is a medium of teaching sacred knowledge to women via teachers who have been taught by traditional scholars whose chains of transmission go back to the Messenger of Allah, sallaLahu alayhi wa sallam and his blessed companions, may Allah be pleased with them.

“Al-isnadu minadal din lau lal isnadu la qala man sha’a ma sha’a.”
“The isnad (chain of transmission) is from the Deen; were it not for isnad, anyone would say whatever he wanted.”  – Abdullah bin Mubarak

The purpose of is to  provide content that will help students achieve their ultimate goal – to worship Allah, know Him and get closer to Him, Mighty and Majestic. N’imah strives to achieve this goal through content that guides to correct worship and inspires faith and love.

Shaykha Shaista Maqbool spent ten years in Damascus, Syria, where she learned Arabic and advanced Islamic sciences e.g. fiqh, seerah, tafseer, hadith, and ‘aqeedah, amongst others.

Sha.Shaista started her studies as a teenageer in Queens, NY, under the tutelage of Sh.Abdullah al-Adhami. She studied in the US with Sh.Muhammad al-Yaqubi as well. She then traveled to Syria where she studied under numerous teachers of the highest caliber, amongst them: Sh.Adib al-Kallas, Sh.Samer al-Nass, Sh.Muhammad al-Jum’uah, Sh.Mazin Bakeer, and Sh.Na’eem al-Arqsusi. She is licensed in tajweed from the late Sh.Abul-Hassan al-Kurdi (may Allah have mercy on him).

She has studied the Shafi’i and Maliki schools, though her specialty is in the Hanafi school. She is authorizes to teach and give fatwa. She has a passion for seerah and hadith. Including having read (heard) the 6 canonical books of Sunnah, she has read numerous other hadith texts. She has heard the Shamail of Tirmidhi eight times; Sahih Bukhari three times.

She studied seerah with the late, great author of the Prophet Seerah, Anisa Sameerah Za id, may Allah have mercy on her. As well as hearing it from Sh.Samer al-Nass, aSha. Tamara Gray, and Sh.Gibreel al-Haddad. She has listened to Habib Umar’s seerah online as well.

Sha. Shaista is an expert in the fiqh of menstruation in the Hanafi school (known to be one of the most difficult chapters in fiqh) which she would teach in Syria to other Arab students as well as the wives of her shuyukh. It is rare to find a woman with her credentials who speaks English as a first language.

In May, 2011, just as protests were starting to break out, Ust. Shaista left Damascus with her newborn baby. She currently resides in Albany, NY with her husband and four children. She teaches locally at her mosque and through social media. She continues to seek Sacred Knowledge when possible.

Teacher Saira Abu Bakr has studied the Sacred Sciences primarily under the following teachers: Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, Shaykh Muhammad Ya`qūbi, Shaykh Khatri ould Baba (West Africa), Shaykh Salik Bin Sidina, (West Africa), Shaykh Samer Nass (Syria), Imam Zaid Shakir, Shaykh Yahya Rhodus, Shaykha Shaista Maqbool and Shaykh Faraz Rabbani.

In Aqīdah she has studied the following texts: `Aqīdah Tahāwiyyah (two commentaries), Jawharah (three commentaries) and Ummal Barāhīn (Sanusiyyah). In Maliki Fiqh (Jurisprudence): Akhdari, Ibn `Āshir, Risālah and Mukhtasar Khalīl (Worship and other sections). She has also studied texts on the Shāmail of the Prophet Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم, Seerah (Life of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم), Hadith Terminology, Purification of the Heart, Rights of Parents, and other texts, in Arabic and English, at Zaytuna Institute, Hayward, CA since 1997. In 2000 she attended an eight-month Arabic intensive program at the Fajr and Diwan centers in Cairo, Egypt to study Grammar and Rhetoric. In 2008 she completed a B.S. in Islamic Studies from Zaytuna College (Seminary; Director Imam Zaid Shakir).

In 2010 she returned from Syria, where she had spent two years furthering her studies in `Aqīdah, Fiqh, Arabic (Teacher: Ustadh Jamal Omari) and Tajwīd (Science of Quran Recitation; Teacher: Anse Maria) and where she attended classes taught by Shaykh Muhammad Yaqoubi, Shaykh Samer Nass and Shaykha Shaista Maqbool. During this time she also continued to teach women Seerah, Fiqh, Arabic and other subjects in online and private gatherings. She currently continues to teach traditional Islamic subjects to children and adults in private and public settings, online and in-person.

Teacher Saira AbuBakr has received a B.S. in Biology (California State University at Stanislaus) and an M.S. in Genetic Counseling (Sarah Lawrence College, New York).