Umar Bin Hafiz

Early life and education

He was born on 27 May 1963 (4 Muharram 1383 AH) in Tarim into a family of the Ba'Alawi line. His father, Muhammad ibn Salim ibn Hafiz, the mufti of Tarim, fell victim to the communist regime that then ruled South Yemen. He memorised the Quran young and studied jurisprudence, Arabic and hadith with his father and the scholars of Hadramawt, among them Habib Zayn ibn Ibrahim ibn Sumait. He continued his training at the Ribat of al-Bayda under Habib Muhammad ibn Abdullah al-Haddar, and also studied with Ibrahim ibn Aqil ibn Yahya, mufti of Taiz, and with scholars of the Hijaz, including Habib Abd al-Qadir ibn Ahmad al-Saqqaf. He began teaching and preaching at the age of fifteen.

Dar al-Mustafa

Back in Tarim, he founded Dar al-Mustafa for Islamic studies in the early 1990s (1414 AH); it was officially inaugurated in 1997, and he serves as its dean. Its programme rests on the transmission of knowledge through chains of teachers, spiritual refinement and da'wa, and thousands of students from many countries have graduated from it. A sister institute for women, Dar al-Zahra, opened in 2001.

Influence

He travels widely to teach, having visited the Gulf states, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Sudan, East and Southern Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia and several European countries. He sits on the advisory board of the Tabah Foundation in Abu Dhabi and in 2007 signed "A Common Word Between Us and You", the open letter from Muslim scholars to Christian leaders. The 500 Most Influential Muslims, published by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre in Amman, ranked him first for 2024 and second for 2025.