AbduAllah Yusufali

Salaams, sorry for posting this message a little late, but I was waiting for DB net to open. This message is pretty interesting, and thanks again to Shk. Mustafa Abdulhussein for providing a brief glimpse of A. Yusuf Ali.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 10:58:55 +0100
From: Mustafa Abdulhussein 
To: Hudaifa Kapadia 
Subject: Re: The miraculous Qur'an

>I have a question regarding  AbduAllah Yusufali, was he Bohra?
>If so, is he still alive?  Could you tell me all that you know about this
>man, who translated the Qur'an?  I have heard many times that he was
>SHi3a and even Dawoodi Bohra...are these statements true??

Sorry for the delay in responding. Things have been hectic recently. I had
forgotten about this message and uncovered it when cleaning my in-box. Here
is what I know. You may post this to DB if you feel there is interest
for it.

Abdullah Yusufali was the son of Yusuf Ali Allabaksh, also known as Khan
Bahadur. This was a Dawoodi Bohra family, though I am not yet certain
whether they were practicing mu`mineen. Allabaksh had a civil service post
in the Surat Municipality and in his obituary, the name "Shaikh Yusuf Ali
Shujauddin" was used, a title which MAY have come from the Dawat. However,
the father, who apparantly spoke and taught Arabic, sent Abdullah Yusufali
to Anjuman-e-Islam, a modernist Islamic seminary, from an early age,
indicating that he had little affinity with us, even if he was a practising
Bohra.

Abdullah Yusuf Ali was never a Bohra because it is unlikely that he ever
gave mithaq. He has eulogised Abu Bakr in his translation of the Qur'an and
accepted the Sunni interpretations of some verses, such as the one with
"Siddiq", so he must have shunned his Shia background. However, I cannot see
Wahabism his writing and he does not appear to have written anything against
the Dawat. He seems to have completely ignored his Dawoodi Bohra roots.

He spent most of his life in the Western education system and was
sufficiently well versed in western literature to produce a translation that
is strongly focused on a western readership. Most scholars regard his
translation as highly apologetic and consider him to be among Islamicists
who, perhaps unwittingly, did more damage to the cause of Islam than
furthering it. Having said that, his translation is also widely acknowledged
as a classic work of scholarship.

He died in London in 1953, a poor man, wretchedly uncared for. I am not sure
how and why a man of lofty connections, who was at one time a man of good
means ended up like that.

Request du`a in Ashara.

Mustafa