Many of the Sufis trace their origin to Hazrat Khizr, believed to have been one of those who served as a pathfinder to Moses when he led the Israelites through the desert. Maulana Rumi was influenced by him, as was Khwaja Moinuddin Chishtri and the others of his ‘silsila’. Bibi Fatima Sam, who was a contemporary of Baba Farid Ganjshakar and Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia, too sought the support of Hazrat Khizr’s mantle.
Bibi Fatima belonged to Sam, a place on the Iraq-Iran border, but came to India in response to an inner urge. She eventually settled down in Delhi, where she later died. Her shrine is situated in Bapa Nagar (near Kaka Nagar). In the 13th century, the place was a wilderness, far removed even from the seat of government of the Slave dynasty, founded by Qutbuddin Aibak.
Fariduddin Attar, a poet and Sufi proponent, in his famous work, Mantiq-at-Tayr or the Parliament of Birds, likens the soul to a bird which had to pass through seven valleys: those of search, love, mysticism, detachment, unity, bewilderment, and final annihilation — before it reaches the gates of the Almighty.
The Venerable Bede, the Christian monk, compared human life to a bird which comes in through the dark, flies through a lit-up hall and then goes into the darkness again. The darkness signifies eternity with a brief interlude of mortal existence, before the ultimate reunion with the eternal.
Bibi Fatima faith was also based on the belief of the final meeting with the Great Beloved. She did not ever marry but passed her life in the love of Allah through meditation and mystic experience. To those who came to her, she was guide, philosopher and friend. Her ‘mureeds’ were both men and women.
Those who revere her say that the Bibi led a dual existence. Outwardly, she was calm and did not betray the inner turmoil of the spiritual yearning for the Supreme. Some say that she came as an infant with her parents, others that she accompanied only her father, and yet others that she was conceived in Sam but born here. Nizamuddin Aulia called her ‘Appa’, a term endearingly used for an elder sister.
They visited her out-of-the-way abode after hearing reports of her piety and spiritual eminence, though according to some they had come to know of her presence though their own meditation and ‘Jalal’. But Bibi Fatima was a simple woman who did not show off her saintliness.
The Bibi was a spiritual recluse for whom religion was just an outer covering, because a Sufi is different from a mere adherent of faith for whom only fasting, prayer and good works constitute the good life. The Sufiyana Kalaam goes beyond this. The wanderings of the mind and spirit are limitless and it is thus that the true Sufi is constantly attuned to the eternal.
One visits the shrine of this hoary woman saint with great expectations but is disappointed at the way it is maintained. The caretakers, despite recent renovation, are handicapped by a lack of resources and those who should help hold back their hand. It would be in the fitness of things if the Archaeological Department takes it under its protective wing, for it is a historic place. The Delhi Administration could also help by releasing funds for the upkeep of the tomb of the first Sufi woman saint of India whose followers belong to all communities and who is hailed as Rabia of Delhi.
Burqa-clad women and those with vermilion in their hair pray side by side at this inter-faith shrine. Bibi Fatima’s ‘Urs’ is held at her death anniversary in February every year as she died in that month in AD 1246, though no one knows how she died, or how the grave became a shrine, covered with a typical green cloth.
That the Bibi fulfils vows, especially in regard to young girls seeking husbands, is a deep-seated belief. Others swear she has come to their aid at times of great distress. If she is indeed the saint people believe her to be, she certainly needs a befitting monument.
The author is a veteran chronicler of Delhi
