Khwaja Muhammad Latif Ansari

Hujjat al-Islam Professor Khwaja Muhammad Latif Ansari (1887-1979), alternatively spelled Muḥammad Latīf Anṣārī, was a 20th-century Shia Muslim scholar, poet, historian, and cleric from Pakistan.

Ansari was born in British India, but migrated to the newly formed Pakistan immediately after it achieved independence. In Pakistan, he took up residence in the city of Wazirabad. He spent much of his life in Kenya, where he is remembered to this day by the Shia community for bringing active and organized Shi'ism to the country. Ansari spent the last ten years of his life partially paralysed. Although he was a prolific author, many of his books were not published.

Years in Pakistan

Ansari was a member of the Shi'i scholarly community, both in the years leading up to Partition in British India and over the first decade of Pakistani independence. He served as the Secretary-General of the Punjab Shia Conference (PuSC) under British rule in the 1940s, struggling against the passivity of the organization and its inability to extract annual membership dues and regularly publish its weekly journal, ''Razâkâr.'' Migrating to Wazirabad after Partition in 1947, Ansari was elected as the first Secretary-General of the All-Pakistan Shia Conference (APSC) in a lively contest.

Ansari was intensely concerned with the state of Shi'i ''tabligh'' in these years, writing and speaking extensively on what this phenomenon's implications for the future of the Shi'ism would be. In one article from March 1956, he contends the following:

Migration to Kenya

Ansari left South Asia for Kenya in the 1950s, fulfilling his dream of preaching to distant, foreign Shi'i communities that he mentions in the above quote. He was already a reputed cleric by that time, but nevertheless joined a number of scholars coming from South Asia into the relatively unheard of Shia community of Kenya. After becoming a resident alim there, Ansari helped the community to become large and prosperous as it is today. He is remembered to this day in the country for an address he delivered at the Arusha Conference in December 1958, in which he emphasized the need for tabligh. A large amount of his efforts were focused on the Khoja community.

Legacy

Scholars in Canada, United States, Iran, Pakistan, and Kenya, among other places, have used his works as source material.

Publications

Most of his writings are in Urdu