On Friday morning, author of the famous and most resourceful Madinah Arabic Book, Shaikh Dr. V Abdur Raheem, passed away in Madinah, Saudi Arabia at the age of 90.
A master of the Arabic language, a world renowned Islamic Scholar, multi-linguist, author, teacher and translator he dedicated his life to extraordinary contributions to Arabic literature by helping millions learn the Arabic language in his over 50 years of experience.
Born in 1933 in Vaniyambadi, Tamil Nadu, he obtained his B.A in English from the University of Madras and M.A in Arabic from the Aligarh Muslim University, India in 1962. He also held a M.Phil. and a Ph.D. in Arabic Philology from Al-Azhar University, Egypt.
A recipient of the National Award from the President of India in 1997 for his services in teaching, he was a self made man who learnt Arabic from the scarcest resources available to him in his little town. His three-volume series, Madinah Arabic Book, a one of a kind in its field, is the official curriculum of the Madinah University, Saudi Arabia, and is also used widely in schools and universities across the world to teach students the Arabic language.
Former Professor of Arabic Language for 30 years at the International Islamic University of Madinah, he has taught Arabic Language at Islamic Universities around the world including at Omdurman in Sudan, Germany, Washington D.C and British Guyana. An expert on European Languages and their etymology, phonetic change and semantic development he was a former Director of the ‘Institute of Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language’, at the Islamic University of Madinah.
A close associate of the Islamic Foundation Trust (IFT), Chennai, majority of his books have been published by IFT.
Along with the Madinah Arabic Book series he has to his credit a host of other books too including ‘Let’s Begin to Read Arabic: A Beginners Guide to Learning the Arabic Language and the Qur’aan’, ‘AL-TIBYAAN – Easy way to Qur’aanic Reading’, ‘Arabic Course for Non-Native Speakers of Arabic: Originally Devised and Taught at Islaamic University, Madinah’, ‘From Esfahan To Madinah In Search of Truth: Salmaan al-Faarisi’s Hadiith’, ‘Both These Lights Emanate from the Same Niche’ – Hadiith of Umm Salamah (raDiyAllaahu “anhaa).’ ‘Suurah al-Hujuraat – With Lexical and Grammatical Notes and DVDs’.
His passing is indeed a great loss to both the Muslim world and to Islamic literature.
