Raja Ali Haji bin Raja Haji Ahmad ar-Riyawi

Raja Ali Haji bin Raja Haji Ahmad ar-Riyawi – The Master Linguist
(adapted from Hj. Wan Mohd Shaghir Abdullah r.h. ‘s Ulamas of the Malay World))

About Him

This ulama from a noble family was a Syafi’i in mazhab, an Ahlus Sunnah wal Jamaah in creed, and a Naqsyabandi in tariqah.

The fact that he wrote books on disciplines outside of fiqh and Islamic jurisprudence made him more famous in Malay literature than in Islamic knowledge. Not only his name well known among Malaysian and Indonesian language scholars, the Dutch and English researcher also paid a lot of attention to his works.

His full name is Tengku Haji Ali al-Haj bin Tengku Haji Ahmad bin Raja Haji Asy-Syahidu fi Sabilillah bin Upu Daeng Celak. He was born in Pulau Penyengat, an island south of Singapore in 1809. At the time, Penyengat was the capital of Riau-Lingga-Johor kingdom. His mother was Encik Hamidah binti Panglima Malik Selangor. He had 9 brothers and 7 sisters.

Around 1822, he went to Jakarta (Batavia) together with his father, who was the government representative to the Dutch Governor. Raja Ali Haji took the opportunity to study under the ulamas there. One of them was Saiyid ‘Abdur Rahman al-Mashri, under whom he studied Ilm Falak (astronomy). He also made friends with some Dutch officials such as T. Roode and Van Der Waal.

In 1827 (Hijri 1243) Raja Ahmad together with his son went for pilgrimage to Makkah. They stayed on for a while and Raja Ali Haji studied Arabic and other Islamic disciplines there. Among people he met were Syeikh Daud Abdullah al-Fathani and Syeikh Syihabuddin (son of Syeikh Abdullah al-Banjari). They also made a detour to Cairo befor returning home to Penyengat.

Now a qualified ulama, Raja Ali Haji then asked by his cousin (the Yamtuan Muda of Riau– equivalent to Sultan) to teach Arabic Grammar (nahwu), morphology (sorof), creed (usuluddin), jurisprudence (fiqh), tasawwuf and other disciplines. Even the sultan himself (Raja Ali bin Raja Ja’far) and the later sultan studied under him. Raja Ali Haji became one of the greatest ulama before his death.

He practiced Naqsyabandiah tariqah, and routinely read the salawat Dalail al-Khairat of Saiyyid Sulaiman al-Jazuli, which had been practiced in his family for generations. In fact, his grandfather – Raja Haji asy-Syahid fi Sabilillah died on the battlefield fighting the Dutch invaders – one hand holding the salawat booklet, while the other holding a sword.

More on him and his land of origin available here:- http://rajaalihaji.com/en

Wallahu a'lam