Abu Bakr bin Abdullah al-Aydarus was a prominent Ba Alawi scholar born in Tarim in 851 AH, corresponding to 1447 CE. He was the son of Imam Abdullah al-Aydarus and belonged to the line descending through Abu Bakr al-Sakran and Abd al-Rahman al-Saqqaf. His education began within his family and continued with scholars in Hadramawt and Yemen.
Al-Mashra al-Rawi, drawing substantially on Muhammad bin Umar Bahraq’s Mawahib al-Quddus fi Manaqib Ibn al-Aydarus, records that Abu Bakr memorised the Quran and studied tasawwuf, fiqh and other religious sciences with his father, his uncles Ali and Ahmad, Sa’d bin Ali Bamadhaj, Abdullah bin Abd al-Rahman Balhaj Bafadl, Muhammad bin Abd al-Rahman Balfqih and others. It also describes his close engagement with Imam al-Ghazali’s Ihya Ulum al-Din.
He travelled through Yemen and later performed Hajj, studying with scholars including Muhammad bin Abd al-Rahman al-Sakhawi. After returning to Tarim he taught and received students. He later settled in Aden, where he became an influential religious figure. Independent biographical dictionaries likewise identify him as a Ba Alawi scholar born in Tarim who spent many years in Aden, where he died in 914 AH, corresponding to 1508 or 1509 CE.
Spiritual states and karamat
The traditional biographies preserve a number of karamat and unusual spiritual experiences associated with Abu Bakr. Al-Mashra al-Rawi, following Bahraq’s account, relates that while travelling in Yemen he met the scholar Yahya bin Abi Bakr al-Amiri, who was said to have seen the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, touch Abu Bakr’s back in a dream. The account says marks resembling fingers were then seen on Abu Bakr’s back and remained visible thereafter. This is preserved as part of the received devotional tradition surrounding his life.
The same work also relates an episode during a journey toward Mecca in which a well had been exhausted by travellers. Abu Bakr instructed his servant to draw water for a group whose animals needed watering, and the narrative says the servant continued drawing until their animals and water-skins were supplied. Al-Mashra al-Rawi presents this among the karamat associated with him.
Later tradition also associates Abu Bakr with the early history of coffee drinking in Yemen. Because the surviving accounts differ in how strongly they frame that association, it is best understood as a transmitted historical tradition rather than a settled claim of invention.
Lineage and source note
Primary source: Al-Mashra al-Rawi fi Manaqib al-Sada al-Kiram Al Abi Alawi, volume 2, drawing on Muhammad bin Umar Bahraq’s dedicated biography Mawahib al-Quddus fi Manaqib Ibn al-Aydarus. These works preserve his lineage, education, travels, teaching, settlement in Aden and the traditional karamat associated with him. Later biographical dictionaries corroborate his Tarim origin, Aden residence and death in 914 AH.