By MALIK MERCHANT
Publisher/Editor Simerg, Barakah and Simergphotos

One of the most well known and travelled missionaries of the Shia Ismaili Muslim community in the past century has to be Alwaez Rai Abualy Alibhai. He passed away in May 2008, before this website was inaugurated, and I have often thought of him several times over the past decade. A mentally and physically strong person all his life, he continued until his very last years to sit on the floor in Jamatkhana, without twitching. He was always fully focused in his prayers.

I remember him fondly calling my late mum as “meri beti” (my daughter), especially after she had delivered a waez (sermon). My parents knew him from India, but I first met the beloved missionary in the late 1950’s when he made two visits to Lourenço Marques (now Maputo). Now, in Mozambique there was no guarantee about when a specific visitor would arrive in the country — as travel via South Africa was sometimes tricky, with possible delays — and I would remember my dad walking up to all the boys who were playing football in the Jamatkhana field and telling us that when we got back home we should tell our parents that a missionary had arrived in the city and that he would be delivering a waez that evening. This may not have been the case with missionary Abualy but it was definitely the case with missionary Salim Issa Moosa. I was in the group of footballers when my dad introduced Salim missionary to all of us, and asked us to attend Jamatkhana with our parents to listen to his waez. We not only spoke Portuguese but spoke and wrote in Gujarati quite well. My parents had taught us Dua meanings of all six parts in Gujarati by the time we were 8!

During his lifetime, Alwaez Abualy delivered thousands of waezes around the world, and one thing that he did which my parents never did was that he always carried a portable tape recorder to the stage to tape his own waez. Thus, the collection of waezes that have been gathered for the late missionary is phenomenal.

I propose to publish a longer piece about the missionary one day, but for today I am putting out this short piece because Toronto’s Kamru Rashid, an avid reader and also a contributor of articles on this website, sent me a forward of an excerpt from a talk that Alwaez Abualy had delivered a few years before he passed away. The video clip has been circulating on the social media recently.

In the video, the missionary gives a powerful message to all Ismailis. Speaking in Urdu, Alwaez mentions about the difficulties mankind will face in the 21st century, and then he makes a passionate plea to all Ismailis to keep the remembrance of Allah constantly in their hearts. He asks the Jamat to recite Ya Allah, Ya Muhammad, Ya Ali, or the names of the Imams including Mawlana Shah Karim for protection from difficulties and for strength in adversity.

Then, finally, as the clip nears the end, he asks each and everyone to attend Jamatkhana at least once a day to avail ourselves of Mawlana Hazar Imam’s bountiful grace and blessings.

I urge you to listen to missionary Abualy’s message in the video recording below, and explain it to non-Urdu listeners.

Date posted: December 16, 2021.

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