Ranir — also written Rānīr — is a coastal town near Surat in Gujarat, the father-city of Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī and the principal node of the Gujarati-Ḥadramī Sufi network from which the orthodox reaction of Acheh drew its principal Malay-Indonesian agents. The identification of Ranir as Raniri’s father-city, established by Drewes in BKI 111 (1955) and recorded by Voorhoeve in the introduction to his 1955 edition of Raniri’s two Malay treatises, was the precondition for the modern understanding of Raniri’s Gujarati-Ḥadramī background.
Identification as the father-city of Raniri
Voorhoeve records, in the introduction to the 1955 edition, that Drewes’s 1955 article in BKI 111 “recently threw new light on the heredity of the author; there can now be no doubt that his father-city was Ranir near Surat in Gujarat.” The identification placed Raniri’s family origin at Ranir — rather than at the various other places that had been proposed — and was the basis for the account of Raniri’s family, his spiritual genealogy, and his connection with the Rifāʿiyya that Voorhoeve gives in the introduction to his edition.
The Gujarati milieu
The coastal towns of Gujarat in this period had a very international population. Ships regularly sailed thence to the Strait of Malaka; among the mercenary troops of the sixteenth century were “Javanese” — that is, in this context, Indonesians. The Malay language was certainly not unfamiliar in the harbour towns; and the family of Raniri — Indian Arabs of mixed blood, who maintained contact with the motherland by correspondence and study-journeys, and who stood in relation with Indonesia — had its centre at Ranir. Ranir was, in this period, a node of the Indian Ocean network that linked the religious scholarship of Surat, Ahmadabad, Bījāpūr, and Bilgrām with the Malay-Indonesian world.
The spiritual genealogy
The spiritual genealogy of Raniri — and of Shaikh Yūsuf al-Makassar — had its centre at Ranir. It was at Ranir that Muḥammad al-ʿAddārs (d. 1620) succeeded his famous grandfather as religious teacher; it was at Ranir that Sayyid ʿUmar Bā Shaybān was received into the Rifāʿiyya by al-ʿAddārs; and it was from Ranir that Raniri himself set out for Acheh in 1637 and to Ranir that he returned in 1644.
Ranir as a node of transmission
Ranir was, in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, one of the principal nodes by which the orthodox Sufi scholasticism of the Arab and Persian worlds was transmitted to the Malay-Indonesian archipelago. The Indian-Arab religious families of mixed blood — the al-Aydārūs family, the family of al-ʿAddārs, and the family of Raniri himself — formed the network that carried this transmission; and Ranir, with Surat and Ahmadabad, was one of the principal centres of the network. The fact that the family of Raniri had, even before his own time, maintained relations with Acheh — his uncle Muhammad Djailani Hamid having visited Acheh between 1580 and 1583 — is a measure of the directness of the connection between Ranir and the Achehnese court.
Significance
Ranir is the father-city of Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī and the principal node of the Gujarati-Ḥadramī Sufi network from which the orthodox reaction of Acheh drew its principal Malay-Indonesian agents. The identification of Ranir as Raniri’s father-city by Drewes in 1955 was the precondition for the modern understanding of Raniri’s background, and is the basis of the account of his family, his spiritual genealogy, and his connection with the Rifāʿiyya that is given in the modern scholarship on Raniri and on the religious controversy of Acheh.
See Also
- Abd al-Qadir al-Aidaros
- Ahmad Rifa’i
- Ahmadabad
- Bilgram
- Bijapur
- Gudjarat
- G. W. J. Drewes
- Muhammad al-Addars
- Muhammad Djailani Hamid
- P. Voorhoeve
- Raniri
- Rifa’iyah order
- Sajjid Abu Hafs Umar Ba Sjaiban
- Surat
- Yusuf Makasar
Source
Twee Maleise geschriften van Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī: in facsimile uitgegeven met aantekeningen door P. Voorhoeve. Uitgaven van de Stichting De Goeje, No. 16. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1955. Inleiding §1 (“De auteur”), pp. 5–6, citing G. W. J. Drewes in BKI 111 (1955).
Ranir — also written Rānīr — is a coastal town near Surat in Gujarat, the father-city of Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī and the principal node of the Gujarati-Ḥadramī Sufi network from which the orthodox reaction of Acheh drew its principal Malay-Indonesian agents. The identification of Ranir as Raniri’s father-city, established by Drewes in BKI 111 (1955) and recorded by Voorhoeve in the introduction to his 1955 edition of Raniri’s two Malay treatises, was the precondition for the modern understanding of Raniri’s Gujarati-Ḥadramī background.
Identification as the father-city of Raniri
Voorhoeve records, in the introduction to the 1955 edition, that Drewes’s 1955 article in BKI 111 “recently threw new light on the heredity of the author; there can now be no doubt that his father-city was Ranir near Surat in Gujarat.” The identification placed Raniri’s family origin at Ranir — rather than at the various other places that had been proposed — and was the basis for the account of Raniri’s family, his spiritual genealogy, and his connection with the Rifāʿiyya that Voorhoeve gives in the introduction to his edition.
The Gujarati milieu
The coastal towns of Gujarat in this period had a very international population. Ships regularly sailed thence to the Strait of Malaka; among the mercenary troops of the sixteenth century were “Javanese” — that is, in this context, Indonesians. The Malay language was certainly not unfamiliar in the harbour towns; and the family of Raniri — Indian Arabs of mixed blood, who maintained contact with the motherland by correspondence and study-journeys, and who stood in relation with Indonesia — had its centre at Ranir. Ranir was, in this period, a node of the Indian Ocean network that linked the religious scholarship of Surat, Ahmadabad, Bījāpūr, and Bilgrām with the Malay-Indonesian world.
The spiritual genealogy
The spiritual genealogy of Raniri — and of Shaikh Yūsuf al-Makassar — had its centre at Ranir. It was at Ranir that Muḥammad al-ʿAddārs (d. 1620) succeeded his famous grandfather as religious teacher; it was at Ranir that Sayyid ʿUmar Bā Shaybān was received into the Rifāʿiyya by al-ʿAddārs; and it was from Ranir that Raniri himself set out for Acheh in 1637 and to Ranir that he returned in 1644.
Ranir as a node of transmission
Ranir was, in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, one of the principal nodes by which the orthodox Sufi scholasticism of the Arab and Persian worlds was transmitted to the Malay-Indonesian archipelago. The Indian-Arab religious families of mixed blood — the al-Aydārūs family, the family of al-ʿAddārs, and the family of Raniri himself — formed the network that carried this transmission; and Ranir, with Surat and Ahmadabad, was one of the principal centres of the network. The fact that the family of Raniri had, even before his own time, maintained relations with Acheh — his uncle Muhammad Djailani Hamid having visited Acheh between 1580 and 1583 — is a measure of the directness of the connection between Ranir and the Achehnese court.
Significance
Ranir is the father-city of Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī and the principal node of the Gujarati-Ḥadramī Sufi network from which the orthodox reaction of Acheh drew its principal Malay-Indonesian agents. The identification of Ranir as Raniri’s father-city by Drewes in 1955 was the precondition for the modern understanding of Raniri’s background, and is the basis of the account of his family, his spiritual genealogy, and his connection with the Rifāʿiyya that is given in the modern scholarship on Raniri and on the religious controversy of Acheh.
See Also
- Abd al-Qadir al-Aidaros
- Ahmad Rifa’i
- Ahmadabad
- Bilgram
- Bijapur
- Gudjarat
- G. W. J. Drewes
- Muhammad al-Addars
- Muhammad Djailani Hamid
- P. Voorhoeve
- Raniri
- Rifa’iyah order
- Sajjid Abu Hafs Umar Ba Sjaiban
- Surat
- Yusuf Makasar
Source
Twee Maleise geschriften van Nūruddīn ar-Rānīrī: in facsimile uitgegeven met aantekeningen door P. Voorhoeve. Uitgaven van de Stichting De Goeje, No. 16. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1955. Inleiding §1 (“De auteur”), pp. 5–6, citing G. W. J. Drewes in BKI 111 (1955).