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 Abdul
Rashid Benish was born in the year 1921 into a well-known
family in the city of Kabul, Afghanistan. His father,
Abdul Qayoom, was a prestigious village elder in the
Kodaman municipality of northern Afghanistan. However,
when King Nader Shah's government took over in 1929,
they sent Abdul Qayoom to prison and seized all his
properties - all without a court decision. In addition,
they forced Abdul Rashid Benish and his brothers out
of school. Abdul Rashid’s mother and siblings were forced
to take shelter with their uncle. Even though Abdul
Rashid Benish was unable to attend school, he still
continued his education at home. Under his uncle’s supervision,
Abdul Rashid Benish studied and excelled in all subjects,
especially writing and calligraphy.
It was fifteen years later, at the age of 23, that
Abdul Rashid Benish first became employed at the Afghan
Central Bank as a writer. This was the beginning of
a very successful career. In the next 25 years, Abdul
Rashid Benish rose to the post of personnel chief, while
continuing to expand his knowledge through outside education
courses. In 1966, he became vice-president of Qaraqul,
a large fur manufacturing company in Kabul. With this
post he took innumerable business trips to both Europe
and America, where he perfected his English. Six years
later, in 1972, Abdul Rashid Benish took the post of
vice-president for the national insurance company of
Afghanistan, where he’d work for twelve years.
In the year 1978, when the communist government took
power, Abdul Rashid Benish resigned from his post as
vice-president. Three years later, like thousands of
other Afghans, he and his family fled Afghanistan amid
the Afghan-Soviet War. They settled in the United States,
in a lesser-known city in the state of California named
Fremont. Later, Fremont was to become home to one of
the largest Afghan communities in the United States.
It was here that Abdul Rashid Benish began publishing
his essays and short stories in Afghan newspapers. His
work was very instructive and reminiscent of life in
Afghanistan. The Afghan community became very fond of
his work and immense talent. After gaining such popularity,
Abdul Rashid Benish decided to publish a collection
of his short stories. In 2001, he published “Baraka
ha hey Benish” (Sparks of Vision). The book became highly
regarded among Afghans in both the United States and
Europe. In 2005, Abdul Rashid Benish published a translation
of the one hundred hadiths of Sahey Bukhari by Ustad
Ehrari. This book has been entirely handwritten by Abdul
Rashid Benish in his beautiful calligraphy style writing.
In 2006, a translation of six of Mr. Benish's short
stories was published in Germany in a book called "Schicksalswende"
(Change in Fortune).
Today, he diligently continues his work and hopes to
publish more books in the next few years. Mr. Benish
still lives in Fremont with his wife of 54 years. Mr.
Benish has 5 children, 8 grandchildren, and 1 great-grandchild.
He is an active and well-respected member of the Afghan
community and Afghan Elder's Association.
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