Hyderabad has had the unique honor of inviting and promoting many foreigners to such an extent that most of them stayed on and never left. A few returned back to their native countries but only after very successfully completing the tasks for which they were initially brought in.One such great personality I would like to elaborate upon in this post is, British Muslim Novelist, School Principal, Civil servant and Scholar, Mohammad Marmaduke Pickthall.(7.4.1875-19.5.1936, aged 61).Few people know that Pickthall translated The Holy Quran under the patronage of HEH
Nawab
Sir
Mir Osman Ali Khan
Bahadur
, Asaf Jah VII, while he was staying and working in Hyderabad.
Pickthall insisted and always emphasized that it was not a translation but the MEANING of the Holy Book as he understood it. .As per him it was not humanly possible to derive the exact meaning in any other language but Arabic, the language in which The Holy Quran was revealed to Prophet Mohammed(PBUH).
“The British Muslim” says that Pickthall’s humility did not prevent him from taking a rightful pride in ancestry to a Knight of William The Conqueror days, Sir Roger de Poictu from whom his odd surname derives. He was the son of Charles, an Anglican Parson and Mary O’Brien who was the daughter of Admiral D H O’Brien, a hero of the same Napoleonic war which brought Sheik Abdullah Quilliam’s grand father fame as a Master of “HMS Victory” at Trafalgar.It may not be a coincidence that Pickthall ,Quilliam and before that Lord Byron all found their vocation as rebellious lovers of the East were related to Naval Officers.”
Pickthall was educated at Harrow which he left after six terms. His closest friend in school was Sir Winston Churchill. He set sail for Palestine when he was not yet 18. He donned the local garb and learnt Arabic from native teachers…the first British Muslim to do so.
Pickthall was a prolific writer and linguist and has authored 18 books. His language was flowing and he had the ability to discuss a point in detail…give his own interpretation to a subject and to finally present it in text which was clearly understood. He was a fluent orator and always said that he was more comfortable when talking about Islam, in Arabic, than in his own native English.
He was a true admirer of the Qalifath in Constantinople and liked the TURKS and Turkey a lot. Before enrolling in the army as a corporal looking after the influenza struck soldiers during the Great War (1914-1918) he made it very clear that he will not fight the Turkish Army.The Turkish armed forces/The Ottoman Empire had joined the Germans during The Great War.
Pickthall converted to Islam in 1917 .He was a leader among the emerging group of British Muslims
“He was invited by the passionate Khilafatist movement in September 1919 to become the Editor of The Bombay Chronicle and he landed at Appolo Bunder and started his career and remained its editor from 1920-1924.The Bombay Chronicle was founded in 1910 by Sir Pherozeshah Mehta and it stopped publishing in 1959.As editor he got involved in the wave for Independence sweeping across India and was well respected and liked by Mahatma Gandhi. This rather put him on the wrong foot with the Empire. He started wearing Khadi but this did not stop him from his religious obligations.”…(British Muslim Heritage)
PICKTHALL IN HYDERABAD.
All his time in Bombay, Pickthall kept on thinking of moving to HYDERABAD and working for HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan, Asaf Jah VII, as he saw in him the political application of Islams tolerant polity and the city as a chief cultural centre of India.
Pickthall saw Hyderabad as a sort of Capital for all
M
uslims. The Ruler himself an able administrator and a poet in Persian and Urdu made Hyderabad the Chief Cultural Centre of India. More so it was a place outside the British Empire.
Pickthall started his Hyderabad connection in the respected position of the Principal of The Chaderghat Boys High School. He remained in this position for 10 years but was given additional responsibilities and with his ability to adjust to the various aspects of Royal life, the Rule liked and confided in him.He was given the post of Director of the Information Department and for a time in 1933 even served as the Controller
of Affairs to Nawab Mir Salabath Jah Bahadur,
the younger brother of HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan Asaf Jah VII.This shows us how well liked he was and what respect he commanded in The Royal Household.He was also in charge of the Hyderabad Civil Service House .
Pickthall then took over as editor of THE ISLAMIC REVIEW (IR), a quarterly published from Hyderabad under Royal Patronage.Under his editor ship the IR increased its sale and prestige internationally with contributors from all around the world.He did full justice to this appointment as he was proficient in Arabic, Urdu and English.He also wrote and delivered what are known as the “Madras Lectures”all over South India.
“It was at this time after having established himself in the Royal Household as a gentleman of position and respect; having direct access to the Ruler, who saw in him a man of great learning and courage, that Pickthall ventured out to translate the Holy Quran into English.He was encouraged by HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan Bahadur,Asaf Jah VII. Pickthall was given a big expense account and he went on a sabbatical for 2 years to complete his work.After having mastered the classic Islamic sources he traveled to Germany to consult with leading Orientalists and studied the ground breaking work of Noldeke and Schwally, the GESCHICHTE DES QORANS, to which his notes often refer.”(extract.. the British Muslim)
He also traveled to Damascus and Palestine on numerous occasions and carried out his research. So much so he was known as a man of two cities…Hyderabad and Damascus.The mission of translating The Holy Quran had preoccupied Pickthalls mind since his conversion to Islam.He saw that there was an obligation for all Muslims to know The Holy Quran intimately.
After he had completed his task he proceeded to Egypt to secure the seal of The Most Learned Authority, The Ulema of AL-AZHAR..to whom the mantle of Authority had passed after the Caliphate.
Here I quote verbatim and have drawn this extract from Tauheed-Sunnat.
“The battle was won when Pickthall addressed, in Arabic, a large gathering of the Ulema, including Rashid Rida,* explaining the current situation of Islam in the world, and the enormous possibilities for the spread of Islam among the English-speaking people. He won the argument entirely. The wiser heads of al-Azhar, recognizing their inability to understand the situation of English speakers and the subtle urgencies of daâwa, accepted his translation. The former Shaykh al-Azhar, Al-Maraghi, who could see his sincerity and his erudition, offered him these parting words: If you feel so strongly convinced that you are right, go on in God’s name in the way that is clear to you, and pay no heed to what any of us .
Here I would add that Rashid Rida too was not against translating The Quran for propagating Islam but was critical of having a substitute for the original.”
*
Rashid Rida was a
Syro-Egyptian Islamic thinker and reformer.
Pickthall completed his work and “The MEANING OF THE GLORIOUS QURAN” was published in 1930.He always maintained that the word of ALLAH (SWT) could not be translated. Now he set himself to edit the translation with corresponding Arabic text (Mushaf which actually denotes the Written Form of that particular revelation).and thus the bi-lingual was published .
Attached please see an image of his work, first published in 2 volumes by The Government Press in Hyderabad and priced at RS 48-0-0.His is the only translation to be re-translated into Portugese, Turkish and Tagalog, a language spoken by The Moro Muslims of Southern Phillipines.
‘The translation duly appeared,in 1930,and was hailed by the Times Literary Supplement as a “GREAT LITERARY ACHIEVEMENT”.It was recognized as the best translation ever of The Holy Quran,and,indeed, as a monument in the history of translation.(‘ The British Muslim”)
Pickthalls is the first translation by a Muslim whose native tongue was English and remains to date among the two most popular translations, the other being by Abdullah Yousuf Ali.(b 14.4.1872 d 10.12.1953 aged 81) the son of a Dawoodi Bhora father from the city of diamonds, Surat in Gujrat.
Abdullah Yousuf Ali was proficient in both Arabic and English.
Pickthalls work is of international repute and is being continuously printed since its first publication.
“In 1935 Pickthall left Hyderabad . He handed over Islamic Culture to the new editor, the Galician convert Muhammad Asad. He then returned to England , where he set up a new society for Islamic work, and delivered a series of lectures.”
He died in a cottage in the West Country on 19 May 1936 of coronary thrombosis..(The British Muslim)
The Muslim graveyard at Brookwood, Surrey near Woking is the final resting place of leading Muslims including Abdullah Quilliam, the Sheik- ul- Islam of the British Isles who died in 1932, Pickthall in 1936, followed 16 years later in 1952 by the other translator, Abdullah Yousuf Ali who had died in London while there on a visit and after yet another 54 years later by The late Princess of Berar, Princess Durresevar of Hyderabad who passed away in London aged 92 years in 2006.Princess Durreshevars mother also lies buried here.
I will elucidate why I have mentioned the name of the elder daughter- in-law of HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan, Asaf Jah VII while I write about Pickthall.
“HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan, Asaf Jah VII asked Pickthall to use his good offices with the Caliph to arrange the marriage of his Heir Apparent with Princess Durreshevar, the daughter of the last Caliph Abdul Mecid II.
At that time the Ottoman exiles lived in France and HEH Nawab Mir Osman Ali Khan,Asaf Jah VII of Hyderabad gave the family a pension of GBP 4000 Annually.Pickthalls influence with the Caliph, his knowledge of Ottoman and Moghal protocol allowed him to not only bring off this brilliant match but he also arranged the marriage of the Heir Presumptive with Princess Nilofer, a cousin of Princess Durreshevar.These twin marriages of Azam Jah Bahadur and Moazzam Jah Bahadur were solemnized personally by Abdul Mecid II, in Nice, France in 1931.
Pickthalls intent in helping arrange these marriages was very clear.He wanted the Caliphate to continue in Hyderabad.He regarded the Caliphate as still by right vested in the House Of Osman {the administrative structure of the Ottoman Dynasty-OSMANLI HANEDANI } might now pass on to a Hyderabad Prince yet to be born who would use the Wealth of India and the Holiness of the Caliphate to initiate a new dawn of independence and success for Islam.
Hyderabad would well have been the Centre of Islamic Authority but Delhis decision to absorb HEH The Nizams Dominions with independent India made it impossible.Regardless the Princesses who arrived in Hyderabad devoted their lives in good work.
( added glamour to the Hyderabadi social life, enhanced the position of women and chaired various committees for their welfare and well-being.They also attended public functions,receptions and in one picture Princess Durreshevar is seen standing next to the Ala Hazarath when he took the Salute at his annual SALGIRA parade from THE GRAND STAND in Fathe Maidan. The Parade was commanded by the C-in-C of The Hyderabad State Force General HH Azam Jah Waleshan Sahebzada Nawab Mir Himayet Ali Khan Bahadur,Prince Of Berar, GBE .We still have two big functional hospitals and a Junior College for girls in Hyderabad named after them.)
Muriel, wife of Pickthall, in an article entitled ‘A Great English Muslim’published in the Islamic Review XI of 1937 Pages 138-142 , stated that after his death she cleared his desk.He was revising his lectures and she found the last lines that he wrote were from The Holy Quran.
‘Whoever surrendereth his purpose to Allah,while doing good, his reward is with the Lord, and there shall no fear come upon them,neither shall they grieve’….
Pickthall warned against the danger of adoring the book rather than its content but cautioned that the Holy Quran must be given the respect it qualifies for and deserves. In his own words ‘keep the message always in your heart and live by it’.Once speaking at a Milad-ul-Nabi lecture in London held at the Cecil Hotel he described the Holy Quran. He said that ‘The book is like no other book on earth.Explanations of the mystery have been suggested by the skeptical but none explains it.It remains a wonder of the world.’
The eulogy in The Islamic Review summed up the illustrious life of Mohammed Marmaduke Pickthall calling him a SOLDIER OF FAITH and a TRUE SERVANT OF ISLAM..
Captain Bakhtyar S Kaoosji
Kuala Lumpur-Malaysia
02 December 2014.