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Lamu descendants of Prophet Mohammed

Sunday March 20 2011
muhsin

Aydroos and Ahmad Muhsin. Photo/JOHN RUGOIYO

Aydaroos Muhsin, 30, and Ahmad Muhsin, 28, are brothers who are ustadhis (Islamic teachers).

They teach at the Riyadha Mosque and the adjacent Islamic Center in Lamu.

They are afro-Arabic in appearance, just like the majority of the people in Lamu.

But appearances can be deceiving as the two are, in a manner of speaking, far from the ordinary.

Ask anyone on the streets of the island about the two, and if they happen to know them, they will speak of them in very high regard — in fact something near veneration.

The two brothers are descendants of Prophet Mohammed. In the Muslim world this is cause for one to be held in very high esteem.

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But Aydaroos and Ahmad, pious and self-effacing almost to a fault, say they feel no different from the guys on the street.

“Being descended from Prophet Mohammed,” Aydaroos elucidates, “is not something that you feel in your bones. The truth is, you hardly think about it. Even if you do, it doesn’t make you feel special. It is only when people mention it to you time and again that you feel, ah, yes, it is quite a heritage. And often it makes a difference in the way some people relate to you.”

“We are normal, and indeed ordinary people,” Ahmad adds, “people take us for what we are. We are ustadhis, so that makes people respect us. And because of our heritage, people respect us more than they would other ustadhis.”

“If you are of good character,” Aydaroos adds, “people will respect you for that. If you are a descendant of Prophet Mohammed and you are of bad character, people will not respect you and will hold you in much more contempt than if you are not a descendant. We try to measure up to what society expects of us.”

Family tree

The two are great, great grandsons of Habib Swaleh Jamal Lelyl, born in the Comoros Island town of Singani in 1852 of an Arab “Sharif” father of Yemen origin and a Comorian mother.

Swaleh is famous for starting the unique version of the Maulidi festival in Lamu, and building the Riyadha Mosque and Islamic Center in the town.

Less known is that his family roots go back to Prophet Muhammed. His grand and great grand children in Lamu are therefore descendants of the Prophet.

At 25, the Prophet married a wealthy 40-year old widow, Khadijah, and they had a daughter, Fatimah.

Fatimah married the Prophet’s first cousin, Ali Ibn Abi Taleb and they had two sons, Hassan and Hussein.

Descent from Prophet Mohammed is traced through these two grandsons as his three sons died in childhood.

Those descended from Hassan are bestowed the title Sayyid and those from Hussein are titled Sharifs, though these titles vary from region to region and usually are interchangeable.

Some areas could also have localised versions. In Lamu and the Comoros, for instance, the title “Mwenye” is the same as Sayyed.

Habib Swaleh’s father’s title of Sharif is a good indicator of the Lamu family’s lineage: for over 1,300 years in Islamic tradition, the titles Sayyed, Sharif or Habib have been conferred on Muslims who can trace their heredity back to Prophet Mohammed.

These titles, which in English can loosely be translated into “Mister,” “Lord,” “Master,” “Chief” or “Leader,” are given to males accepted as descendants of the Prophet through his two grandsons.

The trace can be through genealogical records, family trees or even oral history.

The written genealogical record held by the Muhsin brothers of Lamu goes back to Hussein.

Aydaroos says it has taken them many hours of research in making their comprehensive family tree.

The research was carried out in Kenya and Yemen where the two undertook Quranic and Islamic Jurisprudence studies for seven years.

Aydaroos also says that many families of Prophet Mohammed’s descendants are well chronicled.

Family histories of people who rely on oral tradition are not quite as reliable.

Nevertheless all who claim credible descent — whether oral or written — are estimated to number in the millions.

They are believed to be scattered all over the world, many in Arab North Africa, in East Africa, in Europe, in the Far East Muslim countries such as Indonesia. But by far the vast majority are in the Middle East.

And in a quest to authenticate the claims of descent through a scientific method, an American DNA genealogy and genetics testing company claims to have identified the DNA signature of Prophet Mohammed.

Family Tree DNA says it was requested by clients who have family lineage through written records or oral history linking their heredity to the Prophet to have their DNA sequences mapped.

From the results, a common DNA signature was identified for most of the people tested.

Scientists at the Houston, Texas, based company suggest that this common thread could be the genetic link to the Prophet.

The Muhsin brothers say that they would not in the least mind a DNA test to determine whether they are the Prophet’s descendants.

And if such a test were to prove that they are descended from the great man who founded a religion that today has over 1.5 billion followers, then they certainly would be in great company.

Other renowned figures widely accepted as the Prophet’s descendants include King Abdullah II of Jordan who is a Hashemite, a clan to which the Prophet belonged, and Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, the 49th Ismaili Imam who claims direct lineage to Ali, the Prophet’s first cousin and son-in-law.

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