Alhaj Yusuf Salih Ajura
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780300207118
- eISBN:
- 9780300258202
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300207118.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This is the first English translation of and commentary on the collected poems of Alhaj Yusuf Salih Ajura (1910–2004), a northern Ghanaian orthodox Islamic scholar, poet, and polemicist known as Afa ...
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This is the first English translation of and commentary on the collected poems of Alhaj Yusuf Salih Ajura (1910–2004), a northern Ghanaian orthodox Islamic scholar, poet, and polemicist known as Afa Ajura, or “scholar from Ejura.” The poems, all handwritten in Arabic script, mainly in the Ghanaian language of Dagbani and also Arabic, explore the author's socio-religious beliefs. In the accompanying introduction, the translator examines the diverse themes of the poems and how they challenge Tijaniyyah Sufi clerics and traditional practices such as idol worship. The introduction provides a background on the translation and commentary. It describes Ajuraism, which is Afa Ajura's reform-oriented educational approach based on the concept of orthodoxy. Orthopraxy, according to Sunnah, that rejected the status quo of traditional Dagomba practices and the syncretism and innovations of Tijaniyyah Sufism. Afa Ajura's collection of handwritten poems address multiple intellectual issues and diverse socio-religious topics.Less
This is the first English translation of and commentary on the collected poems of Alhaj Yusuf Salih Ajura (1910–2004), a northern Ghanaian orthodox Islamic scholar, poet, and polemicist known as Afa Ajura, or “scholar from Ejura.” The poems, all handwritten in Arabic script, mainly in the Ghanaian language of Dagbani and also Arabic, explore the author's socio-religious beliefs. In the accompanying introduction, the translator examines the diverse themes of the poems and how they challenge Tijaniyyah Sufi clerics and traditional practices such as idol worship. The introduction provides a background on the translation and commentary. It describes Ajuraism, which is Afa Ajura's reform-oriented educational approach based on the concept of orthodoxy. Orthopraxy, according to Sunnah, that rejected the status quo of traditional Dagomba practices and the syncretism and innovations of Tijaniyyah Sufism. Afa Ajura's collection of handwritten poems address multiple intellectual issues and diverse socio-religious topics.
