hasan and 'Alawi, Muhammad b. Shaykh al-Jifri, Ahmad b. Zayn al-Habashi, 'Umar b. Hamid, Hasan b. Muhammad, 'Ali b. 'Abd Allah al-Saqqaf and Ahmad b. 'Abd al-Karim al-Shajjar. His pupil Muhammad b. Zayn wrote his hagiography entitled Ghayat al-qasd wa-l-murad fi manaqib al-qutb al-ghawth 'Abd Allah b. 'Alawi al-Haddad , and Ahmad b. 'Abd al-Karim al-Shajjar collected his teacher's sayings on various subjects in his Tathbit al-fu'ad . His Poetry and Sufi Line — His poems are collected in his voluminous diwan al-Durr al-manzum li-dhawi al-'uqul wa-l-fuhum , made up of 150 odes; it also contains a long ode rhyming in ta' in the metre of Ibn al-Farid's ode. It is said that some sections of the diwan were recited as litanies after the prayers in and around Tarim after his death; commentaries were written on many of the odes, and one was expanded into a takhmis by Husayn b. Muhammad Ba Fadl. In his works on Sufism and ethics he drew substantially on the sources of Sufism and ethics, above all Ghazali's Ihya' 'ulum al-din . His Works — The source lists eighteen works; the principal ones are: al-Durr al-manzum (the diwan); al-Fusul al-'ilmiyya wa-l-usul al-hikamiyya , composed in 1130 (1718), made up of forty chapters and a conclusion and apparently drawn from his lesson, sermon and guidance notes; Ithaf al-sa'il bi-jawab al-masa'il , completed in 1072 (1661), written while he was in Shibam to answer the questions of his friend 'Abd al-Rahman b. 'Abd Allah Ba 'Abbad, treating subjects from the interpretation of the profession of divine unity to repentance, annihilation, subsistence, dhikr and sama' , and explaining in its conclusion some Sufi poems of Abu Bakr b. 'Abd Allah al-'Aydarus; Sabil al-iddikar , completed in Sha'ban of the year 1110 (February 1699), which describes the five stages of the human being from the loins of Adam to the resurrection and reckoning and to paradise or hell — the source notes that Sarkis wrongly attributed this work to Fadl b. 'Alawi, who died around 1283 (1866); Risalat al-mudhakara , a book of exhortation completed in 1099 (1688); Risalat al-murid , completed in 1071 (1661), which sets out the principles and manners of spiritual wayfaring, stresses that one cannot be a Sufi without observing the commands and prohibitions of religion, asks that no importance be given to miracles in choosing a shaykh, and states that the best shaykh is the one who is an example to his disciple in his words and his life; al-Da'wa al-tamma wa-l-tadhkira al-'amma ( al-Wasiyya al-Haddadiyya ), completed in 1114 (1702); Risalat al-mu'awana ; al-Nasa'ih al-diniyya ; al-Durar al-bahiyya ; Tabsirat al-wali bi-tariq al-sada Bani 'Alawi ; al-Masa'il al-sufiyya ; al-Tawassulat li-l-nabi ; Lum'at al-nibras fi sirat al-nabi ; Miftah al-sa'ada wa-l-falah ; Hizb al-fath ; al-Qasida al-ghazaliyya al-'ilmiyya ; and Ratib al-Qutb al-Haddad , on which two separate commentaries were written.
