Two hundred years ago, Hazrat Syed Ali Yadullahi went to Makkah and Madina for Haj pilgrimage, performed the rituals and decided to stay on for a year to perform a second Haj on behalf of his mother, as stated in the preface. He divided his time equally between the two holy cities. At Makkah, he discussed Mahdavi faith and tenets with the local ulema (scholars). King Sharif Ghalib joined the debate and asked for an authentic book on Mahdavism for further study. Having none at band, Hazrat Syed Ali wrote one on the spot for the king.
The book, AL-QAUL AL-MAHMOOD, is in Arabic. In the last hundred years, it has been translated into Urdu twice and published thrice. It has all the elements of an expository discourse on and serves as an introduction to Mahdavi faith and beliefs. This English translation is intended for the new generation which knows English and cannot read and understand Arabic and/or Urdu.
The original Arabic text and, to some extent, its Urdu translations, which had scholars as its target readership, are in the style of an extempore oration, repeating at times a given idea in three or even four consecutive sentences. Besides, the elaborate discussions about the nuances of Arabic grammar and syntax, so convincing to the Arabic scholars, are difficult for the ordinary English reader to comprehend and appreciate. Highly technical among these have been omitted in part but care has been taken to follow the sequence of ideas throughout as meticulously as possible. Hence, this is not a verbatim translation of the original Arabic text or either of its two Urdu versions.
I have already dealt with at some length the need for rendering our religious texts in English and the problems a translator faces in doing so in my note to the English translation of AQIDA SHARIFA of Hazrat Syed Khundmir, published in 1994. I feel I need not repeat them.
The first translation of AL-QAUL AL-MAHMOOD into Urdu was done by Hazrat Syed Ashraf Shamsi Yadullahi. the great great grandson of the author, Hazrat Syed Ali Yadullahi, and was published twice. The second Urdu translation was done by Maulana Syed Nusrat Alam and published in early 1980s. Both have been used for this English version. Help was sought and readily given by Mufti Syed Yaqub Ishaqi (Channapatna), Maulana Syed Nusrat Alam (Hyderabad) and others. My grateful thanks to them as also to Maulvi Muhammad Shihabuddin Nadvi for his help and permission to use his Furqania Academy Trust Library in Bangalore. While they and others assisted me with their valuable suggestions, any mistakes found in this book are entirely mine and none other is responsible for them.
Last, but not the least, I also thank the Farah Committee, Dubai, UAE for their generous financial assistance for the publication and Maulvi Abul Fatah Syed Jalaluddin Yadullahi for his help in arranging the printing, publishing and distribution of this book.
Syed Ziaullah Yadullahi S/o.
Hazrat Syed Alam Yadullahi
B-664. Dairatul Islam, Channapatna -571 501, Karnataka, India.