Shaikh Abdul-Quddus Gangohi Rh

Shaikh Abdul-Quddus Gangohi Rh (860 944/1456–1537),

Qutube Alam Hazrat Shaikh Abdul Quddus Gangohi Rh

A prominent Sufi Shaikh of the Sabri branch of the Chishti order in India, was born at Rudauli, in what is today eastern Uttar Pradesh. (The Chishtiya was founded in the fourth/tenth century in Chisht, a small town near Herat, in present-day Afghanistan, by Abu Ishaq Shami (d. 328/940) and introduced into India by Moin Uddin Chishti (d. 633/1230); its Sabri branch goes back to Ala Uddin Ali Ahmad Sabir (d. ca. 1291), a spiritual successor of Baba Farid masood Ganje Shakar (d. 664/1265 in Ajodhan, now Pakpatan in Pakistan Panjab). The family of Shaikh Abdul Quddus Gangohi possessed distinguished scholarly credentials and claimed descent from Imam Abu Hanifa (d. 150/767), the founder of the Hanfia school of jurisprudence. His formal education was left incomplete when he was drawn towards mysticism and joined the local Chishti Khanqah (Sufi convent) at Rudauli, founded by Shaikh Ahmad Abdul Haq Rudauli (d. 837/1434). Although a disciple of Shaikh Mohammad(a grandson of Shaikh Abdul Haq, he maintained that he received spiritual grace directly from the spirit of Abdul Haq. During the last decade of the ninth/fifteenth century, frequent wars between the sultan of Delhi Bahlol Lodi (r. 855–94/1451–89) and the ruler of the Sharqi kingdom Husain Shah (r. 862/ 1458–911/1505), along with the disturbances created by Bachgoti Rajput, created a volatile situation in the region. Therefore in 896/1491, at the request of Umar Khan (d. 925/1519), one of his influential disciples, a minister of the Delhi sultan Sikandar Lodi (r. 894–923/1489–1517), Abdul Quddus decided to leave his ancestral home and move to Shahabad (in Karnal District of the Panjab). From there he visited Delhi, Multan, and Ajodhan. In 931/1525, Abdul Quddus settled at Gangoh (in Saharanpur District of Uttar Pradesh). On the eve of the Battle of Panapat (932/1526)—in which the Mughal armies under Babur (r. 932–6/1526–30) defeated the sultan of Delhi, Ibraham Lodi (r. 923–32/1517–26), and founded the Mughal empire Shaikh Abdul Quddus was summoned to bless the Lodi armies but instead obliquely prophesied disaster. On Babur’s victory, he was taken to Delhi as a captive but was released and allowed to  settle at Gangoh, where he died in 944/ 1537 and was buried in a domed tomb. Biographers record that Abdul Quddus was often in a state of sukr (mystical intoxication) but did not neglect the precepts of the sharia . He spent considerable time performing supererogatory prayers and rituals and did strenuous spiritual exercises while he was in Rudauli. Being a Chishti, he was a strong follower and an open advocate of wadat-ul-wujud (unity of being), over the efficacy of which he debated with a scholar from Multan, Miran Sayyidi Ahmad. Among other Sufi practices, he favored sama(audition assemblies) accompanied by raqs (rhythmic movement) and dhikr-e-jahr (loud remembrance; dhikr is a Sufi spiritual exercise consisting of the repetition of a litany or a divine name, individually or collectively, loud or silent, with or without movements). Among the Chishti, he was the most frequent practitioner of Salat-e-Makus (devotions performed in an inverted position) during which he experienced a mystical state called Sultan-e-dhikr (lit. “the sultan of dhikr ”, a spiritual and physical state resulting from constant dhikr , a term unknown in early Chishti writings). He accepted the view that the Peer (lit. “old,” in Persian, also used for a “Sufi shaikh ”) was a Perfect Man (Insan-e-Kamil) and permitted Sajda (prostration) before him. The Rudauli area was a stronghold of Nath-Panthi and other yogic traditions, and Abdul Quddus drew upon Vedantic philosophy and yogic practices in his teachings and rituals. His work on Sufi themes entitled Rushd-nama (“The book of rectitude”) reveals such yogic influences. For instance, it draws links with yogic practices in the description of pas-e-anfas (breath control ), and it identifies wadat-ul-wujud with the teaching of the Naths, as well as Salat-e-makus with ulti sadhana (trans-gressive (lit. “upside down”) way to salvation). Besides, the work is interspersed with Hindavi doha's (couplets; Hindavi refers to the indigenous language of north India which became the predecessor of modern Hindi and Urdu) and Persian verses. He was a poet of some merit and composed verses in Hindavi, under the pen-name of Alakhdas. His poems not only express human love but also deal with Sufi beliefs, spiritual experiences and the details of spiritual path. Political disturbances towards the end of ninth/fifteenth century forced him to establish some political connections. Several of his Afghan disciples served in the Lodi army.Abdul Quddus wrote letters to Sikandar Lodi and to the Mughal emperors Babur and Humayun (r. 937– 47/1530–40 and 962–3/1555–6), delivering moral exhortations and urging them to recognize the worth of such Muslim religious groups as Shaikh s, Faqirs,Ulama  etc.
Among his prominent spiritual successors ( Khalifa s) were Shaikh Jalal-ud-Din Thaneseri (d. 989/1581), Shaikh Abdul-Ghafur Azampuri (d. 985/1577), and his own son, Shaikh Rukn-ud-Din Quddusi (d. 983/1575). Shaikh Abd-ul-Nabi, a grandson of Abdul-Quddus, was appointed Sadr-al-sudur (“the chief Sadr ,” the highest judicial and religious position under the Mughals) during the reign of Akbar (963–1014/1556–1605).

Reference 

Few of Abdul Quddss Gangohi’s compositions are extant. His important writings include a short Sufi treatise, Rushd-nama , lithographic edition, ed. Ghulam Amad Khan, Jhajjar 1314/1896–7;
an account of Shaikh Abdul Haq, Anwar al-uyun fi asrar al-maknun ,lithographic edition, ed. Ahan al-Matabi, Aligarh 1323/1905;

and a collection of his letters, Maktubat-e-Quddusi , Delhi 1287/1870.

Another important work is Lataif-e-Quddusi,Delhi 1311/1893–4 written by his son Rukn-ud-Din Quddusi.
His accounts are also available in medieval tazkira's (biographies) such as Abd-ul-Rahman Chishti,
Mirat-ul-asrar,(MS, Khaliq Ahmad Nizami Personal Collection), 917–22 ;
Shaikh Abdul Haq Muaddith Dehelvi, Akhbar-ul-akhyar (Delhi 1309/1891–2), 215–8;
Ghulam Sarvar, Khazinat-ul-Aulia (Lucknow 1873), 1:416–8;
Muammad Ghauthi Shattari, Gulzar-e-abrar , Urdu trans. Fazal Amad (Agra 1326/1908), 239–40; and Muammad Akram quddus, Iqtibas-ul-anvar (Lahore n.d.), 225–52.
Simon Digby has written a short monograph in English, Abdul-Quddus Gangohi (1456–1537 A.D.). The personality and attitudes of a medieval Indian Sufi, in Khaliq Ahmad. Nizami (ed.), Medieval India. A miscellany (Delhi 1975), 3:1–66. In Urdu, a detailed biography utilizing some minor sources is by Ijaz-ul-Haq Quddusi, Shaikh Abddul-Quddus Gangohi Or Unki Ta'alimat , Karachi 1961. See also Sayed Athar Abbas Rizvi, A history of Sufism in India , 2 vols., Delhi 1978–83, and Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, Taarikh-e-mashaikh-e-Chisht (Karachi 2007), 1:253–60.

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