Necessity is the mother of invention no longer remains a mere proverb for Islamic scholar Farooq Naeemi Al Bukhari. On Wednesday, Dr. Bukhari set a record of sorts by publishing the 365th essay on the life of Prophet Mohammed using the social media platform.
A move that he began on June 15, 2022, to assuage the tensions and discontentment set loose by former BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma through her criticism of Prophet Mohammed and his wife Aysha, Dr. Bukhari’s daily essays named Mahabba have won him global fame.
Without a single day’s break, Dr. Bukhari published his essays in eight languages, including English, Malayalam and Arabic. The other languages he has chosen to publish his essays are Urdu, Kannada, Bengali, Tamil and Hindi.
By banking heavily on authentic resources of knowledge and history, Dr. Bukhari delineated the life and times of Prophet Mohammed in a lucid manner. The enormous amount of feedback that his Mahabba essays generated on social media pointed out that he has not been opinionated or biased.
“Apart from offering pieces of knowledge through my daily postings, I could convince the community and society at large that telling facts without falling prey to impassioned style of delivery can have its positive and long-lasting results,” said Dr. Bukhari.
Ms. Sharma had triggered a wide variety of responses when she hurt the Muslim community by speaking disparagingly about Prophet Mohammed last year. “But I chose the occasion to address it with facts, and not take recourse to passions,” he said.
He said that much of the criticism against Prophet Mohammed had spawned out of ignorance. “Ms. Sharma’s too was out of ignorance,” he said.
He had no plans to celebrate the anniversary when he started the essay on June 15 last year. But, as he wrote every day, his audiences widened and crossed the linguistic barriers. Dr. Bukhari’s original essays on Facebook were reposted on other social media platforms.
His style and simplicity were also appreciated. “What I find quite interesting in his essays is their style of presentation. Being simple may not be easy for all writers; but Dr. Bukhari has mastered that art,” said Jamal Karulai, Kerala Muslim Jamat worker who helped him popularize the Mahabba move.
His essays on Prophet Mohammed are being compiled into a series of books, the first volume of which was brought out the other day.
