The Book of Assistance
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Translator
Mostafa al-Badawi
Description
About The Book
There are many books in English which present Sufi doctrine, but few which can be used as practical travel guides along the Path. The aptly-named Book of Assistance (Risalat al-Mu’awana) is today in widespread use among teachers across the world. This manual of devotions, prayers and practical ethics is invaluable to all who love the Prophet and the Sufi Way.
About the Contributor(s)
About the author
Abdallah ibn Alawi al-Haddad: A scholar, Sufi master, and poet of the Hadramawt valley in Yemen, al-Haddad (1044–1132 AH / 1634–1720 CE) was born and lived his whole life in the town of Tarim, where his tomb is still visited. He descended from the Prophet through the Ba ʿAlawi sayyids of Hadramawt, followed the Shafiʿi school in law and the Ashʿari creed, and is widely regarded as the renewer (mujaddid) of the twelfth Islamic century. Though he lost his sight in childhood, he became one of the most influential teachers of the Ba ʿAlawi tradition, drawing on al-Ghazali and the earlier masters of Tarim. He wrote with a clarity that made deep matters accessible, and several of his books are still read daily. Landmark works include al-Nasaʾih al-Diniyya wa al-Wasaya al-Imaniyya (Counsels of Religion), al-Daʿwa al-Tamma wa al-Tadhkira al-ʿAmma (The Complete Summons and General Reminder), Risalat al-Muʿawana (The Book of Assistance), al-Fusul al-ʿIlmiyya, and a Diwan of mystical poetry, alongside his collected letters. His litanies, especially the Ratib al-Haddad and the Wird al-Latif, are recited across the Muslim world. His legacy endures in the living spiritual tradition of Tarim and in English translations that have carried his counsel to new readers.
About the translator
Mostafa al-Badawi: Mostafa al-Badawi (b. 1948 CE, Cairo) is one of the leading contemporary translators of classical Islamic texts from Arabic into English, and a scholar associated with the Ba ʿAlawi sayyids of Hadramawt in Yemen. He graduated from Cairo University Medical School in 1971 and completed his postgraduate training in the United Kingdom, where he has practiced as a consultant psychiatrist and is a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. Alongside his medical career he pursued a serious study of the Islamic sciences and of the spiritual path of the Ba ʿAlawi tradition. He is best known for his translations of the prose works of Imam ʿAbdallah ibn ʿAlawi al-Haddad, the great Hadrami sage and poet, including The Book of Assistance, Gifts for the Seeker, Counsels of Religion, and The Lives of Man. His translation work also extends to The Degrees of the Soul of Shaykh al-Shabrawi and Key to the Garden of Habib Ahmad Mashhur al-Haddad. As an author in his own right, he wrote Sufi Sage of Arabia, a full biography of Imam al-Haddad drawing on the life and teachings of seventeenth-century Yemen, and Man and the Universe, among other studies. He is regarded as a careful, faithful translator who has made the devotional and ethical literature of the Ba ʿAlawi masters accessible to a wide English readership.
Specifications
EAN 13 / ISBN
9781872038018
Publisher
Quilliam Press
Author
Abdallah ibn Alawi al-Haddad
Pages
142
Translator
Mostafa al-Badawi
Year Published
2014
Size
W-5.6 in | H-8.7 in | D-0.6 in
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