Muhammad Ilyas Kandhalvi - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

Muhammad Ilyas was born in 1885 in his maternal grandmother's house in the town of Kandhla in Uttar Pradesh, India. His childhood was spent partly in the city of Nizamuddin, where his father, Muhammad Ismail, was an imam and religious teacher, and partly with with his maternal grandmother's family in Kandhla. Like all other children in the family, Ilyas began his education in the maktab. There he memorized one and a quarter ajza' of the Qur'an. He completed memorizing the Qur'an under his father. The learning of the Qur'an was so common in the family that in the one-and-a-half rows of worshippers in the family mosque, there was not a single non-Hafiz except the muezzin. Thereafter, he studied the elementary books of Arabic and Persian language mostly under his father. Some of his studies were under Muhammad Abrar, a doctor in Nizamuddin.

In his youth, Ilyas was known for his piety. Ilyas's mother, Bi Safiya, used to say to him, "Ilyas, I feel the aroma of the holy Companions in you," referring to the companions of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. Sometimes, placing her hand on his back, she would say, "How is it that I see figures resembling the holy companions moving along with you?" The Islamic scholar Mehmud Hasan remarked, "when I see Mohammad Ilyas, I am reminded of the holy companions." Eagerness and enthusiasm for faith were ingrained in Ilyas's nature.

At Nizamuddin, Ilyas's further education was being neglected due to the over-fondness and busy schedule of his father and Ilyas's own excessive occupation with prayers. Therefore, Ilyas's brother, Muhammad Yahya, requested that his father allow Ilyas to come with him to Gangoh, where Yahya lived with and studied under Rashid Ahmad Gangohi. Their father agreed, and Ilyas came to Gangoh in 1896 or early 1897, where Mohammad Yahya began to teach him regularly.

At the time Gangoh was a base of many Islamic scholars and Sufis. Muhammad Yahya wanted Ilyas to benefit from this spiritual environment. Often, when scholars that were former students or disciples of Gangohi would visit Gangoh, Muhammad Yahya would stop his lessons and instruct Ilyas to sit and listen to their conversation instead.

In Gangoh, Ilyas benefited from the company of Rashid Ahmad Gangohi as well. He requested to give bay`ah (an oath of allegiance to a Sufi teacher) at the hand of Gangohi. Although Gangohi did not usually take bay`ah from children and students, he made an exception due to the exceptional merit of Ilyas. Ilyas developed a strong attachment to Gangohi, who had great affection for Ilyas as well.

At one point, Ilyas's studies had to be suspended due to severe illness. He was anxious to begin studying again, but, due to his health, was not allowed. Eventually he succeeded in returning to his studies.

In 1905, the death of Rashid Ahmad Gangohi occurred, when Ilyas was 20. Ilyas was at Gangohi's bedside at the time, reciting Surat Ya Sin. The death of Gangohi greatly affected him. He said, "Two shocks have been most painful to me. One was of the death of my father, and the other, of the death of Maulana Rasheed Ahmad Gangohi."

After, the death of Gangohi, Ilyas generally remained silent and spent most of his time in meditation. Muhammad Zakariya Kandhalvi said, "We studied elementary Persian from him those days. His practice, then, was that he sat cross legged, and in utter silence, on a coarse mat behind the tomb of Shah Abdul Quddus. We presented ourselves for the lesson, opened the book, and placed it before him, indicating with the finger where we were to begin from on that day. We would read aloud and translate the Persian verses. When we made a mistake, he would shut the book with a movement of the finger, and the lesson came to an end. It meant that we were to go back, prepare the lesson thoroughly, and, then, come again ... He used to offer nafl prayers much and often at that time. From maghrib till a little before isha', he devoted himself exclusively to nafl prayers. His age, then, was between 20 and 25 years."

In 1908, Ilyas enrolled in Darul Uloom Deoband. There he studied the Qur'an, hadith, Islamic jurisprudence, and other Islamic subjects under notable Deobandi scholars, including Ashraf Ali Thanwi, Shah Abdur Rahim Raipuri, and Mahmudu'l-Hasan Deobandi. He studied the hadith collections Sahih al-Bukhari and Jami`at-Tirmidhi under Mahmudu'l-Hasan, on whose hand Ilyas took an oath of jihad against the British. Mahmudu'l-Hasan also advised Ilyas to approach Khalil Ahmad Saharanpuri, a disciple of Rashid Ahmad Gangohi, for bay`ah since Gangohi had died. Thus, under Saharanpuri’s supervision, Ilyas would complete the various stages of sulook in Saharanpur.