Fat’h's-Shakuur

The Inciting of Gratitude

The   SIIASI is honored to present the Fat’h’s-Shakuur Fee Ma`arifat `Ayaan `Ulama’   ‘t-Takruur of Shaykh Abu Abdallah, Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr as-Sideeq Ahmad ibn Abdallah ibn Muhammad ibn   at-Taalib Ali Banaan al-Bartuli al-Wulaati al-Maaliki is one of the rarely   known texts which discusses the biographies of about two hundred of the learned   sages of West Africa who lived between the   period of 1056 A.H. to 1215 A.H. (circa 1650 C.E. to 1800 C.E.). In a sense this   text should be placed along side the Shajat’n-Nuur az-Zakiyya of Shaykh Ibn Makhluf, the Infaq’l-Maysuur of Muhammad Bello, the   renowned Nayl’l-Ibihaaj of Shaykh Ahmad Baba at-Tinbukti, the ad-Dibaaj’l-Madh’hab of Shaykh Ibn   Farhuun, and the Tarteeb’l-Madaarik of Qadi `Iyad. Shaykh Muhammad al-Wulaati, follows these famous biographical texts by   arranging the scholars in alphabetical order, citing the place, day, and   sometimes hour that they were born. He mentions their major teachers and the   sciences and books they learned from them, as well as their chains of   authorities; and the students they taught. He also mentioned the journeys that   these scholars took in search of knowledge, the names of the books they produced   as well as professions and responsibilities they fulfilled in the Islamic   societies in which they resided. More important ly, Shaykh Muhammad   al-Wulaati, took care to mention the spiritual bounties, austerity,   righteousness, virtue and the service these two hundred or so sages contributed   to the societies in which they lived. The author arranged the text in   twenty-two chapters and Allah willing we will post these chapters gradually in   that order.

In   short, the Fat’h’s-Shakuur is a brief picture of the kind of super   empowered individuals essential for the generation and development of Islamic civilization. One of my teachers often said: “An   entire civilization cannot necessarily generate a Man of Allah, but a Man of   Allah can generate an entire civilization.” The Fat’h’s-Shakuur Fee   Ma`arifat `Ayaan `Ulama’   ‘t-Takruur paints a picture of the kind of individuals who laid the   foundations for the high Islamic civilizations of Takruur, Mali, Songhay,   Baghirma, Dia, Messina, Segou, Zaura, Kanem-Bornu, Wodai, Dar Fur, and Sokoto.   It was the memories and legacies of such sages which imbued the enslaved African   Muslims in the western hemisphere with the powerful historical consciousness   required to raise the banner of liberty and freedom in the countless slave   insurrections and wars ignited in Bahia, Surinam, Belize, Jamaica, Cuba, Haiti, the Florida Everglades, southern Georgia, the Sea Islands and the French   Territories of Louisiana. No doubt, the Fat’h’s-Shakuur Fee Ma`arifat `Ayaan `Ulama’   ‘t-Takruur will be the essential element in formulating the identity   construct needed by the resurgent indigenous African Muslim communities in the   west as they rise from the dust of the present crumbling dominant   culture.

In one sense the translation of the Fat’h’s-Shakuur is a fulfillment of the mandate given to us by al-Hajj Malik El Shabazz, rahimuhu Allah ta`ala on the eve of   the formulation of the Organization of African American Unity some forty years ago, when he   said:

“We assert that we Afro-Americans have the right to   direct and control our lives, our history, and our future, rather than to have   our destinies determined by American racists. We are determined to rediscover   our true African culture, which was crushed and hidden for over four hundred   years in order to enslave us and keep us enslaved up to today. We,   Afro-Americans, enslaved, oppressed, and denied by a society t hat proclaims   itself the citadel of democracy, are determined to rediscover our history,   promote the talents that are suppressed by our racist enslavers, renew the   culture that was crushed by a slave government and thereby, to again become a   free people.”

The achievement of   freedom is a spiritual, intellectual, political and in some cases a necessary   military ACT. No aspect of the struggle for freedom can be attained without a   historical consciousness. The author Shaykh Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr   as-Sideeq al-Wulaati, was born in 1732 C.E. during the height of the 19th century Islamic tajdeed movements of the Bilad’s-Sudan, and died in 1804 C.E.,   within months of the famous hijra of Shehu Uthman ibn Fuduye`   and hi s jama`at from under the political sovereignty of the Habe` Hausa kingdoms. His time was an era   of extreme contradictions in Africa, where Europeans were denuding the continent   of her sons on the one hand, and the African Muslims had ignited the fires jihaad and Islamic sovereignty on the other. For the Africans   enslaved in the western hemisphere, this period was a cultural ‘missing link’,   an era of spiritual ‘comatose’ in which we were disconnected from the vitality   of our living culture. The Fat’h’s-Shakuur, reconnects the link, awakens   the historical consciousness and regenerates the upward Path of our culture; and   like an Awakening Lion, insha   Allah, we will emerge into this age of the collapse of western   civilization lucid, alert and unrelenting, joining the other Lions as they   awaken from the slumber which typified the outgoing age.

So, on   this first day of February, the shortest month of the year in which the US   allows its domestically colonized African American national minority to celebrate their   timeless history, we at SIIASI present this seminal text, the Fat’h’s-Shakuur   Fee Ma`arifat `Ayaan `Ulama’ ‘t-Takruur (The Inciting of Gratitude Regarding   Acknowledgment of the Notables Among the Scholars of West Africa) of the African   Muslim sage at-Taalib Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr as-Sideeq Wulaati; as a   form of gratitude to Allah, His Messenger, and to all our righteous forebears   who went before us in the struggle; to say:

“We have the   flag! We have the flag! It did not touch the ground!”

Shaykh Muhammad Shareef bin Farid

Tuesday, 27th Safar, 1432 A.H. (February 01, 2011)

The Book in Sections

• Introduction
• Part 1.
• Part 2.
• Part 3.
• Part 4.
• Part 5.
• Part 6.
• Part 7.
• Part 8.
• Part 9.
• Part 10.
• Part 11.
• Part 12.
• Part 13.
• Part 14.
• Part 15.
• Part 16.
• Part 17.
• Part 18.
• Part 19.
• Part 20.
• Part 21.
• Part 22.