Review By Victor Edwin
Author: Ziya Us Salaam
HarperCollins Publishers India (2020)
New Delhi, Aug 5, 2020: Inside The Tablighi Jamaat by Ziya Us Salaam is the story of a contemporary Islamic movement. From its origins (1927), the Tablighi Jamaat (TJ) assiduously focused on what it considered the spiritual renewal of Muslims and kept away from political questions and livelihood issues of Muslims.
It is one of the largest such Islamic movements today, with a presence in around 150 countries, with millions of followers. The author illustrates how the TJ has flourished despite remaining in splendid isolation from politics and governance issues. However, recently the TJ became the subject of much discussion in the media. It was accused of being a super-spreader of Covid 19, following a religious convention (ijtema) that was convened at TJ’s headquarters earlier this year.
The TJ was founded by a man named Muhammad Ilyas Kandhalvi in the wake of the efforts to bring Indian Muslims and Christians into the Hindu fold. Maulana Ilyas realized that it would be futile to protest against such a movement, but what would be fruitful would be to reform Muslims from within and make them better Muslims, as he understood this. He felt that Muslims must know the tenets of Islam well and practice them properly. Thus was founded the TJ, in 1927.
The following five features underpin the TJ: knowing the kalima (creed of the faith), religious knowledge and remembering God (ilm-o-zikr) respect for fellow Muslims (ikram ul-muslimeen), purifying one’s intention (tashih-e niyyat), and spending time for tabligh (tafrigh-e waqt): that is, communicating the message of Islam among Muslims.
The author discusses a number of intriguing features of the TJ. For instance, the attention the TJ followers give to the rule book of the movement, the Fazail-e Amal, and the relatively less attention given to the Quran. The TJ maintains that the Quran should be read by the ulema and that for ordinary Muslim men and women, it is enough to listen to the ulema. It is an ironical that a movement that supposedly focuses on the renewal of Muslim life ignores the importance of reading and understanding the Quran, which is one of the foundations of the Islamic way of life.
The author also discusses issues such as the invisibility of women in the TJ, TJ’s ways of organizing self-financed missionary tours, and the struggle to keep the movement’s leadership within the Kandhalvi family and its impact on the movement in an informative way.
Readers would find this volume helpful in understanding a movement that draws diverse groups of Muslims and seeks to hold them together through mathematical table-like principles.
(Jesuit Father Joseph Victor Edwin teaches Islam at Vidyajyoti College of Theology, Delhi.)