Deobandis

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- Deobandis are one of thegroups of Muslims. This group is
connected to and named after the University of Deoband – Dar al-Uloom
– in India . Itis an intellectual school of thought that is deeply
rooted, and everyone who graduated from thatuniversity was
influencedby its academic characteristics, so that they became known
as Deobandis.
The University of Deoband was founded by a group of Indian scholars
after the British had put a stopto the Islamic revolution in India in
1857 CE. Its establishment was a strong reaction against western
advancement and its materialistic civilization in the Indian
Subcontinent, aimed at saving the Muslims from the dangers of these
circumstances, especially when Delhi , the capital, had been destroyed
following the revolution and the British had takenfull control of it.
The scholars feared that their religion might be assimilated, so
Shaykh Imdaadullaah al-Muhaajiral-Makki and his student Shaykh
Muhammad Qaasim al-Nanatuwi, and their companions, drew up a plan to
protect Islamand its teachings. They thought that the solutionwas to
establish religiousschools and Islamic centers, thus
al-Madrasahal-Islamiyyah al-Arabiyyah was established in Deoband as a
center for Islam and Sharee'ah in India at the time of British rule.
The most prominent figures of this school :
1- Muhammad Qaasim
2- Rasheed Ahmad al-Kankoohi
3- Husayn Ahmad al-Madani
4- Muhammad Anwaar Shah al-Kashmiri
5- Abu'l-Hasan al-Nadvi
6- Al-Muhaddith Habeeb al-Rahmaan al-A'zami
Thoughts and beliefs of this school :
With regard to basic tenets of belief, they follow the methodology of
Abu Mansoor al-Maatreedi.
They follow the school of Imaam Abu Haneefah with regard to
jurisprudence and minor issues.
They follow the Sufi Tareeqah of the Naqshbandiyyah, Chishtiyyah,
Qaadiriyyah and Saharwardiyyah with regard to spiritual development.
The thoughts and principles of the Deobandi school may be summed up as follows:
1. Preserving the teachings of Islam and itsstrength and rituals.
2. Spreading Islam and resisting destructive schools of thought
and missionary activity.
3. Spreading Islamic culture and resisting the invading British culture.
4. Paying attention to spreading the Arabic language because it is
the means of benefiting from the sources of Islamic Sharee'ah.
5. Combining reason and emotion, and knowledge and spirituality.
Because the Deobandis follow the Maatreedi School with regard to
belief, we have to define what al-Maatreediyyah is:
This is a philosophical (kalaami) group which is named after Abu
Mansoor al-Maatreedi. It is based on using rationaland philosophical
proof and evidence in disputes with opponents from among the
Mu'tazilah, Jahamiyyah and others toestablish the truths of religion
and Islamic belief. With regard to sources, the Maatreediyyah divide
thebases of religion into twocategories depending on the source:
1. Divine or rational: these are matters which are established
independently by reason and the reports follow that. This includes
issues of Tawheed (Islamic monotheism) and the Divine attributes.
2. Legislative matters or transmitted reports, These are matters
which reason states may or maynot exist, but there is no way to prove
rationally that they exist, such as Prophethood, the torment of the
grave andissues of the Hereafter. It should be noted that some of them
regarded Prophethood as coming under the heading of rational issues.
It is obvious that this is contradictory to the methodology of
Ahlus-Sunnah Wal-Jamaa'ah, because the Quran, Sunnah and consensus
ofthe Sahaabah (the Companions of the Prophet ) are the sources of
guidance in their view. This is in addition to their Bid'ah
(innovation) of dividing the sources of religion into rational matters
vs. transmitted reports, which was based on the false notion of the
philosophers who assumed that the religious texts contradict reason,
so they tried to mediate between reason and the transmitted reports.
This led them to force reason into fields where it has no place, so
they came up with false rulings which contradicted Sharee'ah, and that
led them to say that they did not know what the texts mean and that
only Allaah knows their meaning, or to misinterpret them altogether.
In the view ofAhlus-Sunnah Wal-Jamaa'ah (the true Islamic
methodology), onthe other hand, there is no contradiction between
sound reason and the sound transmitted reports.
Attitude of Ahl al-Sunnah towards the Maatreediyyah
It was narrated from the Prophet that this nation would split into
seventy-three sects, all of which would be in the Fire apart from one.
The Prophet explained that the saved group is the Jamaa'ah, which is
the group that follows the same path as the Messenger Sallallaahu
alayhi wa sallam and his Companions.
Undoubtedly, Ahlus-Sunnah Wal-Jamaa'ah, who adhere to the Quranand
Sunnah in terms of both knowledge and actions, are the saved group,
and this description applies to them, i.e., they adhere to that which
the MessengerSallallaahu alayhi wa sallam and his Companions adhered
to in terms of knowledge and actions.
It is not sufficient for an individual or group merely to claim to
belongto the Sunnah whilst going against the methodology of the
righteous predecessors, namely the Sahaabah and Taabi'een (companions'
successors).Rather it is essential to adhere to their methodology in
knowledge, action, approach and spiritual development.
The Maatreediyyah is oneof the groups whose opinions include true and
false views, and some things that go against the Sunnah. It is known
that these groups vary with regard to the truth, how near or far they
are; the closer they are to the Sunnah, the closer they are to the
truth and the right way. Among them are some who went against the
Sunnah with regard to basic principles, and some who went against the
Sunnah with regard to more subtle issues. There are some who refuted
other groups who are farther away from the Sunnah, so they are to be
praised with regard to their refutationof falsehood and what they have
said of truth, but they have overstepped the mark in so far as they
have rejected part of the truth and gone along with some falsehood. So
they have refuted a serious Bid'ah by means of a lesser Bid'ah, and
refutedfalsehood with a lesser form of falsehood. This is the case
with most of the philosophers (Ahl Al-kalaam) who claim to belong to
Ahlus-Sunnah Wal-Jamaa'ah.