Al-Rifai Mosque: It is one of the famous ancient mosques in Cairo. Khushiar Hanim, mother of Khedive Ismail, ordered its construction in the year 1286 AH/1869 AD, and assigned Hussein Pasha Fahmi to implement the project. In the year 1298 AH / 1880 AD, the construction of the mosque was stopped, then Khushiar Hanim died in the year 1303 AH / 1885 AD, and the construction project remained suspended for about 25 years until the reign of Khedive Abbas Hilmi II in the year 1905 to Ahmed Khairy Pasha to complete the mosque. He assigned the engineer Hertz Pasha to complete the construction, and he completed it in the year 1329 AH. / 1911 AD, and the mosque was opened for prayer at the beginning of the month of Muharram in the year 1330 AH / 1912 AD. The mosque contains the tombs of Sheikh Ali Abi Shabak and Yahya Al-Ansari, as well as the tombs of the royal family in which Khedive Ismail and his mother, Khushiar Hanim, the founder of the mosque, and his wives and children, Sultan Hussein Kamel and his wife, King Fouad I, and King Farouk I, rest.
The location of the mosque in the past was “Zawiyat Al-Rifai” where Sheikh Ali Abu Shabak Al-Rifai was buried, and his grave is located in the mosque until now, and from there the mosque took its name. However, after the construction of the mosque, the name was attributed to Sheikh Ahmed bin Ali Al-Rifai, who was buried in Iraq. Ahmed Al-Sayyad found the father of Sheikh Ali Abi Shabak. . The mosque is currently located in Salah al-Din Square in the Khalifa neighborhood of the southern district of Cairo, and next to it are several ancient mosques, namely the Sultan Hassan Mosque, the Mahmoudiya Mosque, the Qani Bay al-Rumah Mosque, the Jawhar al-Lala Mosque, in addition to the Muhammad Ali Mosque, the Nasser Qalawun Mosque in Salah al-Din Citadel, and the Mustafa Museum. Complete.
Naming
At the end of the model of the mosque in the eastern tribal district, it was written: “With the care of God Almighty, this honorable mosque, the mosque of the one who knows God Almighty, Mr. Ahmed Al-Rifai, may God be pleased with him, was completed according to the order of the Benefactor of Blessings, the Most High, the Great Khedive of Egypt, Hajj Abbas Hilmi II, may God honor his state and exalt his word, and that In the year one thousand three hundred and twenty-eighth of the Hijra, he who belongs to the prophets and messengers, may peace and blessings be upon him and his family and companions.
Although the name of the mosque is attributed to Sheikh Ahmed bin Ali Al-Rifai, his grave is not there, as he died in the village of Umm Ubaidah in Iraq in the year 578 AH/1182 AD. But the name was inherent in the old zawiya, “Al-Rifai’s Zawiya,” which was the location of the current mosque, in reference to the sheikh buried there, Ali Abi Shabak, one of Al-Rifai’s descendants, and the name was later transferred to the current mosque.
Sheikh Ahmed Al-Rifai
Sheikh Ahmed Al-Rifai was born as an orphan on Umm Ubaida Island in Iraq in the year 512 AH. His uncle, Sheikh Mansour Al-Batahi, sponsored him. He is attributed to his seventh grandfather, Rifa’ah, who immigrated to Morocco to escape the Abbasid persecution of the Alawites in the East. He settled in Seville, married, and had a large number of children. His grandson, Yahya, traveled to the Hijaz to perform his duties. The obligatory Hajj, so he resided in Mecca for a short period, after which he traveled to Basra and settled there and gave birth to his two sons, Al-Hassan Al-Rifai and Ahmed Al-Rifai. Ahmed received religious education and memorized the Qur’an at a young age, and frequented the great scholars such as Sheikh Mansour Al-Batahi, Sheikh Ali Al-Wasiti, and Imam Al-Kharnoubi. At the age of twenty-five, his uncle, Sheikh Mansour Al-Batahi, died after appointing him as a successor to his path. The Sheikh left many apostles and books on various religious sciences in monotheism, interpretation, hadith, Sufism, and jurisprudence. He died in the village of Umm Ubaidah and was buried in his shrine there in the year 572 AH.
Sheikh Ali Al-Rifai
Sheikh Ali Abi Shabak Al-Rifai bin Ahmed bin Abdul Rahim bin Othman Al-Rifai, brother of the Sufi pole Ahmed Al-Rifai bin Ali Al-Makki bin Yahya Al-Naqib in Basra bin Thabit bin Al-Hazim Ahmed bin Ali Al-Makki bin Al-Hassan Rifa’ah bin Al-Mahdi bin Abu Al-Qasim bin Muhammad Al-Hazin bin Al-Hussein bin Al-Hussein bin Ahmed Al-Akbar bin Musa Abu Shiha bin Ibrahim Al-Murtada bin Musa Al-Kadhim bin Jaafar Al-Sadiq bin Muhammad Al-Baqir bin Ali Zain Al-Abidin bin Al-Hussein bin Ali bin Abi Talib, where his father, Ahmed Al-Sayyad, came to Egypt in the year 683 AH and married the granddaughter of King Al-Afdal, and had a son, Ali. But he left Egypt before his son was born, so Ali remained under the care of his mother and her family in Egypt. He adopted his grandfather’s Sufi path and called for it, and made his family’s residence in the arms market a headquarters for the Rifa’i orders.
Founder
Hoshyar Qadin
He ordered the construction of the mosque by Khushiar Hanim, or Hoshyar Khater Hanim, or Hoshyar Qadin, a woman of Turkish origin who was one of the wives of Ibrahim Pasha, the son of Muhammad Ali Pasha, the governor of Egypt. She was the mother of Khedive Ismail, son of Ibrahim Pasha, who during his reign was called “Mother Pasha.” She was also the sister of the Sultana. Bertoniel, wife of the Ottoman Sultan Mahmoud II, and mother of Sultan Abdul Aziz I. Khushiar Hanim lived in the Doubara Palace in the Garden City area, and she died in the year 1303 AH/1885 AD at the age of over seventy years and was buried in Al-Rifai Mosque.