Biography of Shaykh Abul Ashbal Sagheer Ahmad Shaghif.

Shaykh Abul Ashbal Sagheer Ahmed Shaghif was born in 1942 in India in the province of Bihar in the village of “Tolah Sotah” near Chambaran. He started his studies by studying “Qaidah Baghdadi” from an elder of his village Mian Muhammad Isma’eel. Afterwards he joined a Madrasah near his village and studied there for a year. Afterwards he went to Madrasah Islamiyah Mapodah and studied there for 3 years. He studied there the Quran and Urdu books. Then he joined Madrasah Islamiyah near his village and studied there books of Arabic grammar and morphology. Afterwards he went to Delhi and joined the Madrasah “Subul As-Salam” near Phatak Habash Khan and he studied there for 3 years. He joined after Jamiah Rehmaniyah Banaris but could only study there for a year due to familial compulsions.

He went to Calcutta and worked for a year in different places and went afterwards to Mumbai where he worked for Shaykh AbdusSamad Sharfudin in his “Ad-Dar Al-Qaymah”. He worked there for 10 years in doing Tahqiq and Tashih of books. He worked on verifying and proofreading the second half of the 4th volume of “Al-Mu’jam Al-Fihris lil Alfaz An-Nabawi”. He did most of the verification of the first 3 volumes of “Tufatul Ashraf” of Hafiz Mizzi.

He left Mumbai and went to East Pakistan (Bangladesh) and due to the riots in 1971, he moved to Karachi. He went for a year to teach in Faisalabad in the Madrasah “Jamiyah Taleemat Islamiyah” of Hakeem AbdurRaheem Ashraf and returned afterwars to Karachi. With other scholars, he verified Shuruh Tirmizi. He taught for a year in Karachi in Daar Al-Hadith Rehmaniyah (Soljar Bazar). In 1976 he went for Umrah and obtained on his way back a work visa from Jamiayh Al-Malak AbdulAziz (Jeddah).

Then in 1977 he went to Saudia with his family and worked there. After 12 years, upon the request of Shaykh AbdulMajeed Zendani, he joined the branch Hayah Al-Ijaz Al-Ilmi of the Muslim World League (Rabitah Alam Islami) and hence he moved to Makkah.

His teachers

His teachers of Urdu and Persian are: Shaykh Farman Ali, Shaykh Karamat Ali, Shaykh AbdulGhaffar Shams, Hajji Noor Muhammad and Shaykh AbdurRahman. He studied the Quran from Shaykh Farman Ali and completed it with Shaykh AbdulGhaffar Shams and Hajji Noor Muhammad. He learned Qiraat from Qari Saeed Akhtar.

He learned Arabic grammar and morphology from Shaykh Abul Barakat and Shaykh AbdurRasheed Ad-Daakhi Nadwi. He studied the translation of the Quran from Shaykh Abul Barakat and completed it with Shaykh AbdusSamad Bihari.

He studied “Riyadh Salihin” from Shaykh Abul Barakat and “Bulugh Al-Maram” and “Mishkat” from Shaykh AbdusSamad Bihari. Shaykh AbdusSamad Bihari was a student of Shaykh Nazeer Ahmad Amlawi Rehmani.

He studied the Sihhah Sittah and Tafsir of the Quran from 3 of the students of Shaykh Abul Qasim Banaris: Shaykh AbdurRahman, Shaykh Abdullah, Shaykh Muhammad Akram. And the scholars he benefited the most in Tafsir and Hadith are Shaykh AbdurRasheed Ad-Daakhi Nadwi and Shaykh Muhammad Manzoor Al-Haqq Rampuri, who was a student of Shaykh AbdulWahab Dehlwi.

His writings:

1) “The Madhab of Ahl e Hadith”: His first book written in Urdu, it was published in Hyderabad Deccan.
2) “Tadween Fiqh Hanafi par Ek Taairanah Nazar”: Urdu, it was published in Hyderabad Deccan as well.
3) “Sirat e Mustaqeem or Ikhtilaf Ummat”: Urdu, it was published twice in Pakistan and once in India. Hafiz Salahdin Yusuf introduced it. It is a reply to the book “Ikhtilaf Ummat or Sirat e Mustaqeem” of Shaykh Muhammad Yusuf Ludhianvi.
4) “Taqreeb At-Tahzib Taliq wa Tahqiq”: Verification and notes on this famous book of Hafiz ibn Hajar regarding narrators of Hadith. It was published many times in Riyadh.
5) “Qiyam Al-Layl”: In Arabic, it was published and freely distributed in Kuwait.
6) “Zubdah Ta’jeel Al-Manfa’ah liman yuridu Zawaid Rijaal Al-Aimah Al-Arba’ah”: Arabic, published in Riyadh. A summary of the book “Tajeel Al-Manfa’ah” of Hafiz ibn Hajar with his notes.
7) “Ittihaf Al-Qari bi Baydhat Fath Al-Bari”: Arabic, published in Riyadh.
8) “At-Taliqat Al-Mufidah alal Kutub Al-Adeedah”: Arabic, published in Riyadh.
9) “Al-Mustadrak ala Tuhfatil Ashraf lil Mizzi”: Arabic, published in Riyadh.
10) “Al-Musatdrak ala Kutub Adeedah”: Arabic, published in Riyadh.
11) “Dhiya Al-Qari bi Marifah Rijal Sahih Al-Bukhari”: Arabic, not published.
12) “Qurratul Ayn bi Tarjamah As-Sayid Nazeer Husayn”: Arabic.
13) “Qurratul Ayn Al-Jam’ bayna Rijaal As-Sahihayn”: Arabic, not published.
14) “Talkhis Bulugh Al-Maram”: Arabic, non published.
15) “Maqalat Shaghif”: 47 Urdu epistles written on different topics. Most of these topics are on defence of Hadith and services of scholars of Hadith.
16) “Takhrij At-Taliqat As-Salafiyah ala Sunnan An-Nasai”: Shaykh Abul Ashbal Ahmad Shaghif and Shaykh Ahmad Mujtaba Salafi have both done Takhrij and added notes to “At-Taliqat As-Salafiyah ala Sunnan An-Nasai” of Allamah Muhammad Ataullah Haneef Bhujiyani. This book has been introduced by Shaykh Salih Al-Luhaidan.

To this list of Shaykh Ishaq Bhatti I will add;

17) “Taba’tuna Tuhfatul Ashraf fi Mizan Al-Adl”: A comparison between the publication of AbdusSamad Sharfudin and Bashar Awad.
18) “Tahqiq Risalah fi Jawaz Waqf An-Nuqud”: verification of the book “Waqf An-Nuqud” of Allamah Abu Su’ud Muhammad ibn Muhammad Al-Efendi Al-Hanafi.
19) A Summary of Tafsir ibn Katheer in Urdu published in 2 volumes by Maktabah Salafiyah Lahore. The translation was of Hafiz Muhammad Dawood Raghib Rehmani and the summary and additions by Shaykh Abul Ashbal.

Shaykh Abul Ashbal Sagheer Ahmad Shaghif also introduced “Ghayatul Maqsad fi Zawaid Musnad Imam Ahmad” of Hafiz Al-Haythami with the Tahqiq of Shaykh Irshadul Haq Athari.

His death

Shaikh Abul Ashbal Sagheer Ahmad Shaghif passed away on the 30 May 2019, in the evening, hence on the night of Friday in the last ten days of Ramadhan

Source from which biography is adapted: “Dabistan Hadith” of Shaykh Ishaq Bhatti