The Sufi Saint of Silsila Shattariyya - Shah Muhammad Ghaus Gwaliyari (RA)-- and His Significance Today!
By
Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi, New Age Islam
13 May 2024
Gawaliyari
Has Left Behind An Indelible Legacy Of Syncretic Indian Culture In His Vast
Literature. His Spiritual Insights Will Continue To Guide The Lives And
Thoughts Of Indian Muslims In Art, Culture And Literature, As Well As In An
Experience Of Various Forms Of Yoga As A Philosophy And Practice
Main
Points:
1. The
16th-century Indian Sufi mystic—Hazrat Shah Muhammad Ghaus of Gwalior was a
prominent proponent of Silisila Shattariyya— a branch of the Tayfuri Khanwada
in the Indian subcontinent.
2. Indian
Muslim mystics like Ghaus Gawaliyari and Dara Shikoh have extensively
translated, interpreted and popularised Yoga texts in Persian and other Turkic
languages.
3. He is worth
revisiting in today’s India, as he is uniquely known a "Sufi Yogi"—a
term that would not go down well with the fundamentalists and the orthodox. But
his scholarly and spiritual credentials are too strong to dismiss him outright.
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Etymologically,
Shattar, an Arabic-origin Persian word means “lightning” and "the most
radiant" which denotes a code of spiritual practices that lead to a state
of “completion” in acquiring Noor, the Divine Light. No wonder then, the Sufi
order of Shattariyya originated in Persia but was codified and completed in
India, the land of thousands of enlightened Sufi mystics illuminated with the
divine light. In the Indian subcontinent, Silisila Shattariyya emerged as a
branch of the Tayfuri Khanwada and has been widely spread as an offshoot of the
same Silsila called Shattariyya-Qadiriyya.
The
16th-century Sufi mystic—Hazrat Shah Muhammad Ghaus of Gwalior was a prominent
proponent of this Sufi Order in India. Founded first in Safavid Iran by
15th-century Persian Sufi saint Sheikh Sirajuddin Abdullah Shattar RA,
significantly enough, the spiritual lineage of Shattariyya is a unique Sufi
Order with a chain of transmission--Silsila--which is traced back to the holy
Prophet (PBUH) through Sultan-ul-A'arifin (King of the Realised Ones) Hazrat
Bayazid Bastami (753-845 CE)--one of the few Awliya who attained the state of
fanā, complete immersion in and mystical union with the Divine.
As the
pioneer of Shattari-Sufism in India, and as the great mystic, musician, and an
epoch-making poet and philosopher of Gwalior Sharif, Hazrat Shah Muhammad Ghaus
Gwaliyari (RA) is worth revisiting in today’s India. He is uniquely known as a
"Sufi Yogi"—a term that would not go down well with the
fundamentalists and the orthodx. But his scholarly and spiritual credentials
are too strong to dismiss him outright. His lineage goes back to the great Sufi
Mystic Hazrat Khawaja Fariduddin Attar Nishapuri (RA) who deeply impacted the
Sufi thought and Persian poetry the world over. One of the chief saints and
Sheikhs of the Indian subcontinent in this Sufi Order, Shah Ghaus Ghaliyari's
silsilah is also traced to Haji Hameed Hasoor of Gopalganj, Bihar. In addition,
he also had spiritual guidance from Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani RA, and
therefore, he attained the highest spiritual position (maqam) of Ghausiyyat
through his grace. Shah Gawaliyari (RA) came to India from Nishapur and stayed
here til his last breath serving Sufism and calling people to embrace divine
love. He did not only advance the Shatari Sufi Order in the subcontinent but he
also made it a well-established Sufi order of great prominence. At the same
time, he was a great writer, poet, and philosopher as well as an eminent Yogic
master who authored Jawahar e Khamsa and Bahr al-Hayat as his famous works
explaining the ancient Yoga texts. Thus, Shah Ghaus Gawaliyari (RA) left behind
an indelible legacy of syncretic Indian culture in his literature. His
spiritual insights guided the lives and thoughts of Indian Muslims over a
thousand years and are glaring evidence of how Sufi mystics engaged with
India’s cultural practices, not only with their participation in art, culture
and literature, but also through the experience of various forms of yoga. A lot
of Indian Sufi practices based on self-awareness can be considered yogic in
nature, although yoga is defined differently from myriad perspectives.
Besides
being a Shattari Sufi pioneer, Hazrat Shah Ghaus Gwaliyari was one of the first
translators of Yoga texts to Persian in the 16th century. Before him, Shaikh
Abdul Quddus Gangohi (1456–1537), who ranks as an eminent Sufi poet from the
Sabiri order, was familiar with yoga texts and traditions in India like the
yoga of the Naths — a Shaivism-related yogic practice that emerged around the
13th century. Like Hatha Yoga, the practice of Nath is particularly used to
transform one’s body into a state of awakened self-identity with absolute
reality (Sahaja Siddha). Through the lineage of the Nath yogis, the science of
Kundalini Kriya Yoga has been preserved in India through the corridors of time.
Sufi
mystics like Sheikh Abdul Quddus Gangohi and Shah Muhammad Ghaus Gwaliyari endeavoured
to uphold the age-old Indian legacy. They practiced and preached yoga, though
it drew controversy from a few fundamentalist clergymen who considered yoga to
be incompatible with their puritanical religious moorings. On an account of
such syncretic ideas and practices, Hazrat Shah Ghaus Gwaliyari was vehemently
opposed by the retrogressive clergy. But he did not give up. Rather, he carried
on with his extensive translation and rigorous research on yoga texts into
Persian. It was only because of him that the Indian Yoga texts were later
rendered into Arabic, Turkish and Urdu and other Turkic languages.
One of the
most notable translations of yogic texts rendered by Gwaliyari is Bahr al-Hayat
(The Ocean of Life) — a Persian translation and explanation of Amrtakunda — one
of the key Sanskrit texts on yoga.
This
remarkable Persian translation was rendered in the city of Broach in Gujarat in
1550 and was aimed at explaining the Hawd al-Hayat (The Pool of Life),
which is the first Arabic translation of Amrtakunda. It occupied a paramount
significance in the oral traditions and teachings of the Shattari Sufis in
India to the extent that it became a textbook for many of Gwaliyari’s
followers. Another work by Gwaliyari that highlights close resemblances between
the Shattari Sufi practices and yogic exercises is Jawahir-e-Khamsa (The
Five Jewels), which was later translated to Arabic by a Mecca-based Shattari
teacher, Sibghat Allah. In this treatise, Gwaliyari dwelled upon his mystical
experience of ascension which enabled him to hold conversations even with the
Divine.
Some of his
most celebrated works include Jawahir-e-Khamsa which contain five
chapters including one on the worship of God and Bahr-e-Hayat (the ocean of
life) which sheds light on the yogic secrets of life. These two offer jewelled
lights in modern Sufi mysticism in India. Besides, Bahr-e-Hayat is his
translation and extension of Hawd al-Hayat (The Pool of Life), an Arabic
translation of a lost Sanskrit text on yoga, the Amrtakunda. This shows how
Indian Muslim mystics like Ghaus Gawaliyari and Dara Shikoh have extensively
translated, interpreted and popularised Yoga texts in Persian and other Turkic
languages. Other books that Ghaus Gawaliyari wrote or compiled on various key
issues of Sufi mysticism, include: (1) Awrad-e-Ghausiyya, (2) Me’raaj Nama, (3)
Zamair-e-Basair, (4) Kaleed-e-Makhazin,
(Kanz-ul-Wahdat), etc.
Among his
chief diciples and spiritual heirs and students were Gujarat’s great Sufi
saint-scholar Sheikh Wajihuddin Alawi Gujarati, Bengal’s mystic Sheikh Ali Sher
Bengali, Sheikh Wadudullah Shattari, Sheikh Shamshuddin Shirazi, Sheikh
Sadruddin Zakir, Sheikh Lashkar Muhammad Arif, Sheikh Eisa Jundullah, etc. Shah
Ghaus Gawaliyari (RA) died in 15 Ramadan 970 AH, and his famous and
frequently-visted holy shrine called "Gwalior Sharif" is located in
Madhya Pradesh, which is a living embodiment of this Urdu couplet:
Darbaar-e-Shahanshahi Se Khushtar
Mardaan-e-Khuda Ka Hai Aastaaa
Translation:
These shrines of holy saints and Awliya Allah [as they offer us a lot of
spiritual learning] are far greater and more fascinating than the royal courts
of the kings.
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A Regular Columnist with Newageislam.com, Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi is an
Indo-Islamic scholar, Sufi poet and English-Arabic-Urdu-Hindi writer with a
background in a leading Sufi Islamic seminary in India.
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-society/sufi-saint-silsila-shattariyya-gwaliyari-/d/132311
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