Exemplars For Our Time is a collection of short, photographic essays aimed at introducing a new generation of young people to some of the greatest living Muslim sages of the 20th and 21st centuries. In traditional Islamic societies, living sages are the embodiment of spirituality and enlightenment, serving as inspirational role models for their communities. However, the rise of extremism and atheism within contemporary Islam is increasingly being attributed to the loss of connection between these paragons of virtue and the everyday Muslim.
Internationally acclaimed photographer Peter Sanders (Meetings with Mountains, The Art of Integration, In the Shade of a Tree) and popular author Michael Sugich (Signs on the Horizons, Hearts Turn) have joined forces to produce Exemplars for Our Time, a deluxe limited edition nine-book box set of illustrated biographies of some of the most influential and inspiring Muslim saints and sages in our time.
This unique series profiles the lives of Sayyida Fatima Yashrutiyya, Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad, Shaykh Murabit al-Hajj, Muzaffer Ozak Efendi, Sidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib, Sufi ‘Abdullah, Sayyid ‘Umar ‘Abdallah Mwinyi Baraka, and Shaykh Salih al-Ja‘fari.
Biographers include Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, Dr. Mostafa al-Badawi, Shems Friedlander, Dr. Karim Lahham, Dr. Samer Dajani, and Michael Sugich. Each book is beautifully illustrated with the photography of Peter Sanders, Shems Friedlander, and others, as well as rare images from the lives and times of these great souls.
Discover stories and rare images from the lives and times of these great souls.
The Luminous Virtues of the Sages of Islam
The Luminous Virtues of the Sages of Islam is a fascinating, richly detailed journey into the world of sainthood in Islam. This is a clear and penetrating exploration of a subject that is mystifying to many Muslims today and makes a strong case that the friends of God—the saints—are, and have always been, the true Muslim role models and explains why these role models seem to have disappeared in modern times whereas, in fact, they are hiding in plain sight. Series editor and author Michael Sugich describes the attributes, human and spiritual, of a saint in Islam; the nature of spiritual authority; and ways of identifying a truly qualified spiritual guide in Islam. This volume also addresses the question of why women sages and saints seem so few and far between, whereas in reality there are as many women saints in the world at any given time as there are men.
“We have never before been so in need of spiritual exemplars—role models who can inspire us and guide us through their wisdom, purity, beautiful qualities of character, sublime actions, deep insight and right guidance in these confusing and troubled times. In earlier ages, these men and women were fixtures of Muslim life. The village sage could have been a local imam, a jurist, a saintly woman, a shoemaker, tailor or tanner, or a wealthy merchant. In the cities there were sages that were well-known and sometimes celebrated, scholar-saints with many thousands of disciples, and there were those altogether hidden, except to a few. Many had great formal knowledge and others were illiterate but illuminated from within. They populated the mosques and madrasahs. They took to the roads, traveling from town to town and country to country. They were master craftsmen who led the guilds. They were manual labourers, traders, shopkeepers, and schoolteachers. They were grandmothers who taught the Holy Qur’an. They were trusted, revered, loved, and sometimes feared for their truthfulness and penetrating insight. They gave hope to their communities and sometimes stern guidance.
“There was also something subtle, almost imperceptible, something rare and precious. It was the absence of ego. In its place, luminous knowledge, humility, generosity, selflessness, kindness, wisdom, and love. What distinguished these enlightened souls was their sincere and unshakable adherence to the Book of God and the Sunna of the Messenger of God. They were the living proof of Islam, the spiritual and psychological anchor of the society, the fulcrum of sanity, and a source of solace for the people.”
Shaykh Murabit al-Hajj by Hamza Yusuf
Shaykh Murabit al-Hajj (1913-2018) was a Mauritanian ascetic scholar-saint who would almost certainly have lived out his life in complete obscurity in the remote deserts of Mauritania were it not for a young Muslim convert from California who was guided in a dream to visit him, live in his tent with him, and learn at his feet. The young man was Hamza Yusuf Hanson, who later achieved worldwide fame as the most influential Islamic scholar in North America. Of his experience with his teacher, he wrote: “A great secret of Shaykh Murabit al-Hajj is his presence. He gives God his complete being in prayer, and he gives his studies his complete being during the lesson, and he gives his guest his complete being during his stay. His own presence forces those around him into a state of presence. He has removed himself from the trance-like state that most of humanity is in through a constant state of awareness with his Lord. I can honestly say I have never seen anyone before or after him like him.” Shaykh Hamza Yusuf has brought his close relationship and years of study with the Shaykh to bear in an immaculately crafted and moving biography of one of the hidden treasures of our time, illustrated with the unique photography of Peter Sanders.
“A salient characteristic of Murabit al-Hajj’s life was what some traditions refer to as ‘sacred monotony.’ The word in Arabic for monotony, ratabah, is related to the word ratib, used by scholars to refer to the daily devotional prayers and incantations. For Murrabit al-Hajj, this monotony was his daily practice, a constant working on his presence with God, because if one is present with God, one is present with His creation. Muslim masters, mystics, and men of letters have always embraced the monotony, the sameness, the daily routine—expressed in Arabic with the proverb, “How similar tonight is to last night!”—because it becomes an opportunity to hone the soul and perfect the heart so that one arrives prepared on that final day, the day that ‘avails none save the one who brings to God a sound heart’(Qur’an 26:89).”
From Shaykh Murabit al-Hajj: The Ascetic
By Hamza Yusuf
Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad by Mostafa al-Badawi
Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad (1907-1995) was a renowned Hadrami scholar-sage who immigrated to East Africa from South Yemen and spent much of his life in the interiors, bringing animist and cannibalistic tribes to the monotheism of Islam. It is said that over 300,000 Africans entered Islam at his hand. During this period, while earning a living as a trader, he would venture out into the jungles of East Africa and build schools, mosques, and clinics for the tribal people he ministered to. Considered in his lifetime as one of the greatest saints of Islam, his compassionate teaching had a profound influence on generations of students, including Ba ‘Alawi sages Habib ‘Umar ibn Hafiz and Habib ‘Ali al-Jifri, as well as many aspirants from the West who later became highly influential advocates of a traditional and compassionate Islam, including Dr. ‘Umar Faruq Abd-Allah, Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, Dr. Mostafa al-Badawi, Dr. Timothy Winter (Shaykh ‘Abdal Hakim Murad) as well as Peter Sanders and Michael Sugich. The monograph will be written by Dr. Mostafa Badawi who has dedicated his life to translating and interpreting the teachings of Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad and his ancestor Imam ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Alawi al-Haddad and the sages of the Ba ‘Alawi way.
“Certainty is an immense thing. Each person should be keen to make the faith and certainty in his heart complete, so as to contain all the immutable realities that our Habib, ‘Abd al-Qadir has talked about: those realities that never change or alter, which are the realities of faith; the realities of firmness; the realities of the Hereafter; the realities of the pillars of faith, as you have heard them; the realities of the knowledge that is unchangeable, contrary to these perishable things. We have not been created for evanescent things.
Neither for the fair maidens nor for the songs,
nor for the pleasures of this realm
Nor for anything perishable in any form
but only for all matters sublime
“All these perishable things, why were they called perishable? Money perishes, life perishes, oceans perish, they are all perishable, and God has called it (this world) amusement and play, The life of this world is but play and amusement (47:36), perishable things that you play and amuse yourself with for a while, and then either they leave you or you leave them. This is how this whole life of the world is reduced to amusement and play. When we truly reflect on this matter, we come to know its reality. Therefore, we must do three things: uprightly discharge the matters of Shari’a as best we can, then their courtesies, and then penetrate deeply into this with complete courtesy, so as to reach Haqiqa, such as the faith of Haritha and that of all the other Companions A. Sayyidina ‘Ali said, ‘Were the cover to be removed, I would not increase in certainty!’”
AHMAD MASHHUR AL-HADDAD
From Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad: The Beloved
Mostafa al-Badawi
Sayyida Fatima Al-Yashrutiyya: Daughter of Akka by Karim Lahham
Sayyida Fatima Al Yashrutiyya (1891-1979) was the spiritual heir of her father, Sayyid ‘Ali Nurad’din Al- Yashruti who was born in 1791 and died in 1899 at the age of 108. She was taught in her father’s zawiya (dervish lodge) in Akka, Palestine, imbibing the spiritual teachings of her father and his closest followers until his death. After the 1948 war, Sayyida Fatima and many of the residents of Akka were made refugees and ended up in Beirut where she resided for the remainder of her life. The Yashrutiyya of Akka reconstituted themselves there with the help of its well-established adherents in the zawiyas of Lebanon and Syria. This led to a spiritual renaissance in the order, aided and abetted by the remarkable books that were penned by Sayyida Fatima beginning in 1954. Murids that came from far and wide to seek the teachings of the shaykh of the tariqa, namely her nephew, invariably, on landing in Beirut, first made their way to her home. She would turn them away, requiring her callers to visit the shaykh before visiting her. Sayyida Fatima was a spiritual guide who had the authority to give the path to those that sought it. Her company was illuminating, marked by a devotional gentility that enveloped all those who met her. She devoted her life to the pursuit of knowledge and teaching, but above all to prayer and invocation. As the heir to her father’s secret, her story spans the history of two tempestuous centuries, marked by world wars, the fall of the Ottoman empire, the catastrophe of 1948, and the civil war in Lebanon. Her biography, illustrated with rare photographs from private collections, is authored by Karim Lahham whose family has held a deep and abiding connection to Sayyida Fatima and her father’s teaching for generations.
“The scholar Sayyida Fatima called upon [to teach her
grammar] was no less than the venerable Shaykh
‘Abdallah al-Jazzar, seeking his help in identifying a
student of knowledge who might be able to teach her.
Shaykh ‘Abdallah al-Jazzar (1855-1939) was the mufti
of Akka and principal of the Ahmadiyya Madrasa, a
graduate also of the Azhar in Cairo, his family having
originally come from Alexandria to Palestine in the
early 19th century. A majestic figure to behold, he had
the temperament of the faqir, the humility and
magnanimity of the scholar, and the subtlety and
grace of a spiritual master. He was also known to have
a sweet and pleasant voice, put to much use in his
early life as a munshid. Shaykh Abdallah arranged to
present himself to the zawiya every morning to teach
his charge. Sayyida Fatima pleaded with him to allow
her to at least come to him, given his age. His reply
was characteristic of such men: ‘That would never do,
for even were I to be in India and you were to call for
me, I would come to you walking. You are the daughter
of my shaykh and spiritual guide to God, glory be to
Him, the Exalted.’”
From Sayyida Fatima Al-Yashrutiyya: Daughter of Akka
Karim Lahham
Sayyid Umar ‘Abdallah: The Blessed One by Michael Sugich
Sayyid ‘Umar ‘Abdullah Mwinyi Baraka (1918-1988) was a highly influential East African educator and diplomat and a charismatic interpreter in multiple languages of the tolerance and beauty of Islam. A towering figure in education in East Africa, he was the first educator to successfully synthesize traditional Islamic teaching with secular education and had a profound influence on many leaders of post-independence East Africa, including his student Dr. Ali Mwinyi, the second President of Tanzania.
Born in Zanzibar of Comorean parents, Sayyid ‘Umar was a descendant of the Ba ‘Alawi saint Habib Abu Bakr ibn Salem. He was steeped in traditional studies from early childhood and was one of the first East African Muslims in the colonial era to matriculate through the secular education system, completing his studies at Oxford University. His true education came through his long association with his spiritual master, the great Ba ‘Alawi saint Habib ‘Umar ibn Sumayt. He was a galvanic orator and spiritual guide who elicited love wherever he was. His biography is authored by Michael Sugich, who was his close student for seven years, from 1981 until his death in 1988.
“When I set out to write this short biography of Sayyid ‘Umar ‘Abdallah it dawned on me that, although I was his student for seven years, from 1981 until his death, and wrote about him in Signs on the Horizons, I actually knew very little about his life. He didn’t talk about himself much. Whatever personal information he did share was to impart knowledge and wisdom. He was always, in every moment, teaching not only by words but by example. In reconstructing his life, I was stunned to learn about all the many barriers he had to surmount, the struggles he had and the traumatic reverses and losses he suffered throughout his life. He never let on. He never let up. He brought joy with him and high aspiration and understanding and the best opinion of God and His creation.
“The other thing that struck me was that the momentous life I just described seems like something of a sideshow to the reality of this extraordinary man of God. Mwinyi Baraka was a working man, a wage earner, always in harness. Yet, from the time I first met him in 1975 until the last time I saw him a few months before he died, he never gave any impression that he was ever actually working, in the sense we usually think of work. In fact, he was always working, always teaching, ceaselessly nurturing. His real life revolved around the remembrance of God, visiting other men of God, helping young people, speaking about Islam, meeting new people, calling them to God. When I was with him, we were constantly on the move, visiting people of the path, attending gatherings of knowledge and remembrance. Being with Mwinyi Baraka was a perpetual conversation, an ongoing adventure, a movable feast.”
Muzaffer Ozak Efendi: The Polisher of Hearts by Shems Friedlander
A colourful and charismatic teacher, Muzaffer Ozak Effendi nurtured his students with lively conversation in his bookstore, in cafes across Turkey, on the streets, and in his dervish lodge. A Sufi master, he ventured to America to introduce young seekers to the beauty of Islamic spirituality, and left a vibrant legacy across North America, Europe and the Middle East. Close disciple Shems Friedlander remembers his life and teachings, accompanied by unique photographs by the author.
Shaykh Salih al-Ja‘fari
Shaykh Salih al-Ja‘fari (1910-1979) was the Imam of Al-Azhar Mosque in Cairo, Egypt and lived in a small chamber within the mosque for over thirty years, never venturing out except to make the pilgrimage to Makkah or to visit the tombs of saints in Egypt. A descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, born into the spiritual tradition of the great 18th century Moroccan saint Sidi Ahmad ibn Idris, Shaykh Salih was a preternaturally gifted teacher who became a legend in his own lifetime for his galvanic discourses held every Friday in the courtyard of Al-Azhar Mosque, attracting huge crowds of people from all walks of life. He devoted his entire life to teaching in Al-Azhar and was the mentor of many of the most influential Muslim scholars of our time, including the current Shaykh Al-Azhar Ahmad al-Tayyab, the late Sayyid Muhammad ‘Alawi al-Maliki, and the former Grand Mufti of Egypt, Shaykh ‘Ali Gomaa. The biography has been written by Dr. Samer Dajani, who was a student of the shaykh’s son Shaykh ‘Abd al-Ghani ibn Salih al-Ja‘fari.
Shaykh Salih was recognized by his contemporaries as having reached the highest levels of mastery in jurisprudence. Those attending his Friday Lessons felt that his discourses were inspired. Shaykh Ahmad Taha al-Rayyan said:
He would speak from the knowledge which God caused to overflow onto his heart… No one dared interrupt him because in that state he was like a flowing river…. and people had no reason to ask because everyone was in reception mode…. The time would pass without us feeling it, and the time between the Friday Noon Prayer and the Afternoon Prayer would end as if it were just minutes.
Al-Bayyumi said:
God poured out through his tongue dazzling meanings and precious words of wisdom, as if a spiritual supply was rising from the clashing waves in his heart and flowing forth from his tongue…. We have read what other people have read—the scholarly commentaries on the Qur’an and Hadith—but we have never seen such flowing and pulsating explanations from anyone preceding him.
The sense that Shaykh Salih’s discourse poured out from inspiration, in the same way his poems often came spontaneously, in bursts, was only amplified by the way he seemed to answer everyone’s questions as they arose in their hearts. And yet, despite all this, Shaykh Salih did not allow his students to record his classes. A number of his students have related what seemed to each and every one of them a miracle: that they would bring a recording machine—not widely available at the time—to class, but after class they would find nothing but static in the recording. They would go to Shaykh Salih and his answer to each of them would be the same: “It is because you did not have the teacher’s permission. Recordings preserve a teacher’s mistakes.” Such was Shaykh Salih’s humility despite being so learned and inspired a scholar. It also shows his recognition that even great scholars and inspired saints had fallible memories and could still make mistakes. It was only when he approached the last two years of his life that he gave permission to his students to record his lessons.
Sufi ‘Abdullah Khan
Sufi ‘Abdullah Khan (1923-2015) arrived in the city of Birmingham in the United Kingdom in 1962 with a mission. He had been charged by his spiritual master to immigrate from his native Pakistan to bring a spiritual path to the thousands of Pakistani immigrants who had come to England for material gain but who were losing their faith and religion in the process. The thirty-nine-year-old retired soldier from humble origins left his family and everything he’d known up to that point and started a new life in a foreign land purely for the sake of God and His Messenger. Whereas his compatriots had immigrated to Britain to make money, Sufi ‘Abdullah had come to rescue them from a life without meaning. By the time he returned to his homeland in the Punjab for a visit seven years later, wearing the same blue suit he’d worn the first time he arrived in England, he had single-handedly, by the force of his personality and against all odds, established a vibrant spiritual path, and laid the foundations for a strong, orthodox, and spiritually oriented Muslim community in the industrial heartland of Britain.
His remarkable tale begins in an impoverished peasant village, moves to the battlefields of North Africa, a Nazi prison camp in Europe, a farm in France where he hid out after a daring cross-country escape, and a life-changing encounter in an army barracks with a living spiritual master. With the partition of India and creation of Pakistan, the young veteran joined the Pakistani army, and served with distinction for the next fourteen years. It was only then, in middle age, that the real adventure began.
Sufi ‘Abdullah’s biography is authored by Michael Sugich who spent a memorable night of invocation with the Naqshbandi sage in the 1970s and visited him again at his home during the last part of his life.
“In 1961, after his retirement from the army Sufi ‘Abdullah was at a turning point in his life. His army pension wasn’t enough to support his immediate family and his mother, much less his siblings and their families, for whom he felt responsible. He made the difficult decision to leave Pakistan and join his compatriots in England. He applied for a passport and asked his pir for permission to migrate. ‘At first my Hazrat Sahib wasn’t happy for me to come to England and that’s why there were complications with my passport application, caused by a clerk in Chakwal. However, after some days, Hazrat Sahib called me and instructed me to go to Britain.’ Zinda Pir purified his disciple’s intention and redefined his objective.
‘Abdullah was now to emigrate to England as his khalifa and devote himself to calling his countrymen back to God and the way of His Messenger. ‘Hazrat Sahib gave me the authority to establish and spread the remembrance of God. He also told me that before starting anything, consider the circumstances first. The circumstances will tell you when to begin. When he received his khilafa, ‘Abdullah was filled with self-doubt. ‘I am only an ordinary person. How can I perform such an important task?’ he asked his master. Zinda Pir replied, ‘You are doing God’s work. God will help you.’ Zinda Pir sent his khalifa off with these instructions:
Believe in God. Do not do anything for the sake of your own honour, or refrain from doing anything out of shame. Before taking any action, always consider the pleasure of God and His Messenger. Use your knowledge and intellect for God’s pleasure. This is the only way the intercession of the Prophet (S) can be achieved.
“In early spring of 1962 Sufi ‘Abdullah Khan climbed on a bus in Chakwal headed for the airport, wearing a brand-new blue suit. On April 15th he arrived in England.”
From Sufi ‘Abdullah Khan: Man of Action
Michael Sugich
Sidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib by Michael Sugich
Sidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib (1871-1972) was one of the most influential figures in the North African spiritual tradition in the twentieth century. He was an inspired guide to generations of seekers, throughout North Africa and beyond, from 1911 up until his death in 1972. His Diwan, or collection of invocations and odes, is an encapsulation of the spiritual path and is recited all over the world, from North Africa to North America, from Europe to the Far East, and is quoted and recorded on social media. His biography is authored by Michael Sugich, who has been affiliated with Ibn al-Habib’s spiritual lineage for half a century, most recently through the shaykh’s late successor, Moulay Hachem al-Belghiti (1940-2021). The text is illustrated with unique portraits of the great Moroccan shaykh taken by Peter Sanders in the last year of his life, including one stunning photograph that has never been published.
“In the Moroccan city of Meknes, along Boulevard el-Haboul, which curves along the edge of the old medina, a nondescript entryway gives out on to a long, inclined, weather-beaten, whitewashed passageway open to the sky. The passage leads up to a double door opening on to a stark, cavernous room covered in hasira mats and striped carpets. There was nothing ever physically or architecturally remarkable about the plain rendered brick structure or the utilitarian interior decor. Yet, in 1971, crossing the threshold of this empty space was to walk into a parallel universe, an intensely radiant world concealed by the daily rigors of worship, learning and service, and revealed in circles of remembrance carried out within its walls. The light that saturated this unprepossessing edifice emanated from a single centenarian saint and his illuminated followers. This was the zawiya of the teaching shaykh, Sidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib.
“In 1971, this venerable scholar-saint presided over his zawiya as he had since 1936 when it was first established as a place for learning and the practices leading to purification of the heart and the knowledge of God (ma‘rifat Allah). He was sixty-five years old when he opened his zawiya, the age when most men retire. He had now reached his centenary. This would be his final year on earth.
“The Habibiyya Zawiya served as the home of the shaykh and a center for instruction and discipline of aspirants (fuqara) on the spiritual path of Islam following the tradition of Imam Abu’l Hasan al-Shadhili, in accordance with the teachings of his spiritual descendent Moulay al-‘Arabi al-Darqawi and his successors. Shaykh Muhammad ibn al-Habib brought the full force of nineteenth-century Sufism in all its rigor and purity into the twentieth century, and then over a period of sixty years guided generations of sincere seekers to the knowledge of God.”
From Sidi Muhammad ibn al-Habib: The Teaching Shaykh
Michael Sugich
ihsaan 