Pirani Ameena Begum ( Hindustani: / ; born Ora Ray Baker; 8 May 1892 – 1 May 1949) was the wife of Sufi Master

Inayat Khan Inayat Khan Rehmat Khan ( ur, ) (5 July 1882 – 5 February 1927) was an Indian professor of musicology, singer, exponent of the saraswati vina, poet, philosopher, and pioneer of the transmission of Sufism to the West. At the urging of his ...

and the mother of their four children: World War II SOE agent Noor-un-Nisa (1914-1944),

Vilayat A vilayet ( ota, , "province"), also known by various other names, was a first-order administrative division of the later Ottoman Empire. It was introduced in the Vilayet Law of 21 January 1867, part of the Tanzimat reform movement initiated b ...

(1916-2004),

Hidayat Hidayat is a given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include: *Ignatius Hidayat Allah (d. 1639/1640), Syriac Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch *Hidayat Amin Arsala (born 1942), economist and a prominent politician in Afghanistan *Shahza ...

(1917-2016) and Khair-un-Nisa (Claire) (1919-2011).

Life

Baker first met Khan in New York in 1911 when her half-brother and guardian, Pierre Bernard, engaged the master musician and mystic to teach his ward Indian music. However, he forbade the marriage and Khan sailed for London. Baker found his Indian home address among Bernard's papers when cleaning his desk; the letter was forwarded and she sailed for England alone. They married in 1913 in London, at which point she took the name "Ameena Begum". After living in London and then Paris, they traveled to Moscow, where she gave birth to Noor (January 1, 1914) the new family returned to Paris in July. World War I started in August and they left for England where they remained for the duration of the war. She left a collection of 101 poems, "A Rosary of one hundred and one beads". Some poems were lost during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, but 54 have been preserved and were published in 1998. She was a cousin of

Mary Baker Eddy Mary Baker Eddy (July 16, 1821 – December 3, 1910) was an American religious leader and author who founded The Church of Christ, Scientist, in New England in 1879. She also founded ''The Christian Science Monitor'', a Pulitzer Prize-winning s ...

, founder of the

Christian Science Church The Church of Christ, Scientist was founded in 1879 in Boston, Massachusetts, by Mary Baker Eddy, author of '' Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,'' and founder of Christian Science. The church was founded "to commemorate the word and ...

in the USA.

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 ...

wrote: "In 1926, Hazrat Inayat Khan gave my Mother an exceptional initiation as " Pirani", which was only to be given to her. That special initiation was not to be given to any one else in the Sufi Movement, either in the present or in the future". Hazrat Inayat Khan said in his Autobiography that without Ameena Begum's help he would never have been able to bring his Sufi Message to the Western world.The Biography of Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan. London/The Hague: East-West Publications, 1979 (in "Personal account" pp. 115-118)

Articles and poetry

*''A Mother's Revelation'', by Amina Begum Inayat Khan. "The Sufi" magazine No. 1 Vol. I, Febr. 1915 *''Women's Seclusion in the East'', by Amina Begum Inayat Khan. "The Sufi" magazine No. 3 Vol. I, Sept. 1915 *''The children of today'', by Amina Begum Inayat Khan. "The Sufi" magazine May. 1917 *''Poems from Thy Rosary of a Hundred Beads'', a collection of poems written by 'Sharda, Pirani Ameena Begum Ora-Ray Inayat Khan'. "Caravanseari" magazine (Canada) November 1988 pp. 31–3

*''Poems from Thy Rosary of a Hundred Beads'' by 'Sharda, Pirani Ameena Begum Ora-Ray Inayat Khan'. Published in book of Hidayat Inayat Khan "Once upon a time..." Groningen (Netherlands) 1998 pp. 53–87 *''Rosary of a Hundred Beads 'Sharda' to 'Daya'' by Pirani Ameena Begum Ora Ray Baker. Published by Petama books (Zurich) , paperback, 64 p.

References

Sources

* Johan Witteveen, HJ Witteveen. ''Universal Sufism''. Publisher: Element Books Ltd (September 1997); , pp. 36–37 * ''Russo-Indian Relations in 1900-1917''. A Selection of Documents. (in Russian). Moscow: The Oriental Literature (Russian Academy of Science). 1999; * ''Spy Princess: The Life of Noor Inayat Khan''. Shrabani Basu. Publisher: Omega Publications, Inc.; 1st edition (1 August 2007); * ''Encyclopedia of Hinduism'' / Constance A. Jones and James D. Ryan. 2007 Facts On File, Inc. New York (pp. 70–71)

External links

bbc.co.uk/timewatch "Noor Inayat Khan: Life of a Spy Princess"
bbc.co.uk; accessed 24 September 2016. {{DEFAULTSORT:Begum, Ameena 1892 births 1949 deaths American Sufis American Universalists Sufi poets Ināyati Sufis 20th-century American poets American emigrants to England American emigrants to France American women poets 20th-century American women writers