The woman of both worlds

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Sadia Dehlvi [1]

In the year 816 AD, the people of Egypt were in great distress. They feared a famine would come about, for the Nile did not flood as it did each year. Helpless, the people went to seek Sayyida Nafisa’s intercession with God for mercy. The pious woman gave them her veil and asked the people to cast it in the flowing waters of the Nile. The Egyptians acted on her advice and soon the waters rose to the desired heights.

Born in Mecca, Sayyida Nafisa’s great-grandfather was Imam Hasan, the revered grandson of Prophet Mohammad. Her father held the position of the governor of Medina. Nafisa memorised the Quran and studied Islamic jurisprudence in great detail. She married Isaq, the son of Imam Jafar-al-Siddiq who founded the Jafari School of Islamic Jurisprudence, and migrated with him to Egypt. Nafisa offered the mandatory prayers behind her father in the Prophet’s mosque, often going inside the sacred chamber containing Prophet Mohammad’s tomb.
Once her father addressed the Prophet, “Ya rasul Allah, O Beloved Prophet of Allah! I am pleased with my daughter Nafisa.” One day the Prophet appeared to Nafisa’s father in a dream saying, “Ya Hasan! I am pleased with your daughter and because you are pleased with her, Allah is pleased with her.” Nafisa gained a reputation for leading an ascetic life, one of piety and scholarly knowledge of Islam.
Many religious scholars, including Imam Shafai, who founded one of the four major schools of Islamic jurisprudence, attended Nafisa’s discourses and discussed matters of religious law with her. Before Imam Shafai died in 820 AD, he had requested that Nafisa perform the funeral prayers for him. His body was taken to her house, for her constant fasting had rendered her too weak to travel. Other famous Sufi scholars among Nafisa’s students include Imam Uthman, Dhunun Misri and Imam Abu Bakr Adfawi and Abul Hasan who wrote volumes on the grammar of the Quran.
Nafisa prepared her own grave in her house by reciting the Quran 6,000 times inside it. She used to pray all her supererogatory prayers inside the grave. On her deathbed too, she was fasting, and those around her tried to compel her to break the fast. Nafisa refused saying that throughout her life she had desired to meet God in a state of fasting. She recited verses from the Quran that assure an abode of peace for those blessed by the Lord.
Nafisa’s husband wished to take her body for burial to Medina but the people of Egypt wept and pleaded that she be buried in Cairo. Eventually, she was buried in the grave she had prepared in her home. The numerous titles bestowed on Nafisa include Nafisat al-‘ilmi wal-Marifa (woman of knowledge), Nafisat-al-Tahira (woman of purity) and Nafisat-al-Darayn (woman of both the worlds).

Sadia Dehlvi is a Delhi-based writer and author of Sufism: The Heart of Islam. She can be contacted at sadiafeedback-@gmail.com