Naat ( and ) is poetry in praise of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. The practice is popular in South Asia (Bangladesh, Pakistan and India), commonly in Bengali, Punjabi, or Urdu. People who recite Naat are known as Naat Khawan or sanaa-khuaan. Exclusive "Praise to Allah" and Allah alone is called Hamd, not to be confused with 'Na'at'.
In Arab countries, lyrics and praises said for Muhammad are called madih nabawi.
History
Early Islam
One early author, Hassan, was known as Shair-e Darbaar-e Risalat. Before converting to Islam he was a poet, and after converting he started writing Na'ats in honor of Muhammad. His poetry defended Muhammad in response to rival poets who attacked him and his religion.
Tala al Badru Alayna is a traditional Islamic poem known as nasheed recited to Muhammad when he moved to Medina in 622 CE.
British India
The tradition of composing naʿat poetry in Urdu has deep historical roots and is nearly as old as Urdu poetry itself. Since praising the Prophet Muhammad has long been regarded as a devotional and literary act, most classical Urdu poets composed at least a few couplets of naʿat, including Mir Taqi Mir, Momin Khan Momin, and Mirza Ghalib included devotional verses in their work. However, it was not until the first half of the nineteenth century that naʿat emerged as a distinct and recognized genre within Urdu poetry. The formal consolidation of naʿat as an independent genre is commonly attributed to Kifayat Ali Kafi, an Islamic scholar from Moradabad who was executed by the British in 1858 for his involvement in the Indian Rebellion of 1857. In the late nineteenth century, Mohsin Kakorvi and Ameer Meenai played a decisive role in refining naʿat poetry. Both poets published complete collections devoted exclusively to naʿat, a significant innovation at the time. Mohsin Kakorvi is often regarded as the first Urdu poet to dedicate his entire poetic output to the genre. Another major contributor to Urdu naʿat poetry was Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi.
Pakistan
Beginnings and institutionalization
The na'at genre initially lacked acceptance within formal literary circles after the 1947 Partition, poets and advocates gradually worked to establish it as a respected genre. Poets such as Hafiz Taib (Abdul Hafeez Minhas) and Muzaffar Warsi are credited with elevating na'at<nowiki/>'s literary stature, to the extend that former Marxist or liberal poets such as Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi, Arif Abdul Mateen and Sarshar Siddiqui often turned or returned to religion through na'at; institutions such as the Kul Pakistan Mehfil-e-Naat and Pakistan’s first Naat College helped foster its practice and appreciation. Syed Riazuddin Soharwardi established Pakistan’s first Naat College in 1980 to formalize training in na'at recitation, an initiative credited with training thousands of practitioners and helping embed na'at in religious events, school assemblies, and cultural activities. (b. 1965)
- Junaid Jamshed
See also
- Hamd
- Islam in South Asia