ALLAMAH RASHEED TURABI

Masa'ib of Imam Hussain (as) - 1st Muharram 1428 - Jan 2007

Allama Rasheed Turabi was a prominent and distinguished Pakistani scholar, religious leader, speaker, poet and philosopher. He was born on 9th Jamadiul II, 1326 / July 09, 1908 in Hyderabad, India.

He was the eldest son of Maulvi Sharaf Hussain Khan, a religious, pious and a noble person from Hyderabad. He got his basic Islamic education from his father who taught him till the age of 5. He did matriculation from Hyderabad, intermediate-high school from Shia College Lucknow, BA and MA in Philosophy from Osmania University. He got his basic and advance religious studies from Syed Abubaker ibn Shahab -e- Urezi (descendent of Imam Jafar e Sadiq (A.S.), Sadrul-Ulema Maulvi Syed Ghulam Hussain, Maulana Abbas Ali Sharif, Maulana Syed Sibt -e- Hasan and Hujjatul-Islam Agha Mirza Mehdi Pooya. He learned Urdu and Persian literature from Agha Mohsin Sheerazi, Ali Haider Tabatabai, Allamah Zamin Kanturi, Agha Dai'yal Islam and Agha Mohammed Kirmani. He learned Arabic language from Agha Tahir bin Mohammed and Maulana Sadiq Hussain Majjan, His mentors in Urdu and Persian poetry were Agha Syed Hasan Isfahani, Allamah Zamin Kanturi and Nawab Haider Yarjang Tabatabaie. On the political side, he started his political career as member working committee of Hyderabad Legislative Assembly and worked with Nawab Bahadur Yarjang. Later on, he was nominated by the founder of Pakistan Quaid-e-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah, as member working committee of All India Muslim League, there he was involved in the organization of Muslim League and established branches all over the Indian subcontinent. Simultaneously he had a responsibility to supervise the publication of newspapers and magazines of almost 600 states in then undivided India. He remained the member of the Hyderabad Assembly and All India Muslim League till the partition of the subcontinent. After partition he migrated to Pakistan in 1949, left active politics and devoted himself only to religious affairs.

Allamah Rasheed Turabi had a remarkable accomplishment of having Ijazah of Riwayah and Narration from almost all of his contemporary Mashayekh mainly from Iran and Iraq, notably Ayatullah Sheikh Mohammed Mohsin -e- Tehrani, Ayatullah Mohsin AlHakim Tabatabaie, Ayatullah Syed Hibbatuddin Shahristani, Ayatullah Syed Hadi -e- Meelani, Ayatullah Syed Ibrahim -e- Isfahani, Ayatullah Syed Shahabuddin -e- Marashi and Ayatullah Syed Kazim Shariatmadari. He was superbly knowledgeable and gifted in many areas of Islamic sciences such as Tafseer, Hadith, Usool and Fiqh. He was highly educated, who never claimed himself as jurist per se, always kept himself advanced with contemporary research, comparative religious theories and modern sciences.

He was a literary authority on Arabic, Persian and Urdu poetry. He literally memorized thousands and thousands of poetic lines, stanzas, verse paragraphs and contos of different masters. He had a profound affection and respect for Allamah Sir Mohammed Iqbal, Mir Anees, Mirza Dabeer, Mir Taqi Mir, Mirza Ghalib, Maulana Jalaluddin -e- Rumi, Hafiz -e- Shirazi, Sheikh Sa'adi -e- Shirazi, Fariduddin Attar, Shamsuddin Tabrezi, Sa'eb Tabrezi, Nazam Tabatabaie and Yagana Changezi. A good evidence of his command can be seen in his speeches and writings. He delivered more than 5,000 religious lectures and speeches over the period of 57 years that he spent out of his 65 years of total physical life in the service of Ahl Al-Bait (A.S.).

Allamah Rasheed Turabi had invented many dimensions to Art of Oratory. He was the first person who delivered religious speeches for 10 days or more on selected topics. He had been viewed as "stunning" in his range of scholarship, reported to be crystal clear and meticulous on challenging and versatile subject matters. Allamah's explanations on the verses of the Holy Quran and its commentaries, Sayings of the Holy Prophet (S.A.) and his Ahl Al-Bait (A.S.) were much convincing and forceful. Further to his magnum opus, he was a true genius in Ilm-ul-Rijal (the study on the authenticity of the chain of narrators of a Hadith). During his life, he got numerous recognition from great shi'ite scholars of Rijal, who had unanimously considered him as "Wizard in Ilm-ul Rijal". Allamah did not get enough time during his life-time to publish his master work on Ilm-ul-Rijal which he already named it in his life as "Wasl -e- Qawl".

Allamah Rasheed Turabi had a spiritual charisma and a mesmeric personality. In his majalis and speeches, people used to come from all over the country and the region to listen to his reasoning, insight and spiritual enlightenment. Allamah Rasheed Turabi had received the title of Allamah (The Most Intellectual) from the living Shi'ite scholars of his time who unanimously acknowledged his wisdom and application methods.

Allamah Rasheed Turabi had a legendary life. In his 65-year of lifetime, as mentioned above, he delivered more than 5,000 religious speeches, created supreme nature of poetic work, wrote many books and articles. He was proud of his library that contained thousands of books and hundreds of rare manuscripts. His library was one of the famous religious libraries of Pakistan.

Allamah Rasheed Turabi died on 22 Zilqada 1393 / December 18, 1973.

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