Malik Deenar

Mālik b. Dīnār
The grave adornment (Mazar) of Malik Deenar
Preacher, Theologian, Mystic, Ascetic
Born	Kufa, Iraq
Died	about 748 C.E. possibly Thalangara, Kasaragod, Kerala, India
Venerated in	Islam, especially in all the schools of traditional Sunnism
Major shrine	Malik Deenar Mosque, Thalangara, Kasaragod, Kerala, India
Influences	Ali, Hasan of Basra

Malik Deenar (Arabic: مالك دينار‎, translit. Mālik b. Dīnār‎, Malayalam: മാലിക് ദീനാര്‍) (died 748 CE) is one of the first known Muslims to have come to India in order to propagate Islam in South Asia. Even though historians do not agree on the exact place of his death, it is widely accepted that he died at Kasaragod and that his relics were buried at the Malik Deenar Juma Mosque in Thalangara, Kasaragod. Belonging to the generation of the tabi'i, Malik is called a reliable traditionalist in Sunni sources, and is said to have transmitted from such authorities as Malik ibn Anas and Ibn Sirin. He was the son of a Persian slave from Kabul who became a disciple of Hasan al-Basri. He died just before the epidemic of plague which caused considerable ravages in Basra in 748-49 CE, with various traditions placing his death either at 744-45 or 747-48 CE.

Malik, a preacher and moralist of Basra, made a living as a copyist of the Qur'an, and seems to have been interested in the question of the various readings of the scripture. During his life, Malik had the occasion to follow more or less regularly the teaching of Basran traditionists and mystics as famous as Anas b. Mālik, Ibn Sīrīn, Hasan of Basra and Rabīʿa al-ʿAdawiyya. He was considered to have led an ascetic life himself, and tradition attributed to him several thaumaturgic gifts and miracles, including the ability to walk on water. He seems, moreover, to have been "a most eloquent ḳāṣṣ" or popular orator of religious sermons who admired, in particular, the eloquence of his contemporary al-Ḥaj̲j̲āj̲ "whom he naturally could see at Baṣra."