( Handbook on Islam is a manual on how to establish Islam...)
Handbook on Islam is a manual on how to establish Islam, with understanding, by the famous West African Shaykh who led the jihad (struggle in the way of Allah) which established the Muslim Khalifate in Northern Nigeria in the 18th century. This is the three-dimensional way of Islam, Iman and Ihsan that emerged from Madinah and was the light for the whole of the West, from the Bilad as-Sudan, including Nigeria, right up to Andalus, modern-day Spain, an Islam that holds law, spirituality and a clear intellectual tradition in balance. This book then is another manual, a handbook on the practice of Islam, on the parameters of what needs to be known about Allah and His Messengers, and on the Sufic path of purification of the heart and self from the qualities that obscure their luminous reality and which veil them from Allah. This edition contains an additional text: al-Masail al-Muhimma. Uthman dan Fodio Shehu Usman was born into a highly cultured family in 1168/1754. His father was Muhammad ibn Salih, known generally as Fodio. His mother was Hawwa bint Muhammad ibn Usman. The Shaykh read the Quran with his father, learned al-Ishriniyyah and similar works with his shaykh, Uthman, known as Biddu al-Kabawi. He learned syntax and the science of grammar from al-Khulasah and other works at the hand of Shaykh Abd ar-Rahman ibn Hammada. He read al-Mukhtasar with his paternal and maternal uncle, Uthman, known as Bidduri. Later he learnt from a number of shaykhs, most significantly Jibril ibn Umar, the major collections of hadith, fiqh and tasawwuf. He led a movement for the renewal of Islam in west Africa and founded a caliphate, establishing all the offices of a functioning polity, in the process writing a large number of books on the various issues confronting his people at the various points of their struggle. Among the most famous are his Ihya as-Sunna. Diwan Press also publish a history of his movement called The African Caliphate.
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He was born in the Hausa state of Gobir in 1754, the son of a pious Fulani member of the Qadiriyya Moslem brotherhood. Uthman don Fodio whose complete name was Uthman ibn Muhammad ibn Fudi was commonly known simply as Shehu, the Hausa word for sheikh.
Uthman and his brother Abdullahi received a thorough education in Islamic theology, Arabic, and Moslem law.
By 1774 he began his career as an itinerant preacher and teacher. During these years Uthman wandered throughout Hausaland, gaining adherents and preaching reform in the practice of Islam. His followers, who were later to form the vanguard of his fighting forces, came from all parts of central Sudan.
During the last quarter of the 18th century, Uthman's ideas and asceticism became famous. He represented the ideal life of the Islamic mystic, dedicated to the teaching of the Koran and undefiled by the material desires that corrupted the world around him. But Uthman was more than a preacher. He was also a social reformer who objected to the non-Islamic practices of the Hausa leaders and continually criticized their rule and questioned the legitimacy of the taxes they imposed on his Fulani (Fulbe) brethren. His teaching and the ever-increasing number of his followers throughout Hausaland caused growing alarm among the Hausa chiefs, especially the Sultan of Gobir, who sought to undermine his influence. In 1804 Uthman and his followers were forced to flee for safety from Gobir, in a manner reminiscent of Mohammed's flight from Mecca, known as the hijra, and proclaimed the jihad, or holy war, against the Sultan and eventually against all the Hausa chiefs.
Uthman's principal role during the years of war that followed was that of a spiritual leader, mediator, and chief source of inspiration for his followers. He was neither a warrior nor a politician but the Commander of the Faithful (Sarkin Musulmi), and he left the practical affairs of the jihad to his brother Abdullahi and his son Muhammadu Bello, who commanded Uthman's army.
One by one the Hausa states of Gobir, Kebbi, Zamfara, Kano, Katsina, and Zazzau capitulated to the Fulani and were emulated by pagan areas on the periphery of the Hausa states. All were organized into emirates by the Fulani, but the establishment of political power was for the purpose of implementing the social, legal, and religious ideals of Islam as interpreted by Uthman. Many of these ideas were, of course, compromised by the realities of the jihad and the increasing Fulani orientation that accompanied the establishment of the Emirates, but Uthman's teaching continued to provide the ideological justification for Fulani control until after his death.
The importance of Uthman don Fodio in 19th-and 20th-century West Africa cannot be restricted to Hausaland, for the resurgence and reform of Islam which he had accomplished spread throughout West Africa. The expansion of Islam into Yorubaland, the conquest of Ilorin, and the destruction of Oyo inaugurated 70 years of civil war in southwest Nigeria which ultimately drew the British into the interior of Nigeria in the late 19th century. Similarly, the pressure of his forces on the moribund state of Bornu east of Lake Chad contributed to its rebirth under el-Kanemi and his successors.
In the west, Uthman's concept of the jihad was employed by al-Hajj Omar to build the Tokolor empire, which, before its destruction by the French, came to include a large part of western Sudan between the Niger headwaters in the Futa Jallon and Timbuktu. All of these movements were precipitated by the life and teachings of a small, pious man whose unworldly piety remained uncorrupted by his victories or the material success of his followers.
His character, his achievements, and his impact on West Africa have made him one of the most important men in the history of Africa. Uthman don Fodio wrote more than a hundred books concerning religion, government, culture, and society. He developed a critique of existing African Muslim elites for what he saw as their greed, paganism, violation of the standards of Sharia law, and use of heavy taxation. He encouraged literacy and scholarship, for women as well as men, and several of his daughters emerged as scholars and writers. His writings and sayings continue to be much quoted today and are often affectionately referred to as Shehu in Nigeria.
( Handbook on Islam is a manual on how to establish Islam...)
Many of the Fulani led by Uthman don Fodio was unhappy that the rulers of the Hausa states were mingling Islam with aspects of the traditional regional religion. Usman created a theocratic state with a stricter interpretation of Islam. In Tanbih al-ikhwan ’ala ahwal al-Sudan, he wrote: “As for the sultans, they are undoubtedly unbelievers, even though they may profess the religion of Islam because they practice polytheistic rituals and turn people away from the path of God and raise the flag of a worldly kingdom above the banner of Islam. All this is unbelief according to the consensus of opinions. ”
In Islam outside the Arab World, David Westerlund wrote: “The jihad resulted in a federal theocratic state, with extensive autonomy for Emirates, recognizing the spiritual authority of the caliph or the Sultan of Sokoto. ”
In Rawd al-Janaan (The Meadows of Paradise), Waziri Gidado dan Laima (1777-1851) listed Dan Fodio's wives as: his first cousin Maymuna, Aisha dan Muhammad Sa'd, Hauwa, Hajjo, Shatura. He also had his unique concubine Mariyatu.
By her Dan Fodio was the father of Ahmadu Rufai (1812-1873). Rufai was Sarkin of Silame and later became Sultan of Sokoto (1867-1873).
She and Dan Fodio had 11 children.
She was also known as "Gaabdo" (Joy in Fulfulde) and as "Iyya Garka" (Hausa for Lady of the House/Compound). Iyya Garka was famed for her Islamic knowledge and for being the matriarch of the family.
Hauwa, known also as "Inna Garka" (Mother of the House in Hausa) and Bikaraga. She was described as being prone to asceticism.
By her Dan Fodio was the father of Abdul Qadir (1807-1836) who was known as one of the best poets of Sokoto. Abdul Qadir died from battle wounds during Sultan Bello's last campaign, in Zamfara. He was buried at Baraya Zaki.
She is held up by some as an example of education and independence of women possible under Islam, and by others as a precursor to modern feminism in Africa.
He was the second Sultan of Sokoto and reigned from 1817 until 1837 and was an active writer of history, poetry, and Islamic studies.
He was Sultan of Sokoto from 1867 to 1873. He succeeded Ahmad Bello who reigned for eleven months. Rufai's reign was dinstinguished for being peaceful.
He was the third Sultan of the Sokoto Caliphate, reigning from October 1837 until November 1842.
