Barelvi movement
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The Barelvi movement or Barelvism is a Sunni revivalist movement that generally adheres to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence, as well as a variety of Sufi orders, including the Qadiri, Chishti, Naqshbandi and Suhrawardi orders. It has hundreds of millions of followers across the world and consider themselves to be the continuation of Sunni Islamic orthodoxy.
The movement was founded in Bareilly, British India to counter the rising influence of the Deobandi and Wahhabi movements. The Barelvi movement later spread across the globe with millions of followers, thousands of mosques, institutions, and organisations in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, the United Kingdom, South Africa and other parts of Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, and the United States. As of 2000, the movement had around 200 million followers globally but mainly located in South Asia.[1]
The movement claims to revive the Sunnah as embodied in the Qur’an, literature of traditions (hadith) and the way of the scholars, as the people had lapsed from the Prophetic traditions. Consequently, scholars took the duty of reminding Muslims go back to the ‘ideal’ way of Islam. The movement drew inspiration from the Sunni doctrines of Shah Abdur Rahim (1644-1719) founder of Madrasah-i Rahimiyah and one of the compiler of Fatawa-e-Alamgiri. Shah Abdur Rahim is father of Shah Waliullah Dehlawi. The movement also drew inspiration from Shah Abdul Aziz Muhaddith Dehlavi (1746 –1824) and Fazl-e-Haq Khairabadi (1796–1861) founder of the Khairabad School. Fazle Haq Khairabadi Islamic scholar and leader of 1857 rebellion issued fatwas against Wahhabi Ismail Dehlvi for his doctrine of God's alleged ability to lie (imkan-i kizb) from Delhi in 1825. Ismail is considered as an intellectual ancestor of Deobandis.
The movement emphasises personal devotion and adherence to sharia and fiqh, upholding the doctrine of taqlid, the usage of Ilm al-Kalam and Sufi practices such as veneration of and seeking help from saints among other things associated with Sufism. The movement defines itself as an authentic representative of Sunni Islam, Ahl-i-Sunnat wa-al-Jamāʿat (The people who adhere to the Prophetic Tradition and preserve the unity of the community).
Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi (1856–1921), who was a Sunni Sufi scholar and reformer in north India, wrote extensively, including the Fatawa-i Razawiyya, in defense of the status of Muhammad in Islam and popular Sufi practices, and became the leader of the Barelvi movement.
- ^ Bowker, John (2000). The concise Oxford dictionary of world religions. Oxford paperback reference (Abridged and updated ed. [of the "Oxford dictionary of world religions"] ed.). Oxford: Oxford University press. ISBN 978-0-19-280094-7.
Indian and Pakistani school of Muslim thought with over 200 million followers.