22 Facts About Brahim Boushaki

Brahim Boushaki was an Algerian Scholar, Imam and Sufi Sheikh.

Brahim Boushaki was raised in a very spiritual environment within Zawiyet Sidi Boushaki with high Islamic values and ethics.

Brahim Boushaki had great interpersonal skills and devoted his entire life in service of Islam and Algeria according to the Algerian Islamic reference.

Brahim Boushaki was born in 1912 in the historic village of Soumaa perched at the top of the Col des Beni Aicha in Lower Kabylia.

Brahim Boushaki is part of the 16th generation of the descendants of the illustrious Algerian theologian Sidi Boushaki who was one of the colleagues of Sidi Abderrahmane Thaalibi in his initiatory journey in Bejaia and elsewhere at the beginning of the Gregorian 15th century.

Brahim Boushaki's great-grandfather Cheikh Ali Boushaki was one of the resistance fighters against the French conquest of Algeria during his campaign against Kabylia which began in 1837, and he was an ally of Cheikh Mohamed ben Zamoum as well as of Emir Abdelkader in the region of the Khachna massif.

The first years of Brahim Boushaki's education took place during the beginning of the 20th century in his native village under the spiritual authority of his father Ali in the zawiya of his ancestors.

Brahim Boushaki thus learned the Quran as well as the basic collections of the Muslim religion in the zawiya of his village of Soumaa before moving to the Zawiyet Sidi Boumerdassi in the village of Ouled Boumerdes to perfect his knowledge and to deepen his initiatory journey.

When Brahim Boushaki obtained all the didactic skills to fully assume his obligations as Imam, he joined his father Ali who had then been appointed mufti in the Al-Fath mosque which was erected in the center of the city of Thenia in 1926.

Indeed, the Safir Mosque was then a center of Algerian nationalism which brought together four powerful Imams who stirred the entire periphery of Algiers, Sheikh Brahim Boushaki represented Kabylia, Sheikh Mohamed Charef represented the valley of Khemis Miliana, Sheikh Mohamed Douakh represented the Titteri, while the Sheikh Ahmed Benchicou meanwhile was the representative of the Algerois and Mitidja.

When Brahim was Hezzab in this mosque, his nephews Yahia Boushaki, Boualem Boushaki and Bouzid Boushaki periodically visited him to inquire about his situation and his needs, and they were then integrated into the revolutionary independentist networks before the outbreak of the uprising of 1 November 1954.

Brahim Boushaki was then captured by French soldiers and taken to the Susini villa where he was savagely tortured before being imprisoned with his friend, Ahmed Chekkar in the same cell.

Brahim Boushaki then participated in the influence of the mosques of the Casbah of Algiers by promoting the assiduous recitation of the Hizb Rateb and the reading of Sahih Bukhari in the Djamaa el Djedid and Djamaa el Kebir with his friend, the illustrious Imam and mufti Abderrahmane Djilali.

Brahim Boushaki periodically supervised groups of Algerian pilgrims during the Hajj as a guide and mufti according to the madhhab Malikite.

Brahim Boushaki then reorganized the Quranic and jurisprudential teaching in the Al Fath mosque according to a class regime for the evening teaching of schoolchildren in the city.

Brahim Boushaki was pursuing in his action the directives of the then minister Mouloud Kacem Nait Belkacem who favored the fact that mosques should be places of teaching and intellectual emancipation in addition to the performance of the rites of Muslim worship.

Imam Brahim Boushaki welcomed in this mosque visiting Imams who preached the good word in its mihrab and its minbar, while locally he encouraged the young murids to righteousness and morality.

Brahim Boushaki was replaced in the mosque of Thenia by Imam Omar Arar, a native of the village Soumaa, in a climate of terror and recurring assassinations, and he was fatally murdered in front of his home on 13 October 1993 after Salat Icha.

Sheikh Brahim Boushaki did not return to Thenia for four times while assassinations and terrorist massacres fell throughout the Boumerdes Province and left families and tribes in mourning.

Imam Brahim Boushaki died during the year 1997 in the family home of his relatives in the commune of Kouba in the Algerois at the age of 85.

Brahim Boushaki died of a sudden heart attack while doing his ablution to perform his prayer as usual, as a Muslim and as an Imam.

Brahim Boushaki was then buried in the Sidi Garidi Cemetery within the commune of Kouba in the presence of his relatives, friends and faithful, he who spent a large part of his life in the mosques of the capital Algiers.