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Al-Shaʿrānī’s Defence of Ibn ʿArabī in Context: Interpreting ‘the Oneness of Existence’ (waḥdat al-wujūd) as Experiential Oneness Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-10-17 Haruka Cheifetz
The sixteenth-century Egyptian scholar ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Shaʿrānī was a prominent Shāfiʿī jurist of his time as well as an ardent supporter of Ibn ʿArabī; he played an important role in popularising Ibn ʿArabī’s teaching, which were then considered highly controversial. However, in current scholarship, al-Shaʿrānī’s defence of Ibn ʿArabī’s work is often dismissed as arbitrary and inconsistent. The
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Building an Archival Persona: The Transformation of Sufi Ijāza Culture in Russia, 1880s–1920s Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-10-17 Alfrid Bustanov, Shamil Shikhaliev, Ilona Chmilevskaia
This article analyses the uses of education certificates (ijāzas) as a tool of self-expression by Russia’s Muslims in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. While the transmission of ijāzas as such served as a means of constructing the ideal Muslim personality, manuscript evidence suggests that a selective approach to compiling ijāza miscellanies could successfully be employed in building one’s own
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The Spiritual Teachings of Zakariyyā Kāndhlavī (d. 1982) in Fażāʾil-i Durūd Sharīf Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-10-17 Imad Jafar
Although the influential transnational Deobandi missionary organisation Tablīghī Jamāʿat is scarcely portrayed in contemporary popular media as a “Sufi movement,” the elders of the trend – such as the late Zakariyyā Kāndhlavī (d. 1402/1982) – were staunch Sufi shaykhs. Therefore, it is not surprising to find that one of the core texts of the Tablīghī Jamāʿat – Kāndhlavī’s Fażāʾil-i ʿAmāl – is full
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Summoned Letters, the Disjointed Letters and the Talisman of Ibn ʿArabī Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-10-10 Dunja Rašić
Twenty-nine chapters (sūras) of the Qur’an begin with the disjointed letters (al-ḥurūf al-muqaṭṭaʿāt). These fourteen letters of the Arabic alphabet thus became known as the “openers of the chapters” (fawātiḥ aṣ-ṣuwar). This paper focuses on Ibn ʿArabī’s writings on three disjointed letters, namely, ʾalif-lām-mīm, as well as their meaning, and the power and the talisman he associated with them.
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On Wine-Drinking in Sufi-Philosophical Islam: A Response to Shahab Ahmed Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-08-29 Arjun Nair
Shahab Ahmed’s What is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic is perhaps the most ambitious book in Islamic Studies of the last fifty years. One of the ways specialists might engage critically with Ahmed’s work is with his various presentations of the ideas of different Muslim actors featured in his re-conceptualization of Islam, upon which Ahmed often constructs his own positive theses. Does he represent
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The Ethical Turn of Neo-Traditionalism: Karāmāt al-awliyāʾ in Nuh Keller’s Sea Without Shore Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-10 Elvira Kulieva
This article focuses on the concept of karāmāt al-awliyāʾ in the contemporary Sufi manual Sea Without Shore by Nuh Ha Mim Keller (b. 1954), an American convert and a major representative of the neo-traditionalist camp. Through situating Sea Without Shore within the context of early Sufi manuals, this article analyses the specificities of Keller’s interpretation of karāmāt al-awliyāʾ. I argue that his
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Ibn ʿArabī on the Circle of Trusteeship and the Divine Name al-Wakīl Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-10 Atif Khalil
With special reference to chapters 119 and 558 of the Meccan Revelations, the article draws out Ibn ʿArabī’s (d. 638/1240) understanding of the divine Name al-Wakīl (“The Trustee”) and the nature of trusteeship (wakāla). In the process, it demonstrates how for our mystic trusteeship forms a circle that begins with the human being entrusting his affairs to God, and returns to its point of origin with
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Writing about the Mawlid al-Sharīf in Eighth/Fourteenth-Century Maghrib: A Sufi-Legal Discourse Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-05-10 Kameliya Atanasova
Recent scholarship on the relationship between premodern Sufism and Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) has highlighted the overlap between Sufis and jurists at the level of social and intellectual life. Despite this growing body of studies on Sufi-jurist dynamics, the role of Sufi metaphysics in this intellectual intersection remains unexplored. To address this gap, I provide a close reading of an entry
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Mapping the Unseen: Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Maps in Chapter 371 of al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2023-04-25 Ali Karjoo-Ravary
This paper examines a series of sequential cosmological and eschatological maps drawn by Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) in his second recension of al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya (Türk ve İslam Eserleri Müzesi 1845+). These images, drawn from the visual language of the rational sciences, map the images of revelation into the cosmology of the day so as to show the vastness of God’s cosmos and the limits of the
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Love and the Brethren of Purity: A Comparative Study of Human Intimacy in Islamic Philosophy Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-10-06 Javad Fakhkhar Toosi, Shafique N. Virani
This article is a study of the Brethren of Purity’s thirty-seventh epistle, The Essence of Love. It compares this work with the treatises on love written by the Muslim philosophers Ibn Sīnā, Suhrawardī, and Mullā Ṣadrā, the leading representatives of the Peripatetic, Illuminationist, and Transcendental schools of Islamic philosophy, respectively. A fundamental distinction of the Brethren’s approach
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Tadhkira-yi Ṭāhir Īshān: A Neglected Source on the History of the Naqshbandī Sufi Tradition in Central Asia Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-10-06 Aziza Shanazarova
The present study is intended to introduce and explore a hagiographical compendium known as the Tadhkira-yi Ṭāhir Īshān which was compiled in the middle of the eighteenth century in Khwarazm and Bukhara. Although this work has drawn minimal scholarly attention, it is a critical text for understanding the Naqshbandī history in Central Asia prior to the transformation of the local Sufi communities in
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Visions and Virtues: The Minhāj al-Tarbiya of the ṭarīqa Karkariyya Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-10-06 John C. Thibdeau
Founded in 2006 by Shaykh Muḥammad Fawzī al-Karkarī as a new branch of the Shādhiliyya, the Karkariyya have grown as an international Sufi order that is distinguished by their multi-colored patchwork robes called the muraqqaʿa and their publication of video testimonials describing experience during spiritual retreats (khalwa). This article examines these practices using ethnographic and textual sources
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Religious Practice and Social Services in an Ottoman Sufi waqf Foundation Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-04-21 F. Cangüzel Güner Zülfikar
This article investigates the endowment (waqf) foundation established by an Ottoman Sufi master of the Jilwatiyya order, ʿAzīz Maḥmūd Hudāʾī (1541–1628), and the impact of his philanthropic works on religious, social, and cultural life in sixteenth and seventeenth-century Istanbul. While providing his disciples with space for spiritual training in his Sufi lodge, Hudāʾī’s waqf also funded public services
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Mysticism and Theosophy in the Service of the Regime: Azharite Scholars and the Challenges to Religion-State Relations under Mubarak Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-03-18 Elisheva Machlis
Challenged by Salafi Islam, Sufism managed to reassert itself in Egypt by acquiring new roles in society while emphasizing commitment to the Sharia. This article explores the role played by the religious organs of the state in promoting Sufism under President Hosni Mubarak, in the context of growing challenges to religion-state relations during this period. Focusing on the thought of ʿAlī Jumʿa, the
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On the History of Sufism in Australia: A Manuscript from the Broken Hill Mosque Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-03-18 Abu Bakr Sirajuddin Cook, Rami Dawood
As scholarly interest in Australia’s cameleers has increased, there has been suggestions that some of these Muslim migrants were connected with Sufism. However, to date, there has been limited analysis and insufficient evidence to claim a strong connection between the cameleers and Sufism in Australia. This article attempts to rectify this by providing an analysis and translation of a handwritten manuscript
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Sufism, Miracles and Oceanic Fatwas: The Beloved of North Jakarta Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2022-03-18 Teren Sevea
This article examines stories, hagiographies, fatwas, and treatises related to the grave of a sayyid miracle worker (keramat) buried in North Jakarta. It is a product of research that began in 2008 when I first visited the Sufi shrine of the eminent keramat, Habib Hussein al-ʿAydarus (d. 1169/1756), in the village of Luar Batang. Herefrom, I enjoyed access to a series of documents, oral traditions
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Fragments de gnose musulmane soviétique : Quelques ghazals du dīwān de Shaykh ʿAbd al-Raḥīm Dawlat Īlākī (1881-1947) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Stéphane A. Dudoignon
Résumé Décrit comme isolat de conservatisme, l’islam centrasiatique de l’ère soviétique témoigne, jusque dans ses traits d’archaïsme, de mutations profondes. Parmi elles : la valorisation, par une poésie gnostique persane ou türke de forme classique produite pendant le court XXe siècle, des Voies soufies comme lieu de résistance aux “idolâtries” du moment. Après la disparition des khānqāh (loges) dès
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From the Remainder of Adam’s Clay: Chapter Eight of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Ali Karjoo-Ravary
This article presents an introduction to and a complete English translation of the eighth chapter of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s (d. 638/1240) magnum opus al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya. The chapter, entitled, “On the earth that was made from the remainder of Adam’s leaven clay, which is the Earth of Reality, and on some of the strange and wondrous things contained therein,” contains a description of a world wholly separate
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Introduction: Sufi Texts in Translation Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Amer Latif, Alexandre Papas, Mohammed Rustom
This special issue of the Journal of Sufi Studies attempts to make the case that the act of translation is best seen as a recurrent activity necessitated by the various changes that inform the interpretation of Sufi texts on the one hand, and the languages and cultures that receive them on the other. The nine Sufi texts featured in this collection illustrate the diversity of genres and variety of languages
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Le Traité de la rosace (Risāle-i gül-ābād) d’Ibrāhīm el-Eşrefī el-Qādirī, cheikh soufi ottoman du XIIe/XVIIIe siècle Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Alexandre Papas
Résumé La rose (gül en turc) est un symbole bien connu dans le soufisme, en particulier dans la poésie mystique. Métaphore de l’épineuse beauté divine que le rossignol adule, la fleur hérite d’interprétations supplémentaires dans les manuels confrériques, à partir notamment de hadiths apocryphes. L’un de ces écrits, le Traité de la rosace d’Ibrāhīm el-Eşrefī el-Qādirī, cheikh de la branche Eşrefiyye
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Les États spirituels de Muḥammad le Champion (Ḥālāt-i Pahlawān Muḥammad) de Mīr ʿAlī Shīr Nawāʾī Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Marc Toutant
Résumé Dans le Ḥālāt-i Pahlawān Muḥammad (« Les États spirituels de Muḥammad Le Champion », 899/1493), le grand polygraphe timouride Mīr ʿAlī Shīr Nawāʾī (844-906/ 1441-1501) retrace la carrière d’un champion de lutte qui fut aussi un célèbre mystique. Nawāʾī avait rencontré le Champion lorsqu’il avait lui-même dû trouver refuge à Machhad au début des années 860/fin des années 1450 et les deux hommes
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A Mughal Treatise on Essence and Existence: Muḥibb Allāh Ilāhābādī’s Equivalence between Giving and Receiving (al-Taswiya bayna al-Ifāda wa-l-Qabūl) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Shankar Nair
This article presents an annotated translation of The Equivalence between Giving and Receiving (al-Taswiya bayna al-ifāda wa-l-qabūl), a short Arabic treatise on essence (dhāt) and existence (wujūd) composed by the South Asian philosopher-Sufi Shaykh Muḥibb Allāh Ilāhābādī (996–1058/1587–1648). Although modern scholarship has habitually referred to Muḥibb Allāh as an ardent defender of the doctrine
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Mullā Ṣadrā’s Arrivers in the Heart (al-Wāridāt al-Qalbiyya) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 William C. Chittick
It is increasingly difficult after Ibn ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) to differentiate the aims of the Sufis from those of the philosophers. Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1050/1640) offers a fine example of a thinker who synthesized the Sufi and philosophical methodologies in his voluminous writings. In Arrivers in the Heart he combines the precision of philosophical reasoning with the recognition (maʿrifa) of God and self
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Traduction commentée des sentences parallèles (duilian) de Ma Qixi (1857-1914), fondateur du Xidaotang Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Marie-Paule Hille
Résumé Cet article propose d’explorer les procédés par lesquels une pensée soufie s’est diffusée dans les lieux de culte et de vie communautaire des musulmans chinois dans le nord-ouest de la Chine pendant la première moitié du XXe siècle. La traduction et l’étude des seize sentences parallèles (duilian) écrites entre 1908 et 1914 par le saint fondateur du Xidaotang, Ma Qixi (1857-1914), montrent que
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A Treatise on Practical and Theoretical Sufism in the Sokoto Caliphate: Shaykh Dan Tafa’s Exposition of Devotions (Bayān al-Taʿabbudāt) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Ogunnaike Oludamini
This article presents an annotated translation of The Exposition of Devotions, a short text by Shaykh ʿAbd al-Qādir ibn Muṣtafā (1218–1280/1804–1864) about his spiritual master and maternal uncle, Muḥammad Sambo (1195–1242/1782–1826). Muḥammad Sambo was the son of ʿUthmān ibn Fūdī (also known as Usman dan Fodio), the founder of the Sokoto Caliphate, one of the largest pre-colonial polities on the African
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Ẕahīn Shāh Tājī’s (d. 1978) Signs of Beauty (Āyāt-i Jamāl) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Amer Latif
Bābā Ẕahīn Shāh Tājī (d. 1978) is a well-known Sufi poet in Pakistan. He belonged to the Chishtī Sufi order and his mausoleum in Karachi is a center of pilgrimage known for its weekly Qawwali (devotional singing) gatherings. This article presents an overview of Tājī’s experience and articulation of the Sufi path through selected English translations from his collection of Urdu ghazals, Signs of Beauty
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Rethinking the Institutionalization of Islamic Mysticism Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Nile Green
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Eternity Made Temporal: Ashraf ʿAlī Thānavī, a Twentieth-Century Indian Thinker and the Revival of Classical Sufi Thought Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-06-30 Muhammad U. Faruque
This study investigates the Deobandī engagement with classical Sufi thought through the writings of one of modern South Asia’s most influential Sufi thinkers, namely Ashraf ʿAlī Thānavī (d. 1943). The article brings to focus Thānavī’s contributions to South Asian Sufism by showing how he sought to preserve, defend, revive, and disseminate classical Sufi teachings in a climate of social reform. The
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Replacing Sharīʿa, Ṭarīqa and Ḥaqīqa with Fiqh, Akhlāq and Tawḥīd: Notes on Shaykh Muḥammad Bahārī (d. 1325/1907) and His Sufi Affiliation Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-06-30 Seyed Amir Hossein Asghari
Shaykh Muḥammad Bahārī (1265/1849–1325/1907), aside from being a Shīʿite cleric (mujtahid), was a scholar and follower of Sufism. He was a disciple of Mullā Ḥusayn-Qulī Hamadānī (1239/1824–1311/1894) in ʿirfān (gnosis) in the Shīʿī seminary. In his treatise on spiritual wayfaring, Tadhkirat al-muttaqīn, Bahārī represents a triad of jurisprudence (fiqh), ethics (akhlāq) and monotheism (tawhīd). In his
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Walāya between Lettrism and Astrology: The Occult Mysticism of Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī (d. c. 787/1385) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-06-30 Mohammad Amin Mansouri
This article examines Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī’s occult narratives of sainthood (al-walāya) with a focus on his Naṣṣ al-nuṣūṣ fī sharḥ al-fuṣūṣ, a voluminous commentary on Ibn al-ʿArabī’s (d. 638/1240) Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam. I argue that Āmulī uses lettrism, astrology, and alchemy to construct occult narratives that advocate for the supremacy of sainthood over prophecy (al-nubuwwa). I first examine the relation
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Nearness to the Real: Sainthood as Ontological Proximity in the Thought of Dāwūd al-Qayṣarī Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-07-02 Arthur Schechter
This article presents the theory of sainthood found in the writings of Dāwūd al-Qayṣarī (d. 751/1350), a major commentator on the Sufi thought of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 638/1240). Building on previous philosophical interpretations of Ibn ʿArabī’s thought to systematize the worldview now known as the “Oneness of Being” (waḥdat al-wujūd), Qayṣarī also developed a sophisticated theory of sainthood that not only
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The Horizons of Being: The Metaphysics of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the Muqaddimat al-Qayṣarī, written by Mukhtar H. Ali Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-06-30 Cyrus Ali Zargar
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Repentance and the Return to God: Tawba in Early Sufism, written by Atif Khalil Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-06-30 Mukhtar H. Ali
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Muḥammad al-Ṣūfī, the Prophet Muḥammad, and Ibn al-Fāriḍ: Creative Trends in Arabic Religious Poetry in the 9th/15th Century Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Emil Homerin†
Muḥammad Ibn al-Shihābī al-Ṣūfī composed mystical poems in praise of the prophet Muḥammad, basing much of his verse on the poems of Ibn al-Fāriḍ. While he was not the first to imitate Ibn al-Fāriḍ, Ibn al-Shihābī may have been the first Arabic poet to use consistently a Persian style signature verse (takhalluṣ). This article offers a critical Arabic edition, English translation, and analysis of several
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The Point of Reality and the Circle of Appearance: The Sufi Philosophy of Maḥmūd Shabistarī’s Gulshan-i rāz through the Lens of Shams al-Dīn Lāhījī’s Mafātīḥ al-iʿjāz Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Sayeh Meisami
This article explains three major Sufi themes of Maḥmūd Shabistarī’s Gulshan-i rāz as connected by the point-circle metaphor that captures the illusory state of a circle formed by the fast motion of a point. Inspired by Ibn ʿArabī, Shabistarī employs this metaphor in his poetic presentation of the unity of being, the existential state of the human soul, and the bifurcation of religious knowledge and
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Rūmī’s Mathnawī, Book Two: The Transformation of Blood to Milk and the Transfiguration of the Senses Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Sassan Zand Moqaddam, Mehdi Nourian
Early in Mathnawī Book Two appears a heavily-debated hemistich: “An interval was needed in order that the blood might turn to milk.” Here Rūmī uses three distinct means to introduce the notion of “Transfiguration of the Senses”: a religious conceit; an allegory – in fact, a common Persian-language proverb; and a brief explanation of Ḥusām al-Dīn’s spiritual ascension. Lacking familiarity with Rūmī’s
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Transposing Metaphors and Poetics from Text to World: The Theo-Poetics of Lāhūrī’s “Mystical Commentary” on Ḥāfiẓ’s Love Lyrics Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Axel Marc Oaks Takacs
This article examines the use of Sufi lexicons (iṣṭilāḥāt) through the relatively unknown Mystical Commentary of the Love Lyrics of Ḥāƒiẓ by Abū al-Ḥasan Khatamī Lāhūrī. It resituates the iṣṭilāḥāt within the context of the philosophical-Sufi tradition, engaging theories of metaphor, imagination, poetry, and imaginaries from Ricœur, Castoriadis, Lakoff and Johnson, and Caputo. Rather than employing
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Thus Spake the Dervish: Sufism, Language, and the Religious Margins in Central Asia, 1400–1900, written by Alexandre Papas Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Jürgen Wasim Frembgen
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Poetry in Praise of Prophetic Perfection: A Study of West African Arabic Madīḥ Poetry and its Precedents, written by Oludamini Ogunnaike Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Adnan Adrian Wood Smith
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Dū risāla dar bāra-yi futuvvat va taṣavvuf dar ṭarīqathā-yi Ṣafaviyya va Rifāʿiyya, written by Mehran Afshari Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2021-03-25 Alexandre Papas
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The Human Intellect: Liberation or Limitation?: Some Notes on ʿAql in Classical Islamic Mysticism Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-10-22 Michael Ebstein
The article discusses various attitudes towards the human intellect (ʿaql) in classical Islamic mysticism, as reflected in key mystical writings composed from the third/ninth century to the rise of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the sixth/twelfth. It begins by presenting the basic challenge that the concept of ʿaql posed for the mystics of Islam and then proceeds to analyze diverse approaches to the intellect in
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Metaphysics of Muhammad: The Nur Muhammad from Imam Ja‘far al-Sadiq (d. 148/765) to Nasir al-Din al-Tusi (d. 672/1274) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-10-22 Khalil Andani
This study analyzes the development of the theme of the “Light of Muḥammad” (al-nūr al-Muḥammadī) or the “Muḥammadan Reality” (al-ḥaqīqa al-Muḥammadiyya) among several Shiʿi and Sufi thinkers through the seventh/thirteenth century. These thinkers include Imam Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq (d. 148/765), Sahl al-Tustarī (d. 283/896), the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ (early to mid 4th/10th century), the Ismaili dāʿīs Abū Yaʿqūb
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Sufi Symbol as Gap, Metaphor as Clue: Symbols in Ibn ʿArabī’s Love Poem as a Case Study Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-10-22 Mustafa Muhammad T. Binmayaba
This article introduces an approach to analyzing the way in which figurative language interfaces with cognitive, cultural, and spiritual experience in the symbols employed by the Sufis to express their love of God. It relies on the Cognitive Linguistic Approach to reveal the relationship between the Sufis’ thoughts about God, secular language of love, and the idea of divine love. Through a case study
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Arabic Literature of the North Caucasian Naqshbandiyya in the 19th Century: Shaykh Jamāl al-Dīn al-Ghāzīghumūqī’s Treatise al-Ādāb al-Marḍiyyafī l-Ṭarīqa al-Naqshbandiyya and Its Khālidiyya Tendencies Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-02-28 Gülfem Alıcı
This article analyses the Sufi treatise al-Ādāb al-marḍiyya fī l-ṭarīqa al-naqshbandiyya written by the Daghestanian Naqshbandī shaykh Jamāl al-Dīn al-Ghāzīghumūqī (d. 1866/67), the Sufi master, companion and father-in-law of Imām Shāmil (d. 1871). After providing an outline of the life and activities of Shaykh Jamāl al-Dīn I will examine the concepts, persons, and practices treated in his Ādāb which
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Dreams and Visions as Diagnosis in Medieval Sufism: The Emergence of Kubrawī Oneirology Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-02-28 Eyad Abuali
In recent scholarship the notion that dreams and visions in Islamic societies are phenomena with no relevance to historic events or societal concerns has been challenged and overturned. However, the theoretical underpinnings of Sufi oneirology in the medieval period have yet to receive a full exposition. Furthermore, the relevance of such seemingly abstract texts to Sufi organisational and institutional
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The Origins and Evolution of Sufi Communities in South Asia Revisited Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-02-28 Blain Auer
This article offers a reevaluation of studies on the origins of Sufism in South Asia. Generally, scholars have pointed to the thirteenth century as the genesis of Sufi orders in Northern India. However, this period supplies no textual evidence to support this claim. The vague picture of the thirteenth century is one of individual shaykhs unattached to specific Sufi orders or distinct religious teachings
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Sanctity, Orality and Questions about Cultural and Religious Identity in North Morocco: The Case of Lallā ʿĀʾisha al-Khaḍrāʾ, Saint of Alcazarquivir Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2020-02-28 Rachid El Hour
This study presents some results from my fieldwork dealing with the female saints of the north Moroccan city of Alcazarquivir, which has been carried out between 2012 and 2014 in that village. The connections between orality and writing are more frequent as the educational level of the interviewee is higher; some of these informants raised roader issues regarding the evolution of the customs or the
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Companionship, Human Perfection, and Divine Union in Thirteenth-Century Persian Sufism Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Aydogan Kars
This article reevaluates Rūmī’s approach to divine union in the light of the larger institutional and normative context that orchestrates it. Via key terms “spiritual companionship” [ṣuḥba] and normative Sufi “conduct” [adab], I situate Rūmī within the Khurasanian Sufi milieu wherein divine union was perceived as a communicative and communal process whereby the existentiating divine mercy overflows
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Journey in Sufism: Literal or Metaphorical? Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Mansure Rahmani, Ahad Faramarz Gharamaleki, Hassan Arif
Journey (safar) is strongly relevant to Sufism and mysticism. It has been considered as a paradigm for the various stages of spiritual transition. The problem addressed in this study concerns different uses of the word for analysis of the process of its conversion into a mystical term, and the criticism of this process. Sufis used the term journey in its literal meaning because of its important role
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The Ring Analogy according to al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī and Its Implications for Understanding walāya in Ibn ʿArabī’s Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Aiyub Palmer
The ring analogy is generally associated with Ibn ʿArabī and his Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam. However, al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī uses this same analogy as a way of expressing various aspects of walāya within his original and multi-layered doctrine of the concept. The present article’s understanding of Tirmidhī’s ring analogy and its relationship to his doctrine of walāya builds upon the work of Radtke and others who
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Sufis and Coffee Consumption: Religio-Legal and Historical Aspects of a Controversy in the Late Mamluk and Early Ottoman Periods Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Hatim Mahamid, Chaim Nissim
From the tenth/sixteenth century, coffee consumption spread from Yemen northwards, mainly via the Sufis and their disciples, who claimed that drinking coffee helped their ritual activity. This caused an extended debate among the ulama of different schools, who viewed the Sufis’ coffee drinking as a negative innovation opposed to the sharīʿa. The controversy first focused on whether coffee was permitted
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Weighing Knowledge: Humanity, Modernity, and Ṣafī ʿAlī Shāh’s Mīzān al-maʿrifah Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Robert Landau Ames
This article studies the influence of late Qajar cultures of politics and ethics upon a Sufi theory of knowledge. It argues that Mīrzā Ḥasan Iṣfahānī (known in Sufi circles as Ṣafī ʿAlī Shāh) performed the role of public intellectual in his treatise on knowledge and ethics Mīzān al-maʿrifah (The Scale of Knowledge). I propose that the text’s ethical directives actually serve to dictate the conditions
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Wisdom in Controversy: Paradox and the Paradoxical in Sayings of Abū Yazīd al-Bisṭāmī (d. 234/848 or 261/875) Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Annabel Keeler
Sufi authors, such as Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj (d. 378/998) and Ruzbihan Baqlī (d. 606/1209), were concerned to explain the shaṭḥiyyāt, often translated as “ecstatic utterances”, of earlier mystics and defend them against the condemnation they received from those who had neither the experience nor the purview to understand them. Among the shaṭḥiyyāt explained by these two authors are a number of the most
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ʿAyn al-Quḍāt between Divine Jealousy and Political Intrigue Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Mohammed Rustom
Modern scholars have been interested in the great Persian Sufi martyr ʿAyn al-Quḍāt Hamadānī (d. 525/1131) for over six decades. Despite this fact, many aspects of his life and thought still remain terra incognita. Our knowledge of the circumstances surrounding his death is a case-in-point. Although we have a fairly good understanding of the factors which led to ʿAyn al-Quḍāt’s demise, there are other
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Sufi Qurʾān Commentaries, Genealogy and Originality: Universal Mercy as a Case Study Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-12-05 Pieter Coppens
This article reflects on some methodological issues in the study of tafsīr, taking the dissemination of the ideas of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) on the non-perpetuity of the chastisement of Hell in Sufi tafsīr as a case study. I show that Ibn ʿArabī’s ideas on the issue were hardly adopted by later Sufi commentators on the Qurʾān. I investigate whether just as its exoteric counterpart, and despite the
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Jews and Judaism in Classical Sufi Literature Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-01-30 Elisha Russ-Fishbane
This paper addresses a paradox at the heart of the classical Sufi tradition. On the one hand, key Sufi writers express a radical universalism or ‘transconfessionalism’ in their mystical verse. This has led a variety of modern scholars to identify Sufism as an ecumenical and non-dogmatic tradition. On the other hand, in other writings the selfsame authors conduct a vigorous literary polemic and celebrate
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Comparing the Teachings of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī and Abū Madyan Journal of Sufi Studies Pub Date : 2018-01-30 Pascal Held
This study looks to identify commonalities between the ideas of the prominent sixth/twelfth-century mystics ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (d. 561/1166) and Abū Madyan (d. 594/1198). As will be shown, they not only overlap in their emphasis and interpretations of certain features of the mystical path, but in fact rely on a common basic understanding as regards mystical endeavors overall.