ME AND MAULANA: A PERSONAL RECOLLECTION OF WAHIDUDDIN KHAN - John M. Butt

of original thought, to be a Deobandi madrasa student, but at the same time to appreciate Maulana. I was having trouble with the Deobandi critique of the political interpretation of Islam. To me, it was superficial. “Read Maulana Wahiduddin Khan’s Ta’beer ki Ghalati,” Talha advised me. “That will get you to the crux of the matter.” It is notable that Talha advised me to read Ta’beer ki Ghalati—Mistaken Interpretation. He did not advise me to read a simplification and condensation of Ta’beer ki Ghalat, a pamphlet by the name of Din ki Siyasi Ta’beer–The Political Interpretation of Religion. That simplification would not have satisfied Talha’s intellect. He wanted to delve into the real source of the matter, the more voluminous Ta’beer ki Ghalati. I read Ta’beer ki Ghalati. That was how a lifelong association with Maulana Wahiduddin Khan started. I visited him in his old office in Gali Qasim Jan in Delhi. “We have a great mutual understanding,” Maulana commented. It was not only the political interpretation of Islam that I was able to see in its proper light. All the teachings of Islam “fell into place,” as I put it at the time. I needed the guiding hand of Maulana when the infighting of the two main groups of Deoband ulema—the Thanvi group and the Madani group—ruined my second last year of study. Actually, the event that had caused the rift—the centenary celebrations of Darul Uloom in 1981—had also interrupted my studies. The fighting that erupted after that, leading to the Madani group seizing power in Darul Uloom,