The Nakhawila ( ar, النخاولة) are a community of indigenous Hijazi Twelver

Shia Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, mos ...

s, typically of low social class, who have traditionally resided in and around the city of

Medina Medina,, ', "the radiant city"; or , ', (), "the city" officially Al Madinah Al Munawwarah (, , Turkish: Medine-i Münevvere) and also commonly simplified as Madīnah or Madinah (, ), is the Holiest sites in Islam, second-holiest city in Islam, ...

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the Ara ...

, numbering around 32,000—although no official or certain figures are available.

Etymology

The origin of the name ''Nakhawila'' (singular: ''nakhwali'') is unclear; however, it is most likely derived from the

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

word ''nakhl'', ''nakhla'' or ''nakhil'' (date palm) because the Nakhawila community is said to have worked in the palm groves around Medina. The word is believed to have been first used during the Ottoman rule of

Hejaz The Hejaz (, also ; ar, ٱلْحِجَاز, al-Ḥijāz, lit=the Barrier, ) is a region in the west of Saudi Arabia. It includes the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif, and Baljurashi. It is also known as the "Western Prov ...

and was first recorded by

Abu Salim al-Ayyashi Abu Salim 'Abd Allah ibn Mohammed ibn Abu Bakr al-'Ayyashi () (May 4, 1628December 13 or 18, 1679) was a well-known travel writer, poet, lawyer, and Sufi scholar from Morocco. Biography Abu Salim al-'Ayyashi was born on 4 May 1628 in the Berbe ...

during his 1662-63 stay in Medina. In modern

the Nakhawila are officially known as ''al-nakhliyūn'' or ''al-nakhliya'' (singular: ''nakhli).

Origins

The origin of the Nakhawila is unclear. Most members of the Nakhawila community claim descent from native Medinan Arab tribes such as the

Khazraj The Banu Khazraj ( ar, بنو خزرج) is a large Arab tribe based in Medina. They were also in Medina during Muhammad's era. The Banu Khazraj are a South Arabian tribe that were pressured out of South Arabia in the Karib'il Watar 7th cent ...

Hashemites The Hashemites ( ar, الهاشميون, al-Hāshimīyūn), also House of Hashim, are the royal family of Jordan, which they have ruled since 1921, and were the royal family of the kingdoms of Hejaz (1916–1925), Syria (1920), and Iraq (1921� ...

, while others are claimed to be descended from black African slaves said to have been freed by

Hasan ibn Ali Hasan ibn Ali ( ar, الحسن بن علي, translit=Al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī; ) was a prominent early Islamic figure. He was the eldest son of Ali and Fatima and a grandson of the Prophets and messengers in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad. He ...

and ordered to work on his farms. Other beliefs include that they are the descendants of African slaves, that they came from

eastern Arabia Eastern Arabia, historically known as al-Baḥrayn ( ar, البحرين) until the 18th century, is a region stretched from Basra to Khasab along the Persian Gulf coast and included parts of modern-day Bahrain, Kuwait, Eastern Saudi Arabia, Unite ...

, Iran or are from among the remnants of the Shiites of post-

Fatimid The Fatimid Caliphate was an Ismaili Shi'a caliphate extant from the tenth to the twelfth centuries AD. Spanning a large area of North Africa, it ranged from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Red Sea in the east. The Fatimids, a dyna ...

Egypt.

History

Historically, they have engaged in cultivating palm trees and other menial work. The Nakhawila were prohibited from living within the city walls of Medina and were not allowed to pray in

Al-Masjid an-Nabawi Al-Masjid an-Nabawi (), known in English as the Prophet's Mosque, is a mosque built by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the city of Medina in the Al Madinah Province of Saudi Arabia. It was the second mosque built by Muhammad in Medina, afte ...

or to bury their dead in

Al-Baqi' ''Jannat al-Baqīʿ'' ( ar, ٱلْبَقِيْع, "The Baqi'") is the oldest and the first Islamic cemetery of Medina in the Hejazi region of present-day Saudi Arabia. It is located to the southeast of the Prophet's Mosque, which contains the gr ...

cemetery. This was due to the popular

Sunni Sunni Islam () is the largest branch of Islam, followed by 85–90% of the world's Muslims. Its name comes from the word '' Sunnah'', referring to the tradition of Muhammad. The differences between Sunni and Shia Muslims arose from a dis ...

belief that the Nakhawila would pollute these places. They were also prohibited by the

Ottomans The Ottoman Turks ( tr, Osmanlı Türkleri), were the Turkic founding and sociopolitically the most dominant ethnic group of the Ottoman Empire ( 1299/1302–1922). Reliable information about the early history of Ottoman Turks remains scarce, ...

, and later by the Saudis (following widespread Sunni protests in 1937), from participating in elections. According to

Johann Ludwig Burckhardt Johann Ludwig (also known as John Lewis, Jean Louis) Burckhardt (24 November 1784 – 15 October 1817) was a Swiss traveller, geographer and Orientalist. Burckhardt assumed the alias ''Sheikh Ibrahim Ibn Abdallah'' during his travels in Arabia ...

, the Nakhawila were "despised by the townspeople, because they openly profess heresy, and are moreover of humble degree." Following the fall of Medina during the

Saudi conquest of Hejaz The Saudi conquest of Hejaz or the Second Saudi-Hashemite War, also known as the Hejaz-Nejd War, was a campaign engaged by Saudi Sultan Abdulaziz to take over the Hashemite Kingdom of Hejaz in 1924–25, ending with conquest and incorporation ...

, the Nakhawila demolished the tombs of Al-Baqi' cemetery at the behest of the

Wahhabi Wahhabism ( ar, ٱلْوَهَّابِيَةُ, translit=al-Wahhābiyyah) is a Sunni Islamic revivalist and fundamentalist movement associated with the reformist doctrines of the 18th-century Arabian Islamic scholar, theologian, preacher, an ...

qadi A qāḍī ( ar, قاضي, Qāḍī; otherwise transliterated as qazi, cadi, kadi, or kazi) is the magistrate or judge of a '' sharīʿa'' court, who also exercises extrajudicial functions such as mediation, guardianship over orphans and mino ...

Ibn Bulayhid. During the mid-1970s, the Nakhawila were involved in serious communal disturbances in Medina. For decades, the Nakhawila community in Medina was headed by Sheikh Muhammad Ali al-Amri, a Shia jurist who studied in Najaf under the guide of several notable scholars, up until his death on 24 January 2011. Al-Amri's son Hashim resumed his father's prayer leading position (Imam) at Medina's first Shia mosque, located at his father's farm.

References

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Etymology

Origins

History

References

Further reading