Syed Ahmad Khan

Syed Ahmad Khan was born in Delhi on 17 October 1817 into a family connected to the Mughal court. He received a traditional religious and literary education and entered the service of the East India Company in 1838, holding judicial and administrative posts in the following decades. During this period he wrote his archaeological work Asar al-Sanadid (1847) on the historical monuments of Delhi.

The uprising of 1857 was a turning point in his intellectual life. In The Causes of the Indian Revolt (1859) he analysed the origins of the rebellion and sought to defend India's Muslims against charges laid by the British government. From then on he became convinced that the future of India's Muslims depended on modern education and science. In 1864 he founded the Scientific Society to translate and publish scientific and historical works in Urdu.

During his visit to England (1869–1870), he wrote Essays on the Life of Muhammad (Khutbat-e-Ahmadiya) in response to William Muir's Life of Mahomet. On his return he launched the journal Tahdhib al-Akhlaq (1870) to promote the moral and intellectual reform of Muslims. In 1875 he founded the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College in Aligarh, which became the centre of the Aligarh Movement and later Aligarh Muslim University. In 1888 he received the British knighthood that gave him the title "Sir".

In religious thought, he stressed that the "word of God" (the Qur'an) and the "work of God" (nature) cannot contradict each other, and on that basis held that religion and empirical science cannot be in real conflict. He criticised taqlid, insisted on ijtihad and rational interpretation of religious texts, and in his unfinished Qur'anic commentary reinterpreted some traditional accounts of miracles. These views provoked the opposition of traditional scholars, and critics such as Jamal al-Din al-Afghani branded him a "naturist" (nechari). In politics he urged Muslims to cooperate with British rule and to stay away from the Indian National Congress, positions that remain the subject of differing assessments. Syed Ahmad Khan died in Aligarh on 27 March 1898.