Ibrahim Riahi, birth name Abou Ishak Ibrahim Ben Abdelkader Riahi (1766

Testour Testour ( ar, تستور ') is a small town located in the north of Tunisia. The town is perched on the hills of Medjerda Valley, south-west of Medjez-el-Bab, the crossroads between Tunis, Béja, and the north of Tunisia. It was known during th ...

– August 7, 1850), was a

Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...

n ambassador, theologian and saint. A Sunni Muslim scholar, he was also a poet. He was the grandfather of

Ali Riahi Ali Fethi Ben Mohamed Ben Brahim Riahi (Arabic:علي الرياحي), (March 30, 1912 Tunis – March 17, 1970), was a Tunisian singer and composer. He is the grandson of Sidi Brahim Riahi . In 1938, Othman Kaak invited Riahi to join the radio ...

Biography

Ibrahim Riahi learned about the group of academics and lawyers from Tunisia, in particular: Hamza Al-Jibas, Saleh Al-Kawash, Muhammad Al-Fassi, Omar Bin Qassem Al-Mahjoub, Hassan Al-Sharif, Ahmed Bou Khurais, Ismail Al-Tamimi, Al-Taher Ben Massoud, and others. Sidi Brahim frequented from a young age a kouttab in

and showed talent for religious sciences and learning the

Quran The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Classical Arabic, Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation in Islam, revelation from God in Islam, ...

. Upon his arrival in

Tunis ''Tounsi'' french: Tunisois , population_note = , population_urban = , population_metro = 2658816 , population_density_km2 = , timezone1 = CET , utc_offset1 ...

, around 1782, he studied at the Haouanet Achour madrassah and then at the Bir Lahjar madrassah. Around 1790, he began teaching at Zitouna University where the future ministers Ibn Abi Dhiaf and Béji Messaoudi as well as the greatest theologians of the time, such as Mohamed Bayram IV and Mahmoud Kabadou, were among his students. In 1801, he was part of an embassy in

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...

, where he stayed for several months; there he discovered the Sufi tariqa of the Tijaniyya and introduced it to Tunisia on his return.

Sidi Brahim Riahi Mausoleum

Sidi Brahim is buried with some of his sons, sheikhs and theologians like him, in his mausoleum in the Sidi Brahim Riahi street in the medina of Tunis named Sidi Brahim Riahi Mausoleum.

References

1766 births 1850 deaths People from Béja Governorate Tunisian Muslim theologians Tunisian diplomats Tunisian Sunni Muslims 18th-century Muslim theologians 19th-century Muslim theologians 19th-century diplomats Academic staff of the University of Ez-Zitouna {{Tunisia-bio-stub