Abdur Rahman ibn Yusuf Mangera – Shaykh Taha Karaan An Obituary

There's a lot of people who pass away but generally a lot of our

scholars who passed away they tend to be older.

So clearly there's a one idea is that yes, we've lost the scholar,

we've lost our shake. We lost our shake. Last year, Sheikh Yusuf,

Allah bless him and Allah have mercy on him. We lost him last

year, but the idea was okay, he was older one day he had to go. So

there's always a side of you that thinks, now when you start now

losing or when you start getting old, to the to the level that

somebody's just a bit older than you maybe less than 510 years

older than you they start going at a seemingly young age, then you

start feeling mortality, right then you start feeding water and a

lot of people have this effect when somebody at their kind of age

starts going. Now Sheikh Bahar Quran Rahim Allah may Allah have

mercy on him? He was I think over 50 So he is between five to 10

years older than me. But I knew him well. I've met him at his

house in strand, Cape Town, South Africa. I've met him in Canada on

probably more than one occasion when we had been invited there for

some programs. And I think the last time I met him was a few

years ago.

In

I think it was mocha mocha Rama, and met him in Makkah. mukarram he

was about to depart after his ombre. And we had just arrived.

And I still remember because he was always full of mashallah

knowledge, because he was very, very wide read. I mean, I would

say that from kind of 4050 year old is probably one of the most

wide read person I've seen. I met him in Egypt, actually, yes, I met

him in Egypt as well once when I in 2007, when I went there for the

bookfair, massive, huge, enormous bookfair like becomes old town,

part of part of Cairo. So he he used to come there, if not every

year, then many years. So why did you come?

So the reason he cut he used to come there, from what I understood

is, he used to come there to remain on the cutting edge of what

research and what had been produced. He was such a

bibliophile, that, anytime I asked him a question or that asked him,

you know, he'd be able to give you a very, very

comprehensive idea and guidance, and from many, many different

sources. So he wasn't restricted to one source he would read. And

he was, he's from South Africa. He'd gone to Darwin Durban to

study he's from the Malay background. So which means that

they generally tend to be Shafi. And he remained is remained Shafi

all the way.

He went to download duben to study. So he had to learn Urdu.

His father had been a graduate of Darwin, they opened as well,

you know, many, many years ago. So after he studied in Mia's farm in

South Africa, where he did his of the Quran, I think, then he went

to download the women to study which is the elite institution.

And he must have had to master all due because South Africans are not

very good in order, right? Even the Asian background ones, right,

the Indian background ones. So

he came top in his class of six 700 students at the time, somebody

who didn't know any overdue competing with everybody else. And

it's quite amazing. I mean, the kind of knowledge he had, I mean,

from my experience with him.

I remember asking him, you know, whenever I've asked him questions,

you will always come up with some really enriching answers.

Mashallah. So that time in Amara, that time it was an ombre time,

actually in Morocco in Morocco, and I met him so he's about to

leave and he said, Oh, I have to go and do my twofer. With that. I

said, you're not in hajj, why are you doing a twofer without for he

said the chef is we do it often with that as well. After ombre,

right, so the 100 of us don't have to do that. But we don't have to

do a special final tawaf right after the ombre, right?

Because the waffle widow means the farewell tawaf. So you have to do

a farewell tawaf even for ombre and also in Shafi school, Andre is

also fourth, at least one in your life, just as a hajis. Whereas in

the Hanafi school, it's not we generally tend to do it anyway.

But it's not afforded it's an obligation to Hanafi school. And

in Canada, we used to have long because that's when we would be

traveling together or staying together and they'd be mashallah

really get to pick his brains about the Shafi school and many,

many other things. Mashallah.

So he was always very, very, I mean, in South Africa, I went to

the MJC, which is the Muslim Judicial Council of the Cape Town,

that cape area, and he was really really high up there. He was

actually part of their fatwa department. He was probably the

main person in that footwear department. I remember when I was

given a meeting with them and touring them that that is what it

was. He was there. And I did kickoff twice in Cape Town last 10

days of Ramadan for two years, about 676 to seven years ago, five

to six years ago actually the two years then and mashallah, I mean I

had to interact with a lot of students is left behind people

came from all quite a few countries I remember

I have a student from Canada. I think he was a lawyer or something

I'm not sure he'd given that up to go and study with him. Because we

were really, really impressed by his very comprehensive knowledge.

The other thing is it was a very cool person. Now, he was into

polemics in the sense that he was well read about the Qadiani issue.

So in South Africa, they had a history with the remedies, they

tried to cause a big fuss like 30, about 40 years ago, I think he was

also at the forefront of the producing a lot of the research

and there was a court case that took place, which finally I think

declared them to be out of the fold of Islam. And then regarding

the whole Shia issue, South Africa has really, really suffered from

an onslaught of Setia ideology. Right? When I was there, in 98, it

was at its peak at that time, several, a lot of people there had

been quite a few people had been affected by this. And they were

really presented rising,

using the whole concept of

love of the, the Al bait or debate as a way to try to get to the

heartstrings and the emotional heartstrings to get people

confused about the issue. And he was at the forefront of the

research. But whenever he spoke about these things, he did it in

such a constructive way. You know, you didn't see him kind of getting

red in the face or arguing in a way. Even I guess a detractor

would be able to sit and listen and make up his own mind if he

wanted to refuse to make, you know, refuse to agree if he wanted

to. But it was never a kind of a debate as a tit for tat kind of

idea. It was always very objective, very clear cut very

academic. And mashallah he had

Subhanallah

why is it that when somebody dies, then you start talking about them?

I've just been thinking about this last two years, because so many

people have died, so many scholars have died, and then it's like when

they die, then you start talking about them, and then all of their

work comes out and then you start sending around their work and all

their achievements. Why didn't we do that while they were alive?

Clearly there were people benefiting right but I feel like I

could have benefited from him a lot more because, you know, he

used to see me as a friend but he was I think so much greater

because he's just so vast mashallah Allah subhanaw taala

given him a huge amount of qualities, mashallah very, very

well respected. So he departed, I think it was he suffered for quite

a few days he was in hospital was very critical than they thought he

was going to get better. His father passed away as well. His

father had done many good works as well translating some of the other

works Shakespeare careers I think follow like minded cetera into

into English and Shakhtar mashallah, his, his English was

very high. His writing style was very, very good. And he wrote he

was a poet as well. Really interesting. You don't get too

many poets. And he was a poet in Arabic, he could write really good

Arabic poetry. I remember when he was in Egypt at the mod.

Something had happened with the place that stayed or something. I

remember, he was fluent in egyptian arabic as well, because

he studied there for two years after they opened. He's fluent in

his, the so called colloquial egyptian arabic, which is Arab

onyx or something like that. It was mashallah, mashallah, really,

really a unassuming, down to earth person. And what's really the

thing is, as the Hadith says is that Allah subhanaw taala will not

just pull out knowledge, although that can happen as well that, you

know, there's so many things I knew before. I don't know any more

that can happen, right? I'm sure everybody feels that you forget if

you don't repeat. But the bigger way that Allah subhanaw taala

takes it away is by taking away on a minor one. One aspect of that is

this that what's wrong with that people are going to die. Nobody's

here forever, who said that on them are going to live longer than

anybody else. Right. So I want to put this in perspective because,

you know, the Hadith says that Allah will remove knowledge by

removing the scholars, well, scholars are human beings, human

beings die, so they're gonna die one day. So the point is this,

that yes, scholars will die. But if we're not doing if not, if

we're not working hard enough to replace those collars with

somebody else while they're still alive. So when they die, there's

somebody take their place. And I think Sheikh Taha is definitely

one of those people who's not going to be very easily replaced,

if at all, because he was just amazing. And I got to learn a lot

more about him when I was in the attic of a number of students were

in the aitikaf. And they will tell us, you know, they were telling me

about him. So I don't think he's a very easily replaceable person.

Right? There's a lot of other people they die, right, but you

can see that they can be replaced. There is quite a few people who

cannot be replaced where you're going to get another Sheikh Yusuf

Matata Rahmatullah from where you're going to get that it's just

it's just very difficult. That's the real suffering there. So

people are going

The day Yes, but it's our responsibility to work for that.

May Allah subhanaw taala, bless him, he's gone at just 50

Something SubhanAllah 50 something, whatever Allah wanted

from him,

Allah subhanho wa Taala has allowed him to do, he's definitely

left a legacy, at least he can say that even though he died younger

than a lot of other people, he's definitely left the legacy. And

that's all sadaqa jariya all those students and other people is

inspired.

Allah subhanaw taala

bless him, raise his status, fill his grave with light, grant him

comfort

and raise him on the Day of Judgment among the holy solar hub

in the company of the prophets. And may Allah subhanaw taala.

grant him Jannetty. And for those, and may Allah subhanaw taala allow

us and our progeny

to also leave a legacy and to be of those people who were useful

and were beneficial.

May Allah subhanaw taala accept. Now just think about it. He was in

South Africa, many of you probably didn't even know about him before.

But you've probably just learned about him either from me or from

the messages that are going around. Now imagine if there was a

really, really other wealthy person out there, or some other

achieve some other person who's achieved something in some other

fields.

Maybe the people in that field may have known but how would you know?

The only reason the whole Muslim community knows about this is

because he prospered in terms of Islam, in terms of his knowledge

and Islam. So, don't we want that to happen as well that more people

will make dua for us. So the way to do it is this way,

that doesn't mean you have to give up anything else you're doing.

It's just you have to become religious. Close to Allah subhanaw

taala that's what's most important.

May Allah subhanaw taala accept JazakAllah here for listening, may

Allah subhana wa Taala bless you. And if you're finding this useful,

you know,

as they say to that like button and subscribe button and forwarded

on to others, just like Aloha, Salaam Alaikum Warahmatullahi

Wabarakatuh