{{Short description|The name Josephat in Arabic and Urdu}} {{lead rewrite|date=October 2021}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2018}}{{Ahmadiyya}} '''Youza Asaf''', '''Youza Asaph''', '''Youza Asouph''', '''Yuz Asaf''', '''Yuzu Asaf''', '''Yuzu Asif''', or '''Yuzasaf''', ({{langx|ur|{{nq|یوضا آصف}}}}) are Arabic and Urdu variations of the name Josaphat, and are primarily connected with Christianized and Islamized versions of the life of the Buddha found in the legend of ''Barlaam and Josaphat''.{{citation needed|date=October 2021}}
According to Ahmadiyya thought, the name Yuz Asaf is of Buddhist derivation, and possibly from ''Yusu'' or ''Yehoshua'' (Jesus) and ''Asaf'' (the Gatherer).{{sfn|Ijaz|1986}}
==Overview==
According to Ahmadiyya thought, the Yuz Asaf was a prophet of the ''ahl-i kitab'' (People of the Book) whose real name was ''Isa'' – the Quranic name for Jesus. The prophet Yuz Asaf came to Kashmir from the West (Holy Land) during the reign of Raja Gopadatta (c 1st century A.D) according to the ancient documents held by the current custodian of the tomb.<ref>{{cite web|title=Ahmadiyya -Jesus|work=Islam Ahmadiyya |url=https://www.alislam.org/jesus/}}</ref>
According to ''Tarikh-i-Kashmir'', a history of Kashmir written between 1579 and 1620, Yuzu Asaf was a Prophet of God who travelled to Kashmir from a foreign land.<ref name="Vaziri 2012">{{cite book|last1=Vaziri|first1=M.|title=Buddhism in Iran: An Anthropological Approach to Traces and Influences|date=26 July 2012|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-1-137-02294-3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kWtdAQAAQBAJ&q=Buddhism%20in%20Iran%3A%20An%20Anthropological%20Approach%20to%20Traces%20and%20Influences&pg=PT254|language=en}}</ref>
In 1747, a local Srinagar Sufi writer, Khwaja Muhammad Azam Didamari, stated that the Roza Bal is a shrine to a foreign prophet and prince, Youza Asouph.<ref>{{cite book|author=Khwaja Muhammad Azam Didamari|title=Waqi'at-i-Kashmir (Story of Kashmir), ''being an translation by Khwaja Hamid Yazdani from the Persian MSS Tarikh-i-Kashmir 'Azmi''|language=ur|publisher=Jammu and Kashmir Islamic Research Centre|location=Srinagar|year=1998|page=117}}</ref>
Indologist Günter Grönbold in his ''Jesus in Indien'' assesses that the shrine was previously Hindu, before the Islamization of Kashmir and is possibly the grave of a Buddhist or Hindu saint rather than a Sufi, but, in any case, has no connection with Jesus or Christianity.<ref>Grönbold ''Jesus in Indien'' 1985 p.57</ref>
==Ghulam Ahmad and Ahmadiyya belief== {{main|Ahmadiyya views of Jesus}}
Having stumbled upon research by Russian explorer Nicolas Notovitch, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the founder of the Ahmadiyya movement, identified Yuz Asaf as a name that Jesus of Nazareth may have assumed following his crucifixion and migration from Palestine.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Miller|first1=Sam|title=Tourists flock to 'Jesus's tomb' in Kashmir|url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8587838.stm|access-date=12 April 2017|work=news.bbc.co.uk|agency=BBC News|quote=Officially, the tomb is the burial site of Youza Asaph, a medieval Muslim preacher}}</ref> Ahmad further identified the Roza Bal shrine located in Srinagar, Kashmir as the tomb of Jesus.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.tombofjesus.com/2007/core/founders/ahmad/index.html |title=The Tomb of Jesus Website |access-date=19 August 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090105174234/http://www.tombofjesus.com/2007/core/founders/ahmad/index.html |archive-date=5 January 2009 }}</ref> Drawing on Kashmiri oral traditions, as well as the Qur'an, Hadith and accounts by explorers, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad postulated that Jesus travelled to Srinagar, where he settled and married a woman called Maryam (Mary), and that Maryam bore Yuz Asaf children, before he died aged 120 years. He discusses this belief in the book ''Jesus in India''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ahmad |first1=Hazrat Mirza Ghulam |title=Jesus in India: Jesus' Deliverance from the Cross & Journey to India |date=2016 |publisher=Islam International Publications Ltd |isbn=978-1-85372-723-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PiCFgkGcxRQC |access-date=6 April 2020 |language=en}}</ref> More recent Ahmadiyya writers assert that the tomb of Mary, the mother of Jesus is in Murree, Pakistan.<ref>Ahmaddiya magazine ''Review of Religions'' {{cite book|title=Review of religions - Mary|date=20 April 2019 |url=https://www.reviewofreligions.org/14342/maryas-mother-of-jesusas/}}</ref>
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad's use of various Hindu and Islamic sources have been deemed to be misunderstandings or distortions by various scholars of Buddhism including the Swedish scholar Per Beskow in ''Jesus in Kashmir: Historien om en legend'' (1981), the German indologist Günter Grönbold, in ''Jesus in Indien - Das Ende einer Legende'' (1985) and Norbert Klatt, in ''Lebte Jesus in Indien?: Eine religionsgeschichtliche Klärung'' (1988).{{citation needed|date=April 2020}} His views{{clarify|date=May 2021}} are considered heretical by the majority Sunni Islamic scholars, who assert that Jesus is alive in heaven.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Alexa Brand |date=2016 |title=Placing the Marginalized Ahmadiyya in Context with the Traditional Sunni Majority |journal=Journal of Mason Graduate Research |volume=3 |issue=3 |doi=10.13021/G8jmgr.v3i3.1330 |doi-access=free |s2cid=73710025}}</ref>
Muslims living near the shrine believe Yuz Asaf was a Sufi saint.<ref name="DAWN 2010">{{cite web|date=1 April 2010|title=Kashmir shrine bars tourists over Jesus burial row|url=https://www.dawn.com/news/528299|access-date=11 April 2017|website=DAWN.COM|language=en|quote=medieval Muslim saint Yuz Asaf}}</ref>
==See also== *Jesus in Ahmadiyya Islam
==References== {{reflist}} ;Sources {{cite web|last=Ijaz|first=Tahir|title=Yuz Asaf and Jesus: The Buddhism Connection|url=http://www.reviewofreligions.org/wp-content/pdf-downloads/RR198602.pdf#page=33|publisher=The Review of Religions|year=1986|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170805013728/http://www.reviewofreligions.org/wp-content/pdf-downloads/RR198602.pdf#page=33|access-date=23 May 2020|archive-date=5 August 2017}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Asaf, Yuz}} Category:Year of birth missing Category:Year of death missing Category:Srinagar Category:Kashmiri Sufi saints Category:Ahmadiyya Category:Prophets in Ahmadiyya Category:Swoon hypothesis Category:Jesus in Islam Category:Indian Sufi saints