Inayat Khan Rehmat Khan ( ur, ; 5 July 1882 – 5 February 1927) was an Indian professor of
musicology
Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some mu ...
, singer, exponent of the
saraswati vina, poet, philosopher, and pioneer of the transmission of
Sufism
Sufism ( ar, ''aṣ-ṣūfiyya''), also known as Tasawwuf ( ''at-taṣawwuf''), is a mystic body of religious practice, found mainly within Sunni Islam but also within Shia Islam, which is characterized by a focus on Islamic spirituality, r ...
to the West. At the urging of his students, and on the basis of his ancestral Sufi tradition and four-fold training and authorization at the hands of Sayyid Abu Hashim Madani (d. 1907) of
Hyderabad
Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...
, he established an order of Sufism (the Sufi Order) in London in 1914. By the time of his death in 1927, centers had been established throughout Europe and North America, and multiple volumes of his teachings had been published.
Early life
Inayat Khan was born in
Baroda
Vadodara (), also known as Baroda, is the second largest city in the Indian state of Gujarat. It serves as the administrative headquarters of the Vadodara district and is situated on the banks of the Vishwamitri River, from the state capital ...
to a noble
Mughal
Mughal or Moghul may refer to:
Related to the Mughal Empire
* Mughal Empire of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries
* Mughal dynasty
* Mughal emperors
* Mughal people, a social group of Central and South Asia
* Mughal architecture
* Mug ...
family. His paternal ancestors, comprising yüzkhans (Central Asian lords) and bakshys (shamans), were
Turkmen
Turkmen, Türkmen, Turkoman, or Turkman may refer to:
Peoples Historical ethnonym
* Turkoman (ethnonym), ethnonym used for the Oghuz Turks during the Middle Ages
Ethnic groups
* Turkmen in Anatolia and the Levant (Seljuk and Ottoman-Turkish desc ...
from the
Chagatai Khanate who settled in
Sialkot,
Punjab
Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
during the reign of Amir
Timur
Timur ; chg, ''Aqsaq Temür'', 'Timur the Lame') or as ''Sahib-i-Qiran'' ( 'Lord of the Auspicious Conjunction'), his epithet. ( chg, ''Temür'', 'Iron'; 9 April 133617–19 February 1405), later Timūr Gurkānī ( chg, ''Temür Kür ...
. Inayat Khan's maternal grandfather, Sangit Ratna Maulabakhsh Sholay Khan, was a Hindustani classical musician and educator known as “the Beethoven of India.” His maternal grandmother, Qasim Bibi, was from the royal house of
Tipu Sultan
Tipu Sultan (born Sultan Fateh Ali Sahab Tipu, 1 December 1751 – 4 May 1799), also known as the Tiger of Mysore, was the ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore based in South India. He was a pioneer of rocket artillery.Dalrymple, p. 243 He int ...
of Mysore.
Sufism
Inayat Khan's Sufi sources included both the traditions of his paternal ancestors (remembered as the Mahashaikhan) and the tutelage he received from Sayyid Abu Hashim Madani.
From the latter he inherited four transmissions, constituting succession in the
Chishti,
Suhrawardi,
Qadiri, and
Naqshbandi
The Naqshbandi ( fa, نقشبندی)), Neqshebendi ( ku, نهقشهبهندی), and Nakşibendi (in Turkish) is a major Sunni order of Sufism. Its name is derived from Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari. Naqshbandi masters trace their ...
orders of
Sufism
Sufism ( ar, ''aṣ-ṣūfiyya''), also known as Tasawwuf ( ''at-taṣawwuf''), is a mystic body of religious practice, found mainly within Sunni Islam but also within Shia Islam, which is characterized by a focus on Islamic spirituality, r ...
. Of these, the Chishti lineage, traced through the Delhi-based legacy of
Shah Kalim Allah Jahanabadi
Khwaja Shāh Kalīm Allāh Jahānābādī (شاه كليم الله جهانابادي) b. Nūr Allāh b. Aḥmad al-Miʿmār al-Ṣiddīqī (1650-1729) was a leading Chistī saint of the late Mughal period and is considered to be instrumental i ...
, was primary.
Travels
Inayat Khan toured the United States with his brother
Maheboob Khan
Shaikh-ul-Mashaik Pyaromir Maheboob Khan (1887–1948) was born in Baroda, India. An Indian classical musician and younger brother of Inayat Khan, he became the representative of the International Sufi Movement on the latter's death in 1927.
...
and cousin
Mohammed Ali Khan between the years 1910 and 1912. Further travels took him to England, France, and Russia. During the First World War, living in London, he oversaw the founding of an order of Sufism under his guidance. Following the war he traveled widely, and numerous Sufi centers sprang up in his wake in Europe and the U.S. He ultimately settled in
Suresnes,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, at the house and
khanqah
A khanqah ( fa, خانقاه) or khangah ( fa, خانگاه; also transliterated as ''khankah'', ''khaneqa'', ''khanegah'' or ''khaneqah''; also Arabized ''hanegah'', ''hanikah'', ''hanekah'', ''khankan''), also known as a ribat (), is a buildin ...
(Sufi lodge) known as Fazal Manzil.
Teaching
Inayat Khan's teaching emphasized the oneness of God (
tawhid
Tawhid ( ar, , ', meaning "unification of God in Islam ( Allāh)"; also romanized as ''Tawheed'', ''Tawhid'', ''Tauheed'' or ''Tevhid'') is the indivisible oneness concept of monotheism in Islam. Tawhid is the religion's central and single ...
) and the underlying harmony of the revelations communicated by the
prophets of all the world's great
religions
Religion is usually defined as a social-cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, tran ...
. His discourses treated such varied subjects as religion, art, music, ethics, philosophy, psychology, and health and healing. The primary concern of Inayat Khan's teaching was the mystical pursuit of God-realization. To this end he established an Inner School comprising four stages of contemplative study based on the traditional Sufi disciplines of ''mujahada'', ''muraqaba'', ''mushahada'', and ''mu‘ayyana'', which he rendered in English as concentration, contemplation, meditation, and realization.
Foundational principles
Ten principles, known as the Ten Sufi Thoughts, enunciate the universal spiritual values that are foundational to Inayat Khan's mystical philosophy.
# There is One God, the Eternal, the Only Being; none exists save God.
# There is One Master, the Guiding Spirit of all Souls, Who constantly leads followers towards the light.
# There is One Holy Book, the sacred manuscript of nature, the only scripture which can enlighten the reader.
# There is One Religion, the unswerving progress in the right direction towards the ideal, which fulfills the life's purpose of every soul.
# There is One Law, the law of reciprocity, which can be observed by a selfless conscience together with a sense of awakened justice.
# There is One Brotherhood and Sisterhood, the human brotherhood and sisterhood, which unites the children of earth indiscriminately in the Parenthood of God.
# There is One Moral, the love which springs forth from self-denial, and blooms in deeds of beneficence.
# There is One Object of Praise, the beauty which uplifts the heart of its worshippers through all aspects from the seen to the unseen.
# There is One Truth, the true knowledge of our being, within and without, which is the essence of all wisdom.
# There is One Path, the annihilation of the false ego in the real, which raises the mortal to immortality, and in which resides all perfection.
Family and personal life
In New York, he met the woman who would become his wife, Ora Ray
Ameena Begum née Baker. They had four children:
Vilayat Inayat Khan
Vilayat Inayat Khan (19 June 1916 17 June 2004) was a teacher of meditation and of the traditions of the East Indian Chishti Sufi order of Sufism. His teaching derived from the tradition of his father, Inayat Khan, founder of The Sufi Order ...
,
Hidayat Inayat Khan
Hidayat Inayat Khan ( ur, ; 6 August 1917 – 12 September 2016) was a British-French classical composer, conductor and Representative-General of the Inayati Order.
Biography
Hidayat was born in London to Sufi Master Inayat Khan and Pirani Ame ...
,
Noor Inayat Khan
Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan, GC (1 January 1914 – 13 September 1944), also known as Nora Inayat-Khan and Nora Baker, was a British resistance agent in France in World War II who served in the Special Operations Executive (SOE). The purpose of S ...
, and Khair-un-Nisa Inayat Khan.
Death and legacy
In 1926 Inayat Khan returned to India; he died in Delhi on 5 February 1927. He is buried in the Inayat Khan
dargah in Nizamuddin, Delhi. The dargah is open to the public and hosts
qawwali sessions.
Bibliography
Musicological works
*Balasan Gitmala
*Sayaji Garbawali
*Inayat Git Ratnawali
*Inayat Harmonium Shikshak
*Inayat Fidal Shikshak
*Minqar-i Musiqar
Sufi works
*1914 ''A Sufi Message of Spiritual Liberty''
*1915 ''The Confessions of Inayat Khan''
*1918 ''A Sufi Prayer of Invocation''
*''Hindustani Lyrics''
*''Songs of India''
*''The Divan of Inayat Khan''
*''Akibat''
*1919 ''Love, Human and Divine''
*''The Phenomenon of the Soul''
*''Pearls from the Ocean Unseen''
*1921 ''In an Eastern Rosegarden''
*1922 ''The Way of Illumination''
*''The Message''
*1923 ''The Inner Life''
*''The Mysticism of Sound''
*''Notes from the Unstruck Music from the Gayan Manuscript''
*''The Alchemy of Happiness''
*1924 ''The Soul—Whence and Whither''
*1926 ''The Divine Symphony, or Vadan''
Posthumous Sufi works
*1927 ''Nirtan, or The Dance of the Soul''
*''The Purpose of Life''
*1928 ''The Unity of Religious Ideals''
*1931 ''Health''
*''Character Building; The Art of Personality''
*1934 ''Education''
*1935 ''The Mind World''
*''Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow''
*1936 ''The Bowl of Saki''
*''The Solution of the Problem of the Day''
*1937 ''Cosmic Language''
*''Moral Culture''
*1938 ''Rassa Shastra: The Science of Life's Creative Forces''
*1939 ''Three Plays''
*''Metaphysics: The Experience of the Soul in Different Planes of Existence''
*1980 ''Nature Meditations''
Collected works
*1960–1967 ''The Sufi Message of Hazrat Inayat Khan'', 12 volumes
*1988– ''Complete Works of Pir-o-Murshid Hazrat Inayat Khan'': Original Texts, 12 volumes (to date)
*2016– ''The Sufi Message of Hazrat Inayat Khan'': Centennial Edition, 4 volumes (to date)
See also
*
Inayati Order
The Inayati Order (Inayatiyya), is an international organization dedicated to spreading the Sufi teachings of Inayat Khan, a musician and mystic who first introduced Sufism to the modern Western world in 1910. The Inayati Order operates internat ...
*
Vilayat Inayat Khan
Vilayat Inayat Khan (19 June 1916 17 June 2004) was a teacher of meditation and of the traditions of the East Indian Chishti Sufi order of Sufism. His teaching derived from the tradition of his father, Inayat Khan, founder of The Sufi Order ...
(son)
*
Western Sufism
Western Sufism, sometimes identified with Universal Sufism, Neo-Sufism, and Global Sufism, consists of a spectrum of Western European and North American manifestations and adaptations of Sufism, the mystical dimension of Islam.
Sufism flourish ...
*
Zia Inayat Khan (grandson, current president of the
Inayati Order
The Inayati Order (Inayatiyya), is an international organization dedicated to spreading the Sufi teachings of Inayat Khan, a musician and mystic who first introduced Sufism to the modern Western world in 1910. The Inayati Order operates internat ...
)
References
External links
*
*
*
Hazrat Inayat Khan: A Sufi maestro in Moscow
{{DEFAULTSORT:Khan, Inayat
1882 births
1927 deaths
Chishtis
Indian Sufis
Gujarati people
Founders of new religious movements
Sufi mystics
Sufi psychology
Universalists
Ināyati Sufis
Indian music
People from Vadodara
Indian emigrants to France