Sufi Institutions

Handbook of Oriental Studies

Handbuch der Orientalistik
section one

The Near and Middle East

Edited by

Maribel Fierro (Madrid)

M. Şukru Hanioğlu (Princeton)
Renata Holod (University of Pennsylvania)
Kees Versteegh (Nijmegen)

Handbook of Sufi Studies

VOLUME 1

Editor in Chief

Alexander Knysh (University of Michigan and St. Petersburg State University)

Editors

Marcia K. Hermansen (Loyola University Chicago)

Christian Lange (Utrecht University)
Bilal Orfali (American University of Beirut)
Alexandre Papas (CNRS, Paris)

Founding Editor

Bernd Radtke

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/hsuf

Sufi Institutions
Edited by

Alexandre Papas

LEIDEN | BOSTON
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Papas, Alexandre, editor.

Title: Sufi institutions / edited by Alexandre Papas.
Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2021. | Series: Handbook of Sufi studies ; vol. 1 |
Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020034591 (print) | LCCN 2020034592 (ebook) |
ISBN 9789004389076 (hardback) | ISBN 9789004392601 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Sufism—History. | Sufism—Social aspects. |
Sufism—Economic aspects. | Public administration—Islamic countries.
Classification: LCC BP189.2 .S78 2020 (print) | LCC BP189.2 (ebook) |
DDC 297.4—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020034591
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020034592

Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface.

ISSN 0169-9423
ISBN 978-90-04-38907-6 (hardback)
ISBN 978-90-04-39260-1 (e-book)

Copyright 2021 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.

Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi,
Brill Sense, Hotei Publishing, mentis Verlag, Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh and Wilhelm Fink Verlag.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise,
without prior written permission from the publisher. Requests for re-use and/or translations must be
addressed to Koninklijke Brill NV via brill.com or copyright.com.

This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

Contents

Acknowledgments ix
List of Figures x
Abbreviations xii

Introduction: What Is a Ṣūfī Institution? 1

Alexandre Papas

Part 1
The Economy of Sufism

1 Economies of Sufism 27
Adam Sabra

2 Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 58

Nathan Hofer

3 Donations to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī Institutions 81

Hussain Ahmad Khan

4 Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 89

Mehran Afshari

Part 2
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings

5 Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 105

Daphna Ephrat and Paulo G. Pinto

6 Ṣūfī Shrines 145

Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen

7 Ṣūfī Lodges 157

Peyvand Firouzeh
vi Contents

8 Ṣūfī Outposts (ribāṭs) 174

Nathan Hofer

Part 3
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs

9 The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 187

Rachida Chih

10 Ṣūfī Altruism 218

Richard McGregor

11 Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 227

Nathalie Clayer

12 Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 239

Ahmet Yaşar Ocak

Part 4
Sufism and Worldly Powers

13 Sufism and Worldly Powers 255

Alexandre Papas

14 Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 292

Luca Patrizi

15 Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 303

Neguin Yavari

16 Sufism, the Army, and Holy War 315

David Cook
Contents vii

17 Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 322

Knut S. Vikør

Part 5
The Organisation of Mysticism

18 The Organisation of Mysticism 335

Mark Sedgwick

19 The First Communities 362

Jean-Jacques Thibon

20 Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 374

Ismail Fajrie Alatas

21 Established Ṣūfī Orders 385

Semih Ceyhan

22 Cyber Sufism 405

Stéphane A. Dudoignon

Index 415
Acknowledgments

The editor of this handbook would like to thank all contributors for their
efforts and patience. I am grateful to several people who have worked with
me throughout the editorial process: Alexander Knysh, Valerie Joy Turner,
Abdurraouf Oueslati, and Nienke Brienen-Moolenaar.
Figures

5.1 Khānqāh al-Ṣalāḥiyya in Jerusalem, views of the portal elevation. Photo by

Daphna Ephrat 109
5.2 Khānqāh al-Ṣalāḥiyya in Jerusalem, the mosque minaret. Photo by Daphna
Ephrat 110
5.3 Khānqāh al-Farāfra in Aleppo, muqarnas hood. Yasser Tabbaa Archive,
courtesy of Aga Khan Documentation Center, MIT Libraries
(AKDC@MIT) 111
5.4 Khānqāh al-Farāfra in Aleppo, detail of upper part of courtyard with citadel
in background. Yasser Tabbaa Archive, courtesy of Aga Khan Documentation
Center, MIT Libraries (AKDC@MIT) 112
7.1 View of the open-air burial and entrance portal from the courtyard
of Turbat-i Shaykh Aḥmad Jām. Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 160
7.2 View of tomb enclosures added on the site of Shāh Khalīlullāh’s mausoleum
in Bidar; both as an independent structure, and attached to the main ninth-/
fifteenth-century mausoleum (right). Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 163
7.3 View of the raised platforms at the shrine complex of Bahāʾ al-Dīn
Naqshband at Bukhara. Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 164
7.4 View of open-air grave in front of the entrance īvān at the mausoleum of
Zayn al-Dīn Abū Bakr Tāybādī. Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 164
7.5 Elevated view of the astāna of Shāh Niʿmatullāh Walī in Māhān developed
around the ninth-/fifteenth-century dome chamber from the tenth/
sixteenth through twentieth centuries. Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 166
7.6 View of the Ṣūfī cells, tomb, and mosque at the tekke of Jalāl al-Dīn
Muḥammad Rūmī, and the Selīmīye mosque (right) in Konya.
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 167
7.7 View of the tomb of Nizām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (centre) and the mosque (on the
left) at his shrine complex in Delhi. Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh 169
7.8 View of Salīm Chishtī’s tomb within the great mosque of Fatehpur Sikri
(located in the southern part of the palace complex). Photo by Peyvand
Firouzeh 169
9.1 Servants at the zāwiya of Shaykh Raḍwān during the saint’s mawlid
(Upper Egypt). Photo by Rachida Chih 207
9.2 Servants at the soup kitchen of the zāwiya of Shaykh Raḍwān during
the saint’s mawlid (Upper Egypt). Photo by Rachida Chih 207
12.1 Shrine of Dede Garkın in Dedeköy near Mardin (eastern Anatolia).
Photo by Ahmet Yaşar Ocak 244
Figures xi

12.2 Exterior of Bābā Ilyās shrine near Amasya (Black Sea Region). Photo by
Ahmet Yaşar Ocak 244
12.3 Interior of Bābā Ilyās shrine near Amasya (Black Sea Region). Photo by
Ahmet Yaşar Ocak 245
14.1 ʿAbd al-Qādir Jīlānī sitting upon a throne, Mughal, eighteenth century.
Courtesy of Victor & Albert Museum, South & South East Asia
Collection 298
14.2 Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī holding a globe, detail of miniature by Bichitr from
Minto Album, c. 1610–18, India. Courtesy of Chester Beatty Library 299
15.1 Youth and Dervish, Isfahan, second quarter of the seventeenth century.
Courtesy of Metropolitan Museum, Rogers Fund, 1911 305
15.2 Akbar and Jahangir in apotheosis (folio from the St. Petersburg Album),
attributed to Bichitr, about 1640. Private Collection 310
20.1 The silsila of the Ṭarīqa ʿAlawiyya belonging to the Ḥaḍramī scholar
Aḥmad b. ʿAbdallāh al-ʿAṭṭās (d. 1929) of Pekalongan (Central Java,
Indonesia). Photo by Ismail Fajrie Alatas 377
Abbreviations

Periodicals

AI Annales Islamologiques
AIUON Annali dell’ Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli
AKM Abhandlungen für die Kunde des Morgenlandes
AMEL Arabic and Middle Eastern Literatures
AO Acta Orientalia
AO Hung. Acta Orientalia (Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae)
ArO Archiv Orientální
AS Asiatische Studien
ASJ Arab Studies Journal
ASP Arabic Sciences and Philosophy
ASQ Arab Studies Quarterly
BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research
BEA Bulletin des Études Arabes
BEFEO Bulletin de l’Ecole Française d’Extrême-Orient
BEO Bulletin d’Études Orientales de l’Institut Français de Damas
BIE Bulletin de l’Institut d’Égypte
BIFAO Bulletin de l’Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale du Caire
BKI Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde
BMGS Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies
BO Bibliotheca Orientalis
BrisMES British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies
BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies
BZ Byzantinische Zeitschrift
CAJ Central Asiatic Journal
DOP Dumbarton Oaks Papers
EW East and West
IBLA Revue de l’Institut des Belles Lettres Arabes, Tunis
IC Islamic Culture
IJHAS International Journal of African Historical Studies
IHQ Indian Historical Quarterly
IJMES International Journal of Middle East Studies
ILS Islamic Law and Society
IOS Israel Oriental Studies
IQ The Islamic Quarterly
JA Journal Asiatique
Abbreviations xiii

JAIS Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies

JAL Journal of Arabic Literature
JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society
JARCE Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt
JAS Journal of Asian Studies
JESHO Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient
JIS Journal of Islamic Studies
JMBRAS Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society
JNES Journal of Near Eastern Studies
JOS Journal of Ottoman Studies
JQR Jewish Quarterly Review
JRAS Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society
JSAI Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam
JSEAH Journal of Southeast Asian History
JSS Journal of Sufi Studies
MEA Middle Eastern Affairs
MEJ Middle East Journal
MEL Middle Eastern Literatures
MES Middle East Studies
MFOB Mélanges de la Faculté Orientale de l’Université St. Joseph de Beyrouth
MIDEO Mélanges de l’Institut Dominicain d’Études Orientales du Caire
MME Manuscripts of the Middle East
MMIA Majallat al-Majmaʿ al-ʿIlmi al-ʿArabi, Damascus
MO Le Monde Oriental
MOG Mitteilungen zur Osmanischen Geschichte
MSR Mamluk Studies Review
MW The Muslim World
OC Oriens Christianus
OLZ Orientalistische Literaturzeitung
OM Oriente Moderno
QSA Quaderni di Studi Arabi
REI Revue des Études Islamiques
REJ Revue des Études Juives
REMMM Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée
RHR Revue de l’Histoire des Religions
RIMA Revue de l’Institut des Manuscrits Arabes
RMM Revue du Monde Musulman
RO Rocznik Orientalistyczny
ROC Revue de l’Orient Chrétien
RSO Rivista degli Studi Orientali
xiv Abbreviations

SI Studia Islamica (France)

SIk Studia Islamika (Indonesia)
SIr Studia Iranica
TBG Tijdschrift van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en
Wetenschappen
VKI Verhandelingen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land en
Volkenkunde
WI Die Welt des Islams
WO Welt des Orients
WZKM Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes
ZAL Zeitschrift für Arabische Linguistik
ZDMG Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft
ZGAIW Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen Wissenschaften
ZS Zeitschrift für Semitistik

Other

ANRW Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt

BGA Bibliotheca Geographorum Arabicorum
BNF Bibliothèque nationale de France
CERMOC Centre d’Études et de Recherches sur le Moyen-Orient Contemporain
CHAL Cambridge History of Arabic Literature
CHE Cambridge History of Egypt
CHIn Cambridge History of India
CHIr Cambridge History of Iran
Dozy R. Dozy, Supplément aux dictionnaires arabes, Leiden 1881 (repr. Leiden
and Paris 1927)
EAL Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature
EI 1 Encyclopaedia of Islam, 1st ed., Leiden 1913–38
EI 2 Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., Leiden 1954–2004
EI 3 Encyclopaedia of Islam Three, Leiden 2007–
EIr Encyclopaedia Iranica
EJ 1 Encyclopaedia Judaica, 1st ed., Jerusalem; [New York 1971–1992]
EQ Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān
ERE Encyclopaedia of Religions and Ethics
GAL C. Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litteratur, 2nd ed., Leiden
1943–49
Abbreviations xv

GALS C. Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litteratur,

Supplementbände I-III, Leiden 1937–42
GAP Grundriss der Arabischen Philologie, Wiesbaden 1982-
GAS F. Sezgin, Geschichte des Arabischen Schrifttums, Leiden 1967-
GMS Gibb Memorial Series
GOW F. Babinger, Die Geschichtsschreiber der Osmanen und ihre Werke,
Leipzig 1927
HO Handbuch der Orientalistik
IA Islâm Ansiklopedisi
IFAO Institut Français d’Archeologie Orientale
JE Jewish Encyclopaedia
Lane E. W. Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon
RCEA Répertoire Chronologique d’Épigraphie Arabe
TAVO Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients
TDVİA Türkiye Diyanet Vakfi Islâm Ansiklopedisi
UEAI Union européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants
van Ess, TG J. van Ess, Theologie und Gesellschaft
WKAS Wörterbuch der Klassischen Arabischen Sprache, Wiesbaden 1957-
 Introduction

What Is a Ṣūfī Institution?

Alexandre Papas

1 A Dichotomy in Ṣūfī Studies

The very existence of the present handbook series—in addition to other re-
cent publications, such as the Journal of Sufi Studies (published from 2012) and
ongoing large collaborative projects focusing on Islamic mysticism—is an elo-
quent testimony to the extraordinary growth of Ṣūfī studies, which has tended
to become an independent discipline. This specificity is true of both eastern
and western scholarship on Islam. With departments of Ṣūfī studies (tasavvuf
anabilim dalı) in most university divinity schools (ilahiyat fakültesi), a country
such as Turkey can boast that, since the 2000s, it has been one of the world’s
leading producers of academic research on Sufism (Şimşek). This global in-
tellectual expansion has resulted in, among other outcomes that should be
explored (for example, the works of contemporary Ṣūfī intellectuals), the pub-
lication of important surveys, both individual or collective, discussing Sufism
as a whole. The present handbook does not purport to do the same, but offers a
modest contribution to the discussions opened by these seminal surveys.
Without trying to be exhaustive (many references can be found in Knysh,
Historiography, and Zarcone, Işın, and Buehler (eds.), v–xxi), I review some
of these survey works to understand how Sufism has been constructed con-
ceptually. Our aim is not to decide if this conceptual construction was legiti-
mate or not—there is no science without the construction of subjects—but
to examine how authors have established frameworks, assembled elements,
and built concepts. We do not feel the need to deconstruct the Orientalist con-
ception of Sufism. The Western discovery of Sufism was a more complicated
process than the somewhat facile scenario suggested by the distortions of
European Orientalism. Without detailing the history of this discovery (again
see Knysh, Historiography, 212–7), suffice it to identify various actors—not
just Orientalists (a term which, strictly speaking, should be reserved for phi-
lologists rather than scholars of Islam)—who explored the study of Sufism
well before the colonial period. For instance, among the first trailblazers were
two Frenchmen, the famous Huguenot merchant Jean Chardin (1643–1713)
who, during his stay in Ṣafavid Persia in 1711 provided the first informed ac-
count about soufys (Chardin, 5:152–63), and later, in 1758, the man of letters

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_002

2 Papas

François-Marie de Marsy (1714–63) was one of the first European authors to

use and define the word soufisme (Marsy, 6:437–40). We shall not dwell on the
issue of deconstructing the Orientalist conception of Sufism—but, in passing,
it is useful to note that “deconstruction” (a philological and philosophical term
coined by Jacques Derrida, often misused in the social sciences) does not con-
sist of deconstructing concepts, rather it concerns the language (especially the
writing style) of conceptualisation; that is, more precisely, those aspects of the
wording of concepts that depend on the diachronic determinisms of writers.
If we limit our review to books in English and French, we find two pioneering
titles. The mystics of Islam published in 1914 by the British Orientalist Reynold
Alleyne Nicholson (1868–1945) is a study of “the religious philosophy of Islam”
that aims to set forth the mystics’ “central doctrine” (Nicholson, 1). After pro-
viding a summary of the historical development of Sufism from early ascetics
to later mystics, and noting the purported external influences (Christianity,
Neoplatonism, gnosticism, and Buddhism) on it, Nicholson focuses on the no-
tions of divine light, gnostic knowledge, and love of God, which all rest on a
“pantheistic faith” (Nicholson, 4–20). Nicholson, who also translated Rūmī’s
Mathnawī, gave up studying the various Ṣūfī paths (ṭarīqa, pl. ṭuruq) derived
from this doctrine, for they “are in number as the souls of men” (Nicholson, 27).
Two French colonial administrators in Algeria named Octave Depont
(1862–?) and Xavier Coppolani (1866–1905) took a different approach to
Sufism. They explored the world of Ṣūfī orders in their book Les confréries re-
ligieuses musulmanes on a larger scale than the works of Louis Rinn (1838–
1905) in his Marabouts et khouan and Alfred Le Chatelier (1855–1929) in his Les
confréries musulmanes du Hedjaz, which were published ten years before
(Depont and Coppolani, x–xvi). Printed in 1897 to aid in colonial administra-
tion and state control, the thick volume addressed, for the most part, North
African Ṣūfī brotherhoods, which were perceived as a threat to France’s “ci-
vilising mission.” After a brief introduction to doctrinal principles of Sufism,
the authors detail the organisation of Ṣūfī orders (ch. 3), their numbers (ch. 4),
their financial system (ch. 5), and their political roles (ch. 6); the second part of
the book surveys several major Ṣūfī orders on the basis of firsthand documents
and fieldwork notes.
Although outdated, the books of Nicholson and Depont-Coppolani
launched the academic study of Sufism in two directions, which did not coin-
cide in later phases of the history of the field. In short, one direction is oriented
toward the doctrines of Islamic mysticism, while the other is concerned with
its sociopolitical manifestations. As evidence of this “divorce,” we consider the
next pair of monographs devoted to Sufism, the first of which was written by
Nicholson’s student Arthur John Arberry (1905–69). In Sufism: An account of
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 3

the mystics of Islam, published in 1950, Arberry, who also translated the Qurʾān
into English, abandoned his mentor’s interest in non-Muslim influences and
presented Sufism “as if it were an isolated manifestation, viewing the move-
ment from within as an aspect of Islam, as though these other factors which
certainly determined its growth did not exist” (Arberry, 11). Arberry built his
definition of Sufism on four pillars (to use his own words), i.e., the Qurʾān as
the supreme authority for the guidance of mystics, ḥadīth (prophetic tradi-
tion) as their second source of intellectual enlightenment, the saints (awliyāʾ)
as models of pious behaviour and worldly interactions, and spiritual experi-
ences (aḥwāl and maqāmāt) specific to Ṣūfīs (Arberry, 13–4). One short chapter
(ch. 8) is devoted to Ṣūfī orders, while the last chapter deplores the decay of
spirituality that resulted from the Ṣūfī orders that rule over “credulous masses”
and the “charlatanry” of the cult of saints. Here Arberry explicitly repeats the
arguments of Muslim reformists, such as Tawfīq al-Ṭawīl, an Egyptian reformist
historian of Sufism (Arberry, 119–20).
By contrast, Arberry’s contemporary, John Spencer Trimingham (1904–87),
trained as both a social scientist and a Protestant missionary, published an en-
tire book on The Sufi orders in Islam (in 1971). After mentioning, somewhat
fleetingly, his debt to Rinn and Le Chatelier, Trimingham (who was originally
a specialist on Islam in Africa) reconsiders the historical development of the
brotherhoods according to three stages, which are chronological as well as
social in nature: the khānaqāh (lodge) stage, a golden age during which elite
circles of master and disciples lived a rigorous but informal spiritual life; the
ṭarīqa stage, when initiatory schools developed around a corpus of teachings
and a bourgeois mysticism conformed to social and legal standards; and last-
ly the ṭāʾifa (order) stage, which saw Sufism become a popular and crowded
movement that fragmented into multiple lineages and the cult of saints domi-
nated (Trimingham, preface, 102–3). Citing Muslim reformists, albeit critically,
he, too, bemoans the decline of Sufism, from the epitome of high spirituality
to vulgar mysticism, and considers this a result of the ascendancy of heredi-
tary Ṣūfī orders and the ubiquitous spread of saint veneration (Trimingham,
70–1, 246–8).
In both works, the decline thesis was less due, as is often claimed, to the
Protestant background of its promoters, who might be inclined to juxtapose
the personal experience of mystics to the institutionalisation of mysticism,
than to the replication of the views of Muslim reformism concerning Sufism
(views that were partly influenced by Western modernism and elitism). Simply
put, early Sufism or spirituality was not in question, the problem was in the
Ṣūfī orders. Whatever role Muslim reformism played in the shaping of this con-
ception, there is, now, a sharp dichotomy in Ṣūfī studies, in the two directions
4 Papas

we have pointed out. In other words, scholars of Islam agreed that there was an
irreconcilable difference between Ṣūfī doctrine and Ṣūfī orders.
Still, in its content, Trimingham’s book appears to be an exception to aca-
demic works on Islamic mysticism during that period. Indeed, the bulk of stud-
ies focus on Sufism in its trans-historical form, that is, metaphysical doctrine,
but also its spiritual techniques and poetic expressions. This was perhaps,
again, a result of the conscious or unconscious impact of Muslim reformist
ideas on Western scholarship, as if scholars shied away from social and political
history in order to discuss the “inner life of Islam” (the spiritual and intimate
experience of religion) to use Annemarie Schimmel’s (1922–2003) expression,
or even a hiérohistoire (a prophetic and esoteric history of the soul) to invoke a
term used by Henry Corbin (1903–78) who was more interested in Islamic phi-
losophy and Shīʿī gnosis than in Sufism in the strict sense. As Mark Sedgwick
showed, a movement called Traditionalism, inspired by the French esoterist
and Ṣūfī René Guénon (1886–1951), attracted some early twentieth-century
European intellectuals and, after the 1960s, spread among limited circles in the
Islamic world, Russia, and the United States (Sedgwick). Without going into
the details of this multifaceted movement, we must note its perennialist “phi-
losophy” (that is, its idea that all religions originated in a primordial religion)
and declinist vision of the modern world, which only a small elite was sup-
posedly able to understand. These elements led several eminent academics to
construct (again, this is not a value judgment) a concept of Islamic mysticism
detached from its everyday worldly expressions and from the contingences of
time, particularly those of the early modern and modern periods.
Traditionalists like Seyyed Hossein Nasr and their fellow-travellers such as
Schimmel, who was close to Nasr (Hicks, 158), produced scholarly introduc-
tions to Sufism in which readers could discover an aesthetic spiritual tradition
based on an eternal essence. In his Sufi essays (published in 1972), Nasr was
not indifferent to Islamic history and did not pretend to cover all aspects of
Sufism. Nevertheless, in the context of the “disintegration of Western cultural
values and disenchantment with the experiences of modernism,” he claimed
to expose “the real nature of a spiritual way” as opposed to the distortions
imposed by certain Orientalists, Westernized Muslims, and exoteric-minded
Muslims (Nasr, 11–3). In line with Traditionalist authors (René Guénon, Frithjof
Schuon, Martin Lings, etc.) whom he considered genuine teachers of authen-
tic Sufism, Nasr wrote his book for Western audiences and Western-educated
Muslims (Nasr, introduction). Much less ethereal in writing style and content,
Schimmel’s famous Mystical dimensions of Islam (published in 1975), starts with
a chapter entitled “What is Sufism?” After considering mysticism in general
and the history of European scholarship on Sufism in particular (drawn partly
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 5

from Arberry’s An introduction to the history of Ṣūfism, 1942), Schimmel sum-

marised her answer as follows: “Sufism meant, in the formative period, mainly
an interiorisation of Islam, a personal experience of the central mystery of
Islam, that of tauḥīd, ‘to declare that God is One.’ The Sufis always remained in-
side the fold, and their mystical attitude was not limited by their adherence to
any of the legal or theological schools” (Schimmel, 17). Throughout this erudite
book, which includes descriptions of mediaeval Ṣūfī orders, she privileges a lit-
erary conception of Sufism and portrays Muslim mystics as engaged in a pure
and loving quest for God, far from “spiritless legalism,” on the one hand, and
“saint worship and pirism [the veneration of pīr, the spiritual leader],” on the
other (Schimmel, 22, 32, 238, 405–6; see also Bernd Radtke’s critical remarks
in Radtke, 1–25). In the works of Nasr and Schimmel, we find little discussion
about the social and political realities Ṣūfīs faced throughout their history. Yet,
both books provide a stimulating emphasis, though somewhat exaggerated ac-
count of the difference between Arab and Persian Sufism.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Nasr and Schimmel both contributed to
the monumental three-volume The heritage of Sufism about Persian Islamic
mysticism (edited in the 1990s by the late Leonard Lewisohn (1953–2018)).
Although he himself was influenced by Traditionalists and the Niʿmatullāhī
Ṣūfī order that patronised the project and the publication, Lewisohn aban-
doned the decline thesis and opened his project to a great variety of special-
ists in order to provide multiple approaches. Covering an entire millennium
(750–1750) and a large area (Iran, the Indian subcontinent, Central Asia, and
Anatolia, and China, marginally), the collection of almost seventy chapters
opened new avenues of research, mainly, though not exclusively, into the intel-
lectual history of Sufism, thanks to many detailed studies focusing on original
and heretofore unexplored works of various types, e.g., mystical, philosophi-
cal, poetic, hagiographic, exegetic, and practical. Thus The heritage of Sufism
reintegrated Muslim mystics into their historical contexts. Yet, the book could
not but present a fragmented image of Sufism, one that necessarily juxtaposed
rather than combined the two main approaches (doctrinal on one side, socio-
political on the other) that we have identified. In any case, the collection rep-
resented an intellectual laboratory whose experiments were also conducted
simultaneously in Istanbul and Paris, as we will see.
Before detailing the academic studies of Sufism in the 1990s, it seems ap-
propriate to mention two introductory works in French published in the 1960s
by scholars who did not adhere to Traditionalism and who had alternative ap-
proaches. These approaches are, perhaps retrospectively, more relevant today
than, for instance, Louis Massignon’s (1883–1962) approach. And Massignon,
in any case, did not write a monograph on Sufism per se. The first of these
6 Papas

works, simply entitled Mystique musulmane, was authored by Georges Chehata

Anawati (1905–94) and Louis Gardet (1904–86). Anawati was an Egyptian
Dominican and Gardet a Thomist who belonged to a long and ongoing tradi-
tion of Catholic scholarship on Islam, a tradition that, over time, renounced
its proselytising mission and promoted Muslim-Christian dialogue (Avon).
After a sketchy and declinist historical overview, the book primarily focuses on
mystical experiences, spiritual techniques, and specific practices, such as dhikr
(the repetition of God’s name). In addition to this special interest in the prac-
tical aspects of Sufism, the authors, who were well-versed in Christian meth-
ods of prayer, but also aware of Brahmanic traditions, thanks to the Christian
Indologist Olivier Lacombe (1904–2001), preferred a comparative approach
(Anawati and Gardet, 13–5, 235–56). Our second reference is Marijan Molé’s
(1924–63) Les mystiques musulmans, published posthumously in 1965. Molé, a
Slovene Iranologist based in France (Khismatulin and Azarnouche), submitted
a short but suggestive essay on Muslim mystics, which follows a chronological
order, the last period (from the seventh/thirteenth to eleventh/seventeenth
century) was interestingly titled “la maturité” (Molé, ch. 4). Here again, we find
discussions of Ṣūfī practices, particularly on samāʿ (spiritual concert) (Molé,
18, 34, 52, 97, 111–3), in addition to a reappraisal of the problem of what the
author calls “the prehistory” of Sufism (Molé, ch. 1). Despite their emphasis
on practical Sufism, these three authors ignored the social, economic, and
political activities of Ṣūfīs, thus endorsing the dichotomy I suggest exists in
Ṣūfī studies.
In the 1990s, based on their field experience in various Muslim countries
from the 1980s onwards (experiences that convinced them of the central-
ity and the vitality of Ṣūfī orders), a group of French researchers proposed
to expand on the work of Trimingham and so began to organise regular
meetings in Paris and Istanbul. They invited foreign academic authorities
(e.g., Hamid Algar, Frederick De Jong, and Klaus Kreiser), and published
the proceedings on a regular basis, often in the form of thick collective
monographs devoted to a single Ṣūfī brotherhood (e.g., the Naqshbandiyya,
the Melāmiyye, the Qādiriyya, etc.). Under the leadership of Nathalie Clayer,
Marc Gaborieau, Alexandre Popovic (1931–2014), Gilles Veinstein (1945–2013),
and Thierry Zarcone, the study of orders (ṭuruq) progressed with a clear re-
search agenda: to explore the social world of Sufism, lineage by lineage. In
addition to these monographs, the group published a first opus Les ordres
mystiques dans l’islam (in 1986) and, ten years later, a volume for the general
public entitled Les voies d’Allah—the first book of this type ever published in a
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 7

Western language (Popovic and Veinstein (eds.), Les ordres; Popovic and
Veinstein (eds.), Les voies). These works are striking for their almost exclusive
emphasis on what we call the non-doctrinal dimensions of Sufism. Probably
in response to the preponderance of religious studies (sciences religieuses) on
mysticism in the French academy, great attention was paid to Ṣūfī forms of
organisation, the social impact of Ṣūfī groups, their political activities, their
cultural achievements, and their complex historical developments. At the
disciplinary level, history and anthropology dominated over islamologie as a
religious science. The divorce between the two sub-fields, which can be sum-
marised as, respectively, taṣawwuf studies and ṭarīqa studies, seemed complete.
During this period of intensive academic production on Islamic mysticism,
a new generation of scholars (born in the 1940s and 1950s) emerged, especial-
ly in the United States. Once again, we limit ourselves to essays centred on
Sufism. Two prominent scholars who are close to the Traditionalist “school”
have published innovative handbooks.
William Chittick, a recognised authority in the study of the great Andalusian
Ṣūfī Ibn al-ʿArabī, wrote Sufism: A beginner’s guide, “to find a middle way be-
tween academic obscurity and enthusiast advocacy,” and “to show how basic
teachings appear in various guises in diverse circumstances” (Chittick, vii–viii).
Chittick reincorporates the contributions of Ṣūfīs into the general system of
Islamic thought. Besides jurists ( fuqahāʾ) and theologians (mutakallimūn), the
author methodically re-examines the main topics of Sufism (struggle against
the ego, dhikr, samāʿ, mystical experiences, love for God, the names of God,
and so forth) according to the three scriptural dimensions outlined in the well-
known ḥadīth, i.e., submission (islām), faith (īmān), and excellence (iḥsān).
Ṣūfīs were those who subordinated islām and imān to iḥsān, the highest goal.
Overall, this is a brilliant and unique reconstruction of doctrinal Sufism, in
both its diversity and unity; it also includes a sub-study on Aḥmad Samʿānī
(d. 534/1140), an important though little-known Ṣūfī from Marv (Chittick,
142–77). However, historians of Sufism might not be at ease with bold generali-
sations such as “being a Sufi certainly has nothing to do with the Sunni/Shi’ite
split, nor with the fact that all Muslims are affiliated with one or another of
the schools of jurisprudence … It has nothing to do with social class, although
some Sufi organizations may be more or less class specific. There is no neces-
sary correlation with family …” (Chittick, 23). This is certainly true in principle
but not as much in practice. Likewise, anthropologists would be reluctant to
consider figures such as Nāẓim al-Qubruṣī (1922–2014), Javād Nūrbakhsh
(1926–2008) and others as representatives of Sufism in the modern Muslim
8 Papas

world (Chittick, 38). These masters were important, but they existed in addi-
tion to many other Ṣūfī shaykhs who were unknown in the West but influential
in Turkey, Iran, and beyond.
The second handbook noted above is not American but French. Eric
Geoffroy published an Introduction au soufisme in 2003. An expert on the
Shādhiliyya Ṣūfī path, among other areas, Geoffroy carefully reconnects Sufism
to Islam, but is more interested than Chittick (in his handbook, not in gen-
eral) in the historical contexts in which Muslim mystics lived. Convinced that
“the inward-directed approach of Sufism is not incompatible with a critical
approach” (Geoffroy [trans. Gaetani], xvii), Geoffroy offers an excellent work-
ing instrument by which to understand Sufism from within and in all its facets.
Systematically mentioning the scriptural references to Ṣūfī notions, Geoffroy
first discusses key issues (Sufism and Shīʿīsm; the role of the feminine; Sufism,
quietism, and popular religion; and above all, Sufism and Islam). Then, in
chapter 3, he presents a precise historical overview of Sufism, alternating facts,
intellectual biographies of Ṣūfī masters, and developments on the main trends
in mystical Islam. Practical aspects are described at length in chapter 4, where
he again mixes scriptural and text references with anthropological observa-
tions. In these chapters, we find an exemplary effort to downplay the dichot-
omy between the two approaches to Sufism. Yet, the last sections of the book
revive the Traditionalist views: Sufism is called on to undertake the defence
of “the transcendent unity of religions” against “the pressures of exoterism”;
especially when one recalls that “objective signs of degeneration have affected
Sufism [itself] throughout the ages,” that “the appearance of initiatory paths …
certainly had some negative effects,” and that “from the fifteenth century on,
signs of ossification were clear.” These would be symptoms which “relate to
what one can call the illness of ‘brotherhoodism,’ a form of degeneration in-
herited from the institutionalization of Sufism” (Geoffroy [trans. Gaetani],
194–5). Regardless of their merits, such views cannot be taken for granted in
the social sciences because of their subjective and teleological natures.
The works of Chittick and Geoffroy remain, we think, the best syntheses on
Ṣūfī theory and practice to date. Four other important handbooks have been
published in the same period—more precisely, between 1997 and 2017—by
US-based scholars; these mark decisive steps in the historical study of Sufism.
The first was written by Carl Ernst, a well-known specialist of Islamic stud-
ies, especially Sufism in India and Pakistan. In the Shambhala guide to Sufism,
Ernst builds on his experience in the subcontinent, and carefully avoids “re-
ferring to Islam as a changeless monolithic religion” and stresses that “the
multifarious activities that we [non-Muslims as well as Muslims themselves]
subsume under the terms Sufism and Islam were not spheres of existence or
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 9

separable from religious life in general” (Ernst, xv). By refusing to give a fixed
definition to these constantly contested terms, and opposed to any essential-
ism or dogmatism, Ernst conducts a dispassionate analysis of Sufism “in the
broadest descriptive sense” (Ernst, xvii). Thus, his interpretative essay is nei-
ther a doctrinal survey nor a study of historical Sufism, but an exploration of
the subtle meanings of Sufism based on diverse primary texts and through
a series of topics, namely scriptural sources, saints and sainthood, spiritual
practices, the functioning of Ṣūfī orders, Ṣūfī poetry and music, and the state
of Sufism in the contemporary world. Among the many virtues of this book,
which is addressed to a broad audience, is the fact that it paved the way for
more objective and pluralistic approaches to Sufism.
Not surprisingly, it was also a specialist of the diverse forms of Sufism in the
Indian subcontinent, and an innovative historian of the globalisations of Islam,
who wrote the handbook entitled Sufism: A global history. With his unique
background, Nile Green “devotes equal value and emphasis to each period of
its [Sufism’s] history” (Green, xi); thus, he introduces our field to the broader
area of global theory, making Sufism a horizontal phenomena, rather than
a vertical one. In more conceptual words, in the pen of the global historian,
Sufism appears as a tradition constructed through time periods and regional
contexts, rather than mysticism in the private sphere. In this new perspective,
“brotherhoods formed the conceptual and eventually the institutional chan-
nels through time and space that served to constitute Sufism as a tradition”
(Green, 9). In an original way, Green extends the scope of Ernst’s handbook, to
survey the unexpected diversity and longevity of Sufism, and put an end to at-
tempts to nationalise (Arabise or Persianise mostly) or essentialise its concep-
tion. Furthermore, he narrates the history of Sufism with an emphasis on three
interdependent types of power: discursive (Ṣūfī teachings that shape people’s
actions), miraculous (Ṣūfī saints who perform miracles to influence society),
and economic (the material strength of Ṣūfī leaders that brings a tradition into
being) (Green, 5–8).
The last two handbooks we mention were written by the same author, and
give us the rare opportunity to follow the intellectual evolution of a scholar
of Islamic studies. Alexander Knysh published Islamic mysticism: A short his-
tory in 2000 and Sufism: A new history of Islamic mysticism in 2017. Thanks to
a wide range of interests and expertise, from Sufism in Yemen to Islam in the
Caucasus, including historiography and Ṣūfī doctrine, Ibn al-ʿArabī and the
fifth-/eleventh-century scholar al-Qushayrī, Knysh is particularly qualified to
provide both overviews and clear narratives. In the first handbook, readers
followed “Sufism’s evolution from a simple world-renouncing piety to a series
of highly sophisticated doctrines that circulated within a formal and highly
10 Papas

institutional framework known as the ṭarīqa” (Knysh, Islamic mysticism, 2). Thus,
Knysh never juxtaposes spiritual aspects and temporal aspects of Sufism, and
proposes “to furnish a picture of Islamic mysticism that is firmly rooted in the
historical and socio-political contexts within which it developed” (Knysh, Islamic
mysticism, 3). This descriptive account intentionally neglects the philosophy of
history and ephemeral theoretical pretensions. In chapters 8 and 9, we find an
excellent synthetic account of Ṣūfī institutions, one that not only covers Ṣūfī or-
ders and establishments over time and space, but also understands them as a
means to cultivate (not simply perpetuate) Ṣūfī thought, ethics, and practices.
In his second handbook, Knysh offers a more complex, less positivist nar-
rative that tries to emancipate Ṣūfī studies from false debates and schematic
dichotomies—an ambition that already surfaced in his previous survey. Knysh
convincingly argues that Sufism can be approached consistently by Western as
well as Islamic epistemologies. Therefore, concepts such as “Sufism,” “asceti-
cism,” and “mysticism” appear as efficient analytical tools. Moreover, accord-
ing to the author (Knysh, Sufism, introduction) the latter two terms co-exist
in Sufism. This dual (outsider and insider) perspective, abolishes barriers be-
tween “invented” Western concepts and “authentic” Islamic notions, and thus
reopens the door (left ajar by Anawati and Gardet) for comparative analyses in
Ṣūfī studies (Knysh, Sufism, ch. 4)—a sub-field we hope to explore in a future
handbook. As for the perspective of Sufism: A new history of Islamic mysticism
(specifically its chapter 5), it is an important milestone in overcoming the di-
chotomy we first discussed. Confirming the accuracy of the term “order” (after
the Islamologist Fritz Meier (1914–2009)) to describe the ṭuruq, Knysh pres-
ents these institutions as propitious milieus for the cultivation of initiatory
teachings, and ritual activities that were transformed “to a loftier cognitive and
cosmological plane created by collective Sufi imagination.” Moreover, Sufism’s
evolution from informal circles to hierarchically-structured institutions (often
described by the Weberian concept of “routinisation”) was in fact much more
nuanced, and depended on historical and cultural contexts. Therefore, at-
tempts to explain the relationships between masters and disciples in these
institutions as only power relations “fails to do justice to the complexity of
human aspirations” (Knysh, Sufism, 142, 144, 161, 164). That is, Ṣūfī institutions
should not be reduced to simple traditional communities with no spiritual life,
and their organisation should not be perceived as just a system of power.
At the end of this historiographical review, we see the present handbook as
just a part of the scholarly heritage briefly discussed above. In order to contin-
ue the recent efforts aimed at reconciling divergent tendencies in Ṣūfī studies,
we must follow and deepen the research directions outlined by our predeces-
sors, and discuss the question of Ṣūfī institutions.
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 11

2 Looking for a Third Way: The Institutional Approach

To clarify our approach and answer the basic question, “what is a Ṣūfī insti-
tution?” we return to the classical (i.e. from the 1850s to the 1920s) theories
of institutions (Scott, xi). Here we are dealing with institutional theories of
sociology, not those applied in economics and political sciences. Therefore,
the concept of “institutions” not only includes the establishments but also
the community systems within societies. In parallel with the ideas developed
by American sociologists such as William Graham Summer (1840–1910) and
Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929), European social theorists, chiefly Max
Weber (1864–1920) and Emile Durkheim (1858–1917), also developed variants
of analysis (Scott, ch. 1). As is well known, Durkheim defined sociology itself
as “the science of institutions, of their genesis, and of their functioning,” and
labelled an institution as “all the beliefs and modes of behaviour instituted by
the collectivity,” without reducing institutionalisation to a pure determinism:
“Despite the fact that beliefs and social practices permeate us in this way from
the outside, it does not follow that we receive them passively and without
causing them to undergo modification” (Durkheim, Les règles, xxiii and n. 1).
He later refined his concept, explaining that symbolic systems, in particular
systems of knowledge and beliefs, were social institutions. For Durkheim, cate-
gories of thought and belief depend, among other factors, on the way in which
a collectivity is organised and on its religious institutions. More broadly, nearly
all the great social institutions (e.g., categories of thought, magic, moral and
legal rules) “have been born in religion … If religion has given birth to all that
is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion”
(Durkheim, Les formes, 22, 598–9). In other words, an institution is not so much
a communal organisation decided by individuals as a socially-based system of
collective representations and beliefs that remain constant over time and are
derived from religion. Likewise, the institutionalisation process is not simply a
late introduction of rules and regulations, but the slow social accomplishment
of religious ideals. Against the simplistic views on institutions, we must realize
that religious thoughts do not float outside their collective construction, and
social institutions are not just pragmatic tools that enable society to function.
In our opinion, the Durkheimian concept of social institutions is path break-
ing, not strictly holistic or functionalist, and religion-oriented, and therefore,
particularly appropriate for Islamic studies. We share with Nathan Hofer, a his-
torian of mediaeval Sufism who contributed two chapters to this volume, the
conviction that Sufism has a fundamentally social character. Ṣūfī institutions
can be defined as “the socially constructed and accepted ‘ways of doing things’
[repertoire of praxis but also technical vocabulary]” in a Ṣūfī collectivity. This
12 Papas

definition allows us to better understand how Sufism emerged as a social fact;

Hofer states, “it is the institutions of Sufism that constrain and enable the pro-
duction of Sufi culture in any given time and place” (Hofer, 15–8). As a result,
breaking with most of the historiography of Sufism, Hofer argues that the
institutionalisation of Ṣūfī doctrine and practice took place during the early
formative period (around the fourth/tenth century), not after, and became
foundational for the later organisation of Sufism into establishments and or-
ders (Hofer, 22–3).
In the present book, we propose two ways to go a step further, both of
which were already envisioned by Durkheim: first, we examine Ṣūfī institu-
tions through the prism of the longue durée rather than using an “evolutionist”
model; and second, we rethink their mystical dimensions instead of confining
mysticism to private supernatural experiences.
While we use a sociological concept of Sufism, the contributors of this vol-
ume are mainly historians and thereby more attentive to periods and temporal-
ity than sociologists. As a collective work with some encyclopaedic ambitions,
we tried to encompass a vast area and many historical periods, multiplying
the sociopolitical situations in which Sufism developed. Moreover, we tried
to follow these developments over the longue durée, as suggested by Fernand
Braudel (1902–85) and his colleagues in the French Annales School of histori-
cal writing. It is useful to note that this notion does not refer to a long period
but a slow, sometimes very slow, process of history, a process that is made up
of different durations and temporal rhythms. A longue durée phenomenon re-
mains stable and changes slowly over centuries, with variations from one re-
gion to another. Durkheim touched on the slow nature of institutions, but did
not elaborate on it. In our discussions throughout the book, Ṣūfī institutions
seem to evolve according to what Braudel famously called “the slow pace of
civilisations” (Braudel, 267).
Our second point concerns the mystical dimensions of Ṣūfī institutions. If
mysticism means the knowledge of mysteries, then Sufism is Islamic mysti-
cism, since it claims to provide knowledge of the “ultimate truth” (ḥaqīqa) and/
or of “the world of the invisible” (ʿālam al-ghayb) beyond the knowledge of the
“world of the visible” (ʿālam al-shahāda), all expressions derived from Qurʾān
23:92, 32:6, and other verses (Algar, 7; Geoffroy [trans. Gaetani], 10; Daaif).
Anxious to bring together the two sub-fields of Ṣūfī studies (taṣawwuf studies
on the one hand and ṭarīqa studies on the other), we strive to understand the
institutionalisation of a set of practices and a shared technical terminology,
but also doctrines, speculations, and experiential knowledge. When Durkheim
claimed that religion gave birth to major institutions, he was referring to the
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 13

religious categories of thought at the origin of social organisations, wherein

religious categories are still present but hidden. We support the thesis that
Sufism is more than a cumulative tradition established over generations; it is a
paradoxical form of mysticism entrenched in the social world, which was nec-
essarily institutionalised, and whose institutions were in continuous tension
with their own inherent economic, social, political, and mystical tendencies.
To summarise and answer concisely our initial question: a Ṣūfī institution is
the physical as well as intellectual manifestation of the vicissitudes of Ṣūfī col-
lectivities over the longue durée; it is the setting in which Ṣūfīs experience and
consider their mystical life in relation to the societies in which they are embed-
ded. Our collection of essays elaborates on this short definition at length. We
cover five topics in the five parts that constitute the present volume.
In the first part, entitled “The economy of Sufism,” we suggest that Ṣūfīs ac-
cumulated symbolic and material capital simultaneously, not simply in the
sense of the establishment of a spiritual and financial treasury, but more sub-
tly, in the sense of the growing debates over wealth and poverty understood
as economies (working and begging), spiritual lifestyles (social engagement
and asceticism), and forms of religious experience (cumulative erudition and
purgative devotion). Ṣūfī institutions reflect the complexity of these debates,
in that Ṣūfīs did not make firm distinctions between the critical options out-
lined here.
In his general essay, Adam Sabra explains that, early on, Ṣūfīs debated the
social and moral-ethical implications of wealth and poverty. The great Muslim
thinker al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) celebrated poverty but advised to live from one’s
labour. In contrast, the master al-Shādhilī (d. 656/1258) placed a religious value
on trade and did not consider wealth to be evil in and of itself. This kind of atti-
tude accompanied, in part, the development of generously endowed (mawqūf,
from waqf ) lodges in Ayyūbid and Mamlūk Egypt. In these institutions, Ṣūfīs
could be exempted from work and often they acted not only for their spiri-
tual attainment, but in the name of pious charity, they provided food for the
poor and residences for single women; lastly, the practice of praying for their
patrons and their families was the beginning of a prayer economy. Under the
Ottomans, sultans, but also members of the Ottoman military-administrative
class and middle-class people, all sought blessings, and donated lands to
Bektāşī and Mevlevī networks, which then became active proselytisers. In
fact, as early as the seventh/thirteenth to eighth/fourteenth century, spiritual
“chivalry” ( futuwwa) groups undertook pioneer and missionary activities in
rural areas; later, in Mughal India, Ṣūfī communities also served as pioneers
and missionaries. Like lodges, shrines represented a full-fledged economic and
14 Papas

religious system. For example, the maintenance of Central Asian holy sites was
funded by waqf, donations, and offerings, especially during massive pilgrimag-
es, and these sites fostered the renovation of other construction and increased
the productivity of lands. Modern critics who attacked corrupt financial and
spiritual elements of this system could not put an end to mass devotions
around deceased mystics. Remarkably, Ṣūfī institutions adapted to contempo-
rary economic conditions by reinventing traditional business models, like the
Pakistani Chishtiyya qawwālī (devotional music) that turned into world music
or, in Senegal, the agrarian spirituality of the Murīdiyya that became globalised
as a migrant economy.
Nathan Hofer focuses on pious endowments (waqf, pl. awqāf ), that is, irre-
vocable trusts that enable someone to use part of his or her wealth to support a
religious or socially beneficial cause, in this case, Sufism. From the third/ninth
century until now, waqfs were beneficial to Ṣūfīs in many ways. They provided
them with spaces for learning, teaching, reading, writing, meditating, and cel-
ebrating collectively. More profoundly, endowments shaped specific patterns
of Ṣūfī social activity, which changed over time; these included innovations in
devotional life and conceptual language in mediaeval Baghdad, the systemati-
sation of Ṣūfī thought and practice, as represented by Ṣūfī literature in fifth-/
eleventh- to sixth-/twelfth-century Khurāsān, and so forth. Hussain Ahmad
Khan studies the range of donations (mainly futūḥ and nudhūr), another as-
pect of the economy of Sufism. Donations were well developed in the Middle
East, the Maghrib, and India throughout the mediaeval and early modern pe-
riods, and proved instrumental in funding Ṣūfī establishments and Ṣūfī ways
of life. However, Ṣūfī circles continuously debated the issue of the acceptance
of gifts and were acutely aware of the problematic aspects of this common
practice: whereas giving and receiving donations was not devoid of ulterior
motives that revealed the weaknesses of men (including mystics), futūḥ espe-
cially favoured pious life and elevated alms to the rank of divine openings onto
hidden truths. Mehran Afshari shows that, faced with earning a living or rely-
ing on God, Ṣūfīs found an alternative solution. They utilised the early Islamic
chivalry code ( futuwwa) to render their professional activities spiritual. From
initiation rituals and symbols to civilities and moral precepts (generosity, self-
abnegation, etc.), Ṣūfī communities in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Egypt, and Anatolia in-
stitutionalised spiritual values. To cultivate these principles, in the seventh/
thirteenth century Ṣūfīs created a literary genre called Kitāb al-futuwwa or
futuvvat nāma in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish. Conversely, later variants of
these writings infused Ṣūfī religiosity and altruism in trade and craft guilds.
The second part of this book, devoted to the “Ṣūfī places and dwellings,” ex-
plores the spatial inscriptions of mystics: where and how they lived, practiced
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 15

their beliefs, received spiritual education, and found their final resting places.
We understand these sites not only as forums for Ṣūfī practice and knowl-
edge transmission but also as sites conceived by Ṣūfī collectivities as meeting
places of the immanent and the transcendent. Shrines, lodges, and outposts
thus appear to constitute a spatial institutionalisation in every sense, that is, as
geographical and architectural spaces, collective and social spaces, ritual and
imaginary spaces.
Daphna Ephrat and Paulo Pinto present a historical overview of Ṣūfī places
and dwellings. Along with the evolution of Sufism, from the late fourth/tenth
to the ninth/fifteenth century, the lodges (khānqāhs) developed into centres
of teaching and spiritual training, with their own structures of authority and
companionship in Khurāsān, Iraq, and beyond. Quite early, Ṣūfī dwellings
were funded by dynastic states, such as that of the Saljūqs who encouraged
sharīʿa-oriented Sufism. In addition, informal groups pursuing ascetic lifestyles
continued to gather in smaller hospices, for example, in Syria. The institutionali-
sation of Sufism also took place at the lodges presided over by revered masters
following the model of the Prophet and his community, rather than in state-
sponsored establishments. These were centres where disciples orbited around
their masters. The centres often contained the graves of the saintly founders,
and thus served as spaces of communal worship and pious visitations (mazār).
The premodern period (tenth/sixteenth to twelfth/eighteenth century) saw the
geographical expansion of Ṣūfī places and their religiosity. For instance, the
Ottoman capital hosted a large number of lodges of many different orders, such
as the Khalwatiyya and the Naqshbandiyya; in Mughal India, shrine complexes
(dargāhs) were hubs for the locally embedded Ṣūfī orders and for interactions
between Muslims and non-Muslims. As opposed to simplistic scenarios (decline
vs. rise, modernity vs. inertia), Ṣūfī institutions experienced five processes of
relative transformation during the modern period: reform, in so far as Ṣūfīs en-
countered Muslim reformist ideas, particularly in the lodges of Mecca; crisis and
adaptation, when lodges were tightly controlled by the state as in Syria, or even
closed, as in socialist Bosnia; revivalism, in the sense that shrines, as alternative
religious spaces, attracted masses and were also used by state authorities to pro-
mote a certain version of the nation’s “cultural heritage”; and globalisation, since
Muslim migrants and converts established new connections and encouraged
cultural transfers between Ṣūfī spaces on a transcontinental scale.
Peyvand Firouzeh takes us into the Ṣūfī lodge, a physical establishment be-
longing to a group of Ṣūfīs gathered around a master. The very fluidity of the ter-
minology related to this institution reflects its diverse regional characteristics,
heterogeneous ascetic-mystic practices, and its differentiated development.
However, in the longue durée, from the fifth/eleventh century to the present,
16 Papas

from North Africa to Southeast Asia, all lodges, beyond their material entities,
were surrounded by narratives linking Sufism to the spiritual memory of its
architecture. As political events and everyday life in the lodges show, the insti-
tution established itself as a key player in history. Terminology is also enlight-
ening in the case of ribāṭ (pl. rubuṭ), or borderland outposts, as discussed by
Nathan Hofer. Originally connoting war and pious renunciation, this paradoxi-
cal term was widespread in frontier regions before the emergence of Sufism;
it was then interpreted by Ṣūfīs as a place for spiritual struggle with one’s ego
and mystical quest. Outposts dedicated to this function emerged in Iraq, Iran,
and elsewhere in the third/ninth to fourth/tenth century, and then prolifer-
ated across the Muslim world after the sixth/twelfth century. These estab-
lishments institutionalised militant and political forms of Islamic mysticism
in the early modern Maghrib and in western and sub-Saharan Africa during
the colonial period. Related to but distinct from Ṣūfī lodges, shrines came to
be identified with Sufism par excellence from the sixth/twelfth to seventh/
thirteenth century onwards, according to Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen. Here, too,
the rich lexis reflects the variety of holy sites, from a sacred tree to a whole com-
plex, from grottoes to mausoleums with cupolas. Whether during their expan-
sion throughout the Muslim world until the eleventh/seventeenth to twelfth/
eighteenth century or in the face of criticism from Wahhābī, Deobandi, and
Jadīd reformist movements, Ṣūfī shrines are ubiquitous in the sociopolitical
history of Islam; they provide their pious visitors with the opportunity to step
out of time and approach the sacred.
The third part discusses the social roles of Ṣūfīs, that is, the different ways
in which they responded to social demands as well as to their own agendas
for changing society in accordance with Ṣūfī values. This ambiguous position
betrays the fact that Muslim mystics were torn between God and men, more
precisely between manifesting their saintly vocations and their ongoing pres-
ence in the secular world. As a “friend of God,” a father or a brother in his
community, and an authority at the heart of sociability, the spiritual master
(shaykh) himself became an institution.
The opening chapter of part 3, written by Rachida Chih, adopts a threefold
approach (textual, historical, and anthropological) to analyse the status of
the master and his relationship with his disciples. Raised to the rank of saints
(awliyāʾ), Ṣūfī masters attracted followers more because of the divine blessing
(baraka) they dispensed than because they taught mystical gnosis. Sufism was
integrated into society at large as early as the ʿAbbāsid period. This trend con-
tinued under the Mamlūks, the Ṣafavids, and the Ottomans. For all devotees,
companionship with the master presupposed the observation of a certain set
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 17

of manners (ādāb) codified in writings mostly in Arabic and Persian, which of-
fered a model of society based on the prophetic ideal. This model was defined
by three concepts. First, companionship (ṣuḥba) was based on a binding pact
between the master and his disciples, one that demanded that they observe
mutual obligations. Authors such as al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072) and al-Shaʿrānī
(d. 973/1565), described disciples’ submission to their master in detail; but
these descriptions can be found also, for example, among contemporary Ṣūfī
brotherhoods in Egypt. Second, within the frame of lodges and shrines, ser-
vice (khidma) to the master and to the companions extended to the site and
their visitors, and the inhabitants around these sites. The hierarchy of Ṣūfī
orders and their servants, attendants, and deputies created social functions
that mixed charity, social services, and spiritual guidance. Third, the media-
tion (shafāʿa; tawassul) performed by Ṣūfī leaders and their lodges and shrines
(through the baraka of the deceased saint) meant, first, that saint would inter-
vene with God on behalf of certain individuals, but could also include food dis-
tribution, healing sessions, and arbitration in conflicts, as, for instance, among
tribes in twelfth-/eighteenth-century Morocco or, today, in regions where
state authorities have failed or are ineffective. In the globalised contempo-
rary world where master-disciple relationships can be long distance, as in the
Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya, the annual visits to the shaykh remain essential social
events that confirm his institutional stature and exceed the confines of his
lodge or shrine.
Contrary to their image as exclusive friends of God, Ṣūfīs devoted consider-
able attention to altruism (īthār), as Richard McGregor shows. Ṣūfī thinkers
such as ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī l-Harawī (d. 481/1089) demanded discipline of the self
in return for divine favour, practiced chivalry and benevolence, and ultimately
made selflessness a mystical experience. Hagiographers provided biographical
examples of this conception, with shaykhs like Abū Marwān ʿAbd al-Mālik b.
Ibrāhīm al-Qaysī l-Yuḥānisī (seventh/thirteenth century) feeding the poor as
part of their spiritual training, or Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Nūrī (d. 295/907) for whom
altruism was the key to proper conduct and eternal life. These activities were
institutionalised in, for instance, langars (soup kitchens) and sabīl-kuttābs
(Qurʾān schools with public fountains). In general, Muslim spiritual authori-
ties had a strong and reciprocal impact on urban sociability, as Nathalie Clayer
argues. Ṣūfī saints and orders were active in the emergence of cities and the
urban fabric. In the eighth-/fourteenth- to ninth-/fifteenth-century Balkans,
or later in twelfth-/eighteenth- to nineteenth-century Cyrenaica, several cit-
ies developed around shrines or lodges. Ṣūfīs developed sociability at the local
level (in Istanbul neighbourhoods, for example) as well as on a global scale (in
18 Papas

hubs for ḥajj, such as Jerusalem). City facilities also reshaped Ṣūfī lifestyles and
institutions with the emergence of new products, such as coffee; new technol-
ogies, such as printing; and modern administration in the form of associations.
Ahmet Yaşar Ocak studies rural environments, which are not separate, but
distinct from urban settings, and reveals a religious landscape where the con-
straints of nature fostered ascetic, but active forms of Sufism. Initially, Yasawī
Ṣūfīs proselytised in remote and rural areas, such as the Qipchaq Steppe,
whereas Naqshbandīs chose to cultivate land and bring spiritual education to
Transoxanian villages. Ṣūfī institutions were instrumental in persuading peo-
ple to settle uninhabited lands, secure roads, and educate people. In addition,
rural Anatolia proved emblematic of a politico-religious form of Sufism: local
autonomy and hostility toward the central powers were accompanied by non-
conformist tendencies.
The fourth part of our volume deals with “Sufism and worldly powers.”
We demonstrate the inextricable interrelationship of mysticism and politics,
thereby departing from the premise of their presumed separation, a view that
still holds sway in the political sciences and sociology. Ṣūfīs often dealt with
politics, but in their own unique way. Historical research on chronicles, mirrors
for princes, hagiographies, and speculative treatises suggests that Ṣūfīs were
compelled to position themselves as interlocutors of power institutions, not
simply for their own survival and promotion but, more deeply, to overcome
the principled contradiction between world renunciation and sociopolitical
involvement.
In the chapter’s introductory essay, Alexandre Papas explores five successive
yet overlapping historical contexts in which Ṣūfīs and worldly powers inter-
acted in a variety of complex ways. First, during the early mediaeval period,
ascetics (zuhhād), then Ṣūfīs proper, confronted not just “infidel” regimes, but
also Muslim rulers they considered illegitimate or corrupt. This was a casus
belli that led to a reflection on jihād later developed by al-Ghazālī. In general,
Muslim mystics maintained an ambivalent relationship with the state appara-
tus of the ʿAbbāsids and the Būyids. Second, when Ṣūfī orders emerged in the
late mediaeval period from the Maghrib to India, sultans’ patronage of Ṣūfīs
was as much pragmatic as religious (i.e., belief in the supernatural power of
holy individuals who made predictions and lent legitimacy to rulers). Third,
the Islamic millennial shift (tenth/sixteenth to eleventh/seventeenth century)
accentuated this tendency towards saintly rulership. In this regard, three cases
of Ṣūfī dynasties were emblematic: the Jazūliyya in Morocco, the Ṣafaviyya in
Iran, and the Naqshbandiyya/Khwājas in eastern Turkestan. It appears that
the theories of the “esoteric government,” which derived from the concept of
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 19

sanctity (walāya) as governorship (wilāya), found later elaborations in these

cases. Fourth, in the twelfth/eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the rise
of colonial powers across the Muslim world revived the discussion of jihād.
Whereas some saintly leaders sought accommodation with the new authori-
ties, notably in Africa, others, such as Shāmil/Shamwīl (d. 1288/1871) in the
Caucasus, led armed resistance and called for jihād. Lastly, from the twentieth
century onwards there emerged what we call a “baraka bureaucracy,” that is,
Ṣūfī officials (for example, in Soviet Uzbekistan) or Ṣūfī associations pursuing
a political agenda, as in Indonesia and western Europe. The backing, and oc-
casionally even the creation, of political parties by Ṣūfī lineages is observable
in Iraqi Kurdistan, Pakistan, and elsewhere and can be interpreted as attempts
to lend a spiritual dimension to nationalist ideologies.
Luca Patrizi discusses the Ṣūfī terminology of power to show how Muslim
mystics integrated the practices and ethos of the royal court into their system
of thought and ritual culture. Derived from non-Islamic and Islamic sources,
Ṣūfī authors such as Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 430/1038) and others used anal-
ogies between temporal power and spiritual power, likening saints to kings,
sultans, etc. and applying the court etiquette of the age to Ṣūfī ādāb. Ṣūfī insti-
tutions imitated the practice of the royal banquet (majlis). This usage was not
just metaphorical; collective assemblies were established with the characteris-
tics of court assemblies, as described by the influential Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr
(d. 440/1049). Neguin Yavari studies proximity, rather than analogy, between
Ṣūfīs and royalty. For example, the famous al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234) served
as an advisor and ambassador to the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir (d. 622/1225).
Interpersonal relationships like this changed scale in the post-Mongol period
in Egypt, Iran, Asia Minor, Central Asia, and India. Books of wise council and
advice were written by Muslim mystics, e.g., al-Simnānī (d. 736/1336), Aḥmad
Kāsānī (d. 949/1542) and even Ṣūfīs at the Qājār court. These books bear wit-
ness to their authors’ ambitions and include calls for a new religious order
based on Sufism, involvement in designing and practicing politics according to
Ṣūfī values, defence of the monarchy, and so forth.
In addition to the court, Ṣūfīs were also active in the army, as demonstrated
by David Cook. From the scriptural interpretations of jihād (struggle of the
soul, of the tongue, of the sword), early Ṣūfīs like ʿAbdallāh b. al-Mubārak
(d. 181/797) combined warfare and asceticism. During the Ottoman conquest,
Ṣūfī brotherhoods were closely affiliated with the Janissary corps. Whereas
Naqshbandīs acted as fighters or saints protecting armies in early modern Asia,
Africa was the scene of anti-colonial jihāds led by Qādirīs and Tijānīs (among
other groups) fighting for greater spiritual goals related to the reform of Islam
20 Papas

and its mystical aspects as manifested in Sufism. Knut Vikør reconsiders and
relativises the concept of the Ṣūfī kingdom or state. This ultimate phase of
institutionalisation seems to emerge from an absence of alternative political
structures in three historical configurations. The aforementioned Khwājas of
Central Asia illustrate the transition from tribal to political-religious order; the
jihād movements of Dan Fodio (d. 1234/1817) and al-Ḥājj ʿUmar b. Saʿīd Tall
(d. 1280/1864) in West Africa established new states based on an Islamic reform-
ist (not Ṣūfī) agenda; and the power of the Ṣūfī leader al-Jazāʾirī (d. 1300/1883)
in Algeria, as well as the Sanūsiyya brotherhood in Libya, emerged when exist-
ing states were devastated by colonial intervention.
The last part, “The organisation of mysticism,” revises the still pervasive
“evolutionist” model derived from Trimingham by emphasizing the complex
development of Sufism and the coexistence of various trends within it, rather
than presenting it as a simple unidirectional process. We describe the insti-
tutional forms taken by Ṣūfī practices over time, collective behaviours, and
doctrinal elaborations. Organisation does not mean sclerosis of spiritual life,
or a triumph of the mundane over the supra-mundane; it does not indicate
decline or the progress of Sufism as a social fact, but more fundamentally, it
relates to the concrete responses given by Ṣūfīs to the eternal question of how
one can ensure religious stability in an unstable world by perpetuating the
key precepts of Islam while at the same time acknowledging the ephemeral
nature of things.
In the general essay authored by Mark Sedgwick, organised Sufism is pre-
sented as a ṭarīqa (path, order) system, but this is only one of the organisa-
tional forms that Sufism has taken. History shows plural, successive, and
interrelated institutionalisations. Following the example of the closely-knit
circles of masters and disciples (which remained a structural nucleus), already
widespread in the fifth/eleventh century, later Ṣūfī lodges regulated the secular
and spiritual activities of their users. Many Ṣūfī shrines (Mīhana in Khurāsān;
Ṭanṭā in Egypt) were not only sites of pilgrimage but also institutions akin to
lodges, providing religious and education services. In parallel, itinerant struc-
tured groups such as the Qalandars existed beyond the comfort of lodges, until
the nineteenth century. Ṭarīqa Sufism developed as the central Ṣūfī organisa-
tion from the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries. Many exist-
ing lodges were integrated into orders but others remained independent. As
successful orders spread, they fragmented into autonomous sub-orders that
then created sub-sub-orders. Various individuals assisted the shaykh, including
the muqaddam (deputy), khalīfa (representative), khādim (servant, guardian),
maddāḥ (reciter), etc. Membership was offered to disciples (murīds), formally
and informally to admirers (muḥibbs), but in any case, it remained fluid. The
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 21

succession process was also flexible and potentially conflictual, resulting in di-
vision into groups headed by a deputy, a representative, or a son of the shaykh.
Hereditary succession was common and formed Ṣūfī families. While orders ex-
perienced life cycles (birth, maturity, replacement), other Ṣūfī organisations
appeared without replacing orders. These were instituted by the states, whose
old patronage tradition culminated, for instance, in the Majlis al-Ṣūfī (Sufi
Council) in nineteenth-century Egypt. From the 1960s onward, modern organ-
isational and administrative techniques were incorporated into ṭarīqas. The
Nurcus in Turkey deny being a ṭarīqa, but organise themselves like a traditional
ṭarīqa into educational institutions. The Threshold Society in the United States
is a non-profit organisation, but is also still a recognizably neo-Mevlevī ṭarīqa.
Returning to the beginnings of Ṣūfī organisations, Jean-Jacques Thibon
details the markers of Ṣūfī lifestyles, which began to be formalised (not stan-
dardised) in the second/eighth century. The first means of organisation in
Sufism, and one that had a deep effect on its subsequent history, included
wearing garments such as the patched cloak (muraqqaʿa), engaging in ritu-
als such as clothing disciples in the Ṣūfī robe (lubs al-khirqa), taking spiritual
paths (ṭarīqas), following the lineage of initiating masters (silsila), and living in
specific places (lodges). The fifth/eleventh to sixth/twelfth century constitute a
pivotal phase in both the institutionalisation and the sophisticated discussions
of these identity markers by Ṣūfī authors such as al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) and
al-Hujwīrī (d. between 465/1072 and 469/1077). At the core of Ṣūfī organisation
stands the principle of continuity in the form of a hereditary line (nasab) and
spiritual lineage (silsila), as analysed by Ismail Fajrie Alatas. Ṣūfīs introduced
the silsila to authenticate transmission of teachings and trace lines of initia-
tory descent, anchoring both in the prophetic past. However, some ṭarīqas
stressed prophetic descent as a prerequisite for spiritual mastership assuming
that Muḥammadan nasab favoured the inheritance of prophetic ḥasab (merit)
and baraka. Silsilas and nasabs intersected, creating tensions but, quite often,
both genealogies combined to strengthen one another (e.g., Sharifian Sufism
in Morocco), and resulted in hereditary sanctity (sayyid families in Java) and
family ṭarīqas, such as the ʿAlawiyya of Yemen. Semih Ceyhan describes the
general organisation of established Ṣūfī orders while explaining the way Ṣūfīs
themselves envisioned this development through classifications (according
to spiritual and teaching methods, litanies, etc.) and narratives, especially ha-
giographical narratives. After the passing of an eponymous master, a ṭarīqa
remained active because of the efforts of the master’s deputies (khulafāʾ). By
ramifying into sub-branches, Ṣūfī orders grew very diverse and widespread as
these deputies were dispatched to various localities. Thus, a cartography of
Ṣūfī orders can be drawn. For example, Iraq was the centre for the spread of
22 Papas

the Qādiriyya, the Rifāʿiyya, and the Suhrawardiyya, while the Mawlawiyya, the
Bektāshiyya, the Bayrāmiyya, and the Jalwatiyya developed from Anatolia. Far
from either declinist or overly enthusiastic visions sometimes ascribed to Ṣūfī
authors, many of these ṭarīqas represented the spread and institutionalisation
of spiritual paths (ṭuruq) as a territorial and an ongoing process.
To conclude this section of our book, Stéphane A. Dudoignon addresses
cyber Sufism as a new type of organisation resulting from the increase of Ṣūfī
activities on the internet from the mid-1990s onwards, and further examines
its impact on the evolution of Sufism from the mid-2000s. In the context of
mass education and professional diasporas, orders such as the Murīdiyya have
availed themselves of the internet to enhance their visibility, transcend dis-
tances between disciples and teachers (marabouts), and offer a virtual space
for collective rituals. The irruption of web 2.0 contributed to the creation of an
online Sufism, represented, for instance, by the Niʿmatullāhiyya, whose spiri-
tual authority is fragmented and sometimes reduced to a psychological role,
but is still available to diverse audiences and is a way of adapting to the rapid
pace of globalisation.

Bibliography

Algar, Hamid, Sufism. Principles and practice, Oneonta 1999.

Anawati, Georges Chehata and Louis Gardet, Mystique musulmane. Aspects et tendances,
experiences et techniques, Paris 1961.
Arberry, A. J., An introduction to the history of Ṣūfism, London 1942.
Arberry, A. J., Sufism. An account of the mystics of Islam, London 1950.
Avon, Dominique, Louis Gardet, L’entrée d’un catholique thomiste en islamologie
1926–1949, Liame 9 (2002): 75–94.
Braudel, Fernand, Civilization and capitalism, 15th–18th century. Vol. 1: The structures of
everyday life, trans. Siân Reynolds, Berkeley 1992.
Chardin, Jean, Voyages de Mr le chevalier Chardin, en Perse et autres lieux de l’Orient,
10 vols., Amsterdam 1711.
Chittick, William C., Sufism. A beginner’s guide, Oxford 2000.
Daaif, Lahcen, Invisible, in Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi (ed.), Dictionnaire du Coran
(Paris 2007), 425–7.
Depont, Octave and Xavier Coppolani, Les confréries religieuses musulmanes, Algiers
1897.
Durkheim, Émile, Les formes élémentaires de la vie religieuse, Paris 1912, trans. Joseph
Ward Swain, as The elementary forms of the religious life, London 1915.
What Is a Ṣūfī Institution ? 23

Durkheim, Émile, Les règles de la méthode sociologique, Paris 1967, trans. W. D. Halls, as
The rules of sociological methods, New York 1982.
Ernst, Carl W., The Shambala guide to Sufism, Boston 1997.
Geoffroy, Eric, Initiation au soufisme, Paris 2003, trans. Robert Gaetani, as Introduction
to Sufism. The inner path of Islam, Bloomington 2010.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Chichester 2012.
Hicks, Rosemary R., Comparative religion and the cold war transformation of Indo-
Persian “mysticism” into liberal Islamic modernity, in Markus Dressler and Avind-
Pal S. Mandair (eds.), Secularism and religion-making (Oxford 2011), 141–69.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Khismatulin, Alexey and Samra Azarnouche, The destiny of a genius scholar. Marijan
Molé (1924–1963) and his archives in Paris, Manuscripta Orientalia 20/2 (2014):
45–56.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history. Leiden 2000.
Knysh, Alexander, Historiography of Sufi studies in the West and in Russia, Pis’mennye
Pamiatniki Vostoka / Written Documents of the Orient 1/4 (2006): 206–38.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism. A new history of Islamic mysticism, Princeton 2017.
Lewisohn, Leonard, ed., The heritage of Sufism. Vol. 1: Classical Persian Sufism from its
origins to Rumi (700–1300), Oxford 1993.
Lewisohn, Leonard, ed., The heritage of Sufism. Vol. 2: The legacy of medieval Persian
Sufism (1150–1500), Oxford 1999.
Lewisohn, Leonard and David Morgan, eds., The heritage of Sufism. Vol. 3: Late classical
Persianate Sufism (1501–1750), Oxford 1999.
Marsy, François-Marie de, Histoire moderne des Chinois, des Japonais, des Indiens, des
Persans, des Turcs, des Russiens, &c., 30 vols., Paris 1755–78.
Molé, Marijan, Les mystiques musulmans, Paris 1965.
Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, Sufi essays, New York 1972.
Nicholson, Reynold A., The mystics of Islam, London 1914.
Popovic, Alexandre and Gilles Veinstein, eds., Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam.
Cheminements et situation actuelle, Paris 1986.
Popovic, Alexandre and Gilles Veinstein, eds., Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques
dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui, Paris 1996.
Radtke, Bernd, Neue kritische Gänge. Zu Stand und Aufgaben der Sufikforschung/New
critical essays. On the present state and future tasks of the study of Sufism, Utrecht
2005.
Schimmel, Annemarie, Mystical dimensions of Islam, Chapel Hill, NC 1975.
Scott, Richard W., Institutions and organizations. Ideas, interests, and identities,
Thousand Oaks, CA, 2014.
24 Papas

Sedgwick, Mark, Against the modern world. Traditionalism and the secret intellectual
history of the twentieth century, Oxford 2004.
Şimşek, Halil İbrahim, Türkiye’deki İlahiyat Fakültelerinde Tasavvuf Anabilim Dalının
Durumu ve Yapılan Doktora Tezlerinin Yönelimleri, Türk Dünyasında İslâmî
İlimlerin Yeri 2/3 (2012): 91–110.
Trimingham, J. Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1971.
Zarcone, Thierry, Ekrem Işın and Arthur Buehler, eds., Journal of the History of
Sufism 1–2. Special issue: The Qâdiriyya Sufi order, Istanbul 2000.
 Part 1
The Economy of Sufism

⸪
 Chapter 1

Economies of Sufism
Adam Sabra

From its earliest formation, Sufism has been deeply involved in the economies
of the societies where it has been practiced. Ṣūfīs have adapted their theory
and practice to a wide variety of social, economic, and ecological environ-
ments. Ṣūfīs have founded cities or villages, converted nomads, begged for a
living, received the largesse of kings, wandered the world, lived in seclusion,
managed shrines, led artisan guilds, worked as civil servants, and migrated to
far off lands in the New World to practice commerce. If Sufism and Ṣūfīs have
been shaped by a wide range of economic systems, they have also been causal
agents, transforming the societies around them as pioneers, agricultural re-
formers, and even founders of states.
Given the immense variety of social and political environments in which
Sufism has been practiced, there is no one economy of Sufism. Nonetheless,
we can identify some patterns and major historical developments. This essay
begins with an examination of how Ṣūfīs conceptualised poverty, charity, and
wealth. For some, poverty was an important spiritual value and even a way
of life. Others believed that Ṣūfīs should live in society, practicing licit trades
and focusing on transforming their inner selves. For those who lived in pov-
erty and pledged themselves to religious devotions, the principal question was
whether to accept the patronage of wealthy and powerful persons. Beginning
in the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh centuries, patrons began to build insti-
tutions to house Ṣūfīs and to allow them to devote themselves to prayer. These
institutions were funded with the Islamic legal instrument of waqf, a term that
may be translated as endowment or trust. As waqfs became more popular and
economically important, control over them gave Muslim states, families, and
individuals considerable economic power, as well as the power to influence
religious life through patronage. For some religious households, Sufism was an
important path to building lasting power and prosperity.
In the spite of the increasingly worldly character of some Ṣūfīs, others
continued to live much more marginal or ordinary existences. They lived as
wandering beggars, or, more commonly, as peasants, herdsman, craftsmen,
shopkeepers, and merchants. Sufism began as an urban phenomenon, but
spread to rural areas, across oceans, and into the nomadic societies of the
steppes. Each society has had its own ecological niche, and Ṣūfīs found ways to

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_003

28 Sabra

flourish in each. Ṣūfī networks have often stretched across these ecological and
social barriers, contributing to the integration of different social systems. Ṣūfīs
have been agents of commercial and agricultural diffusion and have helped
extend the authority of states into new regions.
Since the mid-nineteenth century, Sufism has come under increased criti-
cism over its supposed incompatibility with modernity. This critique is insepa-
rable from the attack on the landholding classes that dominated much of the
early modern Muslim world. Among these landholders were Ṣūfī lineages that
based their wealth on control over waqfs and shrines, many of which func-
tioned like family firms and were deeply embedded in the political and social
order of local societies. As we see, attempts to reform Sufism, including the
nationalisation of endowments and shrines and even the abolition of Ṣūfī net-
works, forced Ṣūfīs to reorganise themselves to meet the challenge of regula-
tion by nation states. At the same time, however, the migration of Ṣūfīs from
rural to urban settings, the spread of Ṣūfī communities across transnational
boundaries, and the invention of new technologies created opportunities for
Ṣūfīs to sustain their networks in new ways. Rather than die out or be replaced
by Islamist movements, Ṣūfī networks and religious entrepreneurs have con-
tinued to innovate in the twenty-first-century economy.

1 Poverty, Charity, and Wealth

The status of wealth has been an issue of concern to Ṣūfīs from its earliest days.
Ṣūfī sources explain the origin of their name as being from the ahl al-ṣuffa
(inhabitants of the portico), a group of Meccans who lived in the portico of
the Prophet’s mosque in Medina, after the emigration from Mecca. The aban-
donment of property and family to follow the Prophet into exile is a power-
ful origin story, though modern scholars consider it apocryphal. The story also
identifies the origins of Sufism as an ascetic movement in Islam. Later Ṣūfī
thinkers such as Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj (d. 378/988) argued that asceticism was the
first step on the path to seek God (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 17). Gradually,
he argued, the seeker should renounce material possessions and even the ap-
petite to acquire material goods. Similar attitudes were expressed by a number
of authors of Ṣūfī manuals in the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh centuries.
The most systematic treatment is that of Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad al-Ghazālī
(450–505/1058–1111) in his extremely influential book, Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn
(Reviving the religious sciences).
Al-Ghazālī was influenced by Neoplatonic psychology; he argued that the
soul is a mirror whose surface is tarnished by sin and material attachments.
Economies of Sufism 29

In order for the believer to obtain true knowledge (ḥaqāʾiq al-maʿlūmāt), he

must first polish the mirror of his soul, by obedience to God’s commands and
a gradual rejection of the material world and all its luxuries. “This world,” he
writes, “is an enemy of God.” For al-Ghazālī, poverty is a virtue defined as “the
absence of what is needed” (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 17). All created beings
are poor in the sense that they are dependent on God, who enjoys absolute
wealth since he is in no way dependent on his creation (Sabra, Poverty and
charity, 19–20). Poverty comes in gradations as one progressively becomes
indifferent to wealth, then rejects it altogether. The implication of practicing
such pious poverty is that it will lead one to live from their labour or from
begging. Al-Ghazālī advises the pious pauper to keep his poverty a secret and
avoid debasing himself before the wealthy since the spiritual status of the con-
tent pauper is higher than that of a rich man (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 22).
Al-Ghazālī’s views were challenged by a number of critics, especially those
of the Ḥanbalī school of law, who also considered themselves ascetics, but
who argued that each person has his own path to follow. Neither the wealthy
nor the poor is inherently superior. One’s spiritual status depends one’s obe-
dience to God’s law. The Ḥanbalī scholar Ibn al-Jawzī (510–97/1116–1200), for
example, questioned the Ṣūfī origin story of the ahl al-ṣuffa. He attacked the
philological argument that the term Ṣūfī is derived from ṣuffa, and argued that
the people of the portico were simply needy individuals obliged to live on
charitable contributions. Once they acquired some wealth, they left the por-
tico and resumed normal lives (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 23). Extreme pov-
erty and hunger should not be regarded as signs of piety, Ibn al-Jawzī says, but
rather as dire straits that force the poor to accept the charity of the wealthy,
making the poor dependent on them. Poverty leads many people to accept
alms from religiously dubious sources. For Ibn al-Jawzī, how wealth is used is
what makes it religiously sanctioned or not. Poverty is an illness. Those who
bear it patiently will be rewarded for their perseverance, but poverty is not
something that should be sought out. Ibn al-Jawzī’s attitude is mirrored in the
writings of two later Ḥanbalī thinkers, Ibn Taymiyya (661–728/1263–1328) and
Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (691–751/1292–1350). For Ibn Taymiyya, both wealth
and poverty could be trials, depending on the individual (Sabra, Poverty and
charity, 24). Ibn al-Qayyim emphasises the purposes for which wealth is ac-
cumulated and used.
Positive attitudes towards wealth persist among some Ṣūfīs. The Shādhilī
order, which spread in North Africa, Syria, and the Arabian Peninsula, placed
great value on practicing a trade. Abū l-Ḥasan al-Shādhilī (593–656/1196–1258) is
said to have forbidden his followers from accepting alms or gifts (Sabra, Poverty
and charity, 27). His followers dressed in ordinary clothes and continued to
30 Sabra

pursue their professions. Al-Shādhilī explicitly rejected the wearing of coarse

clothing of the sort often chosen by Ṣūfīs to indicate their rejection of material
luxuries (Hofer, 146). He argued that wearing torn or coarse clothing advertised
the Ṣūfī’s desire to receive alms, and therefore his dependence on his fellow
creatures. Merchants and craftsmen should continue to follow the profession
that God had chosen for them (Hofer, 148). The Shādhilīs enjoyed consider-
able support among the religious scholars of Mamlūk Egypt, and the network
has continued to influence prominent scholars of al-Azhar up to the present
day. The Shādhilīs’ proximity to the Ayyūbid and Mamlūk rulers in Egypt, and
their political power, with all its ambivalent consequences, was characteristic
of this community (Hofer, 142). From this point, it is easy to say that being a
merchant is a divinely chosen profession and wealth is a sign of God’s favour.
The Shādhilīs argued that Ṣūfīs should remain fully engaged in society, and
this attitude appealed to many merchants, shopkeepers, and religious scholars.
At the other end of the spectrum, we find forms of Sufism that have been
labelled “antinomian” because their practitioners often adopted practices that
violated Islamic norms of dress and behaviour (Karamustafa, God’s unruly
friends). These dervishes, who were particularly popular in the Iranian lands
and Anatolia from the seventh/thirteenth century onwards, lived itinerant
lives, travelled in groups, and accepted people’s alms as a means of supporting
themselves (Karamustafa, God’s unruly friends, 14–5). They did not practice a
trade, wore woollen sacks for clothes, and sometimes shaved their hair, beard,
moustache, and eyebrows, giving them a distinct and strange appearance
(Karamustafa, God’s unruly friends, 19). They were even known to pierce their
genitals as a way of restraining sexual desire. The Qalandars and Ḥaydarīs were
the two groups most commonly associated with these practices. In addition,
the Qalandars became a common trope in Persianate Ṣūfī literature.
Soon the rulers of the mediaeval Middle East sought to be patrons of these
groups. By the late seventh/thirteenth century, Mamlūk amīrs and sultans
were building institutions to house the Qalandars (Sabra, Poverty and charity,
28). Rather than repress these groups as heretical, the rulers of the Mamlūk
realms showered them with patronage, just as they did with more convention-
al Ṣūfīs. It should be noted that the geographical spread of these groups during
the mediaeval period was limited, and even in Egypt they were usually as-
sumed to have originated in Iran and spoke Persian (Karamustafa, God’s unruly
friends, 55). By the twelfth/eighteenth century, Qalandars were also present in
Central Asia and India (Papas, 131). Egypt had its own types of unconventional
Ṣūfīs. These included the group known as the Ḥarāfīsh, poor men described as
able-bodied beggars who consumed hashish (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 29).
Economies of Sufism 31

Another type was common in North Africa, the majdhūb Ṣūfī, who was typi-
cally a solitary, childlike individual who wandered into public places naked,
ignoring social conventions (Geoffroy, 309–33).

2 Networks, Institutions, and Households

From the fifth/eleventh until the late thirteenth/nineteenth century (and in

some places to the present), Sufism was increasingly characterised by the
growth of more or less organised networks, the endowment of religious in-
stitutions, and the rise of wealthy and politically influential households and
lineages to prominence. These developments heralded a sea change in the
social background and economic organisation of Ṣūfīs. Although some Ṣūfīs
continued to practice pious poverty and asceticism, others embraced wealth
and political engagement. Increasingly, both groups came to benefit from the
patronage of wealthy individuals and even sovereigns who endowed institu-
tions for them to inhabit and use for prayers and other rituals.
Ṣūfī had long held rituals and sometimes resided in lodges or other special-
ised buildings. These buildings were known by a variety of names, including
ribāṭ (originally a frontier fort), duwayra (small house), and ṣawmāʿa (hermit-
age) (Böwering and Melvin-Koushki). Of these, the term ribāṭ was the term
used longest. In North Africa and Iberia, it referred to a private home used as
a meeting place and residence by Ṣūfīs. By the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh
centuries, in the eastern part of the Islamic world, the term khānaqāh/khānqāh
predominated. Derived from the Persian word for “dwelling place,” this term
was used to refer to Manichaean lodges; it was also adopted by the Karrāmiyya,
a Central Asian ascetic movement (Böwering and Melvin-Koushki; Hofer [Ṣūfī
Outposts] in this volume; Firouzeh in this volume).
In the fifth/eleventh century, a fundamental change took place in the way in
which many religious institutions were funded. Founders, many of them sover-
eigns or politically powerful people, established endowments known as waqfs
to provide permanent sources of income for the institutions of their choice,
often structures built on their instructions. A waqf was a legal instrument by
which the founder ceded ownership over some property, in these cases usu-
ally urban real estate or agricultural land, whose rents would serve as income.
The founder would designate a building to be used as a religious institution,
the purpose of that institution, and the salaries to be paid to a variety of of-
fice holders to administer the endowment and provide the intended services.
Waqfs were used to found a wide variety of institutions, such as madrasas
32 Sabra

(law schools), khānqāhs, zāwiyas (lodges), Ṣūfī shrines, Qurʾān schools for
orphaned and poor boys, hospitals, and soup kitchens (imarets, an Ottoman
term). Waqfs could also be founded to fund family trusts, and many endow-
ments benefited both the descendants of the founder and a religious or
charitable institution. This dual role made them a useful tool for wealthy and
powerful people to protect their assets from seizure by a ruler or state after
their death.
Although not all waqfs were founded by wealthy or powerful persons, the
spread of these endowments meant that Ṣūfīs received considerable patron-
age. This development accelerated their acceptance in official religious circles,
and increasingly, from the Saljūq period onward, religious scholars also de-
fined themselves as Ṣūfīs. The state-sponsored institution for Ṣūfīs par excel-
lence was the khānqāh. The founder of the Ayyūbid dynasty, Ṣalāh al-Dīn b.
Yūsuf (d. 589/1193; known in the West as Saladin) founded the first khānqāh in
Cairo in 569/1174, after he had abolished the Fāṭimid caliphate. This institution
was known as Saʿīd al-suʿadāʾ (lit., ‘Happiest of all,’ or ‘Best of the saved’), after
the Fāṭimid eunuch whose palace it replaced; it provided lodging and a place
of seclusion within the city of Cairo (Fernandes, 21). Its leader received the
title shaykh al-shuyūkh (chief shaykh), and some 300 Ṣūfīs were provided with
residential units where they could remain in seclusion and prayer (Fernandes,
23). They received a monthly stipend, as well as daily distributions of meat
and bread. Additional food was distributed in Ramaḍān, and the Ṣūfīs also re-
ceived regular rations of soap, oil, candles, clothing, and sweets. They could
make the hajj at the khānqāh’s expense, and if they died with an estate valued
at less than twenty dīnārs, other Ṣūfī residents could divide the deceased’s es-
tate among themselves without interference from the state. They were not sup-
posed to engage in any work outside the khānqāh (Fernandes, 24).
Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn intended for his khānqāh to be a closed institution that provid-
ed a residence for foreign Ṣūfīs. This stipulation has been interpreted as part of
his method to disestablish the Fāṭimid dynasty and its official religion, Ismāʿīlī
Shīʿism (Fernandes). In the Mamlūk period, khānqāhs continued to be built,
some by sultans such as al-Nāṣir Muḥammad b. Qalāwūn (d. 741/1341), who
had one completed in 725/1324, and others by leading amīrs, such as Baybars
al-Jāshnikīr (d. 709/1310), who finished one in 707/1307 (Fernandes, 29, 69). Not
all were as well-populated as that of Salāh al-Dīn; Baybars’s foundation pro-
vided for 100 Ṣūfīs; while al-Nāṣir Muḥammad’s foundation provided for forty
resident Ṣūfīs and sixty visitors (Fernandes, 69, 71). Increasingly, khānqāhs
were incorporated into larger waqf complexes, many of which included a tomb
for the founder and his descendants. Endowment deeds often stipulated that
the Ṣūfīs pray for the souls of the founder and his family (Sabra, Poverty and
Economies of Sufism 33

charity, 99). This practice instituted a prayer economy in which the living re-
ligious devotees offered prayers for their dead patron and his or her spouse
and descendants.
The creation of residential lodges for Ṣūfīs who were banned from seeking
outside employment also reinforced the parallel between the pious poor and
the less fortunate paupers of society. Like the pious poor, ordinary paupers
often offered prayers for their benefactors in exchange for the alms they re-
ceived, a phenomenon that is still common in many Muslim societies today. At
al-Nāṣir Muḥammad’s khānqāh outside Cairo, leftover food was distributed to
the poor on a daily basis, and additional handouts were made to neighbours
on major holidays (Sabra, Poverty and charity, 88). The larger waqf complexes
had their own kitchens to feed the numerous beneficiaries and staff, and these
kitchens often fed neighbours and the poor. In the Ottoman Empire, freestand-
ing soup kitchens were known as imarets.
While khānqāhs evolved into religious communities aimed primarily at
foreign or travelling Ṣūfīs who were supported by sovereigns and other pow-
erful individuals, zāwiyas were more often in private hands. The term zāwiya
originally referred to a corner of a mosque that was used by a certain religious
group for its meetings; later, from the ninth/fifteenth century onwards, it com-
monly denoted Ṣūfī institutions. Zāwiyas were funded by waqfs, but the range
of their patrons was wider, and not all founders of zāwiyas came from the mili-
tary or administrative elites. Typically, control over zāwiyas was given to a spe-
cific shaykh, who could then pass it on to a chosen successor, such as his son, or
son-in-law. The endowment properties were often less extensive and valuable
than those donated to found a khānqāh (Roded, 36). In rural areas, zāwiyas
sometimes played an important role in the local economy. Unlike khānqāhs,
zāwiyas were rarely intended to be closed communities, and the shaykh’s dis-
ciples often held other forms of employment elsewhere in the town or village.
After the Ottoman conquest of the Mamlūk Empire in 922/1516–17, zāwiyas
became the predominant Ṣūfī institution, and the ruling elite ceased founding
khānqāhs in the former Mamlūk realms.
One final Mamlūk institution is worthy of note: the women’s ribāṭ. Unlike
the more general use of the term ribāṭ, this institution was founded specifi-
cally to provide a residence for divorced and widowed women, until they could
remarry. The most famous of these institutions was the Ribāṭ al-Baghdādiyya,
founded in Cairo in 684/1285 by Tidhkārbāy Khātūn, the daughter of Sultan
Baybars (Rapoport, 40). Most were built in the late seventh/thirteenth and
early eighth/fourteenth centuries in the Mamlūk realms. Women’s ribāṭs
were closed residential institutions, and the women there were expected to
devote themselves to prayer and religious instruction. Perhaps because they
34 Sabra

were closed communities, one ninth-/fifteenth-century manual that provides

a model foundation deed describes it as a khānqāh for women (Rapoport, 41).
It is notable that the person who presided over the ribāṭ was also a woman;
she was given the title of shaykha. In general, women did not act as religious
instructors in Ṣūfī institutions, but since all of the residents were women, the
situation was unique. The shaykha led the residents in prayers, dhikr (remem-
brance of God), and delivered sermons. Over the course of the ninth/fifteenth
century, women’s ribāṭs became less common and by the time of the Ottoman
conquest of the Mamlūk Empire had disappeared altogether.
The second major institutional development, which began in the sixth/
twelfth century, is the formation of Ṣūfī networks (ṭarīqa, pl. ṭuruq, lit., “way”
or “path”). Mirroring the Sunnī schools of law, the Ṣūfī networks were named
after the founders who supposedly established them. In most cases, the found-
ers wrote relatively little, and the project of creating a network with canonical
literature (including a hagiography of the founder), a set of rituals, and mate-
rial assets, such as Ṣūfī lodges and shrines, fell to his successors. It is impor-
tant to note that in most cases, Ṣūfī networks were informal and personal in
character. Authority was passed down from one individual to another, whether
within a family or to a close disciple, and each recognised shaykh was free to
choose his own successor. There was relatively little vertical integration, and
while some shaykhs clearly enjoyed precedence over others, they had a limited
ability to select successors or control the distribution of assets (Sedgwick in
this volume).
In a number of cases, Ṣūfī networks took on political roles, and even estab-
lished states. Typically, this sort of political role came in response to a collapse
of state power in a certain region, especially a frontier where states did not
exercise much authority (Papas in this volume; Vikør in this volume). The most
famous case of a Ṣūfī-founded state is the Ṣafavid dynasty in Iran. Its founder,
Shāh Ismāʿīl (r. 907–30/1501–24) turned his family’s Ṣūfī lineage into a revolu-
tionary Shīʿī state in which the relationship between the shah and his followers
was that of master and disciples. In this case, the rise of the Ṣafavids from a
Sunnī Ṣūfī network to a revolutionary Shīʿī movement was preceded by a pe-
riod of missionary activity among Turkmen tribes in eastern Anatolia. Another
case of Ṣūfī revolutionaries took place in late ninth-/fifteenth-century and
early tenth-/sixteenth-century Morocco. The inability of local Moroccan rulers
to prevent Portuguese encroachment in North Africa led to a revolt in which
the Jazūlī branch of the Shādhilī network assisted the Saʿdī dynasty in their rise
to power. When the Saʿdīs (r. 916 to 1069 or 79/1510 to 1659 or 68) fragmented
in the eleventh/seventeenth century, a similar process brought the ʿAlawī dy-
nasty to the throne. In virtually every early modern Islamic state in the tenth/
Economies of Sufism 35

sixteenth to thirteenth/nineteenth century, Sufism played an important role in

validating, though not necessarily establishing, dynastic power.
In the Ottoman Empire, the Bektāşī network came to be associated with
the Janissaries, the elite military unit recruited from the Christian population
of the Balkans. When Sultan Maḥmūd II (r. 1223–55/1808–39) abolished the
Janissaries in 1826, he also banned the Bektāşīs, although the network later
recovered to some degree. The tekke (a Turkish term for a Ṣūfī lodge) of Hacı
Bektaş (d. 669/1270) and dergāh (central shrine) received financial support in
the form of endowments from the reign of Sultan Murād I (r. 761–91/1360–89).
The institution, which contained the founder’s tomb, gradually evolved from
an imaret into a Ṣūfī shrine (Faroqhi, The tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 183–4). The
shrine eventually held a number of villages and a salt mine among its assets,
although these assets fluctuated, depending on the political situation (Faroqhi,
The tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 188). Initially, some of these properties were held as
mālikanes (more or less private property), but over the course of the tenth/
sixteenth century these were turned into waqf endowments (Faroqhi, The
tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 190). Local property owners donated their lands to the
tekke, and to endowments associated with the Mevlevī network in the same
area (Faroqhi, The tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 190). Over a period of centuries, the
tekke of Hacı Bektaş received so many donations (from Ottoman sultans to
local landowners) that it became one of the wealthiest Ṣūfī institutions in the
region, although it was not as wealthy as the Mevlevī dergāh in Konya (Faroqhi,
The tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 194). In spite of the connection between the Bektāşīs
and the Janissaries, from the mid-twelfth/eighteenth to the twentieth centu-
ry it was the supposed descendants of the founder who controlled the tekke
(Faroqhi, The tekke of Hacı Bektaş, 207).
The Bektāşī network existed on the periphery of what the Ottomans consid-
ered orthodox. The Naqshbandīs, on the other hand, were firmly in the main-
stream. They recruited many religious scholars. In some places, their shaykhs
were leaders of large mosques, but in Istanbul they had patrons who pro-
vided specific shaykhs with tekkes where they could teach (Le Gall, 48). Some
were endowed by sultans, while others were established by and for Bukharan
shaykhs. Some were established by women from Bukhara (Le Gall, 48–9).
Other benefactors included members of the Ottoman military administrative
class and middle-class people such as craftsmen, scribes, religious function-
aries, and their wives. Some institutions received dozens of small donations
over the years. Most Naqshbandī tekkes had modest material assets at their
disposal. Although their tekkes were concentrated in certain neighbourhoods,
the Naqshbandīs did not control all of the religious space in them, and other
orders remained (Le Gall, 54).
36 Sabra

In Cairo, the tenth/sixteenth and eleventh/seventeenth centuries saw a shift

towards dominance of Ṣūfī networks by certain lineages that were organised
as households, in a manner reminiscent of military administrative households
(Sabra, Household Sufism in sixteenth-century Egypt). Two of these lineages,
the Sādāt al-Wafāʾiyya and Sāda al-Bakriyya, presented themselves as branches
of the Shādhilī network, which was popular with religious scholars and mer-
chants. Others were associated with the Khalwatīs, some of whose followers
came from the Ottoman ruling class. Finally, there was the Aḥmadī network,
which was very popular in rural areas of the Nile Delta. By the end of the tenth/
sixteenth century, it was clear that the Ottoman authorities allowed the domi-
nant lineages to control many of the religious institutions of Cairo in exchange
for Ṣūfī support of the Ottoman dynasty.
By the middle of the eleventh/seventeenth century, the Ottoman authori-
ties recognised the existence of a number of hereditary Ṣūfī lineages as reli-
gious titles. The holders of these titles were called ṣāḥib al-sajjāda or shaykh
al-sajjāda (master of the carpet), indicating that they had control over the as-
sets of the lineage. These assets could be very substantial. By the end of the
twelfth/eighteenth century, the Sādāt al-Wafāʾiyya controlled some fifty-two
endowments, while the Sāda al-Bakriyya controlled forty-four (Marsot, 141).
Most of these endowments dated to the Mamlūk period and had been inher-
ited by the Ottomans. In principle, the assets held by the lineage head were
all at his disposal, and he would use them to support family members, slaves,
and employees, in addition to funding the religious activities he organised. By
the early nineteenth century, the shaykh al-Bakrī also held the title of naqīb
al-ashrāf (head [of the syndicate] of the descendants [of the Prophet]) and
organised expensive and lavish celebrations of the Prophet’s birthday (Marsot,
145). When Shaykh Muḥammad al-Bakrī donated his waqf in 1779, he held
property in real estate, grain, and coffee (Marsot, 146). Between 1807 and 1813
Shaykh Abū l-Anwār al-Sādāt donated properties that included real estate,
merchants’ warehouses, a coffee house, orchards, ferry boats, and agricultural
tax farms to his endowments, although his endowments were confiscated by
the Ottoman governor Meḥmed ʿAlī (Marsot, 149–50). It has been suggested
that the various Ṣūfī shaykhs used the lands they held as tax farms to carve out
exclusive areas in which to proselytise for their network (De Jong, 41). Although
it is unclear whether such a definitive delineation of territory existed prior to
the nineteenth century, it seems likely that peasants living on lands held as tax
farms or waqf lands that were controlled by a certain lineage would consider
the lineage heads as their patrons. To all intents and purposes, the Ṣūfī lineage
heads were a nobility whose clients included the inhabitants of villages under
their control.
Economies of Sufism 37

3 Cities, Villages, Steppes, and Oceans

Ṣūfīs have been active in a wide range of societies, geographies, and ecologies.
The classic matrix for examining religious thought has often involved distin-
guishing between the country and the city (Clayer in this volume; Ocak in this
volume). Islam is often portrayed as an urban religion, and scholars tend to dis-
tinguish between the literate Islam of the urban scholarly class and the “popu-
lar” religion of the urban lower classes and rural areas. This two-tier model
of religion has come under criticism by scholars of religion for a number of
reasons. In his study of Moroccan Sufism, Vincent Cornell emphasises the in-
terplay between popular and more specialised images of Ṣūfī saints (Cornell,
xxxv–xxxvi). In doing so, he calls into question the juxtaposition of elite and
popular, urban and rural religion. In his study of antinomian Sufism, Ahmet
Karamustafa argues that the Qalandars were not an expression of popular re-
ligion or the survival of pre-Islamic practices, but rather a new form of reli-
giosity that responded to “a historically specific social and cultural context”
(Karamustafa, God’s unruly friends, 10). Like Cornell, Karamustafa denies that
there was ever a clear distinction between the Islam of the elites and the Islam
of the masses (Karamustafa, God’s unruly friends, 5). Furthermore, scholars of
Sufism now acknowledge the existence of a much wider range of social and
ecological structures into which Ṣūfīs are embedded. These include frontier
societies, steppe societies, and oceanic networks and diasporas.
Sufism appears to have originated in urban settings, and important found-
ing figures such as al-Junayd (d. 298/910) and Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī
(325–412/937–1021) were active in Baghdad and Nīshāpūr, respectively. The
patrons of Ṣūfī institutions were also urban based in most cases, and their pa-
tronage of Sufism in major cities reflected this fact. Cornell argues that Sufism
spread in mediaeval Morocco as part of the diffusion of “Sunnī international-
ism” (Cornell, 15, 106–7). Scholars who travelled to the East to perform the hajj
and study played a crucial role in the diffusion of Ṣūfī ideas in the cities of
Maghrib on their return.
In the cities of the eastern Islamic world, Sufism often overlapped with the
practice of futuwwa. Often translated as “chivalry,” futuwwa (Ar., P. javānmardī)
literally means “youthfulness.” Initially, in Khurāsān, this ideology of ethical
conduct was associated with frontier military organisations, urban associa-
tions, and Ṣūfī groups (Zakeri; Ridgeon, 29–45). It became an important part
of the ideology of trade and craft guilds in the central Islamic lands. One such
manifestation was in the akhīs of eighth-/fourteenth-century Anatolia. The
term akhī probably comes from a middle Turkish word referring to a generous
person, although the eighth-/fourteenth-century traveller Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (703–70
38 Sabra

or 79/1304–68 or 69, or 1377) understood it to be the Arabic for “my brother”

(Pancaroğlu, 63). The akhī associations appear to have been urban futuwwa
groups composed of craftsmen and merchants who maintained lodges to pro-
vide hospitality to travellers, many of whom were engaged in commerce. The
lodges provided communal meals and rituals, such as collective dhikr, and
even singing and dancing (Pancaroğlu, 67). The leader (naqīb) of the associa-
tion initiated new members in a ceremony that involved dressing in a specific
item of clothing, such as a sash or trousers (Pancaroğlu, 69).
Elites, including the early Ottoman sultans, supported the akhī associations
and participated in their activities. A genre of writing called futuwwatnāmes
(books of futuwwa) described the correct conduct of the “young man”
(Pancaroğlu, 68–9; Taeschner). The caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–
622/1180–1225), encouraged the spread of futuwwa and was a master himself.
Shihāb al-Dīn al-Suhrawardī (539–632/1145–1234) spread the caliph’s message
by authoring two treatises on futuwwa, and also used the opportunity to in-
stitute new regulations for the organisation of ribāṭs (Ohlander, 249–303).
Al-Suhrawardī played an important role in the spread of futuwwa in Anatolia
and Iran, where it became increasingly popular in the post-Mongol era. The
Ottomans supported the construction of such lodges in frontier regions as part
of their policy of settlement and pacification, and these often became self-
sufficient economic institutions. There seems to have been considerable over-
lap between the Ṣūfī lodge, the akhī lodge, and the Ottoman soup kitchens
(imaret) (Pancaroğlu, 73–81). The connection with craftsmen and merchants
continued in Timūrid Iran, where a ninth-/fifteenth-century futuwwa manual
makes the connection explicit (Ridgeon, 106).
Whether one is speaking of eastern Anatolia or the Maghrib, mediaeval re-
ligious and political authorities tended to see cities as centres of power and
orthodoxy and rural areas as potential sources of heresy. Rulers such as the
Saljūqs in Iran and Anatolia; the Ayyūbids and Mamlūks in Egypt, Syria, and
the Ḥijāz; the Ḥafṣids in Tunisia; and the Marīnids in Morocco promoted in-
stitutionalised Sufism in the major cities of their realms. They also used sup-
port for Ṣūfīs to extend normative religion to rural areas. In the process, Sufism
was “popularised” to some degree, though most Ṣūfīs continued to adhere to
Islamic legal norms. In Saljūq Anatolia after the Mongol conquests, religious
and political elites competed for one another’s support. This competition
often took the form of endowing institutions for Ṣūfīs, many of whom were
refugees from the Mongols (Wolper, 22–3). After the Mongol victory over the
Saljūq rulers of Anatolia in 641/1243, local amīrs began to assert themselves,
providing an opportunity for increased patronage. This policy also helped the
amīrs form alliances with urban elites, with the now greatly reduced authority
Economies of Sufism 39

of the Saljūq court (Wolper, 25–7). In this period the replacement of the Saljūq
court with a number of competing amīrs also transformed urban spaces in
towns such as Tokat, Amasya, and Sivas, as single state-sponsored institutions
gave way to multiple foundations in each town, foundations that represented
competing authorities (Wolper, 59).
In the absence of a strong, stable state, Ṣūfī leaders sometimes served as
intermediaries between local townsmen and peasants and their rulers. In the
second half of the ninth/fifteenth century, Khwāja Aḥrār (806–95/1404–90),
a Naqshbandī shaykh in Central Asia, developed a system of ḥimāyat (protec-
tion, clientage). Jürgen Paul has shown that Khwāja Aḥrār’s tenants, including
peasants, craftsmen, and merchants, looked to him for protection from, and
intervention with, the Timūrid rulers of his time (Paul, Forming a faction, 534).
The shaykh was a landholder with considerable holdings throughout Central
Asia, including some 250 plots that were endowed as waqf (Paul, Forming a
faction, 537). In addition, because of his connections with the Timūrid court in
Herat, he was able to negotiate tax reductions for himself and his clients (Paul,
Forming a faction, 540). Finally, he established a spiritual centre in Samarqand
that also served as a political and economic locus for himself and his succes-
sors (Paul, Forming a faction, 544).
Cornell has shown that Ṣūfīs functioned as missionaries in areas of rural
Morocco in the fourth/tenth century, establishing ribāṭs in the countryside to
bring Sunnī Islam to areas that were thought to harbour Khārijīs and other
“heretical” forms of Islam (Cornell, 33). Many of these new centres of learning
were established along trade routes. Importantly, Ṣūfī instruction of this type
sought to transcend tribal differences and create a more universal Islamic iden-
tity (Cornell, 55). In spite of this, Cornell notes that Sufism and its teachings
were received in rural areas differently, according to region and ethnic groups.
Holy men also served as mediators and intercessors between the rural popula-
tion and their rulers, often tribesmen from different parts of Morocco (Cornell,
58). A study of the social origins of the mediaeval Moroccan saints finds that
50.6 per cent of them were Berbers, 41 per cent were Arabs, 42 per cent (includ-
ing many Arabs) were from Fez, and 70.51 per cent were literate. This is not the
profile of a peasant religion. Furthermore, 48 per cent were middle class, 38
per cent were lower class, and 14 per cent were upper class (Cornell, 104–8).
Craftsmen, scholars, shopkeepers, and rural landowners predominated among
Moroccan saints, although labourers, peasants, and pastoralists made up a sig-
nificant proportion as well.
Admittedly, these numbers are likely to be skewed somewhat, because they
are based on written sources. Nonetheless, Ṣūfī writings, especially hagio-
graphical works, often offer unusual detail about the lives of ordinary people
40 Sabra

in premodern Middle East societies. Unlike chronicles, which tend to focus

on the ruler’s court, and biographical dictionaries, that usually concentrate on
religious scholars, Ṣūfī hagiography offers information about urban craftsmen,
and even rural people. One example of this is the life of Muḥammad al-Ḥanafī
(c. 767–847/1365 or 6–1443), an Egyptian Ṣūfī shaykh who began his career as
an orphan and was later apprenticed to a tradesman. He rebelled, and pursued
a career as a religious ascetic and teacher. Eventually, he became so popular
among the Mamlūk elite that he was able to intercede at the sultan’s court for
his followers (Sabra, From artisan to courtier).
Ṣūfīs have often served as pioneers in rural society and in newly conquered
lands acquired by Muslim empires such as the Ottomans and the Mughals. In
the late tenth/sixteenth and early eleventh/seventeenth centuries, the Mughal
Empire sought to increase the revenue it extracted from its territories in
Bengal. This meant increasing the production of rice, cotton, and silk, includ-
ing that destined for export to Europe (Eaton, 202–3). As far back as the eighth/
fourteenth century, charismatic pīrs (P., shaykhs) developed a reputation
for their ability to clear forests and create new areas for cultivation (Eaton,
208–10). In some cases, they did so under the authority of Hindu monarchs.
Sometimes, Hindus provided the capital, while Muslims provided the labour,
while other times, pīrs acted on their own initiative to organise local people to
clear forests (Eaton, 222–4). Like many frontier societies, the Muslim pioneers
of Bengal had a reputation for being egalitarian and ungovernable (Eaton,
225). As time went on, religious institutions, such as mosques and shrines,
were built, and these institutions received some of the best lands in Bengal as
donations (Eaton, 234–8).
A similar dynamic was at work in tenth-/sixteenth-century rural Morocco.
Muḥammad b. Sulaymān al-Jazūlī (d. 869/1465) and his followers encour-
aged pastoralists to give up their nomadic way of life and take up agriculture
(Rodríguez Mañas, Agriculture, Ṣūfism, and the state, 457). They established
new lodges to bring additional areas under cultivation. Abū Muḥammad
ʿAbdallāh al-Ghazwānī (d. 935/1528) combined missionary work with the de-
velopment of irrigation, and established lodges that provided charitable as-
sistance to the rural poor (Rodríguez Mañas, Agriculture, Ṣūfism, and the state,
458). Over the next century, a series of shaykhs in the countryside worked to
develop rural areas into economically vibrant communities centred around
Jazūlī lodges. They employed rural labourers, offered charity, and gave lands or
tenancies to landless peasants (Rodríguez Mañas, Agriculture, Ṣūfism, and the
state, 460). Donations were held in common by the lodges, and a social hier-
archy based on religious authority determined how the lodge’s assets were uti-
lised and the income was distributed (Rodríguez Mañas, Agriculture, Ṣūfism,
and the state, 461). The novices did most of the manual labour.
Economies of Sufism 41

4 Shrines, Donations, and Celebrations

The veneration of saints and the visiting (ziyāra) of shrines are often seen as
characteristically Ṣūfī practices. This is only partly true. Shrines dedicated to
deceased members of the Prophet Muḥammad’s family arose early in Shīʿism,
and there is evidence that visiting the pious dead is a practice that goes back
to the early third/ninth century, when the earliest known pilgrimage guide was
written (Taylor, 5). Such guides were written with increasing frequency from
the sixth/twelfth century onwards, an indicator of the growing popularity of
visiting cemeteries. This development can be seen as part of the rise of vernac-
ular Islam in the late mediaeval period (roughly seventh/thirteenth to ninth/
fifteenth centuries); once established, shrine visitation remained an integral
part of vernacular religious practice, up to the present day (Mayeur-Jaouen in
this volume).
Vernacular religious practice can be defined as those specific to a given re-
gion or locale. Although such practices are widely defused among the popula-
tion, they may also enjoy the support of learned and political elites. For this
reason, it is problematic to identify vernacular religious practice with “popular
religion.” Shrines are particularly good examples of this phenomenon, in that
they often attract visitors from the same village, town, or city. Some shrines
are places of regional interest, or become associated with a particular political
regime or Ṣūfī network. There are saints’ shrines whose existence is unknown
outside a small village, and there are shrines, such as that of al-Ḥusayn in Cairo,
that are known throughout the Islamic world and beyond. In some cases,
shrines have served as headquarters for a particular Ṣūfī order; the shrine of
Hacı Bektaş discussed above is an example of this. Control over shrines and
the income derived from pilgrimages to them was and remains a significant
economic asset. In particular, the votive offerings (nadhr, pl. nudhūr) made
at shrines can amount to a significant sum of money. This is in addition to en-
dowments that benefit the shrine. It should be noted that this mode of piety is
not restricted to Sufism or to Sunnism. Shīʿī shrines, such as those of ʿAlī b. Abī
Ṭalib in Najaf, Imām Ḥusayn in Karbala, and ʿAlī l-Riḍā in Mashhad, witness
pilgrimages and religious devotions in some ways similar to what one finds in
Ṣūfī shrines.
Although in the mediaeval period visiting shrines provoked some criticism
from figures such as Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, it was not until
the rise of the puritanical movement led by Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb
(1115–1206/1703–92) and his allies in the Suʿūdī dynasty that shrines became
highly controversial. The veneration of saints and shrines, particularly among
Ṣūfīs, is a major issue for modern Salafīs. Given the role of shrines in local and
regional religious life and in the economy of many Muslim societies, attacks on
42 Sabra

practices associated with shrines, and even on the shrines themselves, call into
question traditional religious allegiances and economic relationships.
The building of shrines and other funerary structures became increas-
ingly popular in the late mediaeval period. In Iran, this was in the wake of
the Mongol conquests, when Ṣūfīs played an important role in converting the
Mongols to Islam. The Timūrid rulers of Iran and parts of Central Asia patron-
ised many shrines in the ninth/fifteenth century (Subtelny, 196). The larger
shrines were often funded by waqf, and the Timūrids made a point of renovat-
ing shrines that had fallen into disrepair and were not the property of a specific
Ṣūfī lineage (Subtelny, 200). For example, three such shrines were those of the
Ṣūfī ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī (d. 481/1089; a Ḥanbalī who fell well within the bounds
of Sunnī orthodoxy) in Herat; that of Imām ʿAlī l-Riḍā (148–203/765–818; the
eighth Shīʿī Imām) in Mashhad; that of ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib (d. 40/661; also regarded
by Sunnīs as one of the rightly-guided caliphs and an important early Ṣūfī) in
Balkh (for a detailed study of the latter, see McChesney). Given the veneration
in which Sunnīs hold the family of the Prophet (ahl al-bayt, āl al-bayt), such
shrines likely attracted both Sunnī and Shīʿī pilgrims.
The shrine of Anṣārī first attracted patronage by Shāhrukh (r. 807–50/1405–
47) in 829–30/1425–6. Shāhrukh established the practice of weekly visits to the
shrine on Thursdays, and the shrine served as a pulpit from which to espouse
pro-Timūrid propaganda (Subtelny, 202–3). In 882/1477–8, Sultan Ḥusayn
Bāyqarā (Timūrid ruler of Transoxiana, r. 873–911/1470–1506) built a funerary
platform for the burial of several members of his family and the same location
served as a ceremonial location for political purposes. Other members of the
Timūrid elite also donated to the shrine’s endowments (Subtelny, 204). In addi-
tion, Sultan Ḥusayn exempted the shrine’s endowments from taxation, some-
thing that likely encouraged additional donations.
The case of Mashhad is even more remarkable. With support from the
Timūrids, the shrine city became one of the largest cities in Khurāsān, eclipsing
Ṭūs-Nīshāpūr (Subtelny, 205). Architectural patronage came from Shāhrukh’s
wife Gauharshād and their son Baysunghur (Subtelny, 206). The Ṣafavid dynas-
ty also patronised this shrine as a Shīʿī alternative to the pilgrimage to Mecca,
which was in the hands of Sunnī Ottomans (Subtelny, 207). The shrine had
substantial endowments in agricultural lands, and this provided the bulk of
its income.
The supposed shrine of ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib in Balkh was “rediscovered” in
885/1480–1 (Subtelny, 208). This sort of politicised discovery of a shrine was
quite common. During the conquest of the city in 857/1453, Sultan Mehmed II
is supposed to have rediscovered the burial place of the Companion of the
Prophet Abū Ayyūb al-Anṣārī (d. 52/672) outside Constantinople, in an area
Economies of Sufism 43

now known as Eyüp. That site became the royal shrine of the Ottoman dynasty
and was visited during the accession ceremony of each new sultan (Veinstein).
After the conquest of Damascus in 922/1516, Sultan Selim I rediscovered the
tomb of Muḥyī l-Dīn Ibn al-ʿArabī (560–638/1165–1240). The Balkh site also
had a long history of being regarded as a sacred place. The political signifi-
cance of this rediscovery is underlined by the role of Sultan Ḥusayn Bāyqarā,
with the assistance of the prominent Naqshbandī Ṣūfī ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī
(817–98/1414–92) (Subtelny, 211). In order to preserve the special character of
this site, the Timūrids suppressed information about other discoveries that
might have led to the foundation of competing shrines. Sultan Ḥusayn had a
domed mausoleum built over the site to encourage pilgrimages to it. Within
a few decades, the shrine in Balkh was receiving one million dīnārs annually
in votive offerings by pilgrims (Subtelny, 213). Again, a regional shrine could
function as an alternative to the pilgrimage to Mecca, which in this period was
in the hands of the rival Mamlūk Empire. This policy also had the effect of re-
directing revenues and gifts that might have been sent to the Ḥijāz to regional
shrines in Khurāsān and under Timūrid control (Subtelny, 214).
The development of the shrine also promoted the status of Balkh as a city.
As part of this larger agenda, the Timūrids renovated a major canal from the
Balkh River to supply the city and its surroundings with water for irrigation. A
similar policy was followed in the area around the shrine of al-Anṣārī (Subtelny,
216). The Balkh canal was held in part as state property, and in part as private
property, which could become waqf. The result of irrigation was a substantial
increase in the agricultural productivity of the region around Balkh. Sultan
Ḥusayn also donated considerable endowments to the Balkh shrine, includ-
ing residential buildings, a bazaar, shops, and a bathhouse. He privatised and
then donated the state’s share in the canal, placing it under the administration
of the shrine (Subtelny, 219–20). He may have done so in order to increase the
productivity of the lands in question, and not merely to provide a source of
income for the shrine.
Nile Green has identified what he calls “shrine firms,” one of four types of
religious firms that operated in Bombay in the period from 1840 to 1915, the
other types being associations (anjuman), communities ( jamāʿat), and broth-
erhoods (ṭarīqa, translated in this essay as network) (Green, Bombay Islam,
15). In most cases, shrines were controlled by lineages of descendants of the
saint buried there. They were often linked to Ṣūfī networks, and had the wid-
est appeal of all of the types of religious firms that existed at that time (Green,
Bombay Islam, 17). The use of the term “firm” suggests that shrines were eco-
nomic in nature, whether these entities were controlled by lineages or founded
by rulers as independent entities. Because they were relatively secure, usually
44 Sabra

through waqfs, they were free to pursue long-term economic planning and
investment. There is an obvious parallel between the development of stable
Ṣūfī households and the growth of shrine firms. To some degree, these two cat-
egories overlapped, although the assets held by the wealthiest religious house-
holds in Ottoman Egypt probably dwarfed those held by most shrines.
The economic vitality of many shrines depended on the celebration of festi-
vals, whether saints’ birthdays (mawlid, colloquial mūlid) or death commemo-
rations (ʿurs). The former is typical in the Arabic-speaking world, while the
latter is more common in South Asia. These annual celebrations bring together
large numbers of people; in some cases, millions of people attend. The pilgrims
make votive offerings in the shrines, buy souvenirs, and spend money on lodg-
ing, food, etc.
One of the largest mawlids is the grand mawlid of al-Sayyid al-Badawī
(d. 675/1276) in Ṭantā in the middle of the Nile Delta. Every autumn, after the
planting season is over, as many as two million Egyptian peasants descend on
the town for this event (Mayeur-Jaouen, 208). Unlike tenth-/sixteenth-century
Balkh, twentieth-century Ṭanṭā did not depend on the shrine for its econom-
ic livelihood. In the early part of the century, it was an important industrial
centre, providing cotton (Mayeur-Jaouen, 211). The popularity of the mawlid
spread in part due to the development of modern transportation, particularly
railways and paved roads, in rural Egypt. By 1963, 150,000 pilgrims travelled by
train for the mawlid, while another 250,000 came by bus (Mayeur-Jaouen, 221).
The annual income to the shrine from offerings also skyrocketed. In 1975, it was
98,000 Egyptian pounds, but by 1992 it was estimated that the sum had risen to
two to three million pounds (Mayeur-Jaouen, 232–3). Even taking into account
the declining value of the Egyptian currency, this is a substantial increase. The
donation boxes are opened twice per month, with 4.5 per cent going to each
khalīfa, 13 per cent to the personnel who operate the shrine, and 10 per cent to
the state-sponsored Supreme Council of Sufi Networks (Mayeur-Jaouen, 233).
Another case of a shrine whose popularity has grown in recent decades
is that of Data Darbar, in Lahore, Pakistan. Data Ganj Bakhsh/ʿAlī Hujwīrī
(d. c. 465/1072 or 469/1077), a saint and the author of an early Ṣūfī manual
Kashf al-maḥjūb (Revealing the unseen), is buried there. His ʿurs (death an-
niversary) is commemorated annually, and is a well-attended pilgrimage in
Pakistan. Until 1960, the shrine was in the hands of the sajjāda nashīns, he-
reditary administrators of the shrine, believed to be the descendants of the
saint. This phenomenon is widespread in South Asia, and is similar to the ṣāḥib
al-sajjāda in the Ottoman context. In 1960, the shrine was nationalised by the
Pakistani government and placed under the control of the Ministry of Awqāf
of Punjab. Beginning in the colonial period, there was an increased sense that
Economies of Sufism 45

the private management of religious shrines was enabling them to be used for
personal enrichment, rather than for the pious purposes for which they were
created (Strothmann, 6). As we have seen, this division between the public
and private or material vs. spiritual does not reflect premodern Ṣūfī ideas. It
relates more to the increased ambition of the modern state, and its attempt
to regulate religious practice and reduce the political influence of traditional
religious lineages.
Strothmann notes that this shrine is atypical of South Asian shrines in three
ways: it is not affiliated with a Ṣūfī network, its architecture has changed to
reflect foreign aesthetics, and it is run by the government (Strothmann, 7). The
modernist reformers Muḥammad Iqbāl (1877–1938) and his son Jāvīd (1924–
2015) were both very critical of the private administration of religious endow-
ments and shrines, which they saw as a way to perpetuate reactionary forms
of spiritual and political life. The establishment of state control over endow-
ments was thus a way to stop “the paralyzing influence of the Mullah and Pir
over the rural masses of Islam” and end “feudalism” ( jagirdari) (Jāvīd Iqbāl,
quoted in Strothmann, 83). The decision to nationalise the shrine was part of a
larger project of Islamic modernism, which sought to fundamentally reshape
Pakistani religion, society, and politics. Another controversial decision was
made to redesign the shrine to accommodate the increasingly large number
of visitors. Historians and conservators were unhappy with the changes, which
were completed in 1990. The complex reflects a modern, transnational design,
rather than the historical roots of the shrine, but the changes allow clean and
comfortable access to a wider range of people (Strothmann, 104).
According to Pakistan’s Waqf Ordinance of 1979, the revenues of the waqfs
taken over by the state can be used for any approved Islamic purpose, but 20 per
cent must be spent on the shrine (Strothmann, 125). The sources of income of
the shrine include votive offerings (50 per cent), rents from lands (16 per cent),
rent from shops (12 per cent), service contracts, and shoe-keeping (5 per cent)
(Strothmann, 125). As a major source of income for the Awqāf Department, the
shrine of Data Darbar receives preferential treatment in comparison to smaller
or rural shrines (Strothmann, 131). As the largest shrine firm in Pakistan, and
one that has benefited from significant state investment, there is simply more
to be gained by increasing the profitability of Data Darbar than by investing
smaller sums in minor shrines of local significance.
In terms of services, the hospital, madrasa, library, and research centre are
funded directly by the Awqāf Department, and not by the funds collected by
the shrine itself (Strothmann, 147). Organising the annual ʿurs is an important
function of the shrine and involves a lengthy process (Strothmann, 205). Food
is given away in large quantities at the shrine, and many poor people come to
46 Sabra

receive it. Poor, homeless, and runaway children (almost entirely boys) rou-
tinely turn up at the shrine to obtain food (Strothmann, 246–7). An NGO has
been set up to address the problem of unaccompanied children and is funded
by donations. In addition to the food provided by the shrine administration,
people bring langar (food to be distributed) from home or purchase it in near-
by shops and distribute it at the shrine in fulfilment of vows (Strothmann, 253).
On the night of 1–2 July 2010, two suicide bombers allegedly belonging to the
Pakistani Taliban attacked the Data Darbar shrine, killing at least fifty people,
and wounding more than 200. This was not the first attack by a Salafī organisa-
tion against a Ṣūfī shrine in Pakistan; shrine desecration by Salafīs has taken
place in recent years in many Muslim countries, including Egypt, Iraq, Mali,
and Yemen. To date, these attacks have not had the intended effect of eliminat-
ing Ṣūfī practices. This is hardly surprising, given the religious and economic
significance these shrines and their saints hold for local people. Indeed, shrines
play an important role in defining local, regional, and national identity in most
Muslim societies, in spite of the frequent criticism, that unorthodox religious
practices allegedly take place there. Although Salafism often spreads through
local networks and the influence of local preachers, its simplified version of
Islam emphasises a universal adherence to the Prophetic sunna (example, or
custom), with little tolerance for local traditions and folk customs. As we see,
this hostility, or at least condescension, towards vernacular religious beliefs
and practices is also characteristic of Islamic modernism.

5 State Regulation and Transnational Networks

Since the mid-nineteenth century, Ṣūfīs, their institutions, and their practices
have come under increasing regulation by the colonial and Muslim states. As
with the Data Darbar shrine, this regulation has often been linked to a mod-
ernist discourse about “popular” or “folk” religion and its allegedly backward
customs and support for premodern social and political structures. In a few
places, such as Republican Turkey and the Soviet Union, Ṣūfī networks were
banned altogether and for many years only survived underground. In Saudi
Arabia, under the influence of Salafī ideas of religious reform, Ṣūfīs were la-
belled heretical innovators and their shrines were systematically levelled. In
recent decades, Salafī interpretations of Islam, fuelled in part by funding from
the Gulf States, have spread throughout the Muslim world and in the Muslim
diasporas. The nationalisation of religious shrines and teaching institutions,
the banning of some Ṣūfī practices, and the rise of alternative religious move-
ments and political parties have deprived Ṣūfīs of their leading role in religious
Economies of Sufism 47

philanthropy in much of the Muslim world. These alternative religious move-

ments include the Muslim Brotherhood (in Egypt and other Arab countries),
the AKP (Justice and Development Party, in Turkey), the Muḥammadiyya
Movement (in Indonesia), and a host of Salafī groups.
That said, it would be a mistake to conclude that Sufism is a relic of the past
and that secularisation or the rise of Salafism means that Sufism will be re-
placed by more modern forms of religious practice and organisation. Ṣūfīs have
proved remarkably able to adapt to new social and political developments and
exploit possibilities provided by new technology. Ṣūfīs have made good use of
tape cassettes, CD s, and DVD s to promote their distinctive music and rituals.
One thinks of the Egyptian singer Shaykh Yāsīn al-Tuhāmī (1948–), whose reci-
tations of Ṣūfī poetry to the accompaniment of music have become as popular
as those of many pop singers, or the late Pakistani qawwālī (devotional music
inspired by Chishtiyya performances) singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan (1948–97),
whose recordings received international recognition. There are now Ṣūfī satel-
lite TV channels, and Ṣūfī orders have their own websites on the internet. Ṣūfīs
have adapted quite well to the economic challenges of modernity.
The earliest reforms challenging the social, economic, and political promi-
nence of Ṣūfīs began in the nineteenth century. In 1812, the Ottoman governor
of Egypt Meḥmed ʿAlī (governor, r. 1805–48) appointed Muḥammad al-Bakrī,
the new shaykh al-sajjāda al-Bakriyya, to a supervisory role over all of the Ṣūfī
networks and institutions in Egypt (De Jong, 20). This was a new office; no Ṣūfī
leader had ever been invested with such sweeping powers. Frederick De Jong
argues that Meḥmed ʿAlī’s intent in creating what amounted to a new position
was to give himself the authority to control the material resources of the Ṣūfī
networks and the teaching that went on in Ṣūfī institutions and circles (De
Jong, 20–3). Al-Bakrī also served as naqīb al-ashrāf, giving him control over
the endowments benefiting the descendants of the Prophet. Members of the
Bakrī lineage held these posts for most of the nineteenth century. Beginning in
1847, the head of the Bakrī lineage had the sole authority to appoint the heads
of Ṣūfī networks and administrators of Ṣūfī institutions and shrines (De Jong,
42). He adjudicated disputes over the jurisdiction (qadam, lit., “precedence”)
of Ṣūfī networks (De Jong, 41, 51). There was also a need to avoid conflicts in
the timing of mawlids, and al-Bakrī was responsible for organising the official
celebrations of the Prophet’s birthday (De Jong, 57, 61).
By 1892, control over the various Ṣūfī waqfs passed to the Ministry of Awqāf
and in 1895 a council was set up to govern the Ṣūfī networks, with al-Bakrī at its
head. In 1905, the principle of qadam was abolished and replaced with admin-
istrative regulations, bringing an end to an era (De Jong, 125–88). The Bakrīs
remained titular leaders of the Ṣūfī networks in Egypt (shaykh mashāyikh
48 Sabra

al-ṣūfiyya) until 1946, but their power had long been diminished in favour of
government institutions (Luizard, 9). After the overthrow of the monarchy in
1952, the new military rulers of Egypt took an increased interest in regulating
Sufism, both to “modernise” it, and also to promote Sufism as an alternative
to the Muslim Brotherhood, which was formally dissolved in 1954. In 1976, the
Egyptian government issued new regulations governing the organisation and
activities of Ṣūfī networks in Egypt, and establishing a new entity, the Supreme
Council of Sufi Networks, to regulate them (Luizard, 10). By this time, many
of the Ṣūfī shrines had fallen under the control of the Supreme Council for
Antiquities, since they were historically important buildings. This model of
governance and regulation is similar to Egyptian state policy towards secular
cultural activities; these were regulated, for example, by the Supreme Council
for Culture, which falls under the Ministry of Culture.
Modern Turkey presents an even more restrictive example of state regula-
tion of Ṣūfī activities. Following the abolition of the Ottoman caliphate and
sultanate, a major rebellion took place in southeastern Turkey (in 1925). The
leader of this revolt was Shaykh Said, a Kurdish Ṣūfī shaykh who wanted to
reinstitute the caliphate. After the defeat of this revolt, the Turkish govern-
ment banned all Ṣūfī networks (Yavuz, 52–3). The ban was not enforced uni-
formly. The Naqshbandī Ṣūfī networks were regarded with greater suspicion,
for example, than the Mevlevīs. Nonetheless, many Ṣūfī networks and lineages
lost control over their assets, especially shrines, which the Turkish Republican
government treated as potential sources of sedition. In Ṣūfī circles, opposi-
tion to the secular policies of the government continued. The Nur movement
founded by Said Nursi (1877–1960) emphasised an inward spiritual transfor-
mation, while Naqshbandī Ṣūfīs were more confrontational in relation to the
government (Yavuz, 56).
With the advent of a multi-party system and policies of economic liberalisa-
tion in the 1980s, Ṣūfī and other Islamic movements found greater opportuni-
ties to assert themselves. These political changes resulted in the creation of
what Hakan Yavuz calls an “Islamic bourgeoisie” (Yavuz, 92). The new bour-
geoisie was critical of the crony capitalism that plagued Turkey and proposed
a different form of mercantile ethics, based on Islamic teachings. Ṣūfīs played
an important role in the construction of this Islamic business class (Yavuz, 95).
One by-product of this alliance between Sufism and capital was the creation
of new forms of Islamic consumerism. These included private Islamic schools
offering superior education, hotels offering “Islamic holidays” (without alcohol
and with gender-segregated pools), etc. (Yavuz, 98).
Today, virtually all major Islamic movements in Turkey have their roots
in Sufism, especially the Naqshbandī Khālidī movement that swept the late
Economies of Sufism 49

Ottoman Empire (Yavuz, 135–6). This movement became a mainstay of the

Ottoman political order, and after the closing of Ṣūfī tekkes in 1925, Naqshbandīs
were extremely active in resisting the new policies of compulsory secularisa-
tion. Although the closing of Ṣūfī institutions had catastrophic effects for some
Ṣūfī networks, the Naqshbandīs managed to regroup, and they continue to
serve as mosque imams, civil servants, and as private teachers (Yavuz, 140). An
important group emerged at the İskenderpaşa Mosque under the leadership
of Mehmet Zahid Kotku (1897–1980); this group included a number of future
political leaders in Turkey. Kotku and his successors taught that piety is not
only reconcilable with wealth, but that commerce is a real and effective way to
realise one’s spiritual values in society (Yavuz, 141–3).
The Süleymancıs are a Naqshbandī network present in some parts of rural
Turkey and among the Turkish diaspora in Europe. They are best known for
offering Qurʾān classes and sermons that are not part of the state-regulated
religious services of the Diyanet (Turkey’s directorate of religious affairs) (Hart,
195–6). Kimberly Hart calls the Süleymancıs a “neo-tarikat” because they use
the traditional framework of a Ṣūfī network with certain modern innova-
tions: They use modern media, such as radio, printed books, and television;
they recruit individuals rather than entire families or groups; and they focus
on immigrants or rural/urban migrants (Hart, 197). Migrants and immigrants
make good recruits because they are often far from family and in an unfamil-
iar environment, where their religious values do not predominate. In these
circumstances, the neo-tarikat provides not only companionship and spiri-
tual community, but also a network to locate employment, find a spouse, etc.
(Hart, 197).
It must be noted that these characteristics are not all that innovative.
Rural-urban migration is not a new phenomenon and the description of a
traditional network applies to rural more than urban society, even in the
premodern period. Hart also notes that in rural Turkey, unlike in Europe, the
Süleymancıs operate much more like a traditional Ṣūfī network (Hart, 197).
Like other Ṣūfī-inspired networks in contemporary Turkey, the Süleymancıs
avoid the word tarikat (Ar. ṭarīqa) because of the ban on traditional Ṣūfī net-
works. Instead, they call themselves a cemaat (community), to avoid this
negative association (Hart, 199–200). In particular, the Süleymancıs empha-
sise their freedom to leave the community if they wish, something they claim
differentiates them from members of a tarikat. It should also be noted that
membership in the Süleymancı network can lead to opportunities to emi-
grate abroad or migrate within Turkey. Students who complete their studies
in Süleymancı schools can become hocas (religious teachers) elsewhere in
Turkey or in Europe (Hart, 214). Their school system has now spread abroad as
50 Sabra

well. Since they practice strict gender segregation, they train female hocas to
instruct all-female groups. Women trained in the Diyanet, by contrast, cannot
be appointed as lower-level imams, although they can become public school
religion teachers or preachers (Hart, 215).
The Gülen movement is another Turkish religious group to emerge in the
post-WWII era and define itself as a community (cemaat) instead of a Ṣūfī net-
work (tarikat). Like the Süleymancıs, the followers of Fethullah Gülen are part
of a transnational religious movement that emphasises the role of individual
religious reform and education. The Gülen movement has its origins in the
Nursi movement, a modernist Ṣūfī current that promoted the study of modern
science while maintaining a critical attitude towards the secularising project
of Republican Turkey. Gülen, known to his followers as hocaefendi (revered
teacher), rallied many of the followers of Said Nursi after his death in 1960. In
addition to Gülen’s writings, which have an international market, the move-
ment had a newspaper Zaman, a TV station, a bank, and many businesses; yet
the principle economic asset of the Gülen movement was its education system.
This included a highly successful system of private schools in Turkey, as well
as schools abroad, including charter schools in the United States (Hendrick,
136–43, 217–31). Economic activities are so central to this movement that a full
discussion of them is beyond the scope of this essay; suffice it to say, the Gülen
movement provides yet another example of the voluntary affinity between
Ṣūfī networks as an organisational form and type of religiosity and neoliberal
economics. The success of the Gülen movement in exploiting the opportuni-
ties provided by the neoliberal turn in Turkey’s economic policy, and in culti-
vating a form of pious capitalism, demonstrates the adaptability of Ṣūfī ethics
and organisations.
Perhaps the best-studied modern Ṣūfī network with regard to economics
is the Murīdiyya, originally of Senegambia (and following independence in
1960, of Senegal and Gambia), and its various diaspora populations in Europe
and North America, especially New York City. This network has played an im-
portant role in agriculture, especially in the cultivation of peanuts, but also
expanded into urban areas, due to the migration of its followers from rural
areas to cities. As Senegalese have migrated abroad, the Murīdiyya have be-
come established in the diaspora communities and the network in Senegal has
benefitted from the circulation of people, commodities, and remittances from
the diaspora and to the home country.
The Murīdiyya were founded by Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke (1850–1927)
in Senegambia, shortly before the beginning of French colonial rule in 1883
(Glover, 83). The son of a shaykh of the Qādiriyya network, Aḥmadu Bàmba
was heir to a long tradition of Ṣūfī political activism in Senegambia and West
Economies of Sufism 51

Africa in general. The French colonisers regarded the Ṣūfī networks with some
trepidation, since Ṣūfī shaykhs had led the resistance to French colonisation
in many parts of North and West Africa. Alarmed by the spread of Aḥmadu
Bàmba’s influence, the French exiled him to Gabon and then Mauritania, and
only allowed him to return to Senegal permanently in 1907. The Murīdiyya in-
terpret Aḥmadu Bàmba’s exile as evidence of his resistance to colonial rule,
but his followers consistently avoided confronting the French, and eventually
the French came to see the Murīdiyya as cooperative with French rule.
Virtually all Murīds are Wolof, and studies of the spread of the Murīdiyya
emphasise the importance of the collapse of the Wolof polities as a causal
factor in the development of the group (Cruise O’Brien, 59–60). Initially, the
order was entirely rural. The construction of railways connected these rural
areas to the cities and to foreign markets, creating an incentive to bring new
land into cultivation, especially for peanut farming. The French administration
gave shaykhs title to large tracts of land to which the Murīd ṭalibés (disciples,
students) emigrated in order to cultivate their estates (Cruise O’Brien, 65–6).
These estates are called daras, from the Arabic word for house (dār) (Cruise
O’Brien, 163). Families send their sons to work on the daras, where they did
the arduous work of reclaiming marginal lands for cultivation. Unlike other
Ṣūfī networks in the region, the Murīds established some daras in which there
was little to no education. Cruise O’Brien argues that these daras were based
on the Wolof tradition of collective work groups (Cruise O’Brien, 165). The
ṭalibés either volunteered to submit to the shaykh and work on his dara, or
were brought by their parents and left in the shaykh’s care. In most cases, the
boys came from impoverished families. The dara provided a minimal degree
of economic security, membership in a community, and, for those who served
for several years, the possibility that the shaykh would provide for the ṭalibé’s
marriage (Cruise O’Brien, 173). When the ṭalibé left the dara, he was a respect-
ed figure in his home village and might even receive a plot of land from his
shaykh. In short, service in the dara, while arduous, provided a means of social
mobility for poor, landless, and orphaned boys. In addition to the labour that
the shaykhs received from their disciples, they also built patronage networks.
After independence, these patronage networks made the wealthiest shaykhs
into powerful political brokers who could recruit their disciples to vote in elec-
tions (Coulon).
Peanuts remain central to the Senegalese economy, but as the economy
developed and people increasingly migrated from rural areas to cities, the
Murīdiyya evolved into urban religious societies, known as dahiras, from the
Arabic word for a study circle (dāʾira) (Cruise O’Brien, 251). These societies or-
ganise religious rituals and collect donations to be sent to the shaykhs (Cruise
52 Sabra

O’Brien, 253). They also provide mutual aid for their members, such as assist-
ing with medical care, marriage, or funerals (Cruise O’Brien, 255). The growth
of the network also contributed to urbanisation in Senegal. The shrine town
of Touba, where the founder is buried, is now the second largest city in the
country, after Dakar. Each year, millions of Murīds participate in the Grand
Magal, or pilgrimage, to the Great Mosque of Touba. This event is supported by
donations from Murīds, including those in the diaspora communities abroad.
Senegalese migrants have settled in a number of cities overseas, but per-
haps the most vibrant Murīd community abroad is Little Senegal, in New York
City (Kane, The homeland is the arena, 62). When they arrived in the United
States, most of these immigrants were unskilled, undocumented, and had
little knowledge of English, and so they worked as street vendors (Kane, The
homeland is the arena, 63). Connections to the Murīdiyya have helped them to
establish themselves and obtain vending licenses (Kane, The homeland is the
arena, 65). Murīds established their own mosque, Masjid Touba. In the 1980s,
Senegalese in New York were able to obtain citizenship and branch out into
a variety of businesses, including money transfers, to allow immigrants and
visiting businessmen to transfer money home. Gradually, Little Senegal grew
into an ethnic enclave in the city. More than 75 per cent of the Senegalese im-
migrants are men, most of whom support families at home in Senegal (Kane,
The homeland is the arena, 78). In addition to street vendors, many of these
men drive gypsy cabs, especially in Harlem (Kane, The homeland is the arena,
80). Women often work as hair braiders, which can be a remunerative profes-
sion (Kane, The homeland is the arena, 81).
Murīds began to organise dāʾiras in New York in the 1980s. Every three
months, the donations collected were remitted to Touba (Kane, The homeland
is the arena, 94). In the 1990s, the Murid Islamic Community of America was
founded, providing an umbrella organisation for smaller associations through-
out the United States. Many of the dāʾiras reproduce village social ties from
Senegal (Kane, The homeland is the arena, 95). In addition, there are now wom-
en’s dāʾiras and NGO s. One such NGO funded a number of charitable activities
in Touba, including the building of an 8 million-dollar hospital. The movement
of funds also takes place in the opposite direction. When Masjid Touba was
built in the 1990s, a prominent Murīd leader donated $55,000 towards the
purchase of the building, which was to be acquired without recourse to an
interest-bearing loan (Kane, The homeland is the arena, 96–7). With a reputa-
tion as hard workers and law-abiding citizens, Murīd communities have de-
veloped good relations with municipal leaders in New York and Atlanta. Every
summer, the Murīd community of New York celebrates Murīd month, funded
by contributions by community members (Kane, The homeland is the arena,
Economies of Sufism 53

151). The month is marked by an annual march, public prayers, and lectures
(Kane, The homeland is the arena, 154–5). These events serve to reinforce com-
munity ties and demonstrate the integration of the Murīdiyya into New York
City society. Shaykhs visiting from Senegal play an important role by reinforc-
ing the transnational ties that bind all Murīds into a single community. The
Murīdiyya are a remarkable example of Sufism’s adaptability to the changing
economic and social conditions of modernity. From their origins as agricul-
tural pioneers in the peanut industry, to the creation of new spiritual commu-
nities for migrants in urban areas, to their transformation into a transnational
religious movement, the Murīdiyya epitomise the challenges and possibilities
of capitalist development for modern Ṣūfīs.

Bibliography

Amīn, Muḥammad Muḥammad, al-Awqāf wa-al-ḥayāt al-ijtimāʿiyya fī Miṣr, 648–

923 H/1250–1517 M: dirāsa tārīkhiyya wa-thaqāfiyya, Cairo 1980.
ʿĀmrī, Nillī, al-Walāya wa-l-mujtamaʿ. Musāhama fī l-tārīkh al-dīnī wa-l-ijtimāʿī fī l-ahd
al-Ḥafṣī, Tunis 2001.
Babou, Cheikh Anta, Brotherhood solidarity, education and migration. The role of
the dahiras among the Murid Muslim community of New York, African Affairs 101
(2002): 151–70.
Babou, Cheikh Anta, Urbanizing mystical Islam. Making Murid space in the cities of
Senegal, IJAHS 40 (2007): 197–223.
Böwering, Gerhard and Matthew Melvin-Koushki, Ḵānqāh, EIr.
Buggenhaven, Beth Anne, Prophets and profits. Gendered and generational visions of
wealth and value in Senegalese Murid households, Journal of Religion in Africa 31
(2001): 373–401.
Chih, Rachida, Le soufisme au quotidien. Confréries d’Egypte au XXe siècle, Arles 2000.
Copans, Jean, Les marabouts de l’arachide. La confrérie mouride et les paysans du
Sénégal, Paris 1980.
Cornell, Vincent J., Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism,
Austin 1998.
Coulon, Christian, Le marabout et le prince. Islam et pouvoir au Sénégal, Paris 1981.
Cruise, Donal B. O’Brien, The Mourides of Senegal. The political and economic organiza-
tion of an Islamic brotherhood, Oxford 1971.
Dale, Stephen F. and Alam Payind, The Ahrārī waqf in Kabul in 1546 and the Mughūl
Naqshbandiyyah, JAOS 119 (1999): 218–33.
De Jong, Fred, Ṭuruq and turuq-linked institutions in nineteenth-century Egypt. A histori-
cal study in organizational dimensions of Islamic mysticism, Leiden 1978.
54 Sabra

Eaton, Richard M., The rise of Islam and the Bengal frontier, 1204–1760, Berkeley 1993.
Elboudrari, Hassan, Quand les saints font les villes. Lecture anthropologique de la pra-
tique sociale d’un saint marocain du XVIIe siècle, Annales 40 (1985): 489–508.
El Hour, Rachid, Pauvreté, charité et traditions culinaires des soufis-saints d’après les
sources hagiographiques maghrébines (VIe/XIIe–VIIIe/XIVe siècles), JSS 3 (2014):
157–82.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, The life story of an urban saint in the Ottoman empire. Piri Baba of
Merzifon, Tarih Dergisi 32 (1979): 653–78, 1009–18.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, The tekke of Haci Bektaş. Social position and economic activities,
IJMES 7 (1976): 183–208.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, Vakıf administration in sixteenth-century Konya. The zaviye of
Sadreddin-i Konevi, JESHO 17 (1974): 145–72.
Fernandes, Leonor, The evolution of a Sufi institution in Mamluk Egypt. The khanqah,
Berlin 1986.
Geoffroy, Éric, Le Soufisme en Egypte et en Syrie sous les derniers Mamelouks et les pre-
miers Ottomans. Orientations spirituelles et enjeux culturels, Damascus 1995.
Glover, John, Sufism and jihad in modern Senegal. The Murid order, Rochester 2007.
Green, Nile, Bombay Islam. The religious economy of the West Indian Ocean, 1840–1915,
Cambridge 2011.
Green, Nile, Terrains of exchange. Religious economies of global Islam, Oxford 2014.
Gross, Jo-Ann, The economic status of a Timurid Sufi Shaykh. A matter of conflict or
perception, Iranian Studies 24 (1988): 84–104.
Gross, Jo-Ann, The waqf of Khoja ʿUbayd Allāh Aḥrār in nineteenth-century Central
Asia. A preliminary study of the Tsarist record, in Elisabeth Özdalga (ed.), Naqsh­
bandis in Western and Central Asia. Change and continuity (London 1999), 47–60.
Gutelius, David, Sufi networks and the social contexts for scholarship in Morocco and
the northern Sahara, 1660–1830, in Scott S. Reese (ed.), The transmission of learning
in Islamic Africa (Leiden 2004), 15–37.
Hanretta, Sean, Islam and social change in French West Africa. History of an emancipa-
tory community, Cambridge 2009.
Hart, Kimberly, And then we work for God. Rural Sunni Islam in western Turkey,
Stanford 2013.
Hendrick, Joshua D., Gülen. Ambiguous politics of market Islam in Turkey and the world,
New York 2013.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Kane, Ousmane, Les marabouts sénégalais et leur clientèle aux États-Unis, Afrique
contemporaine 231 (2009): 209–28.
Kane, Ousmane, The homeland is the arena. Religion, transnationalism, and the integra-
tion of Senegalese immigrants in America, Oxford 2011.
Economies of Sufism 55

Karamustafa, Ahmed T., God’s unruly friends. Dervish groups in the Islamic later middle
period, 1200–1550, Salt Lake City 1994.
Karamustafa, Ahmed T., Sufism. The formative period, Berkeley 2007.
Kim, Kwangmin, Borderland capitalism. Turkestan produce, Qing silver, and the birth of
an eastern market, Stanford 2016.
Knysh, Alexander, The sada in history. A critical essay on Hadrami historiography,
JRAS 9/2 (1999): 215–22.
Knysh, Alexander, The ‘Tariqa’ on a landcruiser. The resurgence of Sufism in Yemen,
MEJ 55 (2001): 399–414.
Le Gall, Dina, A culture of Sufism. Naqshbandis in the Ottoman world, 1450–1700,
Binghamton 2005.
Lemercier-Quelquejay, Chantal, Sufi brotherhoods in the USSR. A historical survey,
Central Asian Survey 2 (1983): 1–35.
Luizard, Pierre-Jean, Le soufisme égyptien contemporain, Égypte/Monde arabe 2
(1990): 35–94.
Marsot, Afaf Lutfi al-Sayyid, The political and economic functions of the ʿulamāʾ in the
18th century, JESHO 16 (1973): 130–54.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, Histoire d’un pèlerinage légendaire en islam. Le mouled de
Tantâ du XIIIe siècle à nos jours, Paris 2004.
McChesney, Robert D., Waqf in Central Asia. Four hundred years in the history of a
Muslim shrine, 1480–1889, Princeton 1991.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden and Boston 2008.
Pancaroğlu, Oya, Hospitality and architecture in medieval Anatolia, SI (2013): 48–81.
Papas, Alexandre, Dervish, EI3.
Paul, Jürgen, Die politische und soziale Bedeutung de Naqšbandiyya in Mittelasien im 15.
Jahrhundert, Berlin 1991.
Paul, Jürgen, Forming a faction. The ḥimāyat system of Khwaja Ahrar, IJMES 23 (1991):
553–48.
Pinto, Paulo, Kurdish Sufi spaces of rural-urban connection in northern Syria, Études
Rurales 186 (2010): 149–68.
Rapoport, Yossef, Marriage, money and divorce in medieval Islamic society,
Cambridge 2005.
Reid, Megan H., Law and piety in medieval Islam, Cambridge 2013.
Reysoo, Fenneke, Pèlerinages au Maroc. Fête, politique et échange dans l’islam populaire,
Paris 1991.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Morals and mysticism in Persian Sufism. A history of Sufi-futuwwat in
Iran, London and New York 2010.
Roded, Ruth, Great mosques zāwiyas and neighborhood mosques. Popular beneficia-
ries of waqf endowments in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Aleppo, JAOS 110
(1990): 32–8.
56 Sabra

Rodríguez Mañas, Francisco, Agriculture, Ṣūfism and the state in tenth/sixteenth-

century Morocco, BSOAS 59 (1996): 450–71.
Rodríguez Mañas, Francisco, Charity and deceit. The practice of iṭʿām al-ṭaʿām in
Moroccan Sufism, SI 91 (2000): 59–90.
Rodríguez Mañas, Francisco, Encore sur la controverse entre soufis et juristes au moyen
âge. Critiques des mécanismes de financement des confréries soufies, Arabica 43
(1996): 406–21.
Sabra, Adam, Charity and hagiography. The Akhbar Abi l-ʿAbbas al-Sabti of Ibn al-
Zayyat al-Tadili, Estudios onomásticos-biográficos de al-Ândalus 16 (2011): 207–29.
Sabra, Adam, From artisan to courtier. Sufism and social mobility in fifteenth-century
Egypt, in Roxani Eleni Margariti, Adam Sabra, and Petra Sijpesteijn (eds.), Histories
of the Middle East. Studies in Middle Eastern society, economy and law in honor of
A. L. Udovitch (Leiden and Boston 2010), 213–32.
Sabra, Adam, Household Sufism in sixteenth-century Egypt. The rise of al-Sada al-
Bakriya, in Rachida Chih and Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen (eds.), Le soufisme à
l’époque ottomane, XVIe–XVIIIe siècle/Sufism in the Ottoman era, 16th–18th century
(Cairo 2010), 101–18.
Sabra, Adam, Illiterate Sufis and learned artisans. The circle of ʿAbd al-Wahhâb
al-Shaʿrânî, in Richard J. McGregor and Adam Sabra (eds.), Le développement du
soufisme en Égypte à l’époque mamlouke (Cairo 2006), 153–68.
Sabra, Adam, Poverty and charity in medieval Islam. Mamluk Egypt, 1250–1517, Cambridge
and New York 2000.
Sabra, Adam, The age of the fathers. Gender and spiritual authority in the writings of
ʿAbd al-Wahhab al-Shaʿrani, AI 47 (2013): 133–49.
Schielke, Samuli, On snacks and saints. When discourses of rationality and order enter
the Egyptian mawlid, Archives de sciences sociales des religions 135 (2006): 117–40.
Shikhaliev, Shamil, Downward mobility and spiritual life. The development of Sufism in
the context of migrations in Dagestan, 1940s–2000s, in Stéphane A. Dudoignon and
Christian Noack (eds.), Allah’s Kolkhozes. Migration, de-Stalinisation, privatization
and the new Muslim congregations in the Soviet realm (1950s–2000s) (Berlin 2014),
398–420.
Soares, Benjamin, Islam and the prayer economy. History and authority in a Malian
town, Ann Arbor 2005.
Strothmann, Linus, Managing piety. The shrine of Data Ganj Bakhsh, Oxford 2016.
Subtelny, Maria E., Timurids in transition. Turko-Persian politics and acculturation in
medieval Iran, Leiden and Boston 2007.
Taeschner, Franz, Zünfte und Bruderschaften im Islam. Texte zur Geschichte der
Futuwwa, Zurich and Munich 1979.
Economies of Sufism 57

Taylor, Christopher S., In the vicinity of the righteous. Ziyāra and the veneration of
Muslim saints in late medieval Egypt, Leiden 1999.
Trépanier, Nicolas, Foodways and daily life in medieval Anatolia. A new social history,
Austin 2014.
Veinstein, Gilles, Le rôle des tombes sacrées dans la conquête ottomane, Revue de
l’histoire des religions 222/4 (2005): 509–28.
Werner, Christoph, Vaqf en Iran. Aspects culturels, religieux et sociaux, Paris 2015.
Wolper, Ethel Sara, Cities and saints. Sufism and the transformation of urban space in
medieval Anatolia, University Park 2003.
Yavuz, M. Hakan, Islamic political identity in Turkey, Oxford 2003.
Yıldırım, Rıza, Dervishes, waqfs, and conquest. Notes on early Ottoman expan-
sion in Thrace, in Pascale Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in trust. Waqf in the Islamic world
(Cairo 2011), 23–40.
Zakeri, Mohsen, Javānmardi, EIr.
Zarcone, Thierry, Waqfs et confréries religieuses à l’époque moderne. L’influence de
la réforme des waqfs sur la sociabilité et la doctrine mystique, in Faruk Bilici, Le
waqf dans le monde musulman contemporain (XIXe–XXe siecles). Fonctions socia-
les, économiques et politiques: actes de la table ronde d’Istanbul, 13–14 novembre 1992
(Istanbul 1994), 237–48.
Zarcone, Thierry, Writing the religious and social history of some Sufi lodges in Kashgar
in the 20th century, in Ildikó Bellér-Hann, Birgit N. Schlyter, and Jun Sugawara
(eds.), Kashgar revisited. Uyghur studies in memory of Ambassador Gunnar Jarring
(Leiden 2017), 207–31.
Zevaco, Ariane, From old to new Macha. Mass resettlement and the redefinition
of Islamic practice between Tajikistan’s upper valleys and cotton lowlands, in
Stéphane A. Dudoignon and Christian Noack (eds.), Allah’s Kolkhozes. Migration,
de-Stalinisation, privatization and the new Muslim congregations in the Soviet realm
(1950s–2000s) (Berlin 2014), 148–201.
 Chapter 2

Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions

Nathan Hofer

The pious endowment, known in Arabic as a waqf (pl. awqāf ) or ḥabs/ḥubūs

(pl. aḥbās) and in Persian and Turkish, respectively, as vaqf/vakıf, is an inalien-
able trust that enables a person to divert a portion of their wealth into a chari-
table or socially beneficial cause. More precisely, the waqf is a procedure in
Islamic jurisprudence in which an individual (wāqif, or founder) lawfully alien-
ates revenue-generating property on behalf of a designated beneficiary. The
founder also names a trustee (mutawallī or nāẓir) who is paid from said rev-
enue to maintain the property as an inviolable asset in perpetuity. The details
of a waqf are recorded and legally witnessed in a waqfiyya or waqf-nāma (en-
dowment deed), which includes descriptions of the property, the beneficiary,
the trustee, and precise stipulations concerning the distribution of revenue. In
theory, there are two types of waqf: the charitable endowment (waqf khayrī), in
which the beneficiary is a public good or service—e.g., mosques, water foun-
tains, hospitals, schools, soup kitchens, and so on; and the family endowment
(waqf ahlī or dhurrī), in which the wāqif designates his or her own descendants
as trustees and/or beneficiaries; and the revenues revert to a charitable cause
when no descendants remain (Garcin, Le waqf). In practice, however, most en-
dowments are a hybrid (waqf mushtarak), wherein the wāqif designates fam-
ily members as trustees and a public service as beneficiary (for introductory
overviews, see Abbasi; Peters et al.; Haji Abdullah; Dallal; Hennigan; Çizakça,
A history).
The waqf developed from early Islamic traditions and jurisprudence regard-
ing donations and trusts (Oberauer, Early doctrines); it was systematized by
Ḥanafī jurisprudents in the early third/ninth century (Hennigan) and subse-
quently elaborated by the Sunnī and Shīʿī schools of jurisprudence with a num-
ber of crucial differences in conceptualisation and execution (Haji Abdullah).
Once introduced in the third/ninth century, the waqf replaced the charity tax
(zakāt) as the primary economic vehicle funding the majority of public services
and institutions in the Islamic world (Hodgson, 124). Its use was so widespread
that at the beginning of the nineteenth century it is estimated that three-
quarters of all immovable property in the Ottoman Empire were alienated in
endowments (Hennigan, xvii). The adoption of the waqf on such a large scale

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_004

Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 59

by wealthy and ruling elites is a result of a combination of factors (Ghazaleh,

Held in trust): establishing a waqf is itself a meritorious act. The alienated
property is (theoretically) exempt from taxation and (theoretically) protected
against confiscation or seizure. The waqf permits the transfer of wealth across
generations, as it supersedes laws of inheritance and circumvents state appro-
priations. But it may also be used to ensure that family members do not receive
an inheritance, to create heirs outside the family, or to create local groups of
solidarity, most commonly Ṣūfīs and/or jurists who belong to the same order
or school (Bargaoui). Its charitable operations ameliorate class antagonism
and social conflict. Assuming the waqf is managed properly (see Bakhoum),
it drives regional economic growth and provides sustainable funding for in-
frastructure, both rural and urban (Zuki). As a tool of state patronage, it con-
tributes to political stability by providing a socio-legal framework in which the
ruling class subsidise the activities of scholars and local elites in exchange for
the latter’s support for and legitimisation of the state. There are multiple rea-
sons the ʿulamāʾ embraced waqf-financed patronage, despite the scholars’ tra-
ditional anxieties about receiving payment for scholarship. Foremost among
these reasons was that the waqf facilitates the production and transmission of
knowledge on a large scale. The construction of waqf-funded spaces provided
scholars with room, board, learning materials, and stipendiary posts that of-
fered both income and prestige (Berkey; Chamberlain; Ephrat; Makdisi, The
rise). But more importantly, the nature of the waqf itself alleviated much of the
scholars’ anxieties about the commodification of knowledge. As a charitable
institution, the waqf was designed to compensate those who provide for the
poor by recasting what is essentially a financial transaction into a pious act
that endows the donor with baraka (blessing). As knowledge became an in-
creasingly valuable commodity, the waqf served to organise the social relations
between those who possessed it (ʿulamāʾ) and those who needed it (society),
and thereby recast a potentially illicit payment for knowledge into a pious ex-
change of alms (in this case knowledge) for baraka (Décobert).
Ṣūfīs benefitted from the waqf for the same reasons. The construction of
khānqāhs, ribāṭs, zāwiyas, etc., facilitated the transmission of Ṣūfī thought and
practice on a massive scale (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume; Firouzeh in this
volume). Ṣūfī anxieties about payment were likewise alleviated by the pious
social calculus of the waqf. Ṣūfīs are scholars possessing both discursive and
experiential knowledge (ʿilm and maʿrifa); they are literally and metaphorically
poor ( fuqarāʾ); and they are highly charged conduits of baraka. Endowments
proved indirectly beneficial to Ṣūfīs in many ways as well: they learned new
ideas, texts, or rituals that may have been developed in or transmitted through
60 Hofer

endowed spaces; they studied with a teacher who drew income from an en-
dowment; or they had access to manuscript copies donated as an “eternal en-
dowment” (waqf muʾabbad) to a local library (Sublet). From the third/ninth
century to the present, endowments have subsidised the development and
transmission of Sufism across the Muslim world. The waqf provided Ṣūfīs with
spaces to congregate, it housed them, fed them, funded their travel to and
lodging in Mecca, paid their salaries, bought their political loyalty, supported
their mawlid (Prophet’s birth) celebrations, enriched their families, bolstered
their social capital, incentivised their settlement in frontier zones, financed
construction of their tombs, and underwrote their saintly afterlives. A full ac-
counting of Sufism as a historical phenomenon requires significant attention
to the material conditions that shaped the many Ṣūfī “sociabilities” that in turn
shaped Islamic civilisation (Gaborieau). Reconstructing those conditions will
necessarily entail the study of endowments founded by and for Ṣūfīs.
The first in-depth scholarship devoted to Ṣūfī endowments appeared in
the early 1980s as part of the so-called second stage, or wave, of waqf studies
(Hoexter, Waqf studies). These early studies of Ṣūfī endowments focused on
the wealth of economic and social data contained in the extant waqfiyyas for
Ṣūfī lodges or shrines. Much of this data is unavailable in other sources and
have significantly improved our understanding of the political contexts and
institutional frameworks through which Sufism flourished, particularly after
the sixth/twelfth and seventh/thirteenth centuries (e.g., Mahendrarajah, The
shrine; Mahendrarajah, The Gawhar; Schwarz). The history of a particular Ṣūfī
endowment is best understood in terms of both the founding stipulations of the
waqfiyya and the subsequent management of the waqf properties and revenue.
Political and social contexts change; later jurists interpret earlier rulings differ-
ently; and supervisors may interpret the founder’s stipulations as the situation
demands. The legal maxim shurūṭ al-wāqif ka-naṣṣ al-shāriʿ (i.e., “the stipula-
tions of the founder are like the decrees of the Lawgiver”) was oft-violated. One
must pay attention to the wealth of contextual and historical detail from other
sources in order to reconstruct the history of the property or organisation in
the long term, not the history of the document in the short term (Deguilhem,
The waqf; Shatzmiller; Singer, 303–4). Unlike the first wave of waqf studies
and its stereotype of mismanaged and inefficient waqfs, studies of the long-
term management of waqf have shown that they were typically run efficient-
ly and carefully, and generated a long and rich documentary trail (Hoexter,
Endowments; McChesney, Waqf ). The shrine of Muḥammad Bashārā in Mazār-i
Sharīf, for example, is five hundred years old and the documentary record left
in its administrative wake is extraordinarily large (Gross). By extracting waqf
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 61

studies from the confines of legal history, scholars from the second wave have
had a much larger impact on Islamic studies, including Ṣūfī studies. The extent
to which the second wave have penetrated the larger milieu is clear from the
publication of special issues devoted to the waqf in prestigious journals: The
Journal of Economic and Social History of the Orient (1995) and Islamic Law and
Society (1997); the publication of a collection of methodological and historical
studies of waqf across the Islamic world (Deguilhem, Le Waqf ); and Mariam
Hoexter’s state-of-the-field survey published in 1998 (Hoexter, Waqf studies).
The larger scope and visibility of this scholarship has precipitated what one
historian has described as a third wave of waqf studies that is characterised by
its multi-disciplinary engagement with other fields (Moumtaz, Theme issue).
These scholars have brought waqfs into conversations about the public sphere
(Hoexter, The waqf), citizenship (Isin), the nation state (May, God’s land;
Moumtaz, Is the family), neoliberal governance (Atia), and the cultural roots
of capitalism and European economic power (Choudhury; Kuran, The provi-
sion; Kuran, Institutional roots; Kuran, The long divergence; Shatzmiller). One
indication of the importance of this work is the prominence of Islamic stud-
ies in a recently established academic journal devoted to multi-disciplinary,
comparative studies of endowments (Chitwood et al.). This work has much to
offer historians of Sufism (e.g., Erie), though it engages with Ṣūfī studies only
tangentially. This state of affairs is at least partially due to the fact that there
is so much scholarship now that it is simply impractical to engage with all of
it (McChesney, Waqf, 3–4). Recent bibliographic surveys show that, in the last
forty years, scholars of endowments have produced a mountain of Himalayan
proportions (Durmuş and Kaya; Islahi; Rashid).
Furthermore, Ṣūfī studies and waqf studies are animated by separate dis-
courses that, while overlapping to some degree, developed from different sets
of questions, sources, conceptualisations, approaches, and biases. In terms of
Ṣūfī endowments in particular, the result has been a proliferation of studies
devoted to specific Ṣūfī spaces (e.g. Blair, Ilkhanid; Fernandes, The founda-
tion; Hallenberg; Mahendrarajah, The shrine; Mahendrarajah, The Gawhar;
Schwarz); or to Ṣūfī life in specific places (Bölükbaşi; Chabbi; Ephrat and
Mahamid; Faroqhi; Fernandes, Three Sufi; Fernandes, The evolution; Homerin;
Lifchez; Little; Roded); or to surveys of endowments that include Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī
life among other illustrations (ʿAfīfī; Amīn; Deguilhem, Le Waqf; Deguilhem
and Hénia; Ghazaleh, Held in trust; Hennigan; Lambton; Lev, Charity; Peters
et al.). But there has been no synthetic history of Ṣūfī endowments in general.
One way to narrate a more comprehensive history of Ṣūfī endowments is to
focus on specific patterns of Ṣūfī social activity, the role that endowments play
62 Hofer

in shaping or facilitating those patterns, and how both Ṣūfī activity and endow-
ments change over time. In these terms, the history of Sufism can be heuristi-
cally divided into a number of unique morphological patterns. Each pattern
is characterised by the dynamic relationship between the changing political
and material conditions created by endowments and changing patterns of Ṣūfī
social activity. Changes to one element of the social ecosystem produced no-
ticeable adaptations in the others. Innovations in the use of the waqf after the
seventh/thirteenth century meant that it could fund an increasing variety of
architectural projects, public services, and forms of patronage. One tangible
result of this patronage was the consolidation and dissemination of distinctly
Ṣūfī modes of authority that in turn shaped Timūrid, Ṣafavid, and Mughal no-
tions of royal authority (Moin; Rahimi; Rizvi). Likewise, Mamlūk and Ottoman
rulers developed creative ways to fund their patronage of Ṣūfīs. These methods
included the waqf irṣādī, in which lands from the public treasury were alien-
ated as endowments (Cuno; Haji Abdullah, 55; Hernandez; Johansen), and
the cash waqf (Çizakça, Cash; Mandaville). Competition for these resources
contributed to the anti-Ṣūfī Ḳāḍīzādelī movement and changed the social and
political landscape of Ottoman Istanbul and the provinces (Baer; Sariyannis;
Ulumiddin; Green). In these ways, existing patterns of Ṣūfī activity persisted
in new material conditions and new patterns developed. At the centre of this
developmental process were the transmission of accumulated knowledge and
the reproduction of social relations across time and space. From the vantage
point of endowments, then, the history of Sufism is not a strict chronology of
sequential events, but rather a diachronic morphology of accumulating social
patterns across Muslim society.
The first patterns of Ṣūfī activity emerged in third-/ninth-century Iraq and
are characterised by innovations in devotional practice, conceptual language,
and notions of prophetic authority. Baghdad in particular had a thriving intel-
lectual and devotional culture that was a central factor in the development of
Ṣūfī thought and practice. The city was home to a number of pious movements
that had sprung up in the wake of the Islamic conquests. These included the
murābiṭūn—pious warriors who defended the frontier by day and practiced
their devotions at night; the zuhhād—wandering renunciants who rejected the
trappings of social life in favour of a praxis of ostentatious self-mortification;
and the ahl al-ḥadīth—traditionists who collected and transmitted traditions
about the Prophet Muḥammad in order to model their piety on his exempla-
ry ideal (Melchert). The Ṣūfīs drew on the language of the latter in particular
(Thibon, Transmission). Furthermore, the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Ma‌ʾmūn’s (r. 198–
218/813–33) efforts to consolidate the power and authority of the caliphate
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 63

created a vibrant intellectual culture in Baghdad. On one hand, he supported

and generously funded the palace library at the Bayt al-Ḥikma, patronised the
translation of Greek learning into Arabic, and held debates in his salon. On
the other hand, he designated an ʿAlid as his successor and established a reli-
gious test (miḥna) for judges and jurists (Nawas). Al-Ma‌ʾmūn’s activity injected
Aristotelian problems into Muslim theology and galvanised the renunciants,
jurists, and ḥadīth folk against him. The early period of Ṣūfī innovation must
be understood against this social, political, and intellectual backdrop, much
of which was made possible by endowments. The earliest endowments were
donations of weapons, horses, and houses in support of the jihād along the
frontier (Gil; Peters). In these defensive outposts, or ribāṭs, pious militants
and renunciants mingled and practiced the devotions that Ṣūfīs adopted and
adapted in the jihād against the self (Garcin, Assises; Martire; Hofer [Ṣūfī
Outposts] in this volume). Furthermore, many of the rural inns, caravanserais,
and provisions for travelers in the early ʿAbbāsid era were funded by endow-
ments from wealthy patrons (Spuler et al., 437–8). And al-Ma‌ʾmūn himself es-
tablished a large endowment to fund his intellectual projects, including the
palace library known as the Bayt al-Ḥikma, although it is unclear how much
of the archival activity that happened there was in fact connected to his other
political efforts (Algeriani and Mohadi; Gutas and van Bladel). Finally, the op-
erational costs of the mosques in which Ṣūfīs convened their teaching circles,
such as the Shūnīziyya in Baghdad, were funded by the public treasury, which
relied in part on charitable donations for this purpose.
The second morphological pattern developed as Ṣūfīs from Baghdad began
to travel to Khurāsān, just as the waqf was becoming a more prominent econom-
ic vehicle aiding the transmission of knowledge. This pattern is characterised
by the systematisation of Ṣūfī thought and practice in communal spaces and
the production of a specific Ṣūfī literature. These communal spaces, khānqāhs
and ribāṭs, were likely modelled on the khānqāhs of the Karrāmiyya (Zysow).
By the fifth/eleventh century, there were Ṣūfī khānqāhs in every major town
in Khurāsān and Central Asia (Lewisohn). Ṣūfīs began to live in these lodges
communally, according to rules of conduct (ādāb), a practice that began with
Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) (Meier, 310–1). While Ṣūfī communal life
was spreading across the region, there was a flurry of literary activity in the
fifth/eleventh and sixth/twelfth centuries, in which Ṣūfīs produced texts across
several genres (hagiographies, biographical dictionaries, practical manuals,
and lexicographies), the purpose of which was to create a coherent tradition
that linked Sufism’s present to the Muslim community’s sacred past. While we
do not know the details or extent to which these Ṣūfī lodges were endowed
64 Hofer

(Karamustafa, 127), there is no doubt that Ṣūfī activity was facilitated by the in-
troduction of endowments to fund madrasas and khānqāhs during this period
(Malamud). There were already a number of endowed centres of learning in
Baghdad in the early fourth/tenth century (Makdisi, Muslim institutions). And
the first madrasas and khānqāhs associated with Ṣūfīs appeared in Nīshāpūr
shortly thereafter. Both al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) and al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072)
were known to have taught Sufism at endowed spaces in Nīshāpūr: al-Sulamī
at his duwayra (Thibon, L’oeuvre, 238–44) and al-Qushayrī at his madrasa
(Malamud, 430–1). In general, endowments during this era furnished the
capital—social, cultural, and economic—that these early Ṣūfīs required to
fund the early stages of what Alexandre Papas has called the “Sufi patronage of
patrimony and memory” (Papas, Toward a new history, 88).
A third pattern of Ṣūfī activity can be seen as the earlier patterns of inno-
vation and systematisation continued to develop in the context of the Saljūq
and post-Saljūq military patronage states. This pattern is characterised by
two major innovations to the political economy of the region. First was the
Saljūq’s patronage of scholars and Ṣūfīs to promote a particular ideological
program of political legitimisation (Safi). The second was the waqf policy in
Syria of Nūr al-Dīn Zangī (d. 569/1174) which Stefan Heidemann describes as
“the systematic use of a legal instrument of private law for general public du-
ties and purposes, which fell—in the broad sense—under the responsibility
of the state” (Heidemann, 155). The combination of these two innovations—
state patronage of Sufism and waqf-financed public services—allowed the
Zangid and Ayyūbid sultans to undertake a massive campaign of public piety
(Talmon-Heller). From this point on, nearly all Muslim rulers began to fund
public services and patronise scholars using awqāf instead of the public trea-
sury (Lev, The ethics, 612; Sabra, 69–71). At the same time, economic opportu-
nities for Ṣūfīs in the East were becoming increasingly scarce. Economic crises
brought a sizable number of Khurāsānī scholars to Baghdad, Damascus, and
eventually Cairo beginning in the mid fifth/eleventh century (Gilbert). Many
of these scholars were Ṣūfīs who brought the Khurāsānī model of the khānqāh
to Baghdad, where they founded similar lodges known there as ribāṭ and
which subsequently spread as far as Morocco (Chabbi). The Ṣūfīs who passed
through these ribāṭs were some of the most influential scholars of ḥadīth of
their time and enjoyed increasing levels of patronage by the ruling class (Van
Renterghem). These rulers established Ṣūfī organisations and patronised Ṣūfī
individuals by setting up endowments to pay for the construction of lodges,
hospices, tombs, or other spaces for Ṣūfīs to gather. In addition to providing
stipends for Ṣūfīs and salaries for a “head Sufi” (shaykh al-shuyūkh), revenues
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 65

from these endowments paid the wages of the construction workers, the waqf
supervisors, the cooks, custodial workers, singers, bath attendants, and main-
tenance crews. This model was widely replicated and created the conditions
in which Sufism exploded in popularity across the Muslim world. Between
the seventh/thirteenth and tenth/sixteenth century, for example, the number
of Ṣūfī lodges in Damascus doubled, from 38 to 76 (Miura, 13). The Mamlūks
founded and endowed hundreds of Ṣūfī lodges, large and small (Fernandes,
The evolution; Homerin; Little); as did rulers in the Mongol Īlkhānate (Blair,
Ilkhanid; De Nicola, Patrons; De Nicola, The ladies; Lambton; Mahendrarajah,
The Ṣūfī); in Marīnid Morocco (Cornell; Sanseverino); in Timūrid and post-
Mongol Central Asia (Arbabzadah; May, The relationship; McChesney, Earning
a living; Subtelny); in Mughal India (Ernst); and so on.
In addition to their patronage of living Ṣūfīs, Muslim ruling elites also began
to patronise the dead. Rulers would often alienate properties for the con-
struction and upkeep of shrines at the graves of Ṣūfīs that had become regu-
lar objects of pilgrimage (Khan in this volume). The shrine-complex differed
from region to region in its form, but the function was generally to produce a
built environment in which visitors could find family, belongings, and other
miscellanea belonging to the shaykh; the tomb of the shaykh; a mosque; and
some space for accommodating short- and long-term visitors. By the eighth/
fourteenth century, these types of buildings had become so numerous across
the entirety of the Muslim world that one could travel from the Maghrib to
South Asia without paying for lodging (Blair, Sufi saints).
Ruling elites who created large endowments on behalf of Ṣūfīs and saints
not only benefited from the social and cultural capital generated by their pa-
tronage, but also gained the means to raise economic capital for large projects
in need of financing. Despite the large sums required to found such an enter-
prise, the revenues of a waqf often exceeded the stipulated disbursements. In
one example from eighth-/fourteenth-century Egypt, two-thirds of the revenue
from one individual’s large waqf holdings were unassigned (Taher and Garcin).
And the last two Mamlūk sultans held massive waqfs in which 90 per cent of
the revenues were unassigned (Petry, Fractionalized estates; Petry, A Geniza).
The unassigned revenue functioned as a kind of slush fund that provided eco-
nomic security in turbulent years or funded construction and agricultural ef-
forts. After conquering Baghdad, for example, Hülegü reinstated the official
waqf supervisor and rebuilt Baghdad with the resulting revenue (Gilli-Elewy,
170). The Timūrid sultans used complex forms of the waqf mushtarak to endow
lodges and shrines that served as vehicles for wealth preservation and imperial
agricultural reforms (Dale; Mahendrarajah, The Gawhar; Subtelny, 192–234).
66 Hofer

At the same time, Ṣūfīs with means founded and endowed lodges and shrines
of their own on an equally large scale.
In the broader context of state and local patronage of Ṣūfī lodges and shrines,
yet another pattern of Ṣūfī activity emerged as the disciples of well-known
shaykhs and pīrs reproduced and transmitted the unique method (ṭarīqa) of
their masters. The post-mortem institutionalisation of a Ṣūfī masters’ method,
reputation, and sanctity was one of the critical components of the develop-
ment of Ṣūfī orders (Sedgwick in this volume; Ceyhan in this volume). This
process depended, to large extent, on access to the material resources neces-
sary to build, maintain, and accommodate visitors at the shrine or lodge of a
Ṣūfī master. Revenue from endowments, either established by a wealthy pa-
tron or a Ṣūfī with means, provided the resources to maintain the social mi-
lieu in which Ṣūfīs practiced and propagated the master’s ṭarīqa (Papas, No
Sufism). Endowed lodges and shrines were of central importance in the early
appearance of a number of orders, including the Suhrawardiyya (Ohlander),
Shādhiliyya (Hofer), Mevleviyye (Holbrook), Kubrawiyya (DeWeese), Naqsh-
bandiyya (Paul), Mujaddidiyya (Dale and Payind), and Chishtiyya (Ernst and
Lawrence)—to name only a few.
Once established, endowed Ṣūfī lodges, particularly those associated with
a specific order, often developed increasingly complex functions and became
critical to the regional economy. Similarly, the creation of shrine complexes
drove economic growth as benefactors expanded the precincts of the shrine it-
self and added new structures for lodging, food, and other activities. New con-
struction and upkeep often depended on the strategic leveraging of existing
endowment revenue for the acquisition of new properties to be alienated as
waqf. Ṣūfī lodges and shrines could drive urbanisation as much as urban spac-
es transformed Ṣūfī life and practice (Hallenberg; Karataş, The city; Karataş,
The Ottomanization; Mañas; McChesney, Waqf; Rodriguez-Manas; Wolper;
Yürekli; Clayer in this volume). Indeed, a distinct pattern of Ṣūfī activity that
has been described as “colonizing Sufis” (Green, 133) is characterised by the
use of endowments to bring organised Sufism to new regions. Here one finds
imperial expansion carried out by offering Ṣūfīs land grants, endowments, or
other enticements to colonise or tame new regions of the world. In the early
stages of their expansion, the Ottoman armies granted newly annexed ter-
ritories to Ṣūfī dervishes in exchange for their military, political, or colonial
assistance (Kafadar). When sultan Meḥmed II conquered Constantinople in
857/1453, he declared himself wāqif over the entire city, and then parcelled out
land to subordinates to supervise as waqf irṣādī in order to rebuild the city
and attract scholars to the new capital (Atçıl, 61). Ṣūfī dervishes utilised land
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 67

grants and endowments to establish lodges that often developed into vital so-
cial and economic centres, functioning as “vectors of colonization” that were
critical to the Islamisation of the Balkans (Yıldırım), Bulgaria (Koltaş), north-
ern Greece (Lowry), and Bosnia (Aščerić-Todd). One finds a similar pattern
with the Delhi Sultanate (Eaton, The Sufis; Huda); and the Mughal expansion
into Bengal (Eaton, The rise; Kozlowski). There are also cases in which Ṣūfīs
used endowments to settle new areas of their own initiative. The Islamisation
of the Maldives began in earnest when a local Ṣūfī returned from study in
Ḥaḍrawmawt and established a khānaqāh in Vadu in 980–1/1573 (Peacock,
65). Likewise, waqfs were central to the establishment of Ṣūfī networks in the
Western Indian Ocean region during the nineteenth century (Bang). For sub-
Saharan Africa the picture is different. Given a vastly dissimilar economy of
resources in the Islamic regions stretching from West Africa to the Nile Valley,
the use of waqf was rare (Hunwick). Rather, in exchange for “spiritual services
rendered or to come,” rulers granted Ṣūfīs and their families regional adminis-
trative privileges, land grants, or tax exemptions. These financial mechanisms
were instrumental in the Islamisation of the region and the establishment
of overlapping Ṣūfī networks (O’Fahey). Similarly, in the nineteenth century
the Sanūsī order established a network of lodges spanning the trans-Saharan
trade route by developing land the local Bedouin had granted them. These
lodges were nominally waqf properties, but only in the sense that the Ottoman
authorities granted them that status because they were unable to tax them
(Vikør, Sufism and social welfare). These lodges were all based on organisa-
tional principles articulated by al-Sanūsī (d. 1276/1859) himself, whose direc-
tions concerning the founding of zāwiyas were very precise (Vikør, Sufi and
scholar, 189).
Finally, there is a pattern of Ṣūfī activity unique to the European colonisa-
tion of Muslim areas and post-colonial nation states. This pattern is character-
ised by Ṣūfī interactions with colonisers mediated through endowed lodges,
colonial attempts to centralise control of endowments in order to extract their
revenue, and the post-colonial nationalisation of endowments and interfer-
ence with the operation of Ṣūfī orders. There was no single Ṣūfī response to
colonialism or single valence to the character of Ṣūfī interactions with colo-
nial authorities (Vikør, Sufism and colonialism; Voll; Papas in this volume).
Some Ṣūfīs allied themselves with colonial authorities, such as the Tījāniyya in
Algeria. Other Ṣūfīs fought against colonial rule, using their networks of lodges
supported by endowments to organise the resistance (Medici; Vikør, Sufi and
scholar). In any case, we must take care not to assume that the Ṣūfī affiliation
of the leaders or members of an anti-colonial movement necessarily indicates
68 Hofer

the Ṣūfī character of the resistance movement itself (Knysh, 294–300). There
is more uniformity of activity with the European and Ottoman authorities’
centralisation of control over the awqāf in their territories. Europeans gen-
erally found the waqf baffling—an economic institution neither public nor
private—and colonial authorities attempted to take control of them or nullify
them in a variety of ways (Çizakça, A history; Medici; Powers). For Ottoman
administrators, a combination of external and internal pressures to modernise
the Ottoman economy led to a concerted policy of centralisation. In 1826 the
sultan Maḥmūd II (r. 1223–55/1808–39) began a multi-year project to reorga-
nise endowments under the supervision of the ministry for waqf affairs. This
policy had disastrous consequences for endowments, as larger portions of the
revenue were needed to pay the bureaucrats’ salaries, many of whom then
embezzled even more money from the waqf revenue (Argun, 240–3; Barnes;
Çizakça, A history, 75). As a result, most scholars—including Ṣūfīs—saw their
income and political power decline dramatically (Singer). The gutting of the
waqf revenue alongside the growth of European-inspired municipalities with
their tax-driven provision of social services, ultimately led to the obsolescence
of the waqf system in Ottoman territory (Kuran, The provision). While many
endowments survived colonialism and the dissolution of premodern Islamic
states, they typically did so only under the auspices of centralised bureaucra-
cies. For example, in the 1930s, the Turkish Republic pursued the same Ottoman
centralisation policies and ultimately nationalised the awqāf (Zencirci).
There are similar continuities between the colonial and the post-colonial
management of awqāf elsewhere. Most nation states centralised control of the
endowments within their borders; the unique character of each state produced
different results in terms of politicising endowments (Kogelmann, Islamische
fromme Stiftungen; Kogelmann, Die Entwicklung). Acting as representatives of
a reformist political Islam, a number of post-colonial states instituted restric-
tive “policies of bureaucratizing Sufi lifeworlds” in order to marginalise Ṣūfī
leaders or banish them from the public sphere (Malik, 588). These policies
included one or more of the following tactics: eliminating existing waqf ahlī
and preventing the establishment of new ones; effectively nationalising the
awqāf by placing existing waqf khayrī under the regulatory purview of the
state, typically in a ministry of endowments; confiscating waqf properties in
order to redistribute them to the private sector; and restricting waqf supervi-
sors’ use of traditional legal instruments to keep the awqāf solvent (Sait and
Lim, 161–4). Both the Egyptian and the Syrian governments made concerted
efforts to maintain tight control of Ṣūfī endowments and Ṣūfī orders (Luizard;
Pinto). In Iraq, Saddam Hussein’s ḥamlat al-ʿawda ilā l-īmān (or al-ḥamla
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 69

al-īmāniyya; faith campaign) included courting Ṣūfī leaders and funding re-
pairs and new construction of Ṣūfī shrines; the campaign was led by vice-
president, ʿIzzat Ibrāhīm al-Dūrī, who belonged to branches of the Qādirī and
Naqshbandī orders. The politics of sectarianism stoked by the American oc-
cupation resulted in the creation of three regulatory bodies for endowments:
Sunnī, Shīʿī, and other. The creation of the Dīwān al-Waqf al-Sunnī, which is
dominated by the Salafī movement, has had a profound effect on Sufism in
Iraq. In Baghdad, for instance, the Salafī leadership of the Dīwān has attempt-
ed (mostly unsuccessfully) to eliminate Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī practices from the shrine
of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (Al-Gailani). In recent years, politicians in Morocco
and Algeria have publicly embraced what they see as a non-political form of
Islam; in 2002 a prominent Ṣūfī was named to head the Moroccan ministry
of endowments (Muedini). Pakistan legislated centralised control of endow-
ments and the management of national shrines in 1959, both to modernise
the national imagination and to reduce the influence of local saints and their
families. Subsequent Pakistani governments have marshalled different ver-
sions of the saintly patrimony to shore up various nationalist projects and
have used shrines as platforms for state ideology (Ewing; Philippon, A sub-
lime; Philippon, An ambiguous; Zaman, 194–225). The Malaysian government
banned the neo-Ṣūfī movement Al Arqam in 1994 after members successfully
used awqāf to fund their own social services outside the government structures
(Nagata). In many cases, however, Ṣūfī endowments persist and continue to
function as sites of social mobilisation and the production of counter-publics
(Malik, 591). In Bosnia, a newly created directorate of waqfs has been charged
with managing the endowments that survived Tito’s policy of nationalisa-
tion and the destruction by Serbian forces between 1992 and 1995 (Trakic).
In addition to protecting the endowments for Ṣūfī tekkes, the constitution of
Islamska Zajednica Bosne i Hercegovine (the Islamic Community of Bosnia
and Herzegovina) contains provisions for the Ṣūfī orders in Bosnian society
(Karčić).
Finally, there are several aspects of Ṣūfī endowments that remain unex-
plored. One such area is the patronage of relics rather than saints for econom-
ic and political ends, or what McChesney has described as “reliquary Sufism”
(McChesney, Reliquary). A study of Ṣūfī endowments in East Africa remains to
be undertaken, although there is some work on endowments in the region in
general (Athuman; Carmichael; Carmichael and Cooper; Oberauer, Fantastic
charities; O’Fahey and Vikør; Sheriff). Another question is the role of endow-
ments outside the traditional boundaries of the Muslim world. There are, for
example, awqāf in North America. The most well-known is the North American
70 Hofer

Islamic Trust (NAIT), founded in 1973, the revenue of which are used to finance
mosque construction around the country and to fund the Islamic Society of
North America (ISNA). As the waqf experiences a revival in many parts of the
Muslim world, particularly in Southeast Asia (Budiman and Kusuma; Ibrahim,
Amir, and Masron; Islam; Khan; Mohammad et al.; Nour), Ṣūfīs in Europe and
North America may follow this trend and found endowments for their own
activities. And while past scholarship has shown little interest in addressing
this question, the recent growth of research on Sufism in Europe and North
America, particularly in its social and political aspects, suggests that this
state of affairs will soon change (Dressler, Geaves, and Klinkhammer; Piraino;
Raudvere; Sedgwick; Sharify-Funk, Dickson, and Xavier).

Bibliography

Abbasi, Muhammad Zubair, The classical Islamic law of waqf. A concise introduction,
Arab Law Quarterly 26 (2012): 121–54.
ʿAfīfī, Muḥammad, al-Awqāf wa-l-ḥayā al-iqtiṣādiyya fī Miṣr fī al-ʿaṣr al-ʿUthmānī,
Cairo 1991.
Al-Gailani, Noorah, The shrine of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī in Baghdad and the shrine of
ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Jīlānī in ʿAqra. Mapping the multiple orientations of two Qādirī Sufi
shrines in Iraq, PhD thesis, University of Glasgow, 2016.
Algeriani, Adel Abdul-Aziz and Mawloud Mohadi, The house of wisdom (bayt al-
hikmah) and its civilizational impact on Islamic libraries. A historical perspective,
Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences 8/5 (2017): 179–87.
Amīn, Muḥammad, al-Awqāf wa-l-ḥayā al-ijtimāʿiyya fī Miṣr 648–923 H./1250–1517. Dirāsa
taʾrīkhiyya wathāʾiqiyya, Cairo 1980.
Arbabzadah, Nushin, Women and religious patronage in the Timurid empire, in
N. Green (ed.), Afghanistan’s Islam. From Conversion to the Taliban (Oakland 2017),
56–70.
Argun, Selim, Elite configurations and clusters of power. The ulema, waqf, and Ottoman
state (1789–1839), PhD dissertation, McGill University, 2013.
Aščerić-Todd, Ines, Dervishes and Islam in Bosnia. Sufi dimensions to the formation of
Bosnian Muslim society, Leiden 2015.
Atçıl, Abdurrahman, Scholars and sultans in the early modern Ottoman empire,
Cambridge 2016.
Athuman, Suleiman, Competing and conflicting power dynamics in waqfs in Kenya,
1900–2010, PhD dissertation, Bayreuth University (Germany), 2017.
Atia, Mona, Building a house in heaven. Pious neoliberalism and Islamic charity in Egypt,
Minneapolis 2013.
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 71

Baer, Marc David, Honored by the glory of Islam. Conversion and conquest in Ottoman
Europe, New York 2008.
Bakhoum, Dina, The waqf system. Maintenance, repair, and upkeep, in Pascale
Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in trust. Waqf in the Islamic world (Cairo 2011), 179–96.
Bang, Anne K., Islamic Sufi networks in the western Indian Ocean (c.1880–1940). Ripples
of reform, Leiden 2014.
Bargaoui, Sami, Le Waqf. Redéfinitions des appartenances et inscriptions sociales, in
Cerutti and I. Grangaud (eds.), Appartenance locale et propriété au nord et au sud
de la Méditerranée (Aix-en-Provence 2015); online at <http://books.openedition.org
/iremam/3488>.
Barnes, John R., An introduction to religious foundations in the Ottoman empire, 2nd ed.,
Leiden and New York 1987.
Berkey, Jonathan, The transmission of knowledge in medieval Cairo. A social history of
Islamic education, Princeton 1992.
Blair, Sheila S., Ilkhanid architecture and society. An analysis of the endowment deed
of the Rabʿ-i Rashīdī, Iran 22/67 (1984): 67–90.
Blair, Sheila S., Sufi saints and shrine architecture in the early fourteenth century,
Muqarnas 7 (1990): 35–49.
Bölükbaşı, Ayşe, XVI. Yüzyılda Istanbul’daki Halveti Tekkeleri [Khalwati convents in
the sixteenth century of Istanbul], PhD dissertation, İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi,
Istanbul 2015.
Budiman, Mochammad Arif and Dimas Bagus Wiranata Kusuma, The economic
significance of waqf. A macro perspective. The 8th International Conference on
Tawhidi Methodology Applied to Islamic Microenterprise Development, Jakarta,
January 7–8, 2011.
Carmichael, Tim, British ‘practice’ towards Islam in the East Africa protectorate.
Muslim officials, waqf administration, and secular education in Mombasa and en-
virons, 1895–1920, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 17/2 (1997): 293–309.
Carmichael, Tim and Frederick Cooper, Plantation slavery on the east coast of Africa,
New Haven 1977.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, La fonction du ribāṭ à Baghdad du Ve siècle au début du VIIe siè-
cle, Revue des etudes islamiques 42 (1974): 101–21.
Chamberlain, Michael, Knowledge and social practice in medieval Damascus, 1190–1350,
Cambridge 2002.
Chitwood, Zachary, Tillmann Lohse, Ignacio Sánchez, and Annette Schmiedchen.
Endowment studies—interdisciplinary perspectives, Endowment Studies 1/1 (2017):
1–59.
Choudhury, Masudul Alam, The Islamic world-system. A study in polity-market interac-
tion, London 2005.
72 Hofer

Çizakça, Murat, Cash waqfs of Bursa, 1555–1823, JESHO 38/3 (1995): 313–54.
Çizakça, Murat, A history of philanthropic foundations. The Islamic world from the sev-
enth century to the present, Istanbul 2000.
Cornell, Vincent, Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism,
Austin 1998.
Cuno, Kenneth, Ideology and juridical discourse in Ottoman Egypt. The uses of the
concept of irsãd, ILS 6/2 (1999): 136–63.
Dale, Stephen F., The legacy of the Timurids, JRAS 8/1 (1998): 43–58.
Dale, Stephen F. and Alam Payind, The Ahrārī waqf in Kābul in the year 1546 and the
Mughūl Naqshbandiyyah, JAOS 119/2 (1999): 218–33.
Dallal, Ahmad, The Islamic institution of waqf. A historical overview, in Steve
Heyneman (ed.), Islam and social policy (Nashville 2004), 13–43.
De Nicola, Bruno, Patrons or murīds? Mongol women and shaykhs in Ilkhanid Iran and
Anatolia, Iran: Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies 52/1 (2014): 143–56.
De Nicola, Bruno, The ladies of Rūm. A hagiographic view of women in thirteenth- and
fourteenth-century Anatolia, JSS 3/2 (2014): 132–56.
Décobert, Christian, L’Institution du waqf, la baraka et la transmission du savoir,
in H. Elboudrari (ed.), Modes de transmission de la culture religieuse en Islam
(Cairo 1993), 25–33.
Deguilhem, Randi, ed., Le Waqf dans l’espace islamique, outil de pouvoir sociopolitique,
Damascus 1995.
Deguilhem, Randi, The waqf in the city, in S. K. Jayyusi, R. Holod, A. Petruccioli, and
A. Raymond (eds.), The city in the Islamic world (Leiden 2008), 929–56.
Deguilhem, Randi and Abdelhamid Hénia, Les Fondations pieuses (waqf ) en Méditer-
ranée. Enjeux de société, enjeux de pouvoir, Kuwait 2004.
DeWeese, Devin, The eclipse of the Kubravīyah in Central Asia, Iranian Studies 21/1–2
(1988): 45–83.
Dressler, Markus, Ron Geaves, and Gritt Klinkhammer, eds., Sufis in western society.
Global networking and locality, London 2009.
Durmuş, Muhammed Emin and Süleyman Kaya, Türkiye’de vakıflar üzerine yapılmış
lisansüstü tezlerin bibliyometrik analizi (1984–2016), Vakıflar Dergisi 49 (2018):
131–46.
Eaton, Richard M., The rise of Islam and the Bengal frontier, 1204–1760, Berkeley 1996.
Eaton, Richard M., The Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700. Social roles of Sufis in medieval India,
Princeton 1972, repr. 2015.
Ephrat, Daphna, A learned society in a period of transition. The Sunni ʿulama‌ʾ of eleventh-
century Baghdad, Albany 2000.
Ephrat, Daphna and Hatim Mahamid, The creation of Sufi spheres in medieval
Damascus (mid-6th/12th to mid-8th/14th centuries), JRAS 25/02 (2015): 189–208.
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 73

Erie, Matthew S., The traveling waqf. Property, religion, and mobility beyond China,
ILS 35 (2018): 121–55.
Ernst, Carl W., Eternal garden. Mysticism, history, and politics at a South Asian Sufi
center, Albany 1992.
Ernst, Carl W. and Bruce B. Lawrence, Sufi martyrs of love. The Chishti order in South
Asia and beyond, New York 2002.
Ewing, Katherine, The politics of Sufism. Redefining the saints of Pakistan, JAS 42/2
(1983): 251–68.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, Agricultural activities in a Bektashi center. The tekke of Kızıl Deli,
1750–1830, Südost-Forschungen 35 (1976): 69–96.
Fernandes, Leonor, Three Sufi foundations in a fifteenth-century waqfiyya, AI 17 (1981):
141–56.
Fernandes, Leonor E., The foundation of Baybars Al-Jashankir. Its waqf, history, and
architecture, Muqarnas 4 (1987): 21–42.
Fernandes, Leonor E., The evolution of a Sufi institution in Mamluk Egypt. The khanqah,
Berlin 1988.
Gaborieau, Marc, Les modes d’organisation, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein
(eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à
aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 206–12.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Assises matérielles et rôle économique des ordres soufis, in
A. Popovic and G. Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam
des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 213–30.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Le waqf est-il la transmission d’un patrimoine?, in J. Beaucamp
and G. Dagron (eds.), La transmission du patrimoine. Byzance et l’aire méditerranée-
nne (Paris 1998), 101–9.
Ghazaleh, Pascale, ed., Held in trust. Waqf in the Islamic world, Cairo 2011.
Ghazaleh, Pascale, Introduction. Pious foundations. From here to eternity? in Pascale
Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in trust. Waqf in the Islamic world (Cairo 2011), 1–22.
Gil, Moshe, The earliest waqf foundations, JNES 57/2 (1998): 125–40.
Gilbert, Joan E., Institutionalization of Muslim scholarship and professionalization
of the ʿulama‌ʾ in medieval Damascus, SI 52 (1980): 105–34.
Gilli-Elewy, Hend, The Mongol court in Baghdad. The Juwaynī brothers between local
court and central court, in A. Fuess and J.-P. Hartung (eds.), Court cultures in the
Muslim world. Seventh to nineteenth centuries (London 2014), 168–82.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Chichester 2012.
Gross, Jo-Ann, The biographical tradition of Muḥammad Bashārā. Sanctification and
legitimation in Tajikistan, in D. DeWeese and J.-A. Gross (eds.), Sufism in Central
Asia. New perspectives on Sufi traditions, 15th–21st centuries (Leiden 2018), 299–331.
Gutas, Dimitri and Kevin van Bladel, Bayt al-ḥikma. EI3.
74 Hofer

Haji Abdullah, Luckman, Classical Islamic law of waqf. A comparative approach, PhD
dissertation, University of Edinburgh, 2005.
Hallenberg, Helena, The sultan who loved Sufis. How Qaytbay endowed a shrine com-
plex in Dasuq, MSR 4 (2000): 147–66.
Heidemann, Stefan, Charity and piety for the transformation of the cities. The new
direction in taxation and waqf policy in mid-twelfth-century Syria and northern
Mesopotamia, in M. Frenkel, and Y. Lev (eds.), Charity and giving in monotheistic
religions (Berlin-New York 2009), 149–95.
Hennigan, Peter, The birth of a legal institution. The formation of the waqf in third-
century A.H. Ḥanafī legal discourse, Leiden 2004.
Hernandez, Rebecca, Sultan, scholar, and Sufi. Authority and power relations in
al-Suyūṭī’s fatwā on waqf, ILS 20/4 (2013): 333–70.
Hodgson, Marshall G. S., The venture of Islam, vol. 2, Chicago 1974.
Hoexter, Miriam, Endowments, rulers and community. Waqf al-Haramayn in Ottoman
Algiers, Leiden 1998.
Hoexter, Miriam, Waqf studies in the twentieth century. The state of the art, JESHO 41/4
(1998): 474–95.
Hoexter, Miriam, The waqf and the public sphere, in Miriam Hoexter, Shmuel N.
Eisenstadt, Nehemia Levtzion (eds.), The public sphere in Muslim societies (Albany
2002), 119–38.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Holbrook, Victoria Rowe, Diverse tastes in the spiritual life. Textual play in the diffu-
sion of Rumi’s order, in Leonard Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. The legacy
of medieval Persian Sufism (1150–1500), vol. 2 (Oxford 1999), 99–120.
Homerin, Th. Emil, Saving Muslim souls. The khānqāh and the Sufi duty in Mamluk
lands, MSR 3 (1999): 59–82.
Huda, Qamar-ul, Striving for divine union. Spiritual exercises for Suhrawardī Sūfīs,
London 2005.
Hunwick, J. O., Waḳf (VIII. In Sub-Saharan Africa), EI2.
Ibrahim, Haslindar, Afizar Amir, and Tajul Ariffin Masron, Cash waqf. An innovative
instrument for economic development. International Review of Social Sciences and
Humanities 6/1 (2013): 1–7.
Isin, Engin F., Ottoman waqfs as acts of citizenship, in P. Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in trust.
Waqf in the Islamic world (Cairo 2011), 209–29.
Islahi, Abdul Azim, Waqf. A bibliography, Jeddah 2003.
Islam, Mohammad Thowhidul, Historical development of waqf governance in
Bangladesh: Challenges and prospects, Intellectual Discourse 26/2 (2018): 1129–165.
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 75

Johansen, Baber, The Islamic law on land tax and rent. The peasants’ loss of property
rights as interpreted in the Hanafite legal literature of the Mamluk and Ottoman pe-
riods, London 1988.
Kafadar, Cemal, Between two worlds. The construction of the Ottoman state, Berkeley 2002.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Karataş, Hasan, The city as a historical actor. The urbanization and Ottomanization of
the Halvetiye Sufi order by the city of Amasya in the fifteenth and sixteenth centu-
ries, PhD dissertation, University of California, Berkeley 2011.
Karataş, Hasan, The Ottomanization of the Halveti Sufi order. A political story revis-
ited, Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association 1/1–2 (2014): 71–89.
Karčić, Fikret, The other European Muslims. A Bosnian experience, Sarajevo 2015.
Khan, Muhammad Tariq, Historical role of Islamic waqf in poverty reduction in
Muslim society, Pakistan Development Review 54/4 (2015): 979–96.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Kogelmann, Franz, Islamische fromme Stiftungen und Staat der Wandel in den Bezie-
hungen zwischen einer religiosen Institution und dem marokkanischen Staat seit dem
19 Jahrhundert bis 1937, Würzburg 1999.
Kogelmann, Franz, Die Entwicklung des islamischen Stiftungswesens im postkolo-
nialen Staat Prozesse der Säkularisierung in Ägypten, Algerien und Marokko, in
Astrid Meier et al. (eds.), Islamische Stiftungen zwischen juristischer Norm und sozi-
aler Praxis (Berlin 2009), 233–60.
Koltaş, Nurullah, The Bektashī order in Bulgarıa—a 16th century document on Elmalı
(Elmalu) Baba Dargāh, Türk Kültürü ve Hacı Bektaş Velî Araştırma Dergisi 81 (2017):
9–26.
Kozlowski, Gregory, Imperial authority, benefactions and endowments (awqāf ) in
Mughal India, JESHO 38/3 (1995): 355–70.
Kuran, Timur, The provision of public goods under Islamic law. Origins, impact, and
limitations of the waqf system, Law & Society Review 35/4 (2001): 841–98.
Kuran, Timur, Institutional roots of authoritarian rule in the Middle East. Civic legacies
of the Islamic waqf. SSRN Scholarly Paper, Rochester 2014.
Kuran, Timur, The long divergence. How Islamic law held back the Middle East, Prince­
ton 2013.
Lambton, Ann, Awqāf in Persia: 6th–8th/12th–14th centuries, ILS 4/3 (1997): 298–318.
Lev, Yaacov, Charity, endowments, and charitable institutions in medieval Islam,
Gainesville 2005.
Lev, Yaacov, The ethics and practice of Islamic medieval charity, History Compass 5/2
(2007): 603–18.
Lewisohn, Leonard, Overview. Iranian Islam and Persianate Sufism, in Leonard
Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. The legacy of medieval Persian Sufism (1150–
1500), vol. 2 (Oxford 1999), 11–43.
76 Hofer

Lifchez, Raymond, ed., The dervish lodge. Architecture, art, and Sufism in Ottoman
Turkey, Berkeley 1992.
Little, Donald P., The nature of khanqahs, ribats, and zawiyas under the Mamluks, in
Wael B. Hallaq and Donald P. Little (eds.), Islamic studies presented to Charles J. Adams
(Leiden 1991), 91–105.
Lowry, Heath, The shaping of the Ottoman Balkans, 1350–1550. The conquest, settlement
and infrastructural development of northern Greece, Istanbul 2008.
Luizard, Pierre-Jean, Le soufisme égyptien contemporain, Égypte/Monde arabe 2
(1990): 35–94.
Mahendrarajah, Shivan, The shrine of Shaykh Aḥmad-i Jām. Notes on a revised chro-
nology and a waqfiyya, Iran 50/1 (2012): 145–48.
Mahendrarajah, Shivan, The Ṣūfī shaykhs of Jām. A history from the Īlkhāns to the
Timurids, PhD dissertation, Cambridge University, 2014.
Mahendrarajah, Shivan, The Gawhar Shād waqf deed. Public works and the common-
wealth, JAOS 138/4 (2018): 821–57.
Makdisi, George, Muslim institutions of learning in eleventh-century Baghdad,
BSOAS, 24/1 (1961): 1–56.
Makdisi, George, The rise of colleges. Institutions of learning in Islam and the West,
Edinburgh 1981.
Malamud, Margaret, Sufi organizations and structures of authority in medieval
Nishapur, IJMES 26/03 (1994): 427–42.
Malik, Jamal, The sociopolitical entanglements of Sufism, in A. Salvatore et al. (eds.),
The Wiley Blackwell history of Islam (Hoboken 2018), 585–606.
Mañas, Francisco R., Supplanting the ruler. The levying of taxes by Sufi Zawiya-s in the
Maghrib, Maghreb Review 40/3 (1996): 188–99.
Mandaville, Jon E., Usurious piety. The cash waqf controversy in the Ottoman empire,
IJMES 10/3 (1979): 289–308.
Martire, Corrado la, Between Christian monasticism and Islamic ribāṭ in Ifrīqiya.
Pious endowments as traces of historical continuity, Endowment Studies 2/2 (2018):
107–32.
May, Samantha, God’s land. Blurring the national and the sacred in waqf territory,
Politics, Religion & Ideology 15/3 (2014): 421–41.
May, Timothy, The relationship between Sufis and inner Asian ruling elites, Southeast
Review of Asian Studies 30 (2008): 84–101.
McChesney, R. D., Waqf in Central Asia. Four hundred years in the history of a Muslim
shrine, 1480–1889, Princeton 1991.
McChesney, R. D., Earning a living. Promoting Islamic culture in the sixteenth and sev-
enteenth centuries, in N. Green (ed.), Afghanistan’s Islam. From conversion to the
Taliban (Oakland 2017), 89–104.
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 77

McChesney, R. D., Reliquary Sufism. Sacred fiber in Afghanistan, in Devin DeWeese

and Jo-Ann Gross (eds.), Sufism in Central Asia (Leiden 2018), 191–237.
Medici, Anna Maria, Waqfs of Cyrenaica and Italian colonialism in Libya (1911–41), in
P. Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in Trust. Waqf in the Islamic World (Oxford 2011), 155–78.
Meier, Fritz, Abū Saʿīd-i Abū l-Ḫayr (357–440/967–1049). Wirklichkeit und Legende,
Leiden 1976.
Melchert, Christopher, The piety of the hadith folk, IJMES 34/3 (2002): 425–39.
Miura, Toru, Dynamism in the urban society of Damascus. The Ṣāliḥiyya quarter from the
twelfth to the twentieth centuries, Leiden 2015.
Mohammad, Mohammad Tahir Sabit Haji, et al., Awqaf anthology. A collection of re-
search articles on the Islamic charitable endowment institutions of waqf, vol. 1,
Brixton 2010.
Moin, A. Azfar, The millennial sovereign. Sacred kingship and sainthood in Islam, New
York 2015.
Moumtaz, Nada, Is the family waqf a religious institution? Charity, religion, and econo-
my in French mandate Lebanon, Islamic Law and Society 25/1–2 (2018): 37–77.
Moumtaz, Nada, Theme issue: A third wave of waqf studies, ILS 25/1–2 (2018): 1–10.
Muedini, Fait, The promotion of Sufism in the politics of Algeria and Morocco, Islamic
Africa 3/2 (2012): 201–26.
Nagata, Judith, Alternative models of Islamic governance in Southeast Asia. Neo-Sufism
and the arqam experiment in Malaysia, Global Change, Peace & Security 16/2 (2004):
99–114.
Nawas, John Abdallah, al-Ma‌ʾmun, the inquisition, and the quest for caliphal authority,
Atlanta 2015.
Nour, Haysam, Reconsidering the waqf. Traditional mechanism of urban regeneration
in historic Muslim cities, International Journal of Architectural Research 9/1 (2015):
18–30.
Oberauer, Norbert, ‘Fantastic charities’. The transformation of waqf practice in colo-
nial Zanzibar, ILS 15/3 (2008): 315–70.
Oberauer, Norbert, Early doctrines on waqf revisited. The evolution of Islamic endow-
ment law in the 2nd century AH, ILS 20/1–2 (2013): 1–47.
O’Fahey, Rex, Endowment, privilege, and estate in the central and eastern Sudan,
ILS 4/3 (1997): 334–51.
O’Fahey, Rex S. and Knut S. Vikør, A Zanzibari waqf of books. The library of the
Mundhirī family, Sudanic Africa 7 (1996): 5–23.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Brill 2008.
Papas, Alexandre, Toward a new history of Sufism. The Turkish case, History of
Religions 46/1 (2006): 81–90.
78 Hofer

Papas, Alexandre, No Sufism without Sufi order. Rethinking tarîqa and adab with
Ahmad Kâsânî Dahbidî (1461–1542), Kyoto Bulletin of Islamic Area Studies 1/2 (2008):
4–22.
Paul, Jürgen, Die politische und soziale Bedeutung der Naqsbandiyya in Mittelasien im 15.
Jahrhundert, Berlin 1991.
Peacock, A. C. S., Sufi cosmopolitanism in the seventeenth-century Indian Ocean.
Sharīʿa, lineage and royal power in Southeast Asia and the Maldives, in R. M. Feener
(ed.), Challenging cosmopolitanism. Coercion, mobility and displacement in Islamic
Asia (Edinburgh 2018), 53–80.
Peters, R., Waḳf (II. In classical Islamic law), EI2.
Peters, R., Doris Behrens Abouseif, D. S. Powers, A. Carmona, A. Layish, Ann K. S. Lambton,
Randi Deguilhem, R. D. McChesney, G. C. Kozlowski, M. B. Hooker, and J. O. Hunwick,
Waḳf, EI2.
Petry, Carl, Fractionalized estates in a centralized regime. The holdings of al-Ashraf
Qāytbāy and Qānṣūh al-Ghawrī according to their waqf deeds, JESHO 41/1 (1998):
96–117.
Petry, Carl F., A Geniza for Mamluk studies? Charitable trust (waqf) documents as a
source for economic and social history, MSR 2 (1998): 51–60.
Philippon, Alix, A sublime, yet disputed, object of political ideology? Sufism in Pakistan
at the crossroads, Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 52/2 (2014): 271–92.
Philippon, Alix, An ambiguous and contentious politicization of Sufi shrines and pil-
grimages in Pakistan, in Michel Boivin and Rémy Delage (eds.), Devotional Islam in
contemporary South Asia. Shrines, journeys and wanderers (London 2015), 174–89.
Pinto, Paulo, Dangerous liaisons. Sufism and the state in Syria, in S. Jakelic and J. Varsoke
(eds.), Crossing boundaries. From Syria to Slovakia (Vienna 2003), 1–10.
Piraino, Francesco, Between real and virtual communities. Sufism in western societies
and the Naqshbandi Haqqani case, Social Compass 63/1 (2016): 93–108.
Powers, David S., Orientalism, colonialism, and legal history. The attack on Muslim
family endowments in Algeria and India, Comparative Studies in Society and
History 31/3 (1989): 535–71.
Rahimi, Babak, Between chieftaincy and knighthood. A comparative study of Ottoman
and Safavid origins, Thesis Eleven 76/1 (2004): 85–102.
Rashid, Syed Khalid, Bibliography and review of waqf literature produced in India,
Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia & Indonesia during 1977–2007, New Delhi 2009.
Raudvere, Catharina, Sufism today. Heritage and tradition in the global community,
London 2009.
Rizvi, Kishwar, The Safavid dynastic shrine. Architecture, religion and power in early
modern Iran, London 2011.
Roded, Ruth, Great mosques, zāwiyas and neighborhood mosques. Popular beneficia-
ries of waqf endowments in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Aleppo, JAOS 110/1
(1990): 32–8.
Endowments for Ṣūfīs and Their Institutions 79

Rodriguez-Manas, Francisco, Agriculture, Ṣūfism and the state in tenth/sixteenth-

century Morocco, BSOAS 59/3 (1996): 450–71.
Sabra, Adam, Poverty and charity in medieval Islam. Mamluk Egypt, 1250–1517,
Cambridge 2000.
Safi, Omid, The politics of knowledge in premodern Islam. Negotiating ideology and reli-
gious inquiry, Chapel Hill 2006.
Sait, Siraj and Hilary Lim, Land, law and Islam. Property and human rights in the Muslim
world, London and New York 2006.
Sanseverino, Ruggero Vimercati, Fès et sainteté, de la fondation à l’avènement du
Protectorat (808–1912). Hagiographie, tradition spirituelle et héritage prophétique
dans la ville de Mawlāy Idrīs, Rabat 2014.
Sariyannis, Marinos, The Kadizadeli movement as a social and political phenomenon.
The rise of a ‘mercantile ethic’? in Antonis Anastosopoulos et al. (eds.), Political ini-
tiatives ‘from the bottom up’ in the Ottoman Empire (Rethymno 2012), 263–89.
Schwarz, Florian, An endowment deed of 1547 (953 h.) for a Kubravi khanaqah in
Samarkand, in Lorenz Korn, Eva Orthmann, and Florian Schwarz (eds.), Die Grenzen
Der Welt. Arabica et Iranica ad honorem Heinz Gaube (Wiesbaden 2008), 189–210.
Sedgwick, Mark, Western Sufism. From the Abbasids to the new age, Oxford 2016.
Sharify-Funk, Meena, William Rory Dickson, and Merin Shobhana Xavier, Contemporary
Sufism. Piety, politics, and popular culture, London 2017.
Shatzmiller, Maya, Islamic institutions and property rights. The case of the ‘public
good’ waqf, JESHO 44/1 (2001): 44–74.
Sheriff, Abdul, Mosques, merchants and landowners, Azania: Archaeological Research
in Africa 27/1 (1992): 1–20.
Singer, Amy, Charity’s legacies. A reconsideration of Ottoman imperial endowment-
making, in Michael D. Bonner, Amy Singer, and Mine Ener (eds.), Poverty and
Charity in Middle Eastern Contexts (Albany 2003), 295–313.
Spuler, Bertold, Robert G. Hoyland, Gwendolin Goldbloom, and Berenike Walburg,
Iran in the early Islamic period. Politics, culture, administration and public life be-
tween the Arab and the Seljuk conquests, 633–1055, Leiden 2015.
Sublet, Jacqueline, Le Manuscrit autographe: un statut particulier? Des exemples à
l’époque mamelouke, in A. Görke and K. Hirschler (eds.), Manuscript notes as docu-
mentary sources (Würzburg 2011), 173–81.
Subtelny, Maria E., Timurids in transition. Turko-Persian politics and acculturation in
medieval Iran, Leiden 2007.
Taher, Mustapha Anouar and Jean-Claude Garcin, Enquête sur le financement d’un
waqf égyptien du XVe siècle. Les comptes de Jawhār al-Lālā, JESHO 38/3 (1995):
262–304.
Talmon-Heller, Daniella, Islamic piety in medieval Syria. Mosques, cemeteries and ser-
mons under the Zangids and Ayyūbids (1146–1260), Leiden 2007.
80 Hofer

Thibon, Jean-Jacques, L’oeuvre d’Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, 325/937–412/1021, et

la formation du soufisme, Damascus 2009.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, Transmission du hadith et modèle prophétique chez les pre-
miers soufis, Archives de sciences sociales des religions 178 (2017): 71–88.
Trakic, Adnan, A legal and administrative analysis of inalienable Muslim endowments
(awqāf) in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Islam and Civilisational Renewal (ICR) 3/2
(2012): 337–54.
Ulumiddin, Ahya, Socio-political turbulence of the Ottoman empire. Reconsidering
Sufi and Kadizadeli hostility in 17th century, Ulumuna 20/2 (2016): 319–52.
Van Renterghem, Vanessa, Les élites bagdadiennes au temps des Seldjoukides. Étude
d’histoire sociale, Beirut 2016.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufi and scholar on the desert edge. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Al-Sanūsī and his
brotherhood, Evanston 1995.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufism and social welfare in the Sahara, in Hoger Weiss (ed.), Social
welfare in Muslim societies in Africa (Stockholm 2002), 80–97.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufism and colonialism, in L. Ridgeon (ed.), The Cambridge companion
to Sufism (Cambridge 2015), 212–32.
Voll, John O., From saints and renewers to mahdis and proto-nationalists, in A. Salvatore,
et al. (eds.), The Wiley Blackwell history of Islam (Hoboken 2018), 499–518.
Wolper, Ethel Sara, Cities and saints. Sufism and the transformation of urban space in
medieval Anatolia, University Park 2003.
Yıldırım, Rıza, Dervishes, waqfs and conquest. Notes on early Ottoman expan-
sion in Thrace, in Pascale Ghazaleh (ed.), Held in trust. Waqf in the Islamic world
(Cairo 2014), 23–40.
Yürekli, Zeynep, A building between the public and private realms of the Ottoman
elite. The Sufi convent of Sokollu Mehmed Pasha in Istanbul, Muqarnas 20/1 (2003):
159–85.
Zaman, Muhammad Qasim, Islam in Pakistan. A history, Princeton 2018.
Zencirci, Gizem, From property to civil society. The historical transformation of vakifs
in modern Turkey (1923–2013), IJMES 47/03 (2015): 533–54.
Zuki, Mazrul Shahir Md., Waqf and its role in socio-economic development, ISRA
International Journal of Islamic Finance 4/2 (2012): 173–8.
Zysow, Aron, Karrāmiya, EIr.
 Chapter 3

Donations to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī Institutions

Hussain Ahmad Khan

With the emergence of the phenomenon of Sufism, first in the Middle East and
Persia, primary sources from as early as the fifth/eleventh century onwards,
among which we find al-Qushayrī’s (d. 465/1072) Risāla (treatise) and Khwāja
ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī’s (d. 481/1089) Ṭabaqāt al-Ṣūfiyya (Classes of the Ṣūfīs), began
discussing various types of donations, such as futūḥ (sing. fatḥ) and nudhūr
(sing. nadhr), that sultans, kings, nobility, and others (merchants and shop-
keepers are frequently mentioned) gave to Ṣūfī shaykhs and later, to their insti-
tutions. Futūḥ is derived from an Arabic root, fataḥa, that means “to open”; it
is largely understood as alms or charity, and can take the form of money or food,
clothing, or housing. In the mystical writings of the well-known theoretician of
Sufism, Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 638/1240), futūḥ also connotes “revelations” or “spiri-
tual openings,” hence the title of his opus magnum, the Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya
(Meccan openings). Often, Persian Ṣūfī sources translate futūḥ as “God-given
charity” or unsolicited gifts (Auer; Islam, 90–5). We may speculate that both
dimensions of futūḥ, i.e., alms and revelations, are intended in expressions
describing the lifestyle of Muslim mystics. Living “on donations” (ʿalā l-futūḥ)
means relying on God’s opening “the gates of livelihood” (abwāb al-rizq) to the
Ṣūfī; this is the most elevated kind of futūḥ, because it comes from the hidden
treasures of God’s creation (min al-kawn) (Goldziher, 48–50).
Nudhūr (nadhr, votive gifts) refers to the personal vows to dedicate or sac-
rifice something (e.g., money or animals) for an individual Ṣūfī or a Ṣūfī insti-
tution, after the fulfilment of his/her desire (Pedersen). Sometimes niyāz and
ṣadaqa are also used like nadhr. Nadhr is given after a conditional pledge has
been fulfilled, such as the wish for male progeny, or a pardon, or a successful
conquest of territory.

1 Views and Debates on Donations

Over time, a wide range of debates emerged in Ṣūfī circles about accepting
donations. Those who favoured their acceptance, especially futūḥ, argued that
it helps Ṣūfīs dedicate their lives to worshipping God and also saves them from
seeking work, and enables them to avoid subjecting themselves to a worldly

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_005

82 Khan

authority. For South Asian Chishtī Ṣūfīs, acceptance of futūḥ was a reflection
of tawakkul (absolute trust in God). Ṣūfīs did not ask for donations nor did
they refuse them and in most cases, quickly distributed the donations to their
followers among the lower social classes, such as craftsmen, cultivators, and
labourers. In principle, they opposed accepting donations from kings and the
nobility. This position was more of an ideal, one that could not be followed
given the circumstances. For instance, the seventh-/thirteenth-century Chishtī
Ṣūfī, Farīd al-Dīn Ganj-i Shakar (d. 664/1265), who lived in Pakpattan (in the
Punjab), refused donations, but, in cases of acute poverty, permitted his fol-
lowers to beg (“use the begging bowl”), a practice that was not as common
among Ṣūfīs as it was among dervishes (Papas). The shaykh Niẓām al-Dīn
Awliyāʾ (d. 725/1325) of Delhi advised Burhān al-Dīn Gharīb (d. 738/1337) of
the Deccan, to have “worthy people” as disciples and adopt a policy of “not re-
jecting, not asking, not saving” alms. He declared: “If anyone brings you some-
thing, do not reject it, but do not ask for anything, and if they bring a little of
something good, do not reject it (politely) in order to have it increased, nor
should you specify everything (else that you need) in accepting it” (Ernst and
Lawrence, 21). We find equivalent attitudes (that is, the refusal or acceptance
of donations, but only out of necessity) in other contexts, for instance, among
the Shādhilīs of Ifrīqiyya in the seventh/thirteenth century (Amri, 155).
Donations were not always unsolicited; sometimes they were demanded,
either implicitly or explicitly, and were made an essential part of rituals. In
sixth-/twelfth- to seventh-/thirteenth-century Morocco, a boat could not weigh
or cast anchor without giving alms (a part of their merchandise, such as oil,
figs, etc.) to the hermitage of Abū ʿAlī l-Ḥasan al-Qazzāz in Badis (Bādisī, 96–
9). More generally, one could evaluate the popularity of mediaeval Maghribi
saints by measuring (with a yardstick) the amount of futūḥ they collected
(Alouani, 137, 166, 183). In early modern times, two Indian Naqshbandī Ṣūfīs,
Shāh Palangpūsh (d. 1110/1699) and Shāh Musāfir (d. 1126/1715) in the city of
Awrangabad, used to demand nadhr to remove the misfortunes of their fol-
lowers. In the hagiography entitled Malfūẓāt-i Naqshbandiyya, Shāh Maḥmūd
(d. 1175/1762), the successor of Shāh Musāfir, stressed the spiritual and social
importance of giving nadhr. To him, those who neglected nadhr would go
insane or simply die (quoted in Green, 16–7). However, abandoning employ-
ment left Ṣūfīs completely dependent on donations, and this, too, could be
problematic. For instance, a Chishtī Ṣūfī in Delhi, Shāh Kalīm Allāh Jahānabādī
(d. 1142/1729), had to rent out his property to generate additional income, since
donations were not enough to support his khānaqāh and for him to recover
from illness (Ernst and Lawrence, 5). Whatever their pecuniary value, in fact,
donations from common people were often quite modest, and many pilgrims
Donations to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī Institutions 83

throughout the modern period brought nudhūr, as in the case of such dona-
tions to shrines in Cairo (De Jong, 31).
It is important to remember that, in the economy of Sufism, the issue of
income was not necessarily thought to reflect people’s generosity; that is, from
a Ṣūfī viewpoint, one’s income was ultimately God’s will. So, rather than ask-
ing for or expecting alms, many Ṣūfīs preferred to have an occupation. For ex-
ample, we find Ṣūfīs with professions such as bannāʾ (mason), saqaṭī (pedlar),
ḥaddād (blacksmith), ḥallāj (cotton carder), qawārīrī (glassmaker or seller),
warrāq (bookseller or copyist), and nassāj (weaver) (Schimmel, 84; Afshari in
this volume). Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1389), the eponymous master of
Naqshbandiyya Ṣūfī silsila, was an embroiderer or engraver; similarly, Bahāʾ
al-Dīn ʿAmīlī (d. 1030/1621) was an architect in the Ṣafavid Empire and was
involved in the construction of the Masjid-i-Shāh (mosque) in Isfahan. This
was in line with doctrinal positions (of certain Ṣūfīs) against inactivity. Among
other authors, the prominent Baghdad-based Muslim jurist and theologian Ibn
al-Jawzī (d. 597/1200) defended those who believed in working for a living and
rejecting alms, as opposed to those who were slothful:

We have seen a horde of more recent Sufis lounging around in the ribāṭ
so as to avoid working for a living, occupied by eating and drinking, song
and dance; they seek the things of the world from any tyrant, not hesitat-
ing to accept the gift of even the tax-collector! Most of their ribāṭs have
been built by despots who have endowed them with illegal properties …
The Sufis’ concern revolves around the kitchen, food, and ice water …
while they spend most of their time in amusing conversation and visiting
the nobility …
cited in Homerin, 64

2 Donations and Court Patronage

Premodern Muslim societies largely believed in baraka, an Arabic word mean-

ing “[divine] blessing,” “well-being,” or “grace.” This applied to the Ṣūfīs’ mirac-
ulous powers, which motivated people to support them, both individually, and
through their institutions. According to the anthropologist Clifford Geertz,
baraka “encloses a whole range of linked ideas: material prosperity, physical
well-being, bodily satisfaction, completion, luck, plenitude … [suggesting]
the proposition (again, of course, wholly tacit) that the sacred appears most
directly in the world as an endowment—a talent and the capacity, a special
ability—of particular individuals” (Geertz, 44). Mediaeval sultans believed
84 Khan

that by providing Ṣūfīs with material and financial support, they could invoke
baraka to win wars, protect themselves and their kingdoms against enemies,
and resolve their personal issues. For instance, in 708–9/1309–10, the sultan
ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Khaljī (r. 695–715/1296–1316) asked Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ to use his
baraka for the conquest of a fort in the Kakatiya kingdom of Telingana; like-
wise sultan Muḥammad Tughluq (r. 725–52/1325–51) requested the blessing of
a Suhrawardī Ṣūfī, Shaykh Rukn al-Dīn (d. 735/1335) of Multān, to crush a re-
volt. In return, the sultan pledged the waqf income from one hundred villages
to the Ṣūfī after the victory (Rizvi, 1:160, 213).
Supporting Ṣūfīs and their institutions materially was politically significant
for sultans and kings, in terms of commanding legitimacy and gathering faith-
ful subjects. Most mediaeval sultans obtained a khilāfat-nāma (i.e., a letter
from the caliph in Baghdad recognising their rule) that bound them to support
religious communities. Through a policy of patronage and non-intervention in
Ṣūfīs’ affairs the sultans legitimised their rule (Safi, 126). In India, appointing
a Ṣūfī to a ceremonial position, such as shaykh al-islām (an advisor to the sul-
tan on religious matters), made him eligible for a stipend, donations ( futūḥ),
and land grants. Muḥammad Tughluq appointed Sayyid Jalāl al-Dīn Bukhārī
(d. 785/1384) of Ucch Sharīf (in the Punjab), as shaykh al-islām; he was also
granted a khānaqāh in Sistan (at Sehwan) that was financially supported by the
income of nearby villages (Rizvi, 1:279). Such material strength aided in pros-
elytising activities, e.g., those of Suhrawardī Ṣūfīs in India, and new converts
were considered faithful subjects of the state (Aquil (ed.)). Ṣūfīs patronised
by kings largely became mediators between the local populace and the state.
In many cases, Ṣūfīs avoided visiting the royal courts, but when they did so, it
became an occasion for large grants and gifts. For instance, Rukn al-Dīn visited
the court of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Khaljī in Delhi twice and each time the sultan gave him
200,000 tankas (a significant amount at the time) on his arrival and 500,000
tankas when the shaykh returned to Multān. It is said that the shaykh imme-
diately distributed these donations among the people of Delhi (Rizvi, 1:211).
Muslim rulers who assumed the title of bādshāh (monarch or king, from the
Persian pādishāh) and did not request a khilāfat-nāma from the caliph were
still politically compelled to support the Ṣūfīs. These kings were, as in the case
of the Mughals in India, ethnically, culturally, and religiously different, and re-
quired intermediaries who commanded respect among the people. If making
donations to individual Ṣūfīs and their institutions had political undertones,
the Ṣūfīs’ acceptance or rejection of such donations did as well. By accepting
donations, they accepted the legitimacy of the donor. For instance, a contrario,
Shāh Musāfir refused to accept nadhr by a Central Asian soldier because the
latter was aiding the enemies of Shāh Musāfir’s patron (Green, 16).
Donations to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī Institutions 85

With the institutionalisation of Sufism in the Middle East, Iran, and in Central
and South Asia, the belief in baraka and donations to Ṣūfī institutions such as
shrines and khānaqāhs also became institutionalised in a sense. Khānaqāhs
were often huge complexes with staff such as healers, builders, labourers, gro-
cers, water-carriers, butchers, gardeners, and cooks. Kings and nobles donated
large sums in exchange for prayers from the Ṣūfīs in this world and in the here-
after. Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn (r. 564–89/1169–93) established one of the earliest known
khānaqāhs in Cairo, named al-Salāḥiyya or Saʿīd al-Suʿadāʾ, to house itinerant
Ṣūfīs; he also gave huge endowments and futūḥ in the hope that the khānaqāh
would continue to flourish after him (Hofer, 35). The khānaqāh sheltered ap-
proximately 300 Ṣūfīs, most of whom were non-Egyptians. In some instances,
khānaqāh appeared to be more resourceful than the local administration. For
instance, in seventh-/thirteenth- and eighth-/fourteenth-century India, en-
dowments and futūḥ granted by the sultans, nobility, and traders made the
khānaqāh of the Suhrawardiyya so affluent that local governors borrowed grain
from them during periods of drought. A hagiographical story in Iran relates
that the invocations of the shaykh Amīn al-Dīn Balyānī (d. 745/1345) gave Faqīh
Rūḥ al-Dīn Rāmgardī a donation of 200,000 dinars so that he could repay his
debt to the governors of Shiraz (Aigle, Le soufisme, 243). Yet, in most mediaeval
khānaqāhs, Ṣūfīs distributed futūḥ among needy people immediately upon re-
ceiving them. Ṣūfī traditions did not lay down strict rules for how futūḥ were to
be used, so donations collected for one purpose could be used for another. For
instance, on his deathbed, Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ asked that his servant (who
was reluctant to do so) distribute all his grain to the public kitchen (Islam, 113).
Mediaeval rulers gave huge futūḥ to Ṣūfī shrines for two reasons: first, they
believed that those close to God did not die, but were remained alive in their
graves; second, it was in the interest of the kings to support deceased Ṣūfīs
instead of living ones, because there was less possibility of conflict with those
already dead. Muslim rulers in Central and South Asia and Iran continued to
give donations and to rebuild, repair, and maintain the shrines of Ṣūfīs who
had died centuries earlier. Donations from kings and the nobility were one of
the ways of controlling Ṣūfīs and their institutions. When the successors of
Burhān al-Dīn Gharīb’s shrine were unable to cover their expenses, they sought
donations from the sultans of the Deccan.
In the mediaeval Muslim world, particularly in Iran and the Ottoman
Empire, artisan guilds headed by a Ṣūfī shaykh or those that were part of a
Ṣūfī ṭarīqa enjoyed the patronage of kings, artisans, and traders for many rea-
sons (Afshari in this volume): First, they garnered support for the king or for
the opposition to the king; second, they increased the productivity of the ar-
tisan guild by relating craft practices to divine help; third, they intensified the
86 Khan

process of conversion. For instance, artisan guilds and traders donated futūḥ
in large numbers to a Khurāsānī dervish named Ḥasan Jurī (d. 743/1342) and
his militant followers to initiate a resistance movement, popularly known
as the Sarbidarān movement, against the oppression of local landlords. The
movement was successful in establishing an independent state at Sabzevar
between 738/1337 and 783/1381 (Aigle, Sarbedārs). The Ottomans appointed a
shaykh of the Rifāʿiyya Ṣūfī order, Sayyid Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Kamāl
al-Dīn b. ʿAjlān (d. 1025/1616), based in Damascus, as the shaykh mashāyikh
al-ḥiraf (head of guilds). Similarly, in 1098/1687, the Ṣūfī master of the
Khalwatiyya silsila was appointed head of the artisan guild in Tripoli, Lebanon
(Wilkins, 255). The main objective of such appointments and the financial sup-
port of these Ṣūfīs was to reduce the chances of revolt and increase the produc-
tivity of the guilds. Shāh ʿAbbās I (r. 995–1038/1587–1629) of the Ṣafavid Empire
financially supported various Ṣūfī factions, such as Niʿmatīs/Niʿmatullāhīs,
Ḥaydarīs, and Lutīs in artisan guilds dominant in the bazaars of Iran, which
were hubs of political and social life. The main objective of this financial sup-
port was to create a division among the artisan guilds and thereby reduce the
chances of revolt (Keyvani, 249–50).

3 Donations from Non-Muslims

Interestingly, non-Muslim rulers also adopted a strategy of offering dona-

tions to Ṣūfī shrines to obtain their support, and many of these rulers actually
believed in baraka. The futūḥ of non-Muslim rulers to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī institu-
tions provides some interesting quantitative data. For instance, in twelfth-/
eighteenth-century India, a Maratha dīwān (prime minister) at Poona gave
the Naqshbandī shrine of Shāh Palangpūsh and Shāh Musāfir in the city of
Awrangabad the right to collect donations from Maratha rulers and nobility.
Through these donations, the custodians built parts of the shrine, purchased
new land for themselves, managed public kitchens, and held annual ʿurs (festi-
vals on the anniversary of a saint’s death). In 1186/1772, the custodians collected
a large sum (678 rupees) to organise the ʿurs (Green, 60–1). The Maratha State
was in conflict with the Mughals and the Afghans. A famous Naqshbandī mas-
ter, Shāh Wālī Allāh (d. 1176/1762) of Delhi, invited Afghan rulers to save Delhi
from Maratha rule, which had overpowered the Mughals. Similarly, in the
early nineteenth century, the maharaja Ranjit Singh (d. 1254/1839)—despite
the fact that he fought against the Muslim rulers of Multān and Bahawalpur
states, which had the support of Chishtī Ṣūfīs such as Ḥāfiẓ Jamāl Multānī
(d. 1226/1811) and Sulaymān Tawnsawī (d. 1267/1850), and had also destroyed
Donations to Ṣūfīs and Ṣūfī Institutions 87

Ṣūfī shrines in Multān and Jhang—used to make generous donations to the

shrines of ʿAlī b. ʿUthmān al-Hujwīrī (d. between 465/1072 and 469/1077) in
Lahore, Farīd al-Dīn Ganj-i Shakar in Pakpattan, ʿAbd al-Qādir II (d. 940/1533)
in Ucch, Shāh Ḥusayn (d. 1008/1599) in Lahore, and Miyān Mīr (d. 1045/1635)
in Lahore. The Sikh maharaja offered land and subsidies to Ṣadr al-Dīn Shāh
(d. 1270/1853), head of the Qādiriyya of Multān. He also participated in Ṣūfī fes-
tivals, especially the basant festival (spring festival) held at the shrine of Shāh
Ḥusayn. Sometimes, he asked others to give futūḥ to a particular Ṣūfī or shrine,
as in the case of Aḥmad Khān Sial who was asked to pay tribute to the Ṣūfīs in
Ucch. Following the tradition of mediaeval Muslim kings, the maharaja do-
nated 9,000 rupees when the custodian of the Pakpattan shrine, Dīwān Shaykh
Muḥammad Yār, visited him (Singh, 204–9; Papas and Touseef, 212). When the
maharaja was on his deathbed, the communities linked to these shrines held
special prayers for the well-being of their patron.
In the pre-colonial Muslim world, in many ways futūḥ and nudhūr defined
political relationships, and shaped social and cultural lives in the form of the
institutions of khānaqāhs and shrines, and more significantly, they enabled
people to find mystical meanings in worldly practices. During the colonial
period, donations to Ṣūfīs continued, perhaps to a lesser extent, in regions
such as the Indian subcontinent in particular. For example, throughout the
nineteenth century, the lodge of Sulaymān Tawnsawī in the Punjab seems
to have been managed by futūḥ from the local ashrafiyya (Muslim nobility)
(Khan, 37–40 and n. 17).

Bibliography

Aigle, Denise, Sarbedārs, EIr.

Aigle, Denise, Le soufisme sunnite en Fārs. Šayḫ Amīn al-dīn Balyānī, in Denise Aigle
(ed.), L’Iran face à la domination mongole (Tehran 1997), 231–60.
Alouani, Salah, Tribus et Marabouts. Aʿrāb et walāya dans l’intérieur de l’Ifriqiya entre le
VIe/XIIe et le XIIe/XVIIIe siècles, Helsinki 2010.
Amri, Nelly, Les Shâdhilîs de l’Ifrîqiyya médiévale. Filiations et affiliations à l’aune
de l’historien, in Eric Geoffroy (ed.), Une voie soufie dans le monde. La Shâdhiliyya
(Paris 2005), 133–58.
Aquil, Raziuddin, ed., Sufism and society in medieval India, New Delhi 2010.
Auer, Blain, Futūḥ, EI3.
Bādisī, al-ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq, El-Maqṣad (Vies des saints du Rîf ) de ʿAbd el-Ḥaqq el-Bâdisî.
Traduction annotée de G. S. Colin, Archives marocaines, vol. xxvi, Paris 1926.
88 Khan

De Jong, Frederick, Cairene ziyâra-days. A contribution to the study of saint veneration

in Islam, DI 17/1–4 (1976–77): 26–43.
Ernst, Carl W. and Bruce B. Lawrence, Sufi martyrs of love. The Chishti order in South
Asia and beyond, New York 2016.
Geertz, Clifford, Islam observed. Religious development in Morocco and Indonesia,
Chicago 1971.
Goldziher, Ignaz, Materialien zur Entwickelungsgeschichte des Ṣûfismus, WZKM 13
(1899): 35–56.
Green, Nile, Indian Sufism since the seventeenth century. Saints, books and empires in the
Muslim Deccan, New York 2006.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1225,
Edinburgh 2015.
Homerin, Emil T., Saving Muslim souls. The khanqah and the Sufi duty in Mamluk
lands, MSR 3 (1999): 59–83.
Islam, Riazul, Sufism in South Asia. Impact on fourteenth century Muslim society,
Karachi 2002.
Keyvani, Mehdi, Artisans and guild life in the later Safavid period, PhD dissertation,
Durham University, 1980.
Khan, Hussain Ahmad, Artisans, Sufis, shrines. Colonial architecture in nineteenth cen-
tury Punjab, London 2015.
Papas, Alexandre, Dervish, EI3.
Papas, Alexandre and Muhammad Touseef, L’histoire du soufisme à Multan (Pakistan).
Nouvelles données, Journal of the History of Sufism 7 (2018): 199–228.
Pedersen, Johannes, Nad̲ h̲r, EI2.
Rizvi, Saiyid Athar Abbas, A history of Sufism in India. Early Sufism and its history in
India to AD 1600, vol. 1, Lahore 2004.
Safi, Omid, The politics of knowledge in premodern Islam. Negotiating ideology and reli-
gious inquiry, Chapel Hill, NC 2006.
Schimmel, Annemarie, Mystical dimension of Islam, Chapel Hill, NC 1975.
Singh, Rishi, State formation and the establishment of non-Muslim hegemony in the
post-Mughal nineteenth-century Punjab, PhD dissertation, SOAS, 2009.
Wilkins, Charles L., Forging urban solidarities. Ottoman Aleppo 1640–1700, Leiden 2010.
 Chapter 4

Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds

Mehran Afshari

The business and trade guild of a second-/eighth- to fifth-/eleventh-century

Ṣūfī is usually apparent in his appellation. For example, Sarī l-Saqaṭī (d. 253/867)
was a seller of bric-a-brac (saqaṭ); the leader of the Malāmatiyya (or “path of
blame”) in Nīshāpūr, Ḥamdūn Qaṣṣār (d. 271/884), was a laundryman (qaṣṣār);
another member of the Malāmatiyya, Abū Ḥafṣ [ʿAmr b. Salma] al-Ḥaddād
(d. between 265/879 and 270/884) was a metalworker (ḥaddād); Abū Saʿīd
al-Kharrāz (d. c. 286/899) was a cobbler (kharrāz) who sewed and sold leather
goods; and Abū ʿAlī Daqqāq (d. 405/1015) was a flour seller (daqqāq).
However, it was also common for early Ṣūfīs to leave behind their trade
when embarking on the spiritual path. They understood that the proper prac-
tice of tawakkul (entrusting one’s affairs to God), mentioned repeatedly in the
Qurʾān as a trait of those who are truly faithful (see, for example, 5:11, 9:51, 14:11,
58:10), required them to forsake worldly activity and depend only on God for
their sustenance. Early Ṣūfīs, therefore, were opposed to the idea that the spiri-
tual wayfarer should work for a living (Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:103; Ibn al-Jawzī,
225, 227). Thus, when they were initiated into Sufism, they gave up their previ-
ous employment and lived a life of simple poverty, sometimes even begging for
alms in order to humble their egos (Ibn al-Jawzī, 218, 226).

1 Earning a Living and Relying upon God in Sufism

The celebrated Bishr b. Ḥārith al-Ḥāfī (d. 227/841 or 842), remembered for
renouncing the study of ḥadīth and for walking barefoot, is one example of
an early Ṣūfī who renounced earning a living through trade or labour. Before
taking to a life of asceticism, Bishr earned a living by making yarn from cot-
ton (al-Sarrāj, 195). However, despite examples in which early Ṣūfīs renounced
work, this was not the general trend and Ṣūfīs tended to accept that earning a
living and having a profession was something practiced by the prophets of God.
Adam, for instance, was said to be a farmer (Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:1103); Seth
was a weaver of burlap; David was an armourer; Solomon wove baskets from
palm leaves, which he then sold for two loaves of barley bread each; and both
Moses and Abraham were shepherds (Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:1104). Nevertheless,

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_006

90 Afshari

Ṣūfīs did not tend to believe it was obligatory to earn a living, merely that it was
permissible. In short, they did not believe they needed to have a profession,
although they could if they chose to (Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:1105). Most Ṣūfīs un-
derstood tawakkul to mean that relying on God to provide for one’s daily suste-
nance and needs was better than earning a living, and said that only those who
had fallen from the spiritual station of tawakkul had to seek a living and earn a
livelihood (al-Sarrāj, 195–6; Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:1107).
Conversely, in the second/eighth century there were some Ṣūfīs who em-
phasised the importance of earning a living, as they believed this was the
practice of the Prophet of Islam. For example, it was reported that ʿAbdallāh
b. al-Mubārak (d. 181/797), an early scholar and ascetic, said that there is no
good in anyone who has not humbled himself through work, while he also ad-
vised his followers that they should not let their profession or earning a living
cause them to forget to rely on God in all their affairs (al-Sarrāj, 196). Similarly,
Ibrāhīm b. Adham (d. 161/777–8), a prominent early Ṣūfī said, “Earning a
permissible livelihood to provide for one’s family is a religious obligation”
(al-Sarrāj, 196). He himself worked as a gardener and shared his earnings with
his companions (al-Sarrāj, 178). However, later, most Ṣūfī shaykhs relied on beg-
ging or wealthy individuals to sponsor their lodges and provide food for them
to eat (Ibn al-Jawzī, 229), as we read repeatedly, for example, in the biography
of Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) (Ibn Munawwar, 1:118, 148–9, 152–3).
Abū Ḥafs Ḥaddād (d. 264/878), who was a blacksmith, gave what little money
he made each day to the dervishes and spent his nights going door-to-door
begging for alms, living on the bread he obtained in this manner (al-Sarrāj, 197;
Mustamlī Bukhārī, 3:212). It is related that Abū Ḥafs said, “I gave up earning a
number of times before returning to it again, until one day I resolved to give it
up and then never again returned to it” (al-Sarrāj, 196; Hujwīrī, 190). However,
we should hesitate before accepting this report, as Abū Ḥafs was a Malāmatī
and the Malāmatiyya as a rule believed in continuing to earn a living and work
in a profession. The leader of the Malāmatiyya, Ḥamdūn Qaṣṣār, had a disciple
by the name of ʿAbdallāh Ḥajjām, who practiced cupping (ḥijāma) as a profes-
sion. ʿAbdallāh asked his master whether he should discontinue his profession,
to which Ḥamdūn replied, “On the contrary, you should strive harder in your
profession. I prefer that you become known as ʿAbdallāh the ḥajjām (the prac-
titioner of cupping) rather than ʿAbdallāh the zāhid (ascetic) or ʿārif (mystic)”
(al-Sulamī, 94).
The Malāmatiyya movement originated in the third/ninth century, from be-
liefs and practices associated with the ideals of chivalry or futuwwa (Afshari
(ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 67, 68, 74–5, 81). Individuals known to belong to
this group of Ṣūfīs are mentioned in classical books on Sufism as those who
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 91

subscribed to the ideals of futuwwa; they are given descriptions and titles
such as ʿayyār, javānmard, ṣuʿlūk (all words that imply a chivalrous disposi-
tion). Examples of such persons include Aḥmad Khiḍruwiyya (d. 246/860),
Shāh Shujāʿ Kirmānī (d. c. 300/913), and Abū l-Ḥasan Pūshangī (d. 348/959).
These Ṣūfīs introduced the ideals of futuwwa into Sufism—their efforts are
evident in the moral precepts discussed in Ṣūfī works on futuwwa, such as the
Risāla Qushayriyya by Abū l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072) and the Kitāb al-
futuwwa of Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021). Discussions such as
theirs gave rise to the Malāmatiyya, a Ṣūfī movement closely linked to the prac-
tice of futuwwa; in fact the Kitāb al-futuwwa is similar in content to al-Sulamī’s
work on the movement, the Risālat al-Malāmatiyya. However, this is not to say
that these figures gave rise, directly, to futuwwa as a practice or moral code and
it is important to distinguish between ideals and principles, on the one hand,
and a fully-developed code, on the other (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 68).
Centuries later, after the decline of the Malāmatiyya of Khurāsān, the
Khwājagān or early Naqshbandiyya, more than other Ṣūfī orders, emphasised
the importance of earning a living, and their followers tended to have a trade
(Zarrīnkūb, 207–8).

2 Futuwwa

Even though many of the craftsmen who became Ṣūfīs left their trades be-
hind, craftsmen and merchants who did not become Ṣūfīs nevertheless fol-
lowed a code that (like Sufism) emphasised the struggle against one’s lower
desires and the importance of undertaking spiritual wayfaring. The moral pre-
cepts that were of particular importance to these craftsmen and merchants
included helping others, generosity, clemency, self-abnegation, altruism, hos-
pitality, keeping one’s word and fulfilling contracts, keeping the secrets of
others, showing kindness, and forgiving the mistakes of others (Afshari (ed.),
Futuvvat nāma-hā, 58–66). This code was called futuwwa in Arabic (from fatā,
meaning “youth”) and javānmardī in Persian, both of which are similar to the
English term “chivalry.” While futuwwa is a phenomenon that arises out of
the Islamic tradition, chivalric codes can be traced to Sāsānid Iran, suggest-
ing that pre-Islamic Persian sources influenced the practice (Zakeri, Sāsānid
soldiers, 84–94).
Originally, futuwwa reflected the moral code of a class of warriors known
as ʿayyār (a designation that was later adopted by merchants and craftsmen).
We do not know exactly when merchants and craftsmen began following the
same code as the ʿayyār, but the Qābūs nāma indicates that it was well before
92 Afshari

the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–622/1179–1225) combined fu-
tuwwa with Sufism and asceticism. Written by the Ziyārid prince Kaykāwūs
b. Iskandar ʿUnṣur al-Maʿālī in 475/1082, the Qābūs nāma is a Persian text on
futuwwa that discusses not just the code of honour for ʿayyārs and soldiers,
but also that of craftsmen and merchants (Kaykāwūs, 242, 249). Kaykāwūs also
speaks about the futuwwa of the Ṣūfīs, further illustrating that only some Ṣūfīs
followed the moral precepts of the futuwwa code and that Sufism had little to
do with its rituals and ceremonies (Kaykāwūs, 249–57).
In the early centuries of Islam, the ʿayyār were predominantly active in the
cities of Iraq which, prior to the Arab conquests, was part of the Sāsānid em-
pire. They were ordinary people, rather than nobility, but daring and martial
in character, and frequently involved in political affairs. Some would disrupt
the peace and security of cities and steal from homes and shops (Ibn al-Athīr,
9:126, 248). But the unruliness of the ʿayyār paid off in 197/813 when Ṭāhir Dhū
l-Yamīnayn (d. 207/822), the Persian commander of al-Ma‌ʾmūn’s (d. 218/833)
forces, attacked Baghdad with the intention of removing al-Amīn (d. 198/813)
from the caliphate and installing al-Ma‌ʾmūn in his place. The city’s ʿayyārs
fought Ṭāhir’s soldiers and brought about a memorable defeat (Ibn al-Athīr,
6:189–90). Later, in the seventh/thirteenth century, the ʿAbbāsid caliph,
al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh, who was sympathetic to the code of futuwwa, officially
declared himself head of the ʿayyārs, in the hope that it would prevent them
from causing disorder and committing criminal acts in the cities (Ibn al-Athīr,
11:286–7; Taeschner, 55–72; Zakeri, From futuwwa, 30–4; Cahen, 235–42). It
was during this period that Ibn al-Miʿmār (d. 642/1244) wrote (in Arabic) his
Kitāb al-futuwwa, one of the oldest works on the topic, and thereby affirmed
the adherence of al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh and his followers to the code of chivalry.
This work shows that futuwwa in Baghdad at this time had, to varying degrees,
become mixed with asceticism and Sufism, and the number of fighters and
ruffians in its ranks had diminished. Ibn al-Miʿmār enumerates the condi-
tions a person must meet to be accepted into the code of futuwwa: (1) he must
be male; (2) he must be adult; (3) he must be of sound mind; (4) he must be
a pious Muslim; (5) he must not have any blemish or disability in his body;
(6) he must have muruwwa (lit., “manliness,” from the Arabic word marʾ, mean-
ing “man”), which is more or less synonymous with futuwwa but which seems
to have been used by Ibn al-Miʿmār specifically to refer to the traits of fairness,
munificence, and generosity (Ibn al-Miʿmār, 160–78).
Members of futuwwa fraternities organised themselves into a hierarchy of
ranks and grades. The first among these ranks is the jadd (grandfather), of
whom all of the members are disciples. Second is the kabīr (elder), a lower
rank than the jadd, his disciples are those individuals that he initiated into
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 93

futuwwa. Other names for this rank include shaykh (elder), pidar (father),
and pīr (elder). Third in rank is the zaʿīm (chief), whose job it is to give ad-
vice and moral exhortation to the disciples. Fourth is the wakīl (deputy) who
serves as the representative of the kabīr and shaykh and who succeeds them.
Fifth is the naqīb (leader), appointed by the kabīr or pidar, whose responsibil-
ity it was to look after the affairs of the junior members and meet their needs
(Ibn al-Miʿmār, 75–7, 192, 206).
The members of the futuwwa were organised into independent groups
based on their association with some of the leading elders of the organisation.
Each group was called a “house” (bayt) or “party” (ḥizb). Typically, a “house”
was larger than a “party” and a single house might contain several parties (Ibn
al-Miʿmār, 75).
New members of a futuwwa order were initiated through a number of ritu-
als, including tying the girdle, donning the trousers of the futuwwa, and drink-
ing salty water or salty milk from a bowl. The practices of futuwwa spread
throughout Muslim lands, but were especially prevalent in regions such as
Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and Anatolia. The initiation practices of these diverse
groups in various regions appear to have differed from one another over time
but, according to Ibn al-Miʿmār, in the seventh/thirteenth century, it appears
that an aspirant would take an existing member as a mentor and then be ad-
mitted to the futuwwa society after performing whatever rituals of initiation
were required.
During the initiation, the special girding (called a shadd, or “binding”) worn
by members of the futuwwa was placed on the floor in the middle of the gath-
ering. The naqīb would then emerge from the members gathered, and ask both
the kabīr and the aspirant’s mentor (known as a ṣāḥib or ustād) for permission
to begin the ceremony. He would recite a sermon (khuṭba) in Arabic, prais-
ing God and the Prophet, then invoke blessings on the ruler or caliph of the
time, and recite some verses of the Qurʾān or sayings of the Prophet on the
merits of futuwwa. Then he would command the aspirant to stand up. When
the aspirant stood, the naqīb would ask the gathering if anyone had anything
to say or any objection to the aspirant. If no one objected, the naqīb would
respectfully announce the name of the aspirant and say that he wishes such-
and-such a person (namely, his mentor) to accept him as a friend (rafīq) (It
is noteworthy that whereas Ṣūfīs used the term murīd to denote a disciple,
among the futuwwa orders it was common to use the term rafīq). At this point,
all the members of the gathering would stand up and the kabīr would say to
the mentor, “This gathering also wishes you to accept this aspirant as a friend.”
The mentor would say: “I accept.” The naqīb then would then wrap the girding
around the waist of the aspirant, now called a “son” ( farzand) and present him
94 Afshari

with the trousers of futuwwa. The kabīr would get up and firmly tie the knot of
the girding, before giving the aspirant a bowl of salty water (or salty milk) to
drink (this part of the ritual is known as the shurb, or “drinking”). All of those
gathered would pass the bowl and take a drink from it, until it reached the
hand of the mentor. He would drink and say, “Peace be with you, youths!” Then
the naqīb would answer on behalf of those assembled. The mentor would say,
“I have accepted, for the sake of God, in following the Prophet, this person
as an aspirant through this ritual of drinking.” Then the naqīb himself would
take the bowl of salty water and drink from it before bringing the ceremony to
a close (Ibn al-Miʿmār, 192–3, 236–9). By the late seventh/thirteenth century
and early eighth/fourteenth century, Najm al-Dīn Zarkūb (d. 712/1312) wrote
that the mentor himself, rather than the naqīb, would present the trousers of
futuwwa and wrap the girding around the waist of the aspirant. This was done
because the disciple had entered the society of futuwwa and become the stu-
dent of his mentor (Zarkūb, 195).
A statement of the Iranian preacher and polymath Ḥusayn Wāʿiẓ Kāshifī
(d. 910/1504–5) illustrates the way in which the initiatory practices of futuwwa
varied over time and place. Writing almost three centuries after Ibn al-Miʿmār,
Kāshifī says, “A rank called ‘the father of God’s covenant’ (pidar-i ʿahd Allāh)
delivers moral admonition to the disciple during the initiation ceremony and
teaches him several utterances. Then there is a rank called ‘the master of the
girding’ (ustād-i shadd) who wraps the girding around his waist and presents
him with the bowl of salty water to drink” (Kāshifī Sabzawārī, 131–8).
Rank and file members of the futuwwa orders were given the title of “broth-
er” (akh) and would address one another as “my brother” (akhī) (Ibn Baṭṭūṭa,
1:292). However, this practice was not exclusive to the futuwwa orders; Ṣūfīs
also addressed one another in these terms (ʿAbbādī, 78). In the eighth/four-
teenth century, the traveller Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (d. 770/1368–9 or 779/1377) met crafts-
men in Anatolia who followed the futuwwa code and were known as “brothers.”
He said that whatever they earned through their trade during the day, they
would deliver to the elder or head of the guild in the mid-afternoon. With this
money, food and fruit were purchased for the guild lodge. According to Ibn
Baṭṭūṭa, the craft guildsmen of Anatolia would wear a robe and walk around
in a specific style of shoes. They also carried a dagger on their belt. On their
heads, they wore white felt hats with a tassel hanging from the tip. When they
were in the lodge, they would remove their hats. He also describes, in great
detail, the hospitality of the youth, as this reflects one of the fundamental
precepts of the futuwwa code (Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, 1:292–3). Ibn Baṭṭūṭa’s descrip-
tions can be compared to those of Aflākī in Manāqib al-ʿārifīn (The virtues of
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 95

the gnostics), a work on the “brothers” of Anatolia in the seventh/thirteenth

century. According to Aflākī, the “ruffians” (rinds) of Anatolia were disciples
of the “brothers”; that is, they subscribed to the futuwwa chivalric code. Al-
though these brothers were, to varying degrees, ascetics, and some of them
adopted the habits of the Ṣūfīs, some were like the ʿayyārs and frequently dis-
turbed the peace and caused commotion in cities (Aflākī ʿĀrifī, 2:755–8, 840–1;
Ridgeon, Morals and mysticism, 80–3). The most famous brother in the history
of Anatolia was Nāṣir al-Dīn Awrān/Evren who appears to have lived sometime
in the seventh/thirteenth or eighth/fourteenth century. Today his grave is situ-
ated in Kırşehir, Turkey. Although he was the elder of the tanner’s guild, his
initiatic genealogy (which is preserved in the Kırşehir Museum) indicates that
he belonged to an initiatic chain that included elders from other guilds. These
elders included Akhī Ḥusām Sūzangar (who was associated with the needle-
makers guild) and Akhī Muḥammad Ḥaṣīrbāf (who was a mat weaver) (Köksal,
et al., Kırşehir, 48; Köksal, Ana kaynaklarıyla, 43–91).
Guildsmen in eighth-/fourteenth-century Iran called their leader “kulū,”
which might have been a corruption of the word kalān, signifying “great” or
“senior.” The presence of kulūs in Shiraz in this century is notable in the politi-
cal influence they exercised whenever rule in the city passed from one dynasty
to another (Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah risāla, 34–7).
To teach initiates the moral precepts, doctrines, etiquette, and rituals of
futuwwa, masters composed treatises in Persian, Turkish, or Arabic. In Persian,
such works were known as futuvvat nāmas, while in Arabic a work in this
genre would be entitled Kitāb al-futuwwa. The most detailed extant example
of one of these works in Arabic is the aforementioned Kitāb al-futuwwa of Ibn
al-Miʿmār; it expounds the teachings of futuwwa in line with what the caliph
al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh adopted in the seventh/thirteenth century. The oldest
surviving Persian futuvvat nāmas were also written in the seventh/thirteenth
century, by Ṣūfī masters such as Abū Ḥafs Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar Suhrawardī (for
more on his Futuvvat nāma, see Ridgeon, Jawanmardi, 25–40; Zakeri, From
futuwwa, 34–49). Another futuvvat nāma was written by Najm al-Dīn Zarkūb
toward the end of the seventh/thirteenth century, and a didactic poem on
futuwwa was composed by Mawlānā Nāṣirī Siwāsī (d. after 689/1290) around
the same time. The Futuvvat nāma of Mīr Sayyid ʿAlī Hamadānī (d. 786/1385)
from the eighth/fourteenth century makes extensive use of classical Ṣūfī moral
thought with regard to futuwwa, but also discusses some of the etiquette of the
futuwwa guilds, such as the donning of the trousers of futuwwa (for a general
introduction to the genre of futuvvat nāmas in Persian, see Taeschner, 235–73,
394–401). However, the most detailed futuvvat nāma in Persian was written
96 Afshari

in the ninth/fifteenth century by Kāshifī Sabzawārī, and was entitled Futuvvat

nāma-yi sulṭānī.
Of the many Turkish works on futuwwa, perhaps the most well-known and
comprehensive is the fütüvvetnāme of Khalīl Būrghāzī, from the seventh/
thirteenth century (see Gölpınarlı, 32; Taeschner, 319–93). Other notewor-
thy works of futuwwa in Turkish include the Fütüvvetnāme-i Imām Caʿfer
Ṣādıq and the Fütüvvetnāme-i raḍavī from the tenth/sixteenth century, and
the Fütüvvetnāme-i Şeykh Ḥüseyn Ghaybī from the ninth/fifteenth century
(Gölpınarlı, 33–5). There are also a number of untitled and previously un-
known works that the Turkish scholar, M. Fatih Köksal, has introduced in his
work on futuwwa (Köksal, Ana kaynaklarıyla).
The classical Persian futuvvat nāmas from the seventh/thirteenth century
divide the members of the futuwwa into two groups: (1) military (sayfī; from
the Arabic word for sword) and (2) civilian (qawlī; from the Arabic word for
speech). The military members were traditionally drawn from the ʿayyārs and
fighters, while the civilians were drawn from the merchants and craft guilds
(Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 46). The civilians recited the ceremonial
formulae in the futuwwa rituals (Nāṣirī, 24–5; Suhrawardī, 101). The Futuvvat
nāma of Najm al-Dīn Zarkūb, written at the end of the seventh/thirteenth, or
beginning of the eighth/fourteenth century, mentions a third group within the
futuwwa, called the “drinkers” (shurbī) (Zarkūb, 187, 191–2). It seems that the
shurbīs were those members of the futuwwa who, rather than being trades-
people, were inclined towards Sufism and asceticism, and wore clothes made
of wool. It appears that this designation was applied to the Qalandars (Afshari
(ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 46).
All the futuvvat nāmas identify the progenitor and archetype of the futu-
wwa as ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib, with Salmān al-Fārsī, the Persian Companion of the
Prophet, as his successor. The followers of futuwwa believed that on the day of
Ghadīr seventeen individuals were initiated into the order of futuwwa and the
first of these was Salmān. Most of the works on futuwwa that survive from the
seventh/thirteenth century onwards reveal Shīʿa tendencies. This Shīʿism was
outwardly Twelver, though in terms of its beliefs and practices, it was strongly
influenced by the ghulāt (so-called extremists) (Gölpınarlı, 75–79).
From the seventh/thirteenth century also, we see that some futuvvat nāmas
identify certain types of tradesmen as unworthy of joining the fraternity—
winebibbers, gamblers, and fornicators were widely barred from the futuwwa.
For example, Ibn al-Miʿmār said that musicians and painters were not allowed
to join (Ibn al-Miʿmār, 176–8) and Mawlānā Nāṣirī Siwāsī said that butchers,
skinners, and barbers who work in bathhouses are forbidden from joining the
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 97

fraternity (Nāṣirī, 10–2). However, we have extant futuvvat nāmas written by

people from some of these rejected professions. For instance, from the twelfth/
eighteenth century, when the Ṣafavids ruled Iran, despite the views of authors
such as Nāṣirī Siwāsī, there are futuvvat nāmas for butchers and bathhouse
workers (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 147–54; Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah
risāla, 177–95). Indeed, it has been said that Javānmard Qaṣṣāb, the legend-
ary pīr of the butcher’s guild, was one of the seventeen persons supposedly
initiated into the futuwwa by ʿAlī (Kāshifī Sabzawārī, 122, 381; Afshari, Soufis,
héros et metiers en Iran). As for bathhouse workers, they bathed and cleaned
others, shaving the heads of their customers or trimming their hair and mas-
saging them. They would also let the blood of their customers through cup-
ping (hijāma), believing it to be therapeutic. They too traced their futuwwa
to Salmān al-Fārsī but placed greater emphasis on this, going so far as to call
themselves “Salmānīs” (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 182–98, 201–9, 212–3;
Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah risāla, 201–7, 213–8, 223–7). Therefore, it is clear that
those professions that were rejected or banned from joining the futuwwa fra-
ternity were not universally agreed upon at all times and in all places. On the
contrary, at various times in history, and even perhaps from one city to another,
these rules and norms could, and did, vary.

3 Guild Futuvvat Nāmas and Treatises from the Professions

Unlike the Ṣūfīs who did not practice a trade, having a profession and earn-
ing a living were important (even sacred, perhaps) for the people of futuwwa
because they worked with the goal of helping others. This was an important
precept of futuwwa religiosity (Gölpınarlı, 119). A considerable number of
futuvvat nāmas in Persian and some in Arabic and Turkish were guild-based in
character, meaning that they were written in order to introduce new members
of a particular trade guild to the doctrines, etiquette, and ceremonies of the
guild. Naturally, these teachings were mixed with those of the futuwwa chiv-
alry code more generally. This sub-genre of futuvvat nāmas is characterised,
to a greater or lesser extent, by an emphasis on serving others. For example,
in the Futuvvat nāma-yi ṭabbākhān (that is, the futuvvat nāma for the cooks),
God is related as having said to Abraham, “Strive to bring the hot cooked food
to the lips and mouths of my servants!” (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 170).
The Futuvvat nāma-yi salmāniyān (for the bathhouse workers) repeatedly en-
joins its readers to show respect to customers when shaving their heads and to
serve them for the sake of God (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 185–6). In the
98 Afshari

same vein, the Futuvvat nāma-yi nanvāyān (for the bakers) says that if a baker
mistreats people, the pīr of the guild should reprimand him for his behaviour
(Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah risāla, 162).
In these guild futuvvat nāmas, each professional guild traces its trade back
to one of the prophets. In this way, the progenitor of most crafts is none other
than Adam, the first man. For example, the guild of butchers claims Adam as
the first butcher (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 148), the guild of cobblers
claims him as the first cobbler (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 156), and the
guild of bakers claims him as the first baker (Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah risāla,
156). Adam is said to have learnt all of these trades from the Angel Gabriel.
Conversely, the guild of cooks traced their lineage back to Abraham (Afshari
(ed.), Chahārdah risāla, 169–70), the tailors to Idrīs (Afshari (ed.), Sī futuvvat
nāma, 83), and the weavers to Job (Afshari (ed.), Sī futuvvat nāma, 189). Virtually
all of these futuvvat nāmas include a myth and legend that tell the story of
how one of these prophets originated the craft in question. These myths and
legends also tell how each of the tools of a particular trade came into being.
The futuvvat nāmas were usually short treatises consisting of several questions
and answers, intended to teach the followers of the guild and its initiates to
remember God when doing their work and to recite prayers and invocations as
they laboured. These works also taught them to show deference to their teach-
ers and the guild elders, to remember the good deeds of those forebears and
teachers of the guild who had passed away, and to always observe the code
of chivalry ( javānmardī) with their customers. In the course of training, as
alongside the names of the prophets, the names of the famous masters of each
guild were also mentioned. Many of these were the names of real historical
figures, such as a figure by the name of Sulṭān Walad, who was a master of
the guild of skinners (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 152). Other figures are
ambiguous, possibly mythical, such as Shaykh Ẓahīr, one of the masters of the
guild of cobblers (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 162), Ustād Nawrūz Rūmī,
a master of the guild of chefs (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 173), and Ustād
ʿAbdallāh Aqtash and Aḥmad Rūmī, masters of the guild of dyers (Afshari,
Sī futuvvat nāma, 112), and Ustād Suhayl Sharwānī, a master of the guild of
weavers (Afshari (ed.), Sī futuvvat nāma, 189). Finally, there are those names
that are clearly of a mythical character, such as Javānmard Qaṣṣāb of the guild
of butchers and skinners (Afshari (ed.), Chahārdah risāla, 184).
After appearing in the guild futuvvat nāmas that were mainly composed in
the tenth/sixteenth to twelfth/eighteenth centuries when the Ṣafavids ruled
Iran, and even in the two centuries that followed, these lists of masters’ names
that blended historical and legendary personalities found their way into short-
er treatises introducing only the masters of several guilds (usually seventeen
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 99

guilds). These treatises on guilds were usually composed in Iran by the Ṣūfīs of
the Khāksār order, who were heavily influenced by futuwwa (Gramlich, 1:78–
80; Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 347–58) and who attached great impor-
tance to the guild of bathhouse workers (Salmānīs). In the past, when initiates
joined the Khāksār order, they would spend some time working in this profes-
sion (Afshari (ed.), Futuvvat nāma-hā, 180–1). The ʿAjam dervishes, a branch of
the Khaksār, also attended the “sokhanvarī” ceremony, that is, a poem recita-
tion in coffee houses, during which they commemorated seventeen guilds and
included themselves as one of them (Afshari, Tāza bi tāza, 111–25).
The guild treatises identify the first master of each guild, in other words, who
first practiced their craft. Works similar to these Persian guild treatises, written
in Arabic and slightly later, also survive in manuscript form (al-Shaykhalī, 184).
Other manuscripts of treatises in this vein also exist in Turkish (Gölpınarlı,
121–2). However, it should be noted that these treatises in Persian, Arabic,
and Turkish are not uniform in terms of which guilds they introduce, nor the
names of their masters; these details vary from one treatise to another. It seems
that they reflect the earlier beliefs of the people of futuwwa that only certain
trades were permitted to follow the code of chivalry, and that fraternities were
not open to all. As we have seen, these beliefs varied from one time and place
to another; in some cases, a trade that was forbidden from joining the futuwwa
in one treatise is considered a member of the fraternity in another.
The members of guilds continued to follow the futuwwa code in many
Islamic lands until the early twentieth century. Recalling his childhood in
Bukhara, the Tajik writer Ṣadr al-Dīn ʿAynī (d. 1954) says that the guilds of
Bukhara at that time had organisations and institutions like those of the
futuwwa. Each of these guilds followed a particular master, just as depicted
by the Khāksārs centuries earlier. For example, ʿAynī relates, the guild of cob-
blers followed Bābā Pārahdūz Bukhārī (ʿAynī, 467–73), who appears to have
been a legendary figure akin to the aforementioned Javānmard Qassāb. And
just as the grave of the latter is popularly believed to be in southern Tehran, the
grave of Bābā Pārahdūz is commonly thought to be in Bukhara. Furthermore,
according to ʿAynī, the members of the guilds of his youth even had a hier-
archy: bābā (father), āqsaqāl (elder), ustād (teacher), and ṣāḥibkār (master)
(ʿAynī, 467–73). The guild of early twentieth-century Bukhara had handwritten
treatises handed down from their masters containing invocations that their
members should recite as they laboured and worked, exactly like the futuvvat
nāmas of the various guilds in Iran. Interestingly, in Uzbekistan today, we can
still find knowledge transmitted from one generation of artisans to another
(blacksmiths for example), with professional textbooks (risāla) to teach the
craftsman the spiritual values attached to his work (Dağyeli, 111–56, 261–76).
100 Afshari

Bibliography

ʿAbbādī, Quṭb al-Dīn Abū l-Muẓaffar, Manāqib al-Ṣūfiyya, ed. Muḥammad Taqī Dānish­
pazhūh and Īraj Afshār, Tehran 1362 Sh [1983].
Aflākī ʿĀrifī, Shams al-Dīn Aḥmad, Manāqib al-ʿārifīn, ed. Taḥsīn Yāzījī, 2 vols.,
Ankara 1961.
Afshari, Mehran and Mehdi Madayeni, eds., Chahārdah risāla dar bāb-i futuvvat va
aṣnāf, Tehran 1381 Sh [2002].
Afshari, Mehran, ed., Futuvvat nāma-hā va rasāʾil-i Khāksāriyya, Tehran 13942 Sh [2013].
Afshari, Mehran, ed., Sī futuvvat nāma-yi dīgar, Tehran 1391 Sh [2012].
Afshari, Mehran, Soufis, héros et metiers en Iran. La guilde des généreux et bons
bouchers, Journal d’histoire du soufisme 7 (2018): 187–98.
Afshari, Mehran, Tāza bi tāza, nav bi nav, Tehran 1385 Sh [2006].
ʿAynī, Ṣadr al-Dīn, Yāddāsht-hā, ed. ʿAlī Akbar Saʿīdī Sīrjānī, Tehran 1361 Sh [1982].
Cahen, Claude, Mouvements populaires et autonomisme urbain dans l’Asie médiévale
du Moyen Âge, III, Arabica 6/3 (1959): 233–65.
Dağyeli, Jeanine Elif, Gott liebt das Handwerk. Moral, Identität und religiose Legitimierung
in der mittelasiatischen Handwerks-risāla, Wiesbaden 2011.
Gölpınarlı, Abdülbâki, Futuvvat dar kishvarhā-yi Islāmī, trans. Tawfīq H. Subḥānī,
Tehran 1379 Sh [2000].
Gramlich, Richard, Die Schiitischen Derwischorden Persiens, Erster Teil. Die Affiliationen,
Wiesbaden 1965.
Hujwīrī, ʿAlī b. ʿUthmān, Kashf al-maḥjūb, ed. Maḥmūd ʿĀbidī, Tehran 1383 Sh [2004].
Ibn al-Athīr, Kitāb al-kāmil fī l-tārīkh, vol. 9, Leiden 1863.
Ibn al-Athīr, Kitāb kāmil al-tawārīkh, vol. 6, Uppsala 1851.
Ibn al-Jawzī, Talbīs iblīs, ed. al-Sayyid al-Jumaylī, Beirut 1409/1989.
Ibn al-Miʿmār, Abū ʿAbdallāh Muḥammad b. al-Makārim, Kitāb al-futuwwa, ed. Muṣṭafā
Jawād, Muḥammad Taqī l-Dīn al-Hilālī, ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm al-Najjār, and Aḥmad Nājī
l-Qaysī, Baghdad 1958.
Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, Riḥlat Ibn Baṭṭūṭa. Tuhfat al-nuẓār fī gharāʾib al-amṣār, ed. Muḥammad
ʿAbd al-Munʿim al-ʿUryān, Beirut 1407/1987.
Ibn Munawwar, Muḥammad, Asrār al-tawhīd fī maqāmāt al-Shaykh Abī Saʿīd, ed.
Muḥammad Riḍā Shafīʿī Kadkanī, 2 vols., Tehran 1371 Sh [1992].
Kāshifī Sabzawārī, Ḥusayn Wāʿiẓ, Futuvvat nāma-yi sulṭānī, ed. Muḥammad Jaʿfar
Maḥjūb, Tehran 1350 Sh [1971].
Kaykāwūs b. Iskandar, ʿUnṣur al-Maʿālī, Qābūs nāma, ed. Ghulām Ḥusayn Yūsufī,
Tehran 1345 Sh [1966].
Köksal, M. Fatih, Ana kaynaklarıyla Türk ahiliği, Istanbul 2015.
Köksal, M. Fatih et al., Kırşehir müzesi’n deki ahilik belgeleri, Kırşehir 2008.
Mawlānā Nāṣirī, Futuvvat nāma-yi Mawlānā Nāṣirī, ed. Franz Taeschner, Leipzig 1944.
Sufism, Futuwwa, and Professional Guilds 101

Mustamlī Bukhārī, Ismāʿīl b. Muḥammad, Sharḥ al-taʿarruf li-madhhab al-taṣawwuf,

ed. Muḥammad Rawshan, 4 vols., Tehran 1363 Sh [1984].
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Jawanmardi. A Sufi code of honour, Edinburgh 2011.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Morals and mysticism in Persian Sufism. A history of Sufi-futuwwat in
Iran, London and New York 2010.
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr ʿAbdallāh, Kitāb al-lumaʿ fī l-taṣawwuf, ed. Reynold A. Nicholson,
Leiden 1914.
al-Shaykhalī, Ṣabāḥ Ibrāhīm Saʿīd, al-Aṣnāf fī l-ʿaṣr al-ʿAbbāsī, Baghdad 1976.
Suhrawardī, Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar, Futuvvat nāma, in Murtaḍā Ṣarrāf (ed.), Rasāʾil-i
javānmardān, Tehran 1370 Sh [1991].
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Risālat al-Malāmatiyya, ed. Abū l-ʿAlāʾ ʿAfīfī, Cairo
1364/1945.
Taeschner, Franz, Zünfte und Bruderschaften im Islam, Zürich 1979.
Zakeri, Mohsen, From futuwwa to mystic political thought, in Shahrokh Raei (ed.),
Islamic alternatives. Non-mainstream religion in Persianate societies (Wiesbaden
2017), 29–51.
Zakeri, Mohsen, Sāsānid soldiers in early Muslim society, Wiesbaden 1995.
Zarkūb, Najm al-Dīn, Futuvvat nāma, in Murtaḍā Ṣarrāf (ed.), Rasāʾil-i javānmardān,
Tehran 1370 Sh [1991].
Zarrīnkūb, ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn, Dunbāla-yi justujū dar taṣavvuf-i Īrān, Tehran 1376 Sh [1997].
 Part 2
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings

⸪
 Chapter 5

Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings

Daphna Ephrat and Paulo G. Pinto

1 Introduction

While the mystical tradition of Islam originally flourished in private houses

and other informal places or in nearby mosques, from the fourth/tenth Islamic
century onward, buildings known mostly by the terms khānqāh (P.), zāwiya
(Ar.), ribāṭ (Ar.), and tekke (Tk.) became the primary centres associated with
Sufism. Their development and spread paralleled the evolution of Sufism into
an elaborate set of customs based on master-disciple relations, which ulti-
mately culminated in the formation of Ṣūfī orders or ṭarīqas.
In spite of their temporal and regional varieties, the buildings that gave
Sufism a concrete form shared important characteristics: all accommodated
Ṣūfī masters and followers; provided space for communal activities; and, at
times, gave shelter to travellers and opened soup kitchens for the poor. On the
whole, they were organised and spatially arranged to serve their functional and
symbolic purposes. Some were large-scale, state-sponsored hospices designed
by the endowing rulers to support groups of Ṣūfīs, whereas others were modest
lodges built by or for individual Ṣūfī masters and their small circles of disciples;
these typically also included a tomb for the master of the lodge. Gradually, the
lodges and tombs of revered Ṣūfī masters emerged as loci of spiritual guidance,
social cohesion, popular religiosity, and occasionally, also centres of political
activism. Shrine complexes erected around burial places of revered masters of
the spiritual paths were lavishly endowed and provided large spaces for ritual
activities and accommodation for pilgrims and visitors. We find evidence of the
foundation, expansion, and architectural form of Ṣūfī institutions of various
types, and accounts of their significance to the formation of Ṣūfī associations
and society in general preserved in hagiographies, endowment documents,
travellers’ accounts, and guides for pilgrims, in epigraphic inscriptions, in the
ruins of buildings, and in buildings that still exist.
From the nineteenth century onward, processes of modernisation and
globalisation considerably diminished the appeal of Ṣūfī lodges and saints’
tombs, as the state (with its modern education system) and the media and
entertainment industry took over roles previously reserved for Ṣūfīs in many
parts of the Islamic world. Some lodges preserved their traditional functions,

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_007

106 Ephrat and Pinto

whereas many others underwent significant changes in terms of the orbit and
pattern of their geographical expansion, and in their formats and designations.
Numerous magnificent shrines (both old and recent) have acquired a sanctity
of their own, and maintained their importance as prime centres of Muslim
religious and communal life.

2 The Development of Ṣūfī Institutional Settings in the Mediaeval

Period (Late Fourth/Tenth to Ninth/Fifteenth Century)

2.1 Beginnings
The genesis of specifically Ṣūfī structures is not well known. When dealing with
their origins, the usual starting point is the second-/eighth-century duwayra
(the diminutive of dār, “house”) or ribāṭ—the first one we know of is a fortified
cloister on the island of ʿAbbādān (modern Ābādān) on the Persian Gulf. This
ribāṭ became a chief training ground for Iraqi ascetics. Originally a military
outpost against sea raiders, it was later manned mostly by pious volunteers
who, alongside their military service, engaged in acts of worship and super-
erogatory piety (Knysh, 17). During the second/eighth century, early Muslims
who renounced the world combined worship with holy war and settled in forti-
fied strongholds (ribāṭs) along the Arab-Byzantine frontier. Ibrāhīm b. Adham
(d. c. 161/777) is cited as a typical example of a celebrated ascetic-cum-warrior
(Chabbi, Ribāṭ). Yet, it is difficult to verify any historical connection between
the ribāṭs of the frontier areas and later institutions with this name that were
regularly and consistently connected with activities of Ṣūfī masters and their
disciples (Chabbi, La fonction, 102; Hofer [Ṣūfī Outposts] in this volume).
Such institutions became prominent in the eastern lands of the Muslim
world toward the end of the fourth/tenth century. Ṣūfīs in Khurāsān adopted
the institution known as khānqāh (originally linked to the Karrāmiyya ascetic
and missionary movement), and adapted it for their own purposes (Bosworth,
8). These can be considered the first Ṣūfī organisations. The word khānqāh, a
compound of the Persian khān/eh (usually meaning “house”) and the locative
suffix –gāh, conventionally denoted a dwelling occupied by Ṣūfīs; it was used
for meetings, as residences, for study, and for communal prayer under the su-
pervision of a Ṣūfī master (Chabbi, K̲ h̲ānḳāh; Böwering and Melvin-Koushki).
Sources from this age depict such dwellings as centres of teaching and
spiritual training presided over by Ṣūfī masters, and self-sufficient hospices for
residents and travelling Ṣūfīs. Rules of ethical behaviour and companionship
were set to regulate the collective activities of denizens of the khānqāh—most
famously, the code of the celebrated Ṣūfī, Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049)
(Chabbi, K̲ h̲ānḳāh, 1025–6; Meier, 306–10; Graham, 83–135; Omer, 11–4). The
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 107

code he laid down for inhabitants of his khānqāh consists of ten injunctions;
these are quoted in a biography written by Muḥammad b. Munawwar enti-
tled Asrār al-tawḥīd fī maqāmāt al-shaykh Abū Saʿīd (Ibn Munawwar, 316–7 in
O’Kane, 493–5). The first set of injunctions focuses on the constant recollec-
tion of God. All inhabitants must maintain ritual purity and have clean cloth-
ing, supplicate God for forgiveness after the dawn prayer, recite the Qurʾān at
daybreak, not talk to anyone until the sun rises, recite litanies between the
last two ritual prayers, and perform supererogatory night prayers. Such injunc-
tions, designed to regulate a social organisation, demanded that residents re-
ceive the poor and weak to ease their burdens, always eat in the company of
others, and not leave without mutual consent.
Historians of early Sufism in Khurāsān of the late fourth/tenth and fifth/
eleventh centuries have shown that, from this point forward, the connec-
tion between the khānqāhs and followers of Ṣūfī masters became a perma-
nent feature of the Muslim religious landscape. This important development
marked the evolution of Sufism into an established pietistic tradition with its
own structures of authority and companionship. While integrating themselves
into the madrasas and the established schools of law and law colleges, Ṣūfīs
in Khurāsān, such as ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021), ʿAlī b. ʿUthmān
al-Hujwīrī (d. c. 465/1072), Abū l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072), and Abū
Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111), defined the basic beliefs and practices of the
distinctive Ṣūfī traditions, and reiterated that each group needed an authorita-
tive master to guide his disciples through the stages and stations of the Path,
and closely monitor their behaviour (Malamud).

2.2 The Foundation of State-Sponsored Institutions

The stabilisation and spread of the khānqāh as a Ṣūfī institution gained mo-
mentum following the disintegration of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate and the rise to
power of the sultanate of the Great Saljūqs (431–590/1040–1194) in Iran and
Iraq. In addition to founding and endowing a number of madrasas, Saljūq
officials and later the sultans themselves, founded and patronised a string
of khānqāhs throughout Khurāsān. The rulers designated their khānqāhs for
groups of Ṣūfīs, as places to lodge, share their meals, and conduct their ritu-
als, and they supervised the establishments they lavishly endowed. Although
the patronage of religious scholars and Ṣūfīs was initially practised primarily
in Khurāsān, the practice later became common in Saljūq Baghdad and the
Saljūq successor states (Firouzeh in this volume).
East of Khurāsān, khānqāhs swiftly spread beyond the Saljūq domains
and reached the fringes of the Iranian-Afghanistan border, and from there,
they spread into the territories of a new Islamic polity—the sultanate of
Delhi (602–962/12o6–1555). The Chishtiyya formed in Ajmer (in the heart of
108 Ephrat and Pinto

Rajasthan) around Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī (d. 633/1236); it was one of the earliest
Ṣūfī orders and the most widespread in the territories ruled by the sultanate
and in the Indian subcontinent as a whole. Chishtī’s disciples set up numer-
ous khānqāhs throughout India; these served as residences for disciples and
sometimes as inns where free meals were served to visitors. In general, Chishtī
shaykhs remained aloof from the ruling elite. However, beginning in the eighth/
fourteenth century, the centralised administration of the order grew weaker
and less independent, and over time they were compelled to forge ties with the
rulers, a practice that came to be generally accepted. This acceptance resulted
in a significant change in the resources available to the khānqāhs (Nizami, 51–
71; Gaborieau; Ernst and Lawrence).
The late sixth/twelfth century marked the beginning of an alliance be-
tween Ṣūfī khānqāhs and the political rulers of Egypt and Syria. The process of
founding khānqāhs in Egypt began under the Ayyūbids, following the restora-
tion of Sunnī Islam as the official religion of the state (after over two hundred
years of Fāṭimid Shīʿī rule). Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn (Saladin, d. 589/1193) founded his first
khānqāh—a hospice known as Saʿīd al-Suʿadāʾ or Ṣalāḥiyya—in 569/1173, in
order to house Ṣūfī newcomers to Cairo. He built it in the heart of the city and
endowed it with a charitable trust (waqf ) to ensure that the khānqāh would
continue to provide a home for Ṣūfīs long after he had passed away. Ṣūfīs living
in the khānqāh received daily rations of food and sweets, small stipends, and
time away from the khānqāh to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca. At the top of
the khānqāh’s organisation, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn created a salaried position, known as
shaykh al-shuyūkh (lit., “the master of masters”) whose job was to mentor the
Ṣūfīs in the khānqāh and act as a liaison between the ruling class and local Ṣūfī
communities in the Ayyūbid sultanate (Hofer, 35).
Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn also founded the first khānqāh in Jerusalem. In 585/1189, about
two years after the liberation of Jerusalem from the crusaders, he turned the
Patriarch’s residence near the Church of the Resurrection into a khānqāh. He
named it ‘Ṣalāḥiyya’ in his own honour, and endowed it liberally for groups
of Ṣūfī followers—whether indigenous or, more probably, foreign—and cre-
ated the office of director of the khānqāh and trustee of its pious endowment
(Ephrat, Spiritual wayfarers, 113). The regulations regarding the use of the en-
dowment made clear that the founder designed it to safeguard mainstream
Sufism and to promote his image as its supporter:

Members of the above-mentioned group [i.e., the beneficiaries] should

all congregate in this place every day after the afternoon prayer for the
recital of the Qurʾān and for dhikr, which should be followed by prayers
for this waqf donor and for the Muslims in general…. They should [also]
gather with their shaykh every Friday after sunrise, either in this place or
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 109

in al-Aqṣā Mosque, where they should recite the holy book as much as
possible, then pray for the donor and the Muslims and read aloud in the
presence of their shaykh the words of the leading Ṣūfī shaykhs, may God
make them beneficial.
al-ʿAsalī, 94

In Damascus, the foundation of khānqāhs began in the mid-sixth/twelfth cen-

tury under the Zangids, but it was not until the establishment of Ayyūbid rule
in 582/1186 that they grew rapidly. The overall increase in their numbers was
such that they became an integral part of the urban landscape and its sur-
roundings, alongside mosques and madrasas. It is noteworthy that khānqāhs
were often built in the heart of old Damascus, neighbouring the Great Mosque

Figure 5.1 Khānqāh al-Ṣalāḥiyya in Jerusalem, views of the portal

elevation
Photo by Daphna Ephrat
110 Ephrat and Pinto

Figure 5.2 Khānqāh al-Ṣalāḥiyya in Jerusalem, the mosque minaret

Photo by Daphna Ephrat

and the citadel. The religious and political centrality of this area can hardly
be underestimated. Although no deeds of endowment or remnants survived,
we can surmise that, regardless of the density of this prestigious area, their
buildings were sufficiently spacious to house groups of Ṣūfīs. These build-
ings thus projected an aura of religious prestige and highlighted the piety of
their founders and their role as patrons and supporters of Ṣūfīs (Ephrat and
Mahamid, 189–92).
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 111

The affinity between the nature and location of the Ṣūfī institutions was ap-
parent in Aleppo as well. During the early phase of their development, under
the reign of the Zangid Nūr al-Dīn (541–69/1147–74), almost all khānqāhs in
Aleppo were situated at the foothill of the citadel and the palace, in order
to be close to their protector and patron (Elisséeff, 3:367). Apparently, later,
under the Ayyūbids and the early Mamlūks, khānqāhs were clustered in the
area beneath the citadel, which had gained increasing importance as Aleppo
was transformed from a military garrison into a fortified palatial city. Other
khānqāhs were situated in the northern and prosperous northwestern quar-
ters of the walled city, not far from the Great Mosque. Among them was the
Khānqāh al-Farāfra, the only one in Aleppo to have survived. The building

Figure 5.3
Khānqāh al-Farāfra
in Aleppo, muqarnas
hood
Yasser Tabbaa
Archive, courtesy
of Aga Khan
Documentation
Center, MIT
Libraries
(AKDC@MIT)
112 Ephrat and Pinto

Figure 5.4 Khānqāh al-Farāfra in Aleppo, detail of upper part of courtyard with citadel in
background
Yasser Tabbaa Archive, courtesy of Aga Khan Documentation
Center, MIT Libraries (AKDC@MIT)

was erected in 635/1237 in commemoration of Sultan al-Malik al-Nāṣir Ṣalāḥ

al-Dīn Yūsuf (r. in Aleppo 579–89/1183–93), and endowed by Ḍayfa Khātūm,
who ruled in the name of her grandson until her death. Like the contemporary
madrasas, the heart of the building was a courtyard with an ornamented foun-
tain, a richly decorated portal, and buildings laid out around the courtyard that
housed a mosque, a central hall (īwān), and residential cells. Yet, the Khānqāh
al-Farāfra differed from contemporary madrasas by its additional and relative-
ly large number of living units (Tabbaa, 164–82).
The Mamlūks (648–922/1250–1517) followed the Ayyūbids, and under their
rule, state-sponsored and formally organised khānqāhs became increasingly
common. The functions of the structures changed as well: while the early
khānqāhs were places for instruction in Sufism, the later institutions often also
served as centres for legal instruction, in much the same way that madrasas
did. Constituting a marker of the rapprochement between mystical and ju-
ristic Islam, this fusion of educational and devotional activities in the royal
establishments founded in Cairo and other great cities ruled by the Mamlūks
was so complete that by the end of the Mamlūk period it was increasingly
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 113

difficult to distinguish the establishments that supported the activities of

the mystics from those of the jurists. Similarly, the terms madrasa, khānqāh,
and ribāṭ (and sometime jāmiʿ) were often used interchangeably (Fernandes,
20, 33, 39–41; Amīn, 3:817–8; Berkey, 47–50, 56–60).

2.3 The Evolution of the Lodge as the Primary Ṣūfī Centre

The ruling elites’ patronage of Ṣūfīs, alongside the religious scholars of the
madrasas, was a clear indication that they were recognised as dissemina-
tors of the message of Islam. Beginning with the Great Saljūqs, the new po-
litical elites supported juridical Sufism, thoroughly grounded in the Qurʾān
and the prophetic Sunna, as part of their public policy of patronising Sunnī
scholarship through state-sponsored organisations in exchange for ideological
support. The khānqāh thus functioned as an ideological branch of the state
apparatus, in the sense that the Ṣūfīs who lived there wittingly or unwittingly
participated in legitimising the endowing rulers as supporters and defenders
of Islam (Safi, xxv, xxix–xxx, 4–5; 96–7; Broadbridge). Funded by endowment
trusts for the benefit of Ṣūfī jurists and guardians of faith, the khānqāh may
have been used as an instrument of a public policy to bolster the rulers’ pres-
tige (Arjomand). At the same time, as in the case of other charitable foun-
dations in the public sphere, such as mosques and madrasas, the foundation
of khānqāhs was considered an act of piety, one that established a bond of
shared values between the rulers and the beneficiaries and generated positive
public opinion that condoned or even legitimised the rule of the royal donor
(Hoexter, 130–4).
The formal institutional structure of the khānqāh could hardly contain the
activities and energy of the growing numbers of mediaeval Muslim men and
women who identified themselves in some way as Ṣūfīs. At the same time,
some Ṣūfīs pursuing an ascetic mode of life sought to avoid the patronage of
the ruling elite and distance themselves from formally organised and state-
sponsored institutions. It is no wonder, then, that informal groups of Ṣūfī mas-
ters and their disciples continued to gather in mosques and private homes.
Alternatively, they gathered in much more modest and less institutionalised
Ṣūfī structures known as zāwiyas or ribāṭs. Cities and smaller towns and vil-
lages, in Egypt and Syria especially, were littered with zāwiyas.
In contrast to the khānqāh, zāwiyas and ribāṭs in the Ayyūbid and Mamlūk
sultanates were built for living and holding teaching sessions by Ṣūfī shaykhs
themselves or by their close associates. In these cases, the shaykhs were typi-
cally buried in the zāwiya. Each zāwiya was independently owned and oper-
ated; each was associated with its founder and, after his death, his successors
114 Ephrat and Pinto

(Fernandes, 16–32; Hofer, 52–3). Toward the end of the seventh/thirteenth

century, wealthy patrons—particularly senior local governors (amīrs)—also
began to found zāwiyas for the benefit of individuals and their circles of
disciples. These became prevalent in the later Mamlūk period and were, at
least partially, a result of the desire of Mamlūk amīrs to compete with each
other for status, legitimacy, and spiritual benefit. These zāwiyas were small-
scale structures founded and funded for specific Ṣūfī masters (Hofer, 52–3;
Mahamid, 206).
The famous eighth-/fourteenth-century Moroccan traveller Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, who
lodged in zāwiyas during his long travels, provides us with a unique testimony
about the proliferation of zāwiyas in Egypt and the life of their inhabitants:

There are many zāwiyas in Egypt …, and the amīrs compete with others
to build them. Each has a shaykh and doorkeeper, and their affairs are ad-
mirably organised. They have many special customs, one of which relates
to food. The servant of the zāwiya comes in the morning to the fuqarāʾ
[mendicants] and each one indicates what he desires, and when they as-
semble for meals, each man is given bread and soup in a separate dish, no
one sharing with another. They eat twice a day, and are given winter and
summer clothes and a monthly allowance of twenty to thirty dirham [a
silver coin]. Every Thursday night they receive sugar cakes, soap to wash
their clothes, the entrance fee of a bath, and oil for their lamps. These
men are celibate; the married individuals among them belong to a sepa-
rate category. They must attend the five daily prayers, spend the night
in the zāwiya, and assemble in a special room (qubba) in the zāwiya.
Each sits on his special prayer rug…. Copies of the Qurʾān are distributed
among them, and they recite the verses together after the morning and
afternoon prayers…. On Fridays, the servant gathers all of the prayer rugs
and takes them to the mosque. The mendicants leave together with their
shaykh and go to the mosque, where everyone prays on his rug. After the
prayer, they read the Qurʾān silently, and return to the zāwiya with their
shaykh.
Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, 37–8

In Anatolia, dervish lodges, mostly known as tekkes (tekiyye or tekye, from the
Arabic takiyya, “a place or thing on which one leans; or where one rests”) first
appeared after the establishment of Saljūq Sultanate of Rūm in the late fifth/
eleventh century. But it was only following the disintegration of the sultanate
into principalities in the mid-seventh/thirteenth century that dervish lodges
began to proliferate in the region. In the important trading cities of central
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 115

Anatolia—Sivas, Tokat, and Amaysa—a significant number of tekkes was built

in the span of one hundred years, from the mid-seventh/thirteenth to the mid-
eighth/fourteenth century. Dervish leaders set up lodges to serve as centres for
communal worship and to standardise their practices in this region, which was
being transformed by large numbers of immigrants who had fled the Mongol
expansion and the breakdown of central authority. They attracted the support
of semi-independent local rulers, who probably sought to secure their newly
acquired properties by funding dervish lodges, thereby displaying their con-
nection with popular dervish leaders. The deeds of the building endowments
that survived to the present shed light on the wide range of functional designa-
tions of the dervish lodges. Building patrons who endowed dervish lodges also
stipulated that the residents perform duties such as welcoming visitors, pray-
ing, reciting the Qurʾān, and distributing food to the poor. Dervishes and guests
were served meals, and sheltering travellers and pilgrims was one of the lodge’s
primary functions (Wolper, 25–32).
In the Maghrib, the institutional centres of Sufism are commonly denot-
ed by the terms ribāṭ and zāwiya. A ribāṭ originally referred to a fort erect-
ed to protect an exposed border. While in al-Andalūs and Ifrīqiyya the ribāṭ
continued to serve its original military functions, the ribāṭs of Morocco were
often founded as rural mosques that served as centres for the dissemination
of religious knowledge and practice. Textual evidence suggests that the ribāṭ
was conceived as a formal institution for rural Ṣūfīs in Morocco as early as
the third/ninth century. A noteworthy example is Ribāṭ Nakūr in the town of
Nakūr in the Rif Mountains of northern Morocco; this ribāṭ embodies the es-
sential characteristics of what later became a pivotal religious and sociopo-
litical institution in the formative period of Moroccan Sufism (from the fifth/
eleventh through the seventh/thirteenth century). The site was privately built
and locally maintained; in it authoritative Ṣūfī shaykhs taught Islamic creed
and dispensed justice to sedentary and pastoralist peoples alike. Since the rural
ribāṭs also served as teaching centres for normative Islam, they complemented
urban Islamic institutions. In addition, their position amidst multiple social
and intellectual networks allowed them to play an important role in the forma-
tion of the earliest Ṣūfī orders in Morocco, and foster the doctrinal and practi-
cal homogeneity of Sunnī Islam in the region by combining mystical doctrines
with membership based on ethnic or tribal ties (Cornell, 39–40).
Although Ṣūfī orders in the Maghrib are sometimes called zāwiyas, the
zāwiya as an institution antedates the establishment of Ṣūfī orders (ṭarīqas) in
the region. The origin of the zāwiyas can be found in the domed shrines, in the
rābiṭa (a hermitage to which a holy man retired, surrounded by his followers),
and in the ribāṭ, which served inter alia as a centre for waging jihād. However,
116 Ephrat and Pinto

the zāwiya organisation, as a prominent Ṣūfī centre with a wide range of func-
tions, was commonly linked to the consolidation and spread of the ṭarīqas in
the region, most visibly the Shādhiliyya. Under the patronage of the Ḥafṣids
(627–982/1229–1574) in Ifrīqiyya and the Marīnids (614–869/1217–1465) in
Morocco, new Shādhilī lodges were built and funded for popular leaders of the
order. Paradoxically, with time, Shādhilī lodges became seats of opposition to
the central power. However, in general they served as centres of social stability,
by securing the allegiance of local tribes or villages to one or another Shādhilī
leader. Zāwiyas became more common and more elaborate under the patron-
age of the Saʿdian sharīfs (descendants of the Prophet) (916–1069/1510–1659),
who often allied themselves with local religious fraternities. One of the largest
and finest zāwiyas in Morocco was established in Marrakesh for the renowned
Shādhilī shaykh Muḥammad al-Jazūlī (d. 869/1465), whose followers were in-
fluential in bringing the Saʿdian dynasty to power (Cornell, 235).
It was at the lodges presided over by revered spiritual masters—the zāwiyas,
the ribāṭs, and the tekkes—rather than in state-sponsored and organised estab-
lishments that the institutionalisation of Ṣūfī practices of establishing author-
ity and constituting a following, and the eventual formation of ṭarīqa-based
Sufism, took place. There the master guided his disciples in his distinctive
spiritual path, supervised their conduct, set up hierarchies among his disciples
and followers, and formed a community of devout followers. In their lodges,
Ṣūfīs attempted to pattern their micro-communities on the sacred community
of the Prophet and his Companions (ṣaḥāba); they compared themselves to
the “people of the porch” (ahl al-ṣuffa) who slept on his roofed porch (portico)
in Medina.
In the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh centuries, a genre of literature known
as ādāb al-murīdīn (“rules of conduct for seekers of the path”), which had its
origins in the writings of the great mystics of the Islamic East, laid down the
conceptual foundations for the organisation, regularisation, and routinisa-
tion of lodge communities. One of the earliest and most widely read works of
Ṣūfī rules for novices was written by Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī (d. 563/1168)
(Milson; Netton). This literature matured in the writings of his nephew and
disciple ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), the presumed founder of the
Suhrawardiyya order. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī, who had been trained in the
ribāṭ-based community established by his uncle in Baghdad, was probably
the first master to present a systematic description of the regulations of life
in the Ṣūfī lodge in his manual, ʿAwārif al-maʿārif (The benefits of intimate
knowledge). The system, which was replicated thereafter, detailed the hierar-
chy within the institution; the rights, obligations, and roles of its various mem-
bers; the activities they engaged in; and the manner and customs by which
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 117

they interacted with one another (Ohlander, 194–247). Al-Suhrawardī laid out
a body of regulations governing the ritual for departing from and entering the
ribāṭ; this action represented a highly ritualised break between its sacralised
space and the profane space of the outer world, a transition whose gravity he
highlighted. The acts associated with these rituals symbolised the mendicant’s
commitment to embark on a practical and spiritual journey under the supervi-
sion of the spiritual guide and master of the lodge (al-Suhrawardī, 1:304–5, in
Ohlander, 231–2). For al-Suhrawardī, the ribāṭ is first and foremost a space for
the greater jihād against the lower self (mujāhadat al-nafs), the seat of self-
ish lusts and passions, though it is also a space for the lesser jihād against the
infidels. In waging the greater jihād through acts of supererogatory piety and
self-exertion, al-Suhrawardī finds one of the most powerful arguments for the
necessity of such a space vis-à-vis the Ṣūfī path (al-Suhrawardī, 1:265–6, in
Ohlander 194–5).

2.4 Ṣūfī Lodges as Centres for the Worship of Saints

By the turn of the seventh/thirteenth century, Sufism had risen to a prominent
position in religious life and social structure. While the lodges were originally
centres of small groups of disciples orbiting around their spiritual masters,
those containing the gravesites of their founders and their heirs became sites of
communal worship and pious visitations (mazār). Ordinary believers flocked
to the lodges to partake in the rituals of the Ṣūfīs, to pray and recite dhikr, to lis-
ten to the master’s preaching, to seek his blessing (baraka) in times of trouble,
or simply to benefit from his proximity. The heads of Ṣūfī lodges were ascribed
a variety of miracles, from simple acts of reading minds to spectacular feats
of healing and telepathy, to miraculous travels from various remote locales to
Mecca to perform a pilgrimage (Gramlich; Renard, 91–117).
The growing prominence of Ṣūfī masters went hand in hand with the spread
of the so-called cult of saints that, from the sixth/twelfth century onward, be-
came central to the religious experience of many Muslims. Various pious indi-
viduals with Ṣūfī affiliations were celebrated by their fellow believers as holy
men or “friends of God” (awliyāʾ Allāh). They were recognised as such during
their lifetime or after their death. Not all of those whom the Ṣūfīs considered
God’s friends and channels to Him were necessarily accorded saintly status
by the public. Yet, increasingly, there was an overlap between two spheres of
sainthood: sainthood as a metaphysical closeness to God (walāya) and saint-
hood as the exercise of spiritual authority on the mundane plane (wilāya)
(Cornell, xxxv; Karamustafa, 134, 143–55). Conjunctions of such beliefs, teach-
ings, and practices found their most salient expression in visits (ziyārāt) to,
and supplication and worship at saints’ tombs (Meri, Cult; Meri, Etiquette;
118 Ephrat and Pinto

Taylor). While the living friends of God represent the various stages of mystical
progress and closeness to God, the dead saints, in their graves, combine the
merits of transcendent humans with the merits of those still alive. Thus, the
graves of the saints (walī, pl. awliyāʾ) were a double-fold repository of divine
grace through immanence. The walī reached a degree of sanctity through tran-
scendence, and his grave, by virtue of his presence there, is a concentration of
the sacred inherent in the cosmos. Pilgrimage guides pinpointed the specific
locations of blessings (baraka) where pilgrims might come to seek the active
assistance and intercession of the saints or simply benefit from close proximity
to the divine grace that emanates from their graves.
The process by which certain Ṣūfī masters came to be venerated as popu-
lar saints is clearly apparent in shrine communities (Karamustafa, 143). Such
communities became prominent in the sixth/twelfth century, particularly in
small provincial towns, as illustrated by the case of Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr
(d. 440/1049) in Mīhna, Khurāsān. According to sacred biographies composed
by two of his descendants, “the cult practice at the shrine” included

five ritual prayers in congregation, food served mornings and at night,

every morning a recital of the Qurʾān at his [Abū Saʿīd’s] sanctified tomb,
candles every evening until bedtime and every dawn until daylight, pro-
viding Qurʾān reciters mornings and evenings, and a group of Sufis resi-
dent at his sanctified tomb amounting to more than 100 persons from
among his offspring and devotees.
Ibn Munawwar, 341, in O’Kane, 527–8

At the extreme western edge of Islamdom in Morocco, newly converted pas-

toralist Berber communities formed around rural mosques and ribāṭs of pious
figures venerated as popular saints. A noteworthy example is Ribāṭ Shākir in
the region of Rajrāja in the Atlas foothills; the ribāṭ was built around the end of
the fourth/tenth century on the site of the tomb of a Ṣūfī saint known as Sīdī
Shākir. For more than three centuries, this ribāṭ served those engaged in the
propagation of Islam and Sufism among the Maṣmūda Berbers of the Rajrāja,
and then remained as a permanent centre of worship and pilgrimage. In ad-
dition to the tombs of its shaykhs, the ribāṭ included a mosque and perhaps
rooms to accommodate visitors (Cornell, 54–62). A large number of men and
women visited the complex of Ribāṭ Shākir year-round as full-time worshipers
or as seasonal visitors who came, on the twenty-seventh day of Ramaḍān, for
the yearly festival (mawsim) of Sīdī Shākir. One of these was Munya bt. Maymūn
(d. 595/1199), a virtuous woman who came to the ribāṭ from her hometown of
Marrakesh. She was said to have visited the ribāṭ and prayed alongside a group
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 119

of novices; she also reported that a thousand devout women followers visited
the ribāṭ in a single year (al-Tādilī, 316 in Ephrat, Quest, 82–3).
During the sixth/twelfth century, the popularity of Ṣūfī sainthood made
major inroads into small towns and rural areas. It also spread in urban centres,
reaching the peak of its expansion among urban dwellers in the late mediaeval
period, as clearly manifested in Mamlūk Cairo. The link between Sufism and
the Cairene populace was generally a venerated shaykh, who resided in the
Ṣūfī lodge surrounded by his followers. Two circles radiated from the shaykh.
The first, and probably narrower circle, consisted of young people and others
who came to the lodge to receive the shaykh’s spiritual guidance and be initi-
ated into his spiritual path. At least some of those who were attracted to the
shaykh’s circle lived in his lodge and severed their family ties, as in the case
of the zāwiya of Shaykh Bahāʾ al-Dīn al-Kāzarūnī (d. 776/1374), whose lodge
was on Rawḍa Island. The second, wider circle, visited the lodge, and later the
tomb, to receive the shaykh’s blessings (baraka) in times of trouble, to listen to
popular preachers, and to celebrate the Prophet’s birthday (mawlid). In addi-
tion to the Prophet’s mawlid, others gathered in mawlids to honour the various
Ṣūfī saints (Shoshan, 11–2). An example is the ceremonies that took place at
Inbāba (west of Cairo) at the tomb of Ismāʿīl al-Inbābī. In the ninth/fifteenth
century, on the night of the twelfth of each month, the Cairenes commemo-
rated him. Sources report that large numbers of people used to travel by boat
to al-Inbābī’s tomb; they pitched tents in the hundreds, set up fairs, and en-
deavoured to enjoy themselves “to the utmost” (Ibn Iyās, 2:37, in Shoshan, 17).
The development of lodge-tomb complexes that provided settings for pub-
lic activities and popular worship likely played a significant role in sustaining
and perpetuating the veneration of saints, both living and dead. This general
trend is corroborated by the first such gatherings in Anatolia. As we have seen,
these buildings were designed to serve both the residents and the generality of
believers. Apart from prayer halls and enclosed courtyards, rooms for travel-
lers, and sometimes a chamber for ritual meals, almost all the dervish lodges
contained domed chambers for the tombs of saints. Often the saint’s tomb was
the nucleus of a tekke and the most important part of the complex endowment
(waqf ) that provided steady funds for its upkeep and salaries for the officials
responsible for the administration of the waqf. Because of its tangible connec-
tion to a holy figure, the lodge attracted visits from wandering dervishes, mer-
chants, and pilgrims. At the same time, by sheltering travellers and pilgrims,
the fame of the lodge, as both hostel and pilgrimage site, expanded. Large win-
dows allowed access to the tomb. These windows usually faced a main thor-
oughfare and had marble revetments with inscriptions and ornamentation
that drew attention to the windows and the tombs of the saints. On market
120 Ephrat and Pinto

days, the exterior of these buildings became an extension of the interior space,
where food and other charity were offered. Such structural flexibility may be
one of the reasons many of these mediaeval Anatolian buildings continued to
be adapted and used well into the modern period (Wolper, 32–4).

2.5 From Tombs to Shrine Compounds

The popular veneration of Ṣūfī saints led to the development of elaborate
shrine compounds around their tombs. Architecturally, they projected the sanc-
tity of the entombed figure, and spatially, these structures provided areas for
large communal gatherings; this signified the accessibility and outward orien-
tation of the site (Mayeur-Jaouen in this volume). Three shrines from the early
eighth/fourteenth century provide illustrations: the shrine of Zayn al-Dīn Yūsuf
(d. 697/1298) in the northern cemetery of Cairo, that of Nūr al-Dīn al-Iṣfahānī
(d. 699/1299–1300) at Mantaz on the Iranian plateau, and that of the well-known
Andalusian mystic Abū Madyan (d. 594/1197) at ʿUbbād, outside Tlemcen in
North Africa (Blair; Ibrahim, 79–110; Golombek, Cult of saints, 419–30). In all
three sites, the graves of the saints were marked by similarly sized and mag-
nificently decorated domed tombs. Local architectural traditions determined
the materials and profiles of the tombs, but there was clearly an “ideal type,”
visually recognisable throughout the Muslim world (Blair, 42). Several types of
buildings were contained in the shrine complexes surrounding the lodges and
tombs of the popular saints and these served functional and symbolic designa-
tions. All had spaces that served various communal gatherings, from routine
Friday prayers to Ṣūfī-inspired recitations and dancing. In addition, the com-
plex contained quarters for Ṣūfī followers and rooms near the entrance were
probably used to shelter travellers and pilgrims. The architectural composition
also indicates the importance of pilgrims for the three buildings: the elaborate
decoration of the exterior and the façade of the ʿUbbād and Mantaz complex-
es served as beacons for pilgrims coming from afar. In the case of the ʿUbbād
shrine, political considerations, by way of bountiful endowments, must have
played a significant role in monumentalising and sustaining the site. About one
hundred fifty years after Abū Maydan’s death, the Marīnid sultan Abū l-Ḥasan
ʿAlī turned his domed tomb into a monumental complex, apparently to com-
memorate the conquest of the Muwaḥḥid (Almohad) capital of Tlemcen. To
support and assure the perpetuation of the complex, which included a madrasa
with cells for students, the sultan endowed it with the revenues from gardens,
houses, orchards, windmills, baths, and arable land (Blair, 41).
Although saintly cults spread throughout the mediaeval Islamic world from
North Africa to South Asia, shrine complexes seem to have enjoyed a special
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 121

status in the Turco-Mongol world. Indeed, royal and other shrines—among

them the shrines of popular Ṣūfī masters—appear to have been the main ben-
eficiaries of endowments by the Timūrid dynasty (771–913/1370–1507), starting
with Tīmūr himself. The shrine of the Turkish mystic and poet Khwāja Aḥmad
Yasawī (d. 563/1167) in the southern Kazakhstan town of Turkestan is a good
example. Over two hundred years after Yasawī’s death, the founder of the
Timūrid Sultanate ordered the construction of a grand memorial complex atop
the small mausoleum. He personally drew the design for the future mauso-
leum, and instructed its builders. It would seem that the sultan was motivated
not only by purely religious considerations, but also by a wish to visibly assert
his power in an area that had only recently become part of his expansive realm
(Hasse, 218–9; Golombek and Wilber). His descendants, sultans Shāhrukh and
Ḥusayn Bāyqarā, continued his building enterprise. Most notable is the shrine
of the patron saint of Herat, Khwāja ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī (d. 481/1089), which they
sponsored and built at Gāzurgāh, to the northwest of city. During the reign
of Ḥusayn, the Anṣārī shrine reached a political high point: in 882/1477–8, to
underscore his claim to be a descendant of Anṣārī, the sultan had a funerary
platform built in the courtyard of the gravesite; there he placed the tombs of
his father, uncle, and brothers (Subtelny, 200–5).
Some other smaller shrines belonged to dynastic families, as in the case
of Abū Saʿīd (noted above) and Aḥmad-i Jām (d. 536/1141–2). Until the tenth/
sixteenth century, when Shīʿism became prevalent under the Ṣafavid dynasty,
Aḥmad-i Jām’s shrine was the main pilgrimage destination in eastern Iran.
Largely as a result of the efforts of his descendants, the shrine (Turbat-i-Jām)
gradually developed around the grave of the Ṣūfī master and saint. In the early
eighth/fourteenth century, a descendant of the shaykh built a lodge northeast
of the grand dome chamber (the core of the complex); in succeeding genera-
tions, family members constructed a grand hall (īwān) for the chamber, and
built a large mosque and arcade, along with a smaller mosque around the
dome (Golombek, Chronology, 27–44). Since such shrines were usually centres
of Ṣūfī communal life, their members often worked and managed the lands
belonging to their endowments.
The agricultural enterprise of the Central Asian Naqshbandī shaykh Khwāja
ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār (d. 895/1490), which his disciples managed through a com-
munal centre in Tashkent and a tomb shrine outside Samarqand, represented
a successful version of a small-scale, communally-run complex. Building on
the assets he presumably inherited from his family, Aḥrār amassed a large
amount of money in the regions of Samarqand and Shāsh (later known as
Tashkent). At the same time, he gathered a circle of disciples, and transformed
122 Ephrat and Pinto

the Naqshbandī community into a faction—a system of patronage and

protection—around which he organised his agricultural and commercial ac-
tivities. The patronage system, which included peasants, artisans, and traders,
also facilitated the expansion of the spiritual network he established, first from
his lodge in Shāsh, and then from his shrine outside Samarqand (Weismann,
Naqshbandiyya, 34–48).
From the late sixth/twelfth century, the influence of organised Sufism grew
steadily. Some of the spaces and sites surrounding revered spiritual masters
functioned as the effective loci of Ṣūfī associations, and ultimately became
central to the identity formation and spread of the Ṣūfī orders. Branches of
the emerging ṭarīqas were brought together within regional and transregional
spiritual networks that extended from the lodges, tombs, and shrines of their
alleged founders and covered the entire Islamic world (Popovic and Veinstein
(eds.); Ceyhan in this volume; Sedgwick in this volume). Among the most signif-
icant examples are the ribāṭ of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jilānī (d. 561/1166) in Baghdad,
the tekke-tomb compound of Jalāl al-Dīn Rumī (Mevlana) (d. 672/1273) in
Konya, that of Ḥājjī Bektāsh (d. c. 669/1270) in Kırşehir, and those of Muʿīn
al-Dīn Chishtī and ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār.

3 Geographical Expansion and Shrine Remodeling in the Premodern

Period (Tenth/Sixteenth to Twelfth/Eighteenth Century)

The premodern period was marked by a dramatic expansion of Ṣūfī institu-

tions. Organised spiritual networks, headed by deputies, spread the ṭarīqas
to lands ruled by the Ottoman, Ṣafavid, and Mughal empires, solidifying both
Islamic dominance and imperial order. In the central provinces, newly en-
dowed Ṣūfī lodges developed as complexes that comprised buildings specifi-
cally designed for confraternal life and responded to the needs of stable and
permanent Ṣūfī communities. In remote areas, where central authority was
a distant force, saints of important shrines accumulated wealth and wielded
great influence over the lives of tribesmen and villagers. The royal patron-
age of tombs and shrines was another defining characteristic of the period.
Mediaeval shrines of venerated Ṣūfī saints were remodelled to become part
of large ensembles, including a variety of buildings such as mosques and ma-
drasas, ritual and assembly rooms, living quarters, and kitchens. These trends
were not uniform. They were shaped by particular historical and geographical
settings and influenced by the various expansion patterns of the different Ṣūfī
orders, their relationships with the ruling classes, and the modes and inten-
tions of imperial patronage.
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 123

3.1 Ottoman Turkey

With the transformation of Anatolia into an Ottoman state (by the ninth/
fifteenth century), local dervish groups took on a significant role, one which
endured until the end of the empire. As the Ottomans sought hegemony over
Anatolia, they relied on the dervishes for military support and to establish firm
control over newly acquired territories. In return, the dervishes were given
land and endowments for tekkes (Barkan).
The imperial patronage of dervishes was first manifested after the conquest
of Constantinople in 857/1453. In recognition of the major role of the dervishes
in the Ottomanisation of Constantinople, the sultans awarded them numer-
ous Byzantine churches for use as tekkes. These buildings were modified to
accommodate dervish functions: they altered, covered, or destroyed Christian
decorations and architectural features; installed minarets, ablution fountains,
chambers, and prayer niches; and provided residences for shaykhs and quar-
ters for dervishes (Lifchez, 80). Thus, a precedent was established in which the
Ottoman sultans patronised dervishes in their capital and beyond.
Under the Ottomans, Sufism flourished and ṭarīqas proliferated. Some or-
ders were relatively conservative and orthodox in their principles and practic-
es; others were suspected of Shīʿī and heterodox tendencies. Among the more
conservative was the Mawlawī/Mevlevī order (the so-called “whirling dervish-
es”), which had been established in the central Anatolian city of Konya prior
to the reign of the Ottomans. While the Mevlevīs attracted the elite of soci-
ety, some more heterodox groups became extremely popular with the masses.
Most prominent among them were the Bektāshīs, who were directly linked to
the imperial army and among the first dervishes to establish tekkes in the envi-
rons of Istanbul (Kreiser).
Soon after the consolidation of the empire, important ṭarīqas appeared in
Anatolian cities and in the countryside. Three ṭarīqas of particular note gen-
erated large followings and numerous offshoots; these were the Khalwatiyya/
Halvetiyye, the Naqshbandiyya/Naqşibendiyye, and the Qādiriyya/Qādiriyye.
Khalwatī shaykhs were invited to Constantinople in the tenth/sixteenth cen-
tury to join the fight against the heretics, particularly on the western frontier
of the Balkans. Close relationships between Khalwatī shaykhs and Ottoman
sultans continued until the middle of the subsequent century, and for almost
two centuries, the Khalwatiyya had the largest number of tekkes and affiliates
in the Ottoman capital (Trimingham, 75; Clayer, 65–7, 70). The introduction of
the Naqshbandiyya into Anatolia was related to Ottoman state building and
the Ottomans’ concomitant search for an orthodox alternative to unruly der-
vishes. After the conquest of Constantinople, the order established a firm pres-
ence there and in nearby Bursa; in numbers and influence, they were second
124 Ephrat and Pinto

only to the Khalwatiyya, and by the mid-eleventh/seventeenth century they

boasted twelve active tekkes in Constantinople and other areas of Anatolia
(Le Gall, 35–60). By contrast, the Qādiriyya order was introduced into Anatolia
by Eşrefoğlū ʿAbdallāh Rūmī (d. 874/1469) and in Istanbul by Ismāʿīl Rūmī
(d. 1041/1692–3), who is said to have founded some forty tekkes by the end of
the Ottoman period (Işın).
Three exceptional tekke tomb complexes developed in the Anatolian plateau
and survived to the present, those of Sayyid Ghāzī (probably martyred in the
early second/eighth century) near Eskişehir, of Hacı Bektaş Veli (Ḥājjī Bektāsh
Walī, d. 669/1270) in Kırşehir, and of Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī in Konya (Goodwin,
62–3). The tombs of Sayyid Ghāzī and Hacı Bektaş were established in the pe-
riod of the principalities, were then incorporated into the nascent Ottoman
Empire, and underwent radical architectural transformation in the imperial
age. A specific form of architectural patronage shaped the structure of the im-
portant Anatolian centres that housed the saints’ shrines. Separate buildings,
which included massive cooking facilities for gatherings, provided the settings
for the rituals and ceremonies of the orders and reflected their multifunctional
designations.
The shrine of Sayyid Ghāzī (also known as al-Baṭṭāl) marked the gravesite
of an early mythical warrior. It was originally the haunt of wandering dervish-
es who were eventually absorbed into the Bektāshī/Bektāşī order (Goodwin,
64). The vast Anatolian plateau that separates the shrines of Sayyid Ghāzī and
Hacı Bektaş belonged, for much of the ninth/fifteenth century, to the Qara­
mānids (c. 654–880/1256–1475) who were rivals to the Ottomans. The Hun-
garian war captive George de Ungaria, writing in the mid-eighth/fourteenth
century, relates

His [Sayyid Ghāzī’s] tomb and sacred site lies between the territories of
Othman and Charaman, and although there is frequent discord between
them and one of them invades the lands of the other, neither has yet
once dared to approach his tomb. For they know from experience that his
great revenge came upon those who have dared to do so. And among all
of them is the common opinion that no one who implores him for help,
especially in matters of war and negotiation of battle, is ever denied his
wish. This is proven by the multitude of offerings of all kinds, animals as
well as cash, which the king, the princes and all the common people an-
nually give to the tomb. He has indeed the greatest fame and estimation,
not only among the Turks, but in all nations and their sect (Islam).
de Ungaria, 286–8, in Yürekli, Architecture, 5
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 125

The monumental complex that emerged around the burial site of Sayyid
Ghāzī still stands today. In the course of its renovation, his tomb was com-
pletely rebuilt on a colossal scale, the old buildings around it were restored,
and lead-plated tombs were added to them. New buildings included enormous
kitchens and common spaces that were large enough to cater to a great num-
ber of pilgrims, in addition to the dervishes who lived on the premises. From a
hill, the complex, with its remarkable palatial appearance, still dominates the
surrounding plateau (Yürekli, Architecture, 87–102). The fertile land and barns
beneath the tekke belonged to the Bektāshī order; these supplied grain, yogurt,
and vegetables for the kitchen. Moreover, pilgrims brought gifts of sheep and
horses, goats, and cattle. As a result, the dervishes were rich enough to pay sala-
ries and purchase cooking oil, honey, and other luxuries on the open market
(Goodwin, 64).
The shrine of Ḥājjī Bektāsh, the founder of the Bektāshiyya, was built in
Kırşehir in the early seventh/thirteenth century and from the late ninth/fif-
teenth century onward was also largely remodelled. Its transformation was even
more radical than that of the shrine of Sayyid Ghāzī: the only part that certain-
ly predates the late ninth/fifteenth century is the core of today’s so-called ‘hall
of the forty’ (qırqlar meydanı). A series of new buildings were added, creating
a monumental complex arranged around a linear succession of courtyards.
Once again, the complex has a palatial aspect. The courtyards are flanked by
individual buildings, including a kitchen and bakery, assembly rooms, offices,
living quarters, stables, and storage facilities (Yürekli, Architecture, 101–25).
The third shrine arrangement was at Konya, the centre of the Mevlevī order
of dervishes. Once Rūmī was declared orthodox by the chief muftī, this site was
elevated in stature. Though it was originally established in the seventh/thir-
teenth century, the shrine attained extraordinary stature and monumentality
in the tenth/sixteenth century, when, with the ongoing patronage of Ottoman
sultans, starting with Süleymān (r. 926–74/1520–66), it was remodelled. The
sultan commissioned a domed mosque next to the shrine of Rūmī, and initiat-
ed the construction of a domed hall adjacent to the tomb, and a monumental
Friday mosque just outside the shrine complex (Goodwin, 65).
With imperial endorsement, the major Anatolian shrines became principal
centres of interregional networks of various social groups that grew to include
the followers of over one hundred tekkes and saints’ tombs. In many cases, the
tombs of these saintly figures became part of large complexes that included fa-
cilities for dervishes; kitchens and bakeries to supply food to initiates, pilgrims,
festival attendees, travellers, and the poor; and systems to pipe water to pools
and fountains, as well as to residential and educational buildings. The centre
126 Ephrat and Pinto

was usually a hall (meydan or semahane) for prayer and devotional activities
(Yürekli, Architecture, 135–54).

3.2 Ṣafavid Iran

As the Ottoman state was becoming a world power, the Ṣafaviyya Ṣūfī order
provided Iran, for the first time since its conquest by the Arabs, with a dynasty
whose state religion was Shīʿism. The Ṣafaviyya began as a Sunnī order associ-
ated with Shaykh Ṣafī l-Dīn (d. 735/1334). The order began in Ardabil (northern
Iran), then expanded throughout Iran during the days of Shaykh Ṣafī’s son, who
was successor as the head of the order. He established the centre of the order
in Ardabil, and built a dome over his father’s grave, which became a focus of
pilgrimage. His descendants accumulated immense power, and assumed con-
trol over Azerbaijan and Iran. In 907/1501, Shaykh Ismāʿīl founded the Ṣafavid
Empire in Tabriz and established Shīʿī Islam as the official religion. After the
rise of his descendants and the establishment of the state, the shrine of Ṣafī
l-Dīn developed as a dynastic mausoleum and as a political base for the impe-
rial dynasty. The existing buildings were renovated and lavishly decorated; a
rectangular courtyard, which led into a large ceremonial hall, was added; and
new buildings were constructed. The architectural space reflected their vari-
ous uses and the events that were held there. The shrine of Shaykh Ṣafī l-Dīn
was a highly venerated site, and a grandiose setting for the enactment of cere-
monial rites. Ṣūfī rituals, such as dhikr, were performed at the shrine, alongside
Ṣafavid imperial ceremonies, such as the presentation of ambassadors. Thus,
the commemorative architecture was not only utilised to commemorate the
saintly ancestor of the Shīʿī dynasty buried on its premises, but also to pres-
ent and represent the Ṣafavid court (Rizvi, Safavid, 7, 75–158; Rizvi, Its mortar;
Rizvi, Imperial setting).

3.3 Mughal India

The Mughal period (932–1274/1526–1858) marked the heyday of the ṭarīqas
in India. Contemporary sources mention two thousand Ṣūfī khānqāhs and
ribāṭs in Delhi and its surroundings during the tenth/sixteenth century, and
provide a long list of prominent Ṣūfī masters who belonged to various spiri-
tual lines and local Ṣūfī organisations. Two major ṭarīqas were introduced
into the region during the tenth/sixteenth century: the Qādiriyya and the
Naqshbandiyya. The Qādiriyya was introduced into the subcontinent from
Uch, northeast of Multān, in the late ninth/fifteenth century. Later, however,
the Qādiriyya of India appears to have lost ground to other orders, especially
the long-established Chishtiyya, the Suhrawardiyya, and the Naqshbandiyya,
which spread throughout India in the footsteps of the conquering Timūrid
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 127

army and following the establishment of the Mughal Empire (Trimingham,

44). Among the Naqshbandīs who settled in Mughal India were several descen-
dants of Aḥrār who integrated themselves into the religious administrative
elite. They were followed by Ṣūfī masters, who, in the subsequent two centu-
ries, disseminated the Naqshbandī path throughout the country. Most conse-
quential among them was Bāqī bi-Llāh (d. 1011/1603) in Delhi. He established
the first Naqshbandī lodge in the Mughal capital and, unlike his colleagues,
did not confine his activities to the foreign Mughal elite, but propagated the
ṭarīqa among the local population. Among his disciples was Aḥmad Sirhindī
(d. 1034/1624), the founder of the Mujaddidiyya, which, over the course of
time, superseded nearly all the Naqshbandī lines in India (Rizvi, History,
178–81; Weismann, Naqshbandiyya, 49–55).
The social potential of Sufism in India was fully realised with the develop-
ment of shrine complexes (dargāhs) as centres of gravity for locally embedded
and popular ṭarīqas in Mughal India. The Persian term dargāh (lit., “door of
the court”) offers a sense of the “royal” atmosphere that prevailed in many Ṣūfī
venues (Dehlvi, 1–3). Built over the graves of revered indigenous Ṣūfī saints, the
dargāhs served as centres of popular worship and as major points of interac-
tion with non-Muslims; they even helped the process of Islamic acculturation
in India. Biological or spiritual descendants of the saints supervised visits and
devotional activities at the shrines and acted as intermediaries between the
ancestors and their growing followings (Troll (ed.); Taneja (ed.); Aquil).
The first dargāhs were built in the early days of the sultanate of Delhi, and
their number grew under the sultans’ successors. The Mughals, drawing their
inspiration from their Timūrid ancestry, built majestic funerary structures.
Under their patronage, the shrines of Chishtī saints, popular with Hindus and
Muslims alike, were granted extensive court patronage, especially from the
time of Akbar (r. 963–1014/1556–1605). The emperor favoured the Chishtiyya
order, whose roots can be traced to Iran and hence the Mughal’s Timūrid his-
tory and lineage. His patronage of the shrine of Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī, the spiri-
tual ancestor of all Chishtīs in South Asia, is well-known (Currie; Tirmizi).
Akbar initiated his imperial patronage of the shrine in Ajmer during his
ongoing conquest of Rajasthan, a region with a considerable Hindu constitu-
ency. He gathered together many pilgrims who were also architects, engineers,
craftsmen, and artisans and recruited them to renovate the shrine. He used
his fortune to restore it extensively, and built two adjacent mosques surround-
ing the gravesite. In Delhi, one of Akbar’s courtiers rebuilt the mausoleum of
Muʿīn al-Dīn’s spiritual descendant Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (d. 725/1325) shortly
after the governor of Delhi built a mausoleum for the saint’s disciple, Amīr
Khusraw. The buildings at the shrine, with their proximity to the mausoleum
128 Ephrat and Pinto

of Akbar’s father Humāyūn, constituted an integral part of the imperial en-

semble that occupied the area south of the early Mughal palatial citadel Dīn
Panāh. Akbar’s patronage of Niẓām al-Dīn’s shrine continued with the resto-
ration of its congregational mosques (Yürekli, Writing down feats, 102; Koch,
64–5). In his new capital of Fatehpur Sikri, Akbar built his imperial palace next
to the shrine of the Chishtī shaykh Salīm, atop a hill outside the city. When
the shaykh died in 979/1572, Akbar built a mausoleum in the courtyard. The
descendants of the shaykh who occupied residences around the old convent
of Salīm Chishtī were charged with the maintenance of the royal palace and
the mosque (Petruccioli, 15). Thus, the site was transformed from the modest
mosque and convent established by a Chishtī shaykh, into an imperial palace
in the new capital (Yürekli, Writing down feats, 102).

3.4 Ṣūfī Centres as Foci of Regional Cults and Political Dominion

In the age of the great empires, Ṣūfī orders developed as regional cults with
networks extending to remote areas that were the dominion of individual Ṣūfī
saints. Each network comprised various communities linked together by their
focus on a sacred centre. The centre was the place in which a living saint and
a central tomb or shrine were located. Each village, town or district had its
own shrine or tomb that influenced not only the lives of initiated members of
the orders, but also those of the rest of the population in the area. The bond
was essentially one of personal attachment to the saint-founder or acting head
of the shrine; on the material plane this was expressed through a direct re-
lationship to the tomb and associated lodge. Common people attended the
lodge seeking the holy man’s baraka, relief from worldly anxieties, or in order
to participate in collective sessions of dhikr. Over the course of the eleventh/
seventeenth and twelfth/eighteenth centuries, the lodges and tombs became
the centres of devotional and communal life of large circles of ordinary men
and women affiliated to the Ṣūfī organisations through their attachment to a
Ṣūfī saint.
By the eleventh/seventeenth century, Ṣūfī institutions were very much in-
tegrated into the social, cultural, and sometimes, political life of the Muslim
empires and monarchies. When central political authority became strong and
was able to impose its control, Ṣūfī institutions were often incorporated into
the larger mechanisms of governability and state-sponsored production of
moral order in Muslim empires and monarchies from North Africa to Central
Asia and India. Conversely, where central authority was weak or in areas that
were remote, people sought security and stability with Ṣūfī saints. In such cir-
cumstances, leaders became very influential by converting their charisma into
economic and political power.
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 129

In the eleventh/seventeenth century, following the migration and uprisings

of nomads from eastern Anatolia, Ottoman authority in central and western
Anatolia was weakened. Shaykhs and heads of lodges were compelled into
political action to protect themselves and their followers, as people turned to
them for protection and assistance. Thus, strife and instability contributed to
the creation of an extended network of dervish institutions. Yet the Ottoman
state was never so weak as to permit the rise of Ṣūfī shaykhs into powerful posi-
tions, as took place in certain parts of Morocco (Faroqhi, Sainthood, 193–208;
Faroqhi, Tekke).
In the fragmented political and social system of Morocco, where the central
authority was too remote to be effective, holy men and the leaders of zāwiyas
provided local communities with a stable social and political framework. For
local tribesmen, in disputes, these leaders’ moral authority served as a guaran-
tee for the political, legal, and ecological arrangements they arbitrated. In pe-
riods of weak governmental authority (as in the tenth/sixteenth and eleventh/
seventeenth centuries), zāwiyas like the one in the desert town of Tamgrout
(on the southern edge of the Daraa valley) became regional centres of power
and operated almost as autonomous principalities (Gellner, Saints, 41–2;
Gellner, Muslim society, 114–30; Hammoudi, Sainteté).
The situation in Sindh, on the northwestern fringe of the Mughal Empire,
seems to have been somewhat similar to that in Morocco. Since temporal au-
thority was remote and had little impact on local life, local tribes in the area
tended to follow Ṣūfī saints (pīrs) whose power base was in the countryside.
Pīrs of important shrines possessed substantial land holdings and political
power, and wielded great influence over peoples’ lives. The pīrs reached the
zenith of their power in the twelfth/eighteenth century, which witnessed a
weakening of the central Mughal authority in the region. It was also during
this period that waves of tribesmen settled in the Indus Valley. The develop-
ment of the dargāh as the spiritual domain of the saint in India helped build
durable relationships between the pīrs and the local population. The tribes-
men clung to the dargāh to seek the blessings (baraka) of the saints, find relief
from worldly anxieties, and participate in communal dhikr. Thus, the dargāh
strengthened the authority of the pīr, who supervised the site; it also facilitated
the fulfilment of his social and economic functions, notably his role as arbitra-
tor. Intertribal trade took place around the dargāh, where tribes-folk would
also gather for religious festivals. Leadership of the site passed within families
that had great wealth and political power. The pīrs of the key shrines behaved
like kings, wore turbans, and sat on thrones (Ansari, 7–8, 13, 22–33).
In eastern Turkestan, Naqshbandī leaders, locally known as Khwājas/
Khojas, acquired prominent social and political positions during the eleventh/
130 Ephrat and Pinto

seventeenth and the first half of the twelfth/eighteenth century. They came to
exercise considerable influence on the nomadic and sedentary population of
the oases, and later became rulers themselves. From their central lodge in the
oases of the Tarim Basin, the Khwājas’/Khojas’ groups extended their reach as
far as the Chinese frontier (Weismann, Naqshbandiyya, 81–2; Papas, Soufisme
et politique, 51–86, 139–56).
In the late twelfth/eighteenth century, Ṣūfī lodges and saints’ tombs and
shrines dotted the landscapes of the Islamic world. Leaders of the regional and
transregional orders that dominated these sites reached out to the common
people, thus contributing to the dissemination of a more meaningful religious
experience among the lower strata of Muslim societies, and spreading Islam
from the urban to the rural population. These seats of Ṣūfī saintly authority
provided a space for expanding circles of followers, played a vital role in the
expansion of Islam beyond the dominion of the state and, eventually, contrib-
uted to the mobilisation of popular support in the face of growing challenges
posed to Muslim societies and their ruling empires and monarchies in the fol-
lowing century.

4 Ṣūfī Institutions in the Modern Period: Decline, Renewal,

and Expansion

By the late twelfth/eighteenth century, Ottoman Empire Sufism was very

much integrated into the administrative and political apparatus of the state.
Sultans were initiated into the Khalwatiyya, and in certain areas of the em-
pire Ṣūfī orders such as the Mawlawiyya, Qādiriyya, and Rifāʿiyya became
markers of privilege among members of the local administrations. Thus, in
twelfth-/eighteenth-century Aleppo the notable families were classified as
Qādirī or Rifāʿī according to their affiliation to one of the two Ṣūfī traditions
(Meriwether, 52–8). This political aspect led the Ottoman state to take mea-
sures to centralise and control the organisation of the Ṣūfī orders into tekke/
zawiya-based communities in the second half of the twelfth/eighteenth cen-
tury (Luizard, Le Moyen Orient, 351).
Certain authors saw in this process of centralisation and bureaucratisation
of the social organisation of the Ṣūfī communities a sign of religious stagnation
and decline of the mystical aspects of Sufism (Trimingham, 103–4). However,
this view has been proven inaccurate as a general picture of Sufism in the
modern period, for mystical experience organised by personal connections
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 131

to a shaykh remained a central feature of Ṣūfī religiosity even in highly cen-

tralised and hierarchical religious contexts, such as Egypt, where bureaucratic
structures coexisted with charismatic forms of Ṣūfī leadership throughout the
nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Chih, 32–44).
The complexity and diversity of the social expressions that Sufism present-
ed in the late twelfth/eighteenth century were fundamental in allowing the
emergence of various responses to the new social and political contexts that
confronted it. Among these challenges was the growing political and economic
power of the European states and their increasing colonial presence in areas
of long-standing Muslim rule. Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt in 1798, the French
conquest of Algeria in 1830, the Russian conquest of the Caucasus and Central
Asia after 1830, and the suppression of the Mughal Empire by the British in
1858 made clear that the imbalance of power rendered the whole Muslim
world vulnerable to European colonial conquest. In this political context, vari-
ous areas of the Muslim world were confronted with similar issues of political
sovereignty, technological advancement, and moral reform of society.
The modern period in the Muslim world has brought new challenges and
opportunities to Sufism, challenges that generated uneven processes of de-
cline, renewal, and expansion, and in turn transformed the way Ṣūfī forms
of religiosity were understood, practiced, and lived by their adepts. This does
not mean that there were no continuities with the Ṣūfī religiosity of previ-
ous periods, these were numerous and very important (O’Fahey and Radtke).
Traditional forms of Sufism and its organization adapted to the profound and
vast changes that affected most Muslim societies throughout the last two hun-
dred years and, sometimes, thrived in modern contexts.
The transformations in Ṣūfī institutions and their devotional and collective
spaces in the modern period can be summarised by five processes: (1) crisis,
which led to a decline in followers and the closing and destruction of lodges,
shrines and tombs; (2) reform, which led to the reconfiguration of doctrines,
rituals, and forms of organisation of Sufism according to ideals of religious
authenticity; (3) adaptation, which led to a reformulation of the doctrines,
rituals, and forms of organisation of Sufism according to principles consid-
ered to be “modern”; (4) revivalism, which led to a reaffirmation of elements
of the Ṣūfī tradition and enabled them to maintain their attraction in modern
contexts; (5) globalization, which was the participation of Ṣūfī communities
and institutions in the transnational flow of material and symbolic exchanges
that became broader and more intense in the late twentieth and twentieth-
first centuries. In most cases these processes overlapped and created hybrids,
132 Ephrat and Pinto

producing uneven combinations of decline and expansion, continuity and

change, tradition and modernity throughout the vast universe of contempo-
rary Sufism.

4.1 A Hub for Ṣūfī Reform: Mecca in the Modern Era

As the introduction of new technologies of transportation, such as railroads
and steamships, accompanied European imperial and colonial advances, trav-
eling between distant parts of the Muslim world became faster and cheaper.
People and, therefore, ideas could move faster and in greater numbers than
ever before. The impact of these technological innovations was particular-
ly obvious in the Muslim pilgrimage, the hajj: the numbers of pilgrims rose
steadily throughout the nineteenth century (for example, from Central Asia:
Papas, Welsford, and Zarcone (eds.)). Mecca became the meeting place of large
numbers of pilgrims, who could exchange religious views and learn about the
realities of other areas of the Muslim world. Many pilgrims settled in the city
temporarily or permanently, to acquire religious knowledge or simply to live in
the sacred centre of Islam.
Ṣūfī shaykhs from different parts of the Muslim world established residences
in the city, where they led their communities and attracted new members from
the constant flow of pilgrims. This process made Mecca a major religious cen-
tre for Sufism throughout the nineteenth century with almost all the Ṣūfī or-
ders (ṭuruq) present in its religious landscape (Trimingham, 121; Gaborieau and
Grandin, 69–70). Mecca’s geographic position exposed these Ṣūfī shaykhs and
their communities to the major challenges that emerged in the Muslim world.
The first was Wahhābism, a reform movement founded in 1740 by Muḥammad
Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (d. 1206/1792) which rejected all doctrines and practices
that did not have a direct reference in the Qurʾān or the ḥadīth (the collec-
tion of traditions about the Prophet) as un-Islamic innovations (bidaʿ). The
Wahhābīs considered Ṣūfīs and Shīʿīs to be heretics that should be fought and
suppressed (Commins, 26–32). Later in the nineteenth century, another re-
formist movement, the Salafiyya (named after the salaf, or Companions of the
Prophet, that it claimed to emulate), emerged among religious and intellectual
circles in Cairo, Aleppo, Damascus, Baghdad, and Delhi, aiming to restore the
“original” Islamic tradition. While the Salafiyya was not inherently hostile to
Sufism, it questioned which parts of the Ṣūfī traditions derived from the “origi-
nal” prophetic message, and which should be seen as later innovations.
In the pluralistic universe of Mecca’s zāwiyas, adepts of a given ṭarīqa were
confronted with the cultural differences that shaped their understanding, prac-
tice, and experience of the mystical path as expressed in doctrines and rituals.
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 133

The consciousness of cultural differences and the necessity of addressing the

challenges posed by other religious actors, like Salafīs and Wahhābīs, triggered
some Ṣūfī shaykhs to make an effort to determine what elements united the
diverse understandings and practices of the religious tradition; they under-
took a quest for the “original” Ṣūfī tradition. This quest of origins unleashed
a vast movement of reform in Sufism. Reformist trends appeared in Mecca,
the Maghrib, and India, and later spread to most of the Muslim world. One of
the early Ṣūfī reformers was Aḥmad b. Idrīs al-Fāsī (d. 1253/1837), a Moroccan
shaykh who settled in Mecca in 1799. While it is not clear to what extent his
message was actually reformist, he attracted to his circle religious thinkers who
created new Ṣūfī orders. One of these was ʿAbdallāh al-Maḥjūb al-Mīrghanī
(d. 1207/1792), a sayyid (descendant of the Prophet) whose ancestors lived
in Central Asia and founded the Mīrghaniyya, a Ṣūfī order that preached re-
spect for the sharīʿa and the ḥadīth, and spread into Sudan under the name of
Khatmiyya.
The role of Mecca as the connecting ground of Ṣūfī religious ideas from
different regions of the Muslim world, ideas that were central to the modern
reform movements in Sufism was also apparent in the trajectory of Mawlānā
Khālid al-Baghdādī (d. 1242/1827), a Kurd born near Sulaymaniyya, who re-
formed the Naqshbandī tradition and founded the Naqshbandiyya Khālidiyya.
Shaykh Khālid performed a hajj in 1805 and, in Mecca, became acquainted
with the Naqshbandiyya Mujaddidiyya, a branch of the Naqshbandī order. In
1809, he went to Delhi to be initiated by Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī (d. 1824) (Weismann,
Taste of Modernity, 25), who recognized him as a Naqshbandī shaykh after a
year and sent him to spread the order in the Ottoman Empire. In 1823, after
passing through Sulaymaniyya and Baghdad and creating communities over
a vast territory, all unified by his religious authority, Shaykh Khālid settled in
Damascus (Weismann, Taste of modernity, 23–55).
Despite Mecca’s centrality to Ṣūfī reform, important reformed orders
(ṭuruq) also appeared elsewhere. This was the case of the Tijāniyya, a ṭarīqa
founded by Aḥmad al-Tijānī (d. 1230/1815), born in ʿAyn Māḍī, near Tlemcen
in Algeria. After experiencing a vision of the Prophet in 1782, he founded his
own Ṣūfī order. In 1798 he settled in Fez, Morocco, under the protection of the
sultan, Mawlāy Sulaymān (r. 1792–1822); he remained there until his death. The
Tijāniyya’s centralised power structure and tight control over its members al-
lowed it to spread throughout Morocco, and into Algeria, Tunisia, the Sahel,
and western Africa, connecting these territories through its powerful institu-
tions (El Adnani).
134 Ephrat and Pinto

4.2 Crisis and Adaptation: Closing Ṣūfī Lodges, Negotiating

Ṣūfī Modernity
During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, most Muslim societ-
ies were directly confronted by European imperial or colonial powers, which
elicited a variety of responses in Ṣūfī milieus. Ṣūfī orders, in particular those
that were unified and operated from active lodges and shrines, were viewed by
imperialist powers with suspicion and anxiety. The orders’ strong social bases
and capacity for mobilization often led to their surveillance and repression
by colonial authorities. However, other forms of relations between Sufism and
colonial powers also existed. In addition to repression, colonial authorities also
co-opted the Ṣūfī orders, as a way to tame the political potential of these in-
stitutions in their favour. They recognised and protected the religious author-
ity of the shaykhs and their lodges who accepted or, at least, did not openly
oppose colonial power structures. Thus, in the nineteenth and twentieth cen-
turies, many saintly lineages in Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco accepted and,
sometimes, cooperated with French colonial rule (Hammoudi, Master and
disciple, 98–133).
Another challenge that emerged in the nineteenth century was the issue
of adapting Ṣūfī institutions to modern society or, in other terms, incorporat-
ing Sufism into the social and cultural project of “modernity.” By the late nine-
teenth and early twentieth centuries, Ṣūfīs were confronted with two distinct
forms of modern ideology, i.e., secularism, usually associated with national-
ism or ideas of social reform, and the Salafiyya, which, despite its claims to re-
vive tradition, used modern intellectual tools to access the meaning of sacred
texts without the mediation of either religious authorities or a vast interpre-
tive tradition that was often memorized as part of the proper exegetic training
deemed necessary to this task. This textual relation emerged in the Muslim
world from the early nineteenth century onwards through a process linked to
the diffusion of the printing press and modern forms of schooling (Eickelman,
107–34; Messick, 392–7). While both forms of modernity influenced the way
Sufism was adapted, reformed, or revived in the changing political and social
contexts of this period, Ṣūfī ideas and concepts also shaped the way modernity
was imagined and lived in Muslim societies.
The Naqshbandiyya order was mobilised by these issues, and it is no coin-
cidence that one of the most influential codifications of Ṣūfī-inspired “Islamic
modernity” was elaborated by the Naqshbandī shaykh Said Nursi (d. 1960). Said
Nursi was a Kurd born in Nurs, in Anatolia who became an Islamic scholar and
Ṣūfī shaykh. He lived through the end of the Ottoman Empire and the adoption
of the secularist policies of Muṣṭafā Kemāl Atatürk (1881–1938), the leader of
the Republic of Turkey, which was created in 1923. Nursi wrote his major work,
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 135

Risale-i nur külliyatı (Collection of the epistles of light) between 1926 and 1949.
It was not printed until 1956, due to government censorship, though it circu-
lated clandestinely in handwritten or mechanically reproduced copies. In this
book, which is a commentary on the Qurʾān, Said Nursi presented Islam as an
ethical and spiritual framework for religious subjects fully integrated in mod-
ern society. His writings gave rise to the Nur/Nurcu (light) movement, which
consisted of devotional communities organised around schools devoted to the
study of the Qurʾān and Said Nursi’s texts and to the performance of spiritual
exercises derived from Sufism, such as meditation on God’s names. Despite
its clear Ṣūfī influence, the Nurcu movement is not a Ṣūfī order and its adepts
do not consider the Nur movement to be a Ṣūfī tradition, rather it is more a
Ṣūfī-inspired adaptation of Islamic spirituality that arose in response to the
secular character of the Turkish Republic (Yavuz).
The case of Said Nursi shows one way in which Sufism faced the challenges
of the twentieth century, with the end of the empires after World War I and
the emergence of nation-states and communist regimes in places with impor-
tant Muslim populations such as the Soviet Union, and later the Balkans and
China. The nationalist and communist ideologies that guided the construc-
tion of these states were geared to the establishment of sovereign and modern
societies in which religious life was suppressed by official atheism, tamed by
secularism, or rationalised according to the moral and social/economic needs
of the nation.
In Turkey, Ṣūfī lodges were closed and Ṣūfī forms of religiosity were forbid-
den in 1925. In Egypt, the al-Majlis al-Āʿlā lil-Ṭuruq al-Ṣūfiyya (Supreme council
of Sufi orders) was created in 1903 with a view to controlling Ṣūfī activities
in the country (Luizard, Le soufisme). The modernistic views that guided the
organisation of the Wazīrat al-Awqāf (Ministry of religious endowments) in
Syria between 1949 and 1961 (Deguilhem, 125–35), considered Sufism a kind of
“folk” religiosity that should disappear with the modernisation of society and,
therefore, Ṣūfī orders were excluded from regulations and funding by the state.
Even in countries where Sufism was inscribed in the idea of “cultural authen-
ticity” (as in Morocco), controls over Ṣūfī institutions and their activities were
put into place.
In socialist countries with Muslim populations, Ṣūfī places suffered from
various policies. In Yugoslavia, during the interwar period they were partially
transformed into museums or schools on the orders of the ministry of awqāf,
then in 1952, all the tekkes of Bosnia-Herzegovina were closed, following a de-
cision by the Ulema-Madžlis (an assembly of Muslims scholars linked to the
state). Despite a certain easing of these policies in the late 1960s, tekkes were
again shut down in 1972. Yet, in Kosovo and Macedonia, the same Ulema-Madžlis
136 Ephrat and Pinto

left them open (Clayer and Popovic). The situation was different in Soviet
Central Asia. After years of harsh persecution, Ṣūfī communities survived and
in the 1940s and 1950s even found niches to thrive next to state enterprises.
Previously abandoned mosques and shrines were used again by Ṣūfī īshāns
(authorities), especially Naqshbandīs and Qādirīs. Khrushchev’s (d. 1971) anti-
religion campaign, supported by the state Muslim authorities, strongly limited
these activities. For example, by 1959, thirty shrines in Uzbekistan, sixty-two
in Tajikistan, and four in Turkmenistan were closed (Tasar, ch. 1 and 4). The
equivalent alliance between a socialist state and reformist Muslim authorities
occurred in Xinjiang, where important Ṣūfī shrines were turned into museums,
and lodges and inns were shut down (Papas, Les tombeaux). In China more
generally, some waqfiyya land owned by Ṣūfī orders of the Hui minority was
confiscated during the Land Reform programme in the early 1950s and many
Ṣūfī buildings were closed after the implementation of the Religious System
Reform in 1958. The Cultural Revolution between 1966 and 1976 and its trail of
destruction worsened the situation (Dillon, ch. 11).

4.3 Revivalism and Globalisation: Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings Today

Despite the difficulties that these policies created and the negative impact
they had on many Ṣūfī practices, Ṣūfī institutions continued to exist and, by
the 1960s, they started to show signs of revival and renewed expansion of the
tradition. The liberalisation of political life in Turkey in the 1950s and the de-
cline of authoritarian secular nationalism in the Arab world in the 1970s en-
abled the emergence of new forms of inscribing Islam in the public sphere.
During the 1960s and 1970s, political Islam, embodied in organisations such as
the Muslim Brotherhood, was the most visible framework of this project, but
after its relative decline and fragmentation in the 1980s, Sufism appeared as a
major force in the configuration of Islamic social landscapes.
Because of the lack of regulation or funding from the state, Sufism also
escaped the tight control that other forms of Muslims religiosity were sub-
jected to in Syria under the Baathist regime (1963–present). Therefore, after
the 1980s, Ṣūfī gathering places proliferated in most Syrian cities as spaces
where pious Muslims could cultivate their religious subjectivities beyond the
limits imposed by the state in a form of revivalism that attracted both disaf-
fected followers and new adepts across the social spectrum (Pinto, 113–29).
Also, the cult of saints in Egypt and Syria allowed the faithful to be in contact
with and protected by the forms of power embodied in the saints’ shrines and
the territory they bless; this often opposed and neutralised in both symbol-
ic and material ways the authoritarian state’s pretensions to absolute power
(Reeves, 306–23).
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 137

Therefore, it is fair to say that after the 1980s there was a revival of Sufism
throughout the Muslim world, one that involved not only an increase in the
number of disciples and communities but also a greater visibility of Ṣūfī places
and dwellings. This expansion benefitted reformed forms of Sufism as well
as traditional Ṣūfī institutions centred on the charismatic authority of shaykhs
expressed through notions of baraka (grace, divine power, blessing) and
karāmāt (miraculous deeds); the cult of shrines also thrived in this period.
Even the leader of a modernistic Islamic movement, such as Fethullah Gülen,
who created the Hizmet (‘Service’) from the Nurcu movement in the 1960s, was
keen to claim Ṣūfī concepts as central to his understanding of Islam (Gülen,
1–53). This does not mean that the challenges and competition from other
understandings of Islam or secular ideologies were not present, but simply
that Sufism was again a visible player in the religious and cultural field of
Muslim societies.
The increased visibility of Sufism came not only from its place in the pub-
lic, especially urban landscape, but also from a process of commodification of
Sufism as a “cultural heritage” or “Islamic spirituality” and its consumption in
local and global arenas. Since the 1950s, several Mawlawī/Mevlevī tekkes were
allowed to work as cultural associations where the ritual of the whirling der-
vishes was presented to tourists; public performances enabled these tekkes to
recreate their religious life in a framework of cultural heritage. Similarly, the
poetry of Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273), the inspirer of the order (ṭarīqa), was
globally consumed as a form of “universal spirituality.”
The twentieth century also saw the globalisation of Sufism as religious be-
liefs and practices beyond Muslim-majority societies. This happened through
Muslim immigration to Europe and the Americas, as well as the conversion of
non-Muslims to Ṣūfī codifications of Islam. Already in the 1920s, North African
migrants had Ṣūfī gatherings in coffee shops in the outskirts of Paris (Hamès,
442), and in the 1950s and 1960s, Indian and Pakistani migrants also brought
their Ṣūfī affiliations to Great Britain. Some of these orders (ṭuruq) developed
in large transnational organisations that connected discrete communities with
different social and cultural universes across a vast territory religiously delim-
ited by the devotion to a saint or shaykh. This was the case of the Ṣūfī com-
munities organised around the devotion to Zindapir (d. 1999), a pīr (shaykh/
saint) who lived at his dergāh (Ṣūfī lodge) in Ghamkol Sharif; his communities
were scattered across a broad expanse from Pakistan to the United Kingdom.
This vast and discontinuous territory demarcated by the presence of Zindapir’s
devotees was connected to the centre through practices of mimesis and re-
membrance of the saint and his lodge in each community (Werbner, 157–8).
138 Ephrat and Pinto

Another pathway to the globalisation of Sufism was through conversion.

This was the case of the branch of the Naqshbandiyya led by Nazım Kıbrısı
(d. 2014), born in Cyprus and established in Damascus, where he was a dis-
ciple of ʿAbdallāh al-Dāghestānī (d. 1973), an important reformer of the
Naqshbandiyya from Dagestan. Shaykh Nazım started his own branch of the
order, the Naqshbandiyya Haqqaniyya, which he first expanded into Lebanon
and Cyprus. After his master’s death, he established a community in London,
which he visited often, and in 1990 he sent his son-in-law Hisham Kabbani as
his deputy to establish the order in the United States. He adapted the order in
ways that were in harmony with Western expectations towards “Oriental spiri-
tuality,” thereby attracting numerous conversions of Europeans and Americans,
and appealing to Muslim immigrants and their descendants. This inclusive
and individualised approach helped to unite his vast and heterogeneous group
of followers, whose only gatherings for collective religious life took place when
he or his deputies visited their dergāh, or when they went on pilgrimages to the
central dergāh in Cyprus, where he settled again (Stjernholm).
The cultural transfer that shaped the expansion of Sufism was marked not
only by the expansion of Ṣūfī orders from Muslim-majority societies, but also
by the creation of new ones, such as the Maryamiyya, created in the 1960s by
the Swiss convert Frithjof Schuon (d. 1998), who established a centre in Indiana.
This process of cultural transfer was linked to the conversion of Europeans to
Ṣūfī forms of Islam in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Schuon
was initiated into the ʿAlawiyya order by the Algerian shaykh Aḥmad al-ʿAlawī
(d. 1934) (Sedgwick, 175). The Western interest in Sufism was guided by notions
of traditionalism (the idea that certain traditions were passed on from time im-
memorial) and perennialism (the idea that all religions share a common origin
in a single perennial religion), which opened the way to religious engagement
and conversion (Sedgwick, 5–6, 173–4). While in Europe Sufism is sometimes
appropriated within the range of decontextualised “Oriental spiritualities”
that make up New Age religiosity (Haenni and Voix, 241–56), in Morocco, from
the 1990s, Sufism was associated with New Age spirituality (yoga, zen, tran-
scendental meditation, Osho, etc.), through which Moroccans could inscribe
their religious practices and beliefs into an Islamic framework in a discourse
of cultural authenticity that accommodates moral and religious individualism
and, sometimes, a high degree of eclecticism and relativism. Also, by the last
decades of the twentieth century and the early twentieth-first century, a re-
newed affirmation of the Islamic character of Sufism became a clear trend in
Ṣūfī institutions in Europe and the United States (Sedgwick, 236–48).
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 139

The continuing capacity of renewal through adaptation, reform, and revival-

ism that Sufism has shown in the last two hundred years, as well as its continu-
ing expansion both in local and global contexts, shows its vitality as a tradition
that is still capable of producing meaning and giving identity to its followers in
the modern world. In this sense, Sufism was not just affected by the emergence
of modernity in the Muslim world, but it also became an important framework
in shaping what it means to be Muslim and modern.

Bibliography

Amīn, Muḥammad, al-Awqāf wal-taʿlīm fī Miṣr fī zamān al-Ayyūbiyyīn, in al-Tarbiya

al-ʿArabiyya al-Islāmiyya (Amman 1990), 3:817–8.
Ansari, Sarah F. D., Sufi saints and state power. The pirs of Sind, Cambridge 1992.
Aquil, Raziuddin, ed., Sufism and society in medieval India, New Delhi 2010.
Arjomand, Said A., Philanthropy, the law, and public policy in the Islamic world before
the modern era, in W. F. IIchman, S. N. Kats, and E. L. Queen II (eds.), Philanthropy
in the world’s traditions (Bloomington, IN 1998), 109–32.
al-ʿAsalī, Wathāʾiq maqdisiyya tāʾrīkhiyya, Amman 1983–9.
Asher, Catherine Blanshard, Architecture of Mughal India, Cambridge 1992.
Barkan, Ömer Lutfi, Kolonizatör türk dervişleri, Vakiflar Dergisi 2 (1942): 297–377.
Berkey, Jonathan, The transmission of knowledge in medieval Cairo. A social history of
Islamic education, Princeton 1999.
Blair, Sheila S., Sufi saints and shrine architecture in the early 14th century, Muqarnas 7
(1990): 35–49.
Bonner, Michael, Aristocratic violence and holy war, New Haven 1996.
Bosworth, C. Edmund, The rise of the Karrāmiyya in Khurāsān, MW (1960): 6–14.
Böwering, Gerhard and Matthew Melvin-Koushki, Kānaqāh, EIr online: http://www
.iranicaonline.org.articles.
Broadbridge, Ann, Kinship and ideology in the Islamic and Mongol worlds, Cambridge
2008.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, La fonction du ribāṭ à Baghdad du Ve siècle au début du VIIe siè-
cle, REI 42 (1974): 101–21.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, Khānḳāh, EI2.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, Ribāṭ, EI2.
Chih, Rachida, Le soufisme au quotidien. Confréries d’Egypte au XXe siècle, Arles 2000.
Clayer, Nathalie, Mystiques, état et société. Les Halvetis dans l’aire balkanique de la fin du
XV e siècle à nos jours, Leiden 1994.
140 Ephrat and Pinto

Clayer, Nathalie and Alexandre Popovic, Les courants anti-confrériques dans le sud-
est européen à l’époque post-ottomane (1918–1990). Les cas de la Yugoslavie et de
l’Albanie, in Frederick De Jong and Bernd Radtke (eds.), Islamic mysticism contested.
Thirteenth centuries of controversies and polemics (Leiden 1999), 629–64.
Commins, David, Le Salafisme en Arabie Saoudite, in Bernard Rougier (ed.), Qu’est-ce
que le salafisme ? (Paris 2008), 25–44.
Cornell, Vincent J., Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism,
Austin 1998.
Currie, P. M., The shrine and cult of Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī of Ajmer, New Delhi 2004.
Deguilhem, Randi, Le waqf en Syrie indépendante, in Faruk Bilici (ed.), Le waqf dans le
monde musulman contemporain (XIXe–XXe siècles). Fonctions sociales, économiques
et politiques (Istanbul 1994), 123–44.
Dehlvi, Sadia, The Sufi courtyard. Dargahs of Delhi, New Delhi 2012.
Dillon, Michael, China’s Muslim Hui community. Migration, settlement and sects,
London 1999.
Eickelman, Dale, Knowledge and power in Morocco, Princeton 1985.
El Adnani, Jillali, La Tijâniyya, 1781–1881. Les origines d’une confrérie religieuse au
Maghreb, Rabat 2007.
Elisséeff, Nikita, Nūr al-Dīn. Un grand prince musulman de Syrie au temps des Croisades
(511–569/1118–1174), 3 vols., Damascus 1967.
Ephrat, Daphna, In quest of an ideal type of saint. Some observations on the first gen-
eration of Moroccan Awliyāʾ Allāh in Kitāb al-tashawwuf, SI 94 (2002): 67–84.
Ephrat, Daphna, Spiritual wayfarers, leaders in piety. Sufis and the dissemination of
Islam in medieval Palestine, Cambridge 2008.
Ephrat, Daphna and Hatim Mahamid, The creation of Sufi spheres in medieval
Damascus (mid-12th to mid-14th century), JRAS 25/2 (January 2015): 189–208.
Ernst, Carl W. and Bruce B. Lawrence, Sufis martyrs of love, New York 2002.
Evans-Pritchard, E. E., The Sanusi of Cyrenaica, Oxford 1949.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, Sainthood as means of self-defense in seventeenth-century Ottoman
Anatolia, in G. M. Smith and C. E. Ernst (eds.), Manifestations of sainthood in Islam
(Istanbul 1993), 193–208.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, The tekke of Haci Bektaş. Social position and economic activities,
IJMES 7 (1976): 183–205.
Fernandes, Leonor, The evolution of a Sufi institution. The khanqah, Berlin 1988.
Gaborieau, Marc, Les ordres mystiques dans le sous-continent indien, in Alexandre
Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam. Cheminements
et situation actuelle (Paris 1986), 105–34.
Gaborieau, Marc and Nicole Grandin, Le renouveau confrérique (fin XVIIIe siècle–
XIXe siècle), in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 141

ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996),
68–83.
Gellner, Ernest, Saints of the Atlas, Chicago 1969.
Gellner, Ernest, Muslim society, Cambridge 1981.
Golombek, Lisa, The cult of saints and shrine architecture in the 14th century, in
Dichran K. Kouymjian (ed.), Near Eastern numismatics, iconography, epigraphy and
history. Studies in honor of George C. Miles (Beirut 1974), 419–30.
Golombek, Lisa, The chronology of Turbat-i Sheikh Jam, Journal of the British Institute
of Persian Studies 9 (1971): 27–44.
Golombek, Lisa and Donald Wilber, Timurid architecture of Iran and Turan,
Princeton 1988.
Goodwin, Godfrey, The dervish architecture of Anatolia, in Raymond Lifchez (ed.), The
dervish lodge. Architecture, art and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey (Berkeley 1992), 57–69.
Graham, Terry, Abū Saʿīd ibn Abī ʾl-Khayr and the school of Khurāsān, in Leonard
Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. Classical Persian Sufism from its origins to
Rumi (700–1300), vol. 1 (Oxford 1993), 83–135.
Gramlich, Richard, Die Wunder der Freunde Gottes. Theologien und Erscheinungsformen
des islamischen Heiligenwunders, Freiburg 1987.
Gülen, M. Fethullah, Key concepts in the practice of Sufism, Istanbul 2000.
Haenni, Patrick and Raphael Voix, God by all means. Eclectic faith and Sufi resurgence
among the Moroccan bourgeoisie, in Martin Bruinessen and Julia Howell (eds.),
Sufism and the modern in Islam (London 2007), 241–56.
Hamès, Constant, L’Europe occidentale contemporaine, in Alexandre Popovic and
Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musul-
man des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 442–7.
Hammoudi, Abdellah, Sainteté, pouvoir et societé. Tamrout au viie et viiie siècles,
Annales ESC 30 (1980): 615–41.
Hammoudi, Abdellah, Master and disciple. The cultural foundations of Moroccan au-
thoritarianism, Chicago 1997.
Hasse, Claude-Peter, Shrines of saints and dynastic mausolea. Towards a typology of fu-
nerary architecture in the Timurid period, Cahiers d’Asie Centrale 3/4 (1997): 215–27.
Hoexter, Miriam, The waqf in the public sphere, in M. Hoexter, S. N. Eisenstadt, and
N. Levtzion (eds.), The public sphere in Muslim societies (Albany 2002), 119–38.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularization of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, Riḥlat ibn Baṭṭūṭa, Beirut 1992.
Ibn Munawwar, Asrār al-tawḥid fī maqāmāt al-shaykh Abū Saʿīd, ed. Muḥammad Riḍā
Shāfiʿī Khadkanī, Tehran 1987.
Ibrahim, Layla ʿAli, The zawiya of Šaiḫ Zain al-din Yūsuf in Cairo, Mitteilungen des
Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 34 (1978): 79–110.
142 Ephrat and Pinto

Işın, Ekrem, La Kadiriyye à Istanbul. Une vue d’ensemble, Journal of the History of
Sufism 1–2 (2000): 577–90.
Iyās, Ibn, Badāʾi al-zuhūr fī waqāʾi al-duhūr, 5 vols., Cairo and Wiesbaden 1960–75.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Koch, Ebba, Mughal architecture. An outline of its history and development (1526–1858),
Munich 1991.
Kreiser, Klaus, The dervish living, in Raymond Lifchez (ed.), The dervish lodge.
Architecture, art and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey (Berkeley 1992), 49–56.
Le Gall, Dina, A culture of Sufism. Naqshbandīs in the Ottoman world, 1450–1700,
Albany 2005.
Lifchez, Raymond, The lodges of Istanbul, in Raymond Lifchez (ed.), The dervish lodge.
Architecture, art and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey (Berkeley 1992), 73–129.
Little, Donald P., The nature of khānqāhs, ribāṭs, and zāwiyas under the Mamlūks, in
Wael Hallaq and Donald P. Little (eds.), Islamic studies presented to Charles J. Adams
(Leiden 1991), 91–106.
Luizard, Pierre-Jean, Le soufisme égyptien contemporain, Egypte/Monde Arabe 2
(1990): 35–94.
Luizard, Pierre-Jean, Le Moyen Orient arabe, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein
(eds.), in Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines
à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 342–71.
Mahamid, Hatim, Waqf, education and politics in late medieval Syria, Berlin 2013.
Malamud, Margaret, Sufi organizations and structures of authority in medieval
Nishapur, IJMES 26 (1994): 427–42.
Meier, Fritz, Abū Saʿīd-i Abī l-Ḥayr (357–440/967–1049). Wirklichkeit und Legende,
Leiden, Tehran, Liège 1976.
Meri, Joseph, The cult of saints among Muslims and Jews in medieval Syria, Oxford 2002.
Meri, Joseph, The etiquette of devotion in the Islamic cult of saints, in James
Howard-Johnston and Paul A. Hayward (eds.), The cult of saints in late antiquity and
the Middle Ages. Essays on the contribution of Peter Brown (Oxford 1999), 263–86.
Meriwether, Margaret, The kin who count. Family and society in Ottoman Aleppo, 1770–
1840, Austin 1999.
Messick, Brinkley, Genealogies of reading and the scholarly cultures of Islam, in
S. C. Humphreys (ed.), Cultures of scholarship (Ann Arbor 1997), 387–412.
Milson, Menahem (trans.), A Sufi rule for novices. Kitāb ādāb al-murīdīn of Abū al-Najīb
al-Suhrawardī, Cambridge 1975.
Netton, Ian R., The breath of felicity. Adab, aḥwāl, maqāmāt and Abū Najīb
al-Suhrawardī, in Leonard Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. Classical Persian
Sufism from its origins to Rumi (700–1300), vol. 1 (Oxford 1993), 457–82.
Ṣūfī Places and Dwellings 143

Nizami, Khaliq Ahmad, Some aspects of khanqah life in medieval India, SI 13 (1957):
51–71.
O’Fahey, Rex S. and Bernd Radtke, Neo-Sufism reconsidered, Der Islam 70 (1993): 52–87.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden and Boston 2008.
O’Kane, John, The secrets of God’s mystical union. Or the spiritual stations of Shaykh Abu
Said, Costa Mesa, CA 1992.
Omer, Spahić, From mosques to khanqahs. The origins and rise of Sufi institutions,
Kemanusiaan 21, no. 1 (2014): 1–19.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Etude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan oriental, Paris 2005.
Papas, Alexandre, Les tombeaux de saints musulmans an Xinjiang: culte, réforme, his-
toire, Archives de sciences sociales des religions 142 (2008): 47–62.
Papas, Alexandre, Thomas Welsford, and Thierry Zarcone, eds., Central Asian Pilgrims.
Hajj routes and pious visits between Central Asia and the Hijaz, Berlin 2012.
Petruccioli, A., Fatehpur Sikri, Berlin 1992.
Pinto, Paulo G., Sufism and the political economy of morality in Syria, Princeton Papers.
Interdisciplinary Journal of Middle East Studies 15 (2006): 103–36.
Popovic, Alexandre and Gilles Veinstein, eds., Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques
dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui, Paris 1996.
Reeves, Edward, Power, resistance and the cult of saints in a northern Egyptian town,
American Ethnologist 2 (1995): 306–23.
Renard, John, Friends of God. Islamic images of piety, commitment, and servanthood,
Berkeley 2008.
Rizvi, Saiyid Athar Abas, A history of Sufism in India, 2 vols., New Delhi 1996.
Rizvi, Kishwar, The imperial setting. Shah ʿAbbas at the Safavid shrine of shaykh Ṣafī
in Ardabil, in S. R. Canby (ed.), Safavid art and architecture (London 2002), 9–15.
Rizvi, Kishwar, Its mortar mixed with the sweetness of life. Architecture and ceremo-
nial at the shrine of Ṣafī al-Dīn Iṣḥaq in Ardabīlī during the reign of Shāh Ṭahmāsb,
MW 90 (2000): 323–51.
Rizvi, Kishwar, The Safavid dynastic shrine. Architecture, religion and power in early
modern Iran, London 2010.
Safi, Omid, The politics of knowledge in pre-modern Islam. Negotiating ideology and reli-
gious inquiry, Chapel Hill, NC 2006.
Sedgwick, Mark, Western Sufism. From the Abbasids to the New Age, Oxford 2017.
Shoshan, Boaz, Popular culture in medieval Cairo, Cambridge 1993.
Stjernholm, Simon, Lovers of Muhammad. A study of the Nashbandi-Haqqani Sufis in
the twentieth-first century, Lund 2011.
144 Ephrat and Pinto

Subtelny, Maria E., Timurids in transition: Turko-Persian politics and acculturation,

Leiden 2007.
al-Suhrawardī, ʿAwārif al-maʿārif, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Maḥmūd and Maḥmud b. al-Sharaf,
2 vols., Cairo 1971 and 2000.
Tabbaa, Yasser, Constructions of power and piety in medieval Aleppo, Philadelphia 1997.
al-Tādilī, Kitāb al-tashawwuf ilā rijāl al-taṣawwuf, ed. Ahmed Toufiq, Rabbat 1987.
Taneja, A., ed., Sufi cults and the evolution of medieval Indian culture, New Delhi 2003.
Tasar, Eren, Soviet and Muslim. The institutionalization of Islam in Central Asia, 1943–
1991, Oxford 2017.
Taylor, Christopher S., In the vicinity of the righteous. Ziyāra and the veneration of
Muslim saints in late medieval Egypt, Leiden, Boston, Cologne 1999.
Tirmizi, S. A. I., Mughal documents relating to the dargah of Khwaja Muʿinuddin
Chishti, in C. W. Troll (ed.), Muslim shrines in India. Their character, history, and sig-
nificance (New Delhi and Oxford 2004), 48–59.
Trimingham, J. Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1998 [1971].
Troll, Christian W., ed., Muslim shrines in India. Their character, history, and signifi-
cance, New Delhi and Oxford 2004.
Ungaria, Georguis de, Tractatus de moribas et nequicia Turcorum, ed. R. Klochow
(Cologne 1993), 286–8.
Weismann, Itzchak, Taste of modernity. Sufism, Salafiyya and Arabism in late Ottoman
Damascus, Leiden 2000.
Weismann, Itzchak, The Naqshbandiyya. Orthodoxy and activism in a worldwide Sufi
tradition, London and New York 2007.
Werbner, Pnina, Pilgrims of love. The anthropology of a global Sufi cult, Bloomington,
IN 2003.
Wolper, Ethel Sara, Cities and saints. Sufism and the transformation of the urban land-
scape, Philadelphia 2003.
Yavuz, Hakan, Towards an Islamic liberalism? The Nurcu movement and Fethullah
Gülen, Middle East Journal 53, no. 4 (1999): 583–604.
Yürekli, Zeynep, Architecture and hagiography in the Ottoman empire. The politics of
Bektashi shrines in the classical age, Farnham and Burlington 2012.
Yürekli, Zeynep, Writing down feats and setting up the scene. Hagiographers and ar-
chitectural patrons in the age of the empire, in John J. Curry and Erik S. Ohlander
(eds.), Sufism and society. Arrangements of the mystical in the Muslim world, 1200–
1800 (London and New York 2012), 94–119.
 Chapter 6

Ṣūfī Shrines
Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen

1 Definition

What is a Ṣūfī shrine? The answer is certainly not easy; especially since the
expression “Ṣūfī shrine” has no equivalent in Arabic, Persian, or Turkish. If we
try to translate it, we find a rich lexicon relating to the cult of the dead and
Muslim saints, not necessarily Ṣūfīs. The terms qabr, türbe, mazār, maqām,
dargāh, designate mausoleums and tombs of the ʿAlids (descendants of ʿAlī b.
Abī Ṭālib), of the Companions of the Prophet, and—especially in the Muslim
world before the recent urbanisation—“natural sanctuaries,” such as trees,
springs, rocks, or caves, often associated with the presence of a certain “friend
of God,” or saint (Kriss and Kriss-Heinrich). It was only in the sixth/twelfth to
seventh/thirteenth century, after Sufism was institutionalised, i.e., organised
into brotherhoods or communities to become a dominant form of Islam (at
least until the end of the nineteenth century), that Muslim shrines came to be
identified with Sufism par excellence (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume).
A Ṣūfī shrine is usually centred around the tomb of a Ṣūfī shaykh, or saint. In
Arabic, it is called qabr (meaning “grave,” i.e., the place where a body is buried).
Its synonym, turba (Ar.) or türbe (Tk.), is derived from the Arabic for “dust.”
These words can designate a simple stele or a masonry or wooden construction
(ṣundūq, tābūt in Arabic) that marks the location of the tomb. If it attracts wor-
shippers and visitors, the community often builds a sanctuary that then be-
comes a focal point and the beginning of a cemetery (Râghib; Grabar). Certain
family or tribal necropolises sometimes become Ṣūfī shrines, especially when
the family or the ancestor buried therein is identified with a Ṣūfī brotherhood
or a Ṣūfī shaykh.
Two commonly used terms for Ṣūfī shrines are maqām (a place where a
saint resides) and mazār (a place of pious visitation, or ziyāra). A tree with
branches to which people tie rags, a cave where people light candles can be-
come a mazār associated with the cult of a Ṣūfī shaykh. This association is
usually confirmed by a legend (widespread among the saint’s followers) and
eventually, the construction of a sanctuary. One can metonymically designate
such a sanctuary by the name of a walī (saint) buried in it, as is often the case
in the Middle East and the Maghrib, or a nabī (prophet) in Palestine (Canaan).

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_008

146 Mayeur-Jaouen

Again, metonymically, such a site can be designated by the Arabic qubba (the
dome that crowns the sanctuary) or the Persian dargāh (threshold or palace).
The most common term in mediaeval texts is mashhad. In the writings of the
fourth-/tenth-century geographer al-Muqaddasī, mashhad can be a place com-
memorating the passage of a saint, or a place built following a divinely inspired
vision (al-Muqaddasî). It may also be, as the root sh-h-d suggests, the martyrion
(a place built in memory of a martyr), for example, a Shīʿī Imām, as in the
city of Mashhad around the shrine of Imām Riḍā (d. 203/818). In Sunnī lands,
mashhad refers to the mausoleum of a hero of the Arab-Islamic conquests, or
one of the members of the House of the Prophet (ahl al-bayt) (Williams).

2 Early History

Hagiographies and historical chronicles, on the one hand, and anthropologists’

fieldwork, on the other hand, make it possible to reconstruct the history of
Muslim shrines. Archaeology (stratigraphy and architectural surveys), epigra-
phy and art history illuminate some sites, but the archaeological excavation
of active sanctuaries is often impossible for logistical and ethical reasons. The
oldest Ṣūfī mausoleums, often built of wood, have been destroyed by fire, and
only the date of their reconstruction, not that of their original building, is
known (Grabar). For the recent period, such phenomena as demographic ex-
plosion, urbanisation, destruction from wars, as well as recent reconstructions
or enlargements make it difficult to undertake an accurate historical study of
such holy sites.
The first wave of Muslim shrine construction dates to the second half of
the third/ninth century, despite the ḥadīths that condemn the construction
of tombs and advocates the levelling of tombs (taswiyat al-qubūr) (Leisten,
Architektur für Tote; Leisten, Between orthodoxy; Diem and Schöller). Initially,
mausoleums were open cubes surmounted by a cupola. They were gradually
made into enclosed spaces, endowed with a mihrāb and crowned by a dome.
Complexes that combine an oratory, or even a mosque, with the mausoleum of
a saint were rare before the second half of the sixth/twelfth century.
The construction of sanctuaries became widespread in the Muslim world
in the fourth/tenth century. This is the result of four major factors. First, the
Islamisation of pre-Islamic places (natural sanctuaries, tombs of Jewish,
Byzantine, or Coptic saints, and Buddhist sites) went hand-in-hand with the
conversion to Islam of the pious visitors who frequented them. Muslim tra-
ditions integrated local stories and pre-Islamic figures, such as Khiḍr in the
Near East (Khizr/Hızır in the Turko-Persian world) who took on the traits of
Ṣūfī Shrines 147

St. George and the Prophet Elijah (Hasluck; Albera and Couroucli). The second
factor is the importance of the cult of the ʿAlids in Shīʿīsm; this was matched
by Sunnīs’ reverence for the Prophet’s Companions. These parallel cults oc-
curred in the context of clashes between the two communities (Mulder). The
third factor was the spirit of jihād and, more generally, the spirit of the frontier.
In fourth-/tenth-century Khurāsān, in Nīshāpūr, the khānaqāhs were home to
ascetics practicing peregrination and popular preaching. In North Africa, the
ribāṭs (fortified enclosures around tombs of martyrs of the jihād) sacralised a
defensive fort against the attacks of the Franks or the Berber tribes. In Ifrīqiyya,
the oldest ribāṭ was founded in Monastir in 180/796, followed by that of Sousse
in 206/821. In Morocco, as early as the third/ninth century, ribāṭs affirmed the
presence of Islam against the Barghawāṭa (a Berber tribe) of the Atlantic plains.
The Ragrāga (another Moroccan tribe) distinguished themselves in the jihād
in the Atlantic region and became the legendary propagators of Islam in the
Maghrib; they were said to have been converted to Islam by the Prophet him-
self (Ferhat). Under the influence of the mystical movement, which appeared
around the fifth/eleventh century, and developed during the al-Muwāḥḥidūn
(Almohad period) (sixth/twelfth century) and especially during the Marīnid
period (614–869/1217–1465), the ribāṭs became places of Ṣūfī pilgrimages
(Hofer [Ṣūfī Outposts] in this volume). We find this frontier spirit in Nubia,
where forty-nine anonymous tombs in Aswan date to the first half of the fifth/
eleventh century, and were later attributed to Ṣūfī shaykhs of the seventh-/thir-
teenth century. Ṣūfī orders thus annexed older sanctuaries even as they created
new ones. The fourth and final factor in the development of shrines is the role
of the mediaeval dynasties, which in Iran and Central Asia built mausoleums
funded by pious foundations: after the disappearance of these dynasties, some
of these tombs were occupied by Ṣūfī shaykhs and their cults (Kervran).

3 The Expansion of Ṣūfī Shrines

The first tombs of Muslim mystics appeared in the third/ninth century, along
with other mausoleums. While the inscription on the stele of Dhū l-Nūn
al-Miṣrī’s (d. 246/861) grave is perhaps apocryphal (Massignon), the tomb of
al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī (d. 298/910), which is in present-day Uzbekistan, is prob-
ably the authentic grave of this famous mystic. It honours the author who first
developed a theory of holiness (walāya) in Islam. The veneration of the liv-
ing shaykh extended to the deceased saint: he was not considered dead, rather
he continued to guide and instruct his disciples from the grave. Therefore,
for Ṣūfīs, the visit to a sanctuary is not a form of worship of the dead, but an
148 Mayeur-Jaouen

initiatory practice and a spiritual relationship with a master who is still pres-
ent. This transmission mode, called uwaysī, takes place when a Ṣūfī visits
the tomb of the master and visions, nocturnal or diurnal, occur. The prolific
and influential Ṣūfī author al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) already recommended vis-
iting the tombs of saints, although Ṣūfī sanctuaries, strictly speaking, were
rare before the development of Ṣūfī orders in the sixth/twelfth and seventh/
thirteenth centuries.
After 544–5/1150, we witness the rise of large monumental complexes in the
East that combined tombs and pious institutions. At the same time, pilgrimages
to the tombs of local and trans-regional saints multiplied. Written works reflect
both phenomena. Between the sixth/twelfth and the beginning of the elev-
enth/seventeenth century, the historian Yūsuf Rāghib identified some twenty
guidebooks devoted to Qarāfa, Cairo’s great cemetery (Rāġib). More general-
ly (beyond Egypt), the guidebook of the pious visits (kitāb al-ziyāra) by Abū
l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Abī Bakr al-Harawī, a Shīʿī pilgrim who died in Aleppo in 611/1215,
promoted the sanctuaries and visits to them in order to revive a sense of unity
in Islam at a time when the ʿAbbāsid caliphate was disintegrating (al-Harawī;
Meri, A lonely wayfarer’s guide). It was also in the sixth/twelfth century that,
under Fāṭimid domination and due to Ṣūfī influence, the celebration of the
Prophet’s birthday was sponsored in an official sense (Kaptein). This model in-
spired the celebration of annual festivals at the tombs of Ṣūfī saints, such as
the Egyptian mawālid (mulids) and the Maghribi mawāsim (moussems), which
often followed the solar calendar of the seasons observed by farmers and cattle
breeders. Patron saint festivals around shrines often combined Ṣūfī rituals and
trade fairs (Mayeur-Jaouen, The mulid of al-Sayyid al-Badawi; Reysoo).
With the resurgence of Sunnī Islam under the Ayyūbids, the Mamlūks,
and the Ottomans, the role of Ṣūfī orders asserted itself. After the death of an
eponymous saint, a saint’s main disciples established around his sanctuary a
brotherhood whose branches remained linked by pilgrimages to the mauso-
leum of the holy founder. The cult of Ṣūfī shaykhs often entailed worship in
multiple locations. For example, the followers of the Qādiriyya order (Ceyhan
in this volume), who followed and revered ʿAbd al-Qadir al-Jilānī (d. 561/1166)
in a huge mausoleum in Baghdad, also founded a number of sanctuaries in
honour of the founder, from Morocco to Indonesia.
Several Mongol dynasties converted to Islam and the waves of migration
that resulted from various invaders led Ṣūfīs to resettle in areas from Iran and
Central Asia to Anatolia and India, which became a seat of Persianate cul-
ture. The first sanctuaries of the Chishtiyya, a brotherhood founded by Muʿīn
al-Dīn Chishtī (d. 633/1236) who came to Ajmer in 602/1206, appeared in the
seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries (Ernst and Lawrence).
Ṣūfī Shrines 149

It was the worship at the shrine of Ajmer, rather than the saint himself, that led
to many conversions of Hindus to Islam. When the wish of Hindu pilgrims at
the tomb of Chishtī (to heal an only son or have male offspring) was granted,
some converted to Islam (Siddiqui). Under the Mughal Empire, from 926/1526
onward, the alliance between saints and princes, whose gifts to the mauso-
leum of Ajmer funded offices including candlestick lighters, the musician as-
signed to the tomb, the annual pilgrimage, and maintenance of the buildings
(Tirmizi), culminated. Once on the throne in 963/1556, Akbar walked to Ajmer
in 971/1564 and renewed this pilgrimage almost every year. In India during
this time, the annual patron saints’ festivals, known as ʿurs (lit. “wedding”),
became common.
In the Maghrib, the time of so-called “maraboutism” began. The Andalusian
Abū Madyan al-Shuʿayb (d. 589/1193 or 594/1198), revered in Tlemcen under
the name of Sidi Boumediene, was the first great Ṣūfī saint of the Maghrib
(Andezian). In the seventh/thirteenth century, the Shādhiliyya order spread,
followed by the Jazūliyya (Ceyhan in this volume), and in the ninth/fifteenth
and tenth/sixteenth centuries, saints multiplied to such an extent that they
“now embodied a group, a region or a city of which he [the saint] became the
standard bearer” (Ferhat, 22). Large zāwiyas or complexes henceforth repre-
sented political and spiritual power. A zāwiya served many purposes simul-
taneously; it was a mosque, a mausoleum, a place of education, the seat of a
Ṣūfī brotherhood, a centre of economic and political power, and a refuge from
the violence of Bedouins and tribes (Firouzeh in this volume). Holiness, which
had become hereditary, was formed around the great sanctuaries and murābiṭ/
marabout lineages (Amri).
In the Arab Orient (bilād al-Shām) during the seventh/thirteenth to ninth/
fifteenth century, the Frankish and Mongol perils, and the spirit of the
Sunnī resurgence increased the need for the veneration of Ṣūfī awliyāʾ. The
ʿAbbāsid caliph’s move to Cairo after the sack of Baghdad by the Mongols in
656/1258 consecrated Egypt’s new status as an institutional religious centre.
In the eighth/fourteenth and ninth/fifteenth centuries, with the support of
the Mamlūk state that dominated Syria and Egypt, there appeared a “second
wave” of Ṣūfī orders (Geoffroy). Sultan Qāytbāy (r. 872–901/1468–96), the pious
Muslim prince par excellence, built many Ṣūfī shrines.
Rituals at such shrines took on features that are remarkably similar through-
out the Muslim world, namely, circumambulation of the saint’s tomb, like the
Meccan ṭawāf around the Kaʿba, with visitors reciting the fātiḥa (first sūra
of the Qurʾān), lighting candles, burning incense, offering flowers, silver, and
gold. During ceremonies at the shrine, they performed dhikr (a ritualised rep-
etition of God’s names) and samāʿ (the so-called “spiritual concert”). Annual
150 Mayeur-Jaouen

pilgrimages were an occasion for encampments; pious visits were accompa-

nied by songs and dances, banquets, and sacrifices. Frequent rituals involved
touching the tombs (tamassuḥ) to partake of the baraka that was believed to
emanate from the grave, and rolling on the ground around the tombs (tamrīgh)
(Taylor).
Criticism of such practices was voiced, the most famous and virulent being
that of the renowned Ḥanbalī scholar Ibn Taymiyya (d. 728/1328) (Olesen;
Memon). Without condemning the practice of ziyāra itself, he denounced the
cult of Muslim saints as a manifestation of polytheism (shirk) and as imitation
of Christians and Jews. These condemnations remained marginal in an age
when belief in the intercession of the saints was widespread. However, they
were later taken up by Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (d. 1206/1792), his fol-
lowers the Wahhābīs, and more recently by various groups of Salafīs.
After conquering the Arab provinces in 922–3/1516–7, the Ottomans some-
how made Sufism a “state religion,” sponsored Ṣūfīs, and renovated the mauso-
leum of the well-known mystic Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) in Damascus (Atlagh).
Throughout their realm, they encouraged the cult of relics of the Prophet (e.g.,
his footprints and hairs from his beard). Ṣūfī zāwiyas, which multiplied across
the empire, were sometimes simple neighbourhood oratories, and sometimes
complexes belonging to a particular Ṣūfī order, with a mausoleum, a ceme-
tery, and a mosque. Festivals, banquets, hospice activities, and recitations of
the Qurʾān were funded by the revenue from waqfs (charitable foundations
and donations). Waqf deeds describe the economy of the sanctuary precisely:
sums of money or quantities of wheat were allocated to pay the staff of the
mosque (the imām, muezzin, preacher, Qurʾān readers, porter, sweeper, and
lamplighter). Special funds were earmarked for the maintenance of mats or
carpets in the prayer hall, and of oil lamps (Faroqhi; Hofer [Endowments] in
this volume). Apart from the waqfs, Ṣūfī centres benefitted from the gifts of rul-
ers: for example, in the great Moroccan zawāyā, they obtained a share of taxes
on commercial activities related to the trans-Saharan trade. More generally,
tax exemptions for Ṣūfī centres contributed to the flourishing of these sanctu-
aries and pilgrimages to them. At the most modest level, the donations ( futūḥ,
nudhūr) offered by the devotees made it possible to welcome pilgrims and feed
resident Ṣūfīs (Khan in this volume).

4 Modern Criticism of Ṣūfī Shrines

The most radical condemnation of the cult of Muslim saints was launched in
the twelfth/eighteenth century by the aforementioned Muḥammad b. ʿAbd
Ṣūfī Shrines 151

al-Wahhāb. Supported by the Saʿūd family, Wahhābīs treated the cult of saints
as paganism and Sufism as idolatry. Between 1157/1744 and 1233/1818, in the
Najd region of the Arabian Peninsula, where the Wahhābī movement originat-
ed, many shrines were destroyed and sacred trees were cut (Peskes). A century
later, in 1924, the Saudi emirate conquered the holy cities of the Ḥijāz and in
1932 established the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The mausoleums of the cem-
etery of Baqīʿ in the city of Medina were razed to the ground. Only the shrine
of the Prophet, which remains a site of pious visitations, escaped destruction.
The struggle between the advocates of the sacredness of local territories—
embodied by Ṣūfī sanctuaries—and those who promote the idea of a mono-
lithic Islam based on a single version of the Wahhābī-inspired creed remains
as acute today as it was in the past.
In the early nineteenth century, several Ṣūfī orders rejected not Sufism it-
self, but, the practices of the cult of saints: circumambulations, animal sac-
rifices, candles, and so on. In India, Aḥmad Barelwī (d. 1246/1831) permitted
the ceremony of reading the Qurʾān and distributing food at the tombs of
saints, but refused to allow it to take place on specific dates. The process of
Westernisation and modernisation of Muslim societies contributed to the
growth of anti-Sufism criticism. In India, Deobandi members of the Chishtiyya
scholars (ʿulamāʾ) believed in the intercession of saints, but disliked the ritu-
als performed at their sanctuaries (Metcalf). In the late nineteenth century
and early twentieth century in Central Asia and among Russian Muslims
the so-called “Jadidism” (from the Arabic jadīd, “new”) linked in part to the
Naqshbandiyya, emerged. Its representatives stigmatised “Ishānism,” that is,
the very existence of a Ṣūfī “clergy” (the īshāns being the hereditary guardians
of tombs) by presenting their activities as a major cause of the decline of Islam.
The saints were not involved, nor was Sufism as mysticism per se, or as a means
of transmitting and preserving Islamic knowledge. Actually, the Tatar Muslim
reformists wanted to fight the cult of saints, seen as archaic and pagan surviv-
als, according to a vision of Islam that was inspired by the evolutionary way
Europe was then reading the history of religions (Dudoignon, Is’haqov, and
Möhämmätshin (eds.)). The secularised rationalism of the Muslim reformists
owed much to European scientism: it rejected the “superstitions,” the miracles
of the saints, the lack of hygiene of pilgrimages, and the lack of decency associ-
ated with the festive atmosphere of popular ziyāras. Another common theme
was the economic waste involved in hoarding food and other goods around
Ṣūfī shrines in very poor countries.
After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and in the colonial context of
the age, this hostility to Ṣūfī shrines grew even harsher. It was directly related
to the growing urbanisation and secularisation of Muslim societies, especially
152 Mayeur-Jaouen

the rise of new urban and educated social classes. The Muslim Brotherhood,
founded in 1928 in Egypt, was a typical representative of this anti-Ṣūfī rheto-
ric. In Algeria, the ʿUlamāʾ Association (Jamʿiyyat al-ʿUlamāʾ al-Muslimīn) of
Ben Badis/Bin Bādīs, founded in 1931, recognised in its statutes the existence
of saints, which it defined as sincere believers who fear God. Yet, any worship
of the saints was rejected as heretical and as a vestige of paganism, and the
Algerian ʿulamāʾ attacked rural sanctuaries, sometimes violently (Andezian).
In the twentieth century, throughout the Muslim world Islamists of various
types showed their hostility to Ṣūfī shrines, adding to the already strong influ-
ence of Wahhābīs/Saudis who rejected Sufism as a whole.
In spite of the ascendancy of the reformist anti-Ṣūfī discourse, for a long
time it had little effect on events and the life of Ṣūfī shrines and sanctuaries.
They were probably much more affected by the consequences of the grow-
ing urbanisation, industrialisation, and modernisation throughout the second
half of the twentieth century (Clayer in this volume). The Muslim world be-
came predominantly urban in the 1970s, and this led to the decline or even
the disappearance of “natural” sanctuaries in many regions. In the countryside
as in the city, sacred springs and trees disappeared. Stories of the miraculous
saving of holy sites and saints’ from the pickaxe and later bulldozers tell us
more about the inexorable process of their demolition than of their preserva-
tion (Kriss and Kriss-Heinrich; Canaan). Although modern twentieth-century
neighbourhoods in Arab cities continue to build sanctuaries for new saints,
the vast majority of Ṣūfī shrines are confined to ancient quarters or cemeter-
ies. Similarly, despite the fact that roads and railways facilitate pilgrimage and
air travel enables visits by transnational pilgrimages and members of Ṣūfī or-
ders, the majority of sanctuary visits take place within national boundaries
(Werbner).
The nationalist ideology and political independence of Muslim states have
resulted in the construction of large sanctuaries, despite the fact that the dom-
inant discourse of Muslim elites condemns their visitation. The considerable
incomes generated by the sanctuaries attracted the attention of state authori-
ties, anxious to keep popular Ṣūfī teachers under control and still promote
a modern economy. Atatürk’s republican Turkey, in a clear rupture with the
Ottoman past, suppressed Ṣūfī institutions with the law of December 13, 1925.
The Ṣūfī shrines came under the control of the ministry of waqfs and when,
after a long time in hiding, Ṣūfī orders resurfaced, they were deprived of their
earlier material foundations (Zarcone). In the Central Asian republics of the
USSR, Soviet authorities waged a pitiless struggle against mosques, mausole-
ums, and khānaqāhs. In Bourguiba’s Tunisia, some of the zāwiyas were closed
or repurposed (Boissevain).
Ṣūfī Shrines 153

Elsewhere, Ṣūfī sanctuaries often served to legitimate political power: hence

the support of Moroccan ʿAlawīs and the Hashemites of Jordan for the tombs
of saints. We can also mention the ambiguous Nasserist policies vis-à-vis Ṣūfī
shrines in Egypt. Many renowned sanctuaries became part of a national iden-
tity construction: after the breakup of the USSR in 1991 and the independence
of the republics of Central Asia, local saints became national heroes and au-
thorities used them to endorse reconstructed national identities. Thus, Bahāʾ
al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1389) was celebrated in 1993 in Bukhara as the pa-
tron saint of Uzbekistan liberated from the Soviet yoke (Chambert-Loir and
Guillot (eds.)). In Turkey, in 1950, the political process led to the reopening of
certain mausoleums. This, in its turn, resulted in the rebirth of pilgrimages,
for example, to the tomb of Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273) in Konya and to
Ḥājjī Bektāsh. In Tunisia, under the presidency of Ben Ali, from 1987 and until
the revolution (December 2010–January 2011), the state encouraged people to
frequent Ṣūfī zāwiyas. Today, in Morocco, shrines and moussems are subject
to a process of patrimonialisation and folklorisation promoted by the ʿAlawī
monarchy and its ministry of waqfs, for example, around the “seven saints” of
Marrakech (Pénicaud).
The beginning of the twenty-first century saw an intensification of the
struggle between supporters and opponents of Ṣūfī shrines: some shrines
were burned or razed during the 2011 revolutions in Tunisia and Libya; ISIS
(the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) and its affiliates deliberately destroyed
Ṣūfī shrines in Iraq and Timbuktu (Mali); great sanctuaries in Pakistan were
bombed in a particularly violent manifestation of this criticism, which is often
linked to various groups of Salafīs who are hostile toward Sufism and deny the
intercession of saints buried in tombs. Another face of this secularisation is the
defence of cultural heritage, which allows for the preservation and upkeep of
holy sites. Be this as it may, the resilience of Ṣūfī sanctuaries (which are often
rebuilt) and their considerable role in the physical and spiritual landscape of
contemporary Islam remain impressive.

Bibliography

Aitpeva, Gulnara, ed., Mazar worship in Kyrgyzstan. Rituals and practitioners in Talas,
Bishkek 2007.
Albera, Dionigi and Maria Couroucli, eds., Sharing sacred spaces in the Mediterranean.
Christians, Muslims and Jews at shrines and sanctuaries, Bloomington, IN 2012.
Amri, Nelly, Les saints en islam. Les messagers de l’espérance. Sainteté et eschatologie au
Maghreb aux XIV e et XVe siècles, Paris 2008.
154 Mayeur-Jaouen

Andézian, Sossie, Expériences du divin dans l’Algérie contemporaine. Adeptes des saints
de la région de Tlemcen, Paris 2001.
Atlagh, Riad, Paradoxes d’un mausolée, in Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi (ed.), Lieux
d’islam. Cultes et cultures de l’Afrique à Java (Paris 1996), 132–53.
Boissevain, Katia, Sainte parmi les saints. Sayyida Mannûbiya ou les recompositions cul-
tuelles dans la Tunisie contemporaine, Paris 2006.
Boivin, Michel and Rémy Delage, eds., Devotional Islam in contemporary South Asia.
Shrines, journeys and wanderers, London 2016.
Canaan, Taufiq, Mohammedan saints and sanctuaries in Palestine, London 1927.
Chambert-Loir, Henri and Claude Guillot, eds., Le culte des saints dans le monde musul-
man, Paris 1995.
Diem, Werner and Marco Schöller, The living and the dead in Islam. Studies in Arabic
epitaphs, Wiesbaden 2004.
Dudoignon, Stéphane, Dämir Is’haqov, and Räfyq Möhämmätshin, eds., L’islam de
Russie. Conscience communautaire et autonomie politique chez les Tatars de la Volga
et de l’Oural, depuis le XVIIIe siècle, Paris 1997.
Ernst, Carl W. and Bruce B. Lawrence, Sufi martyrs of love. The Chishti order in South
Asia and beyond, New York 2002.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, The tekke of Haci Bektas. Social position and economic activities,
IJMES 7/2 (1976): 183–208.
Ferhat, Halima, Le Maghreb aux XIIe et XIIIe siècles. Les siècles de la foi, Casablanca 1993.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Assises matérielles et rôle économique des ordres soufis, in Gilles
Veinstein and Alexandre Popovic (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans
le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 213–23.
Geoffroy, Éric, La seconde vague. Fin XIIIe–XVe siècle, in Gilles Veinstein and
Alexandre Popovic (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde mu-
sulman des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 55–67.
Gonnella, Julia, Islamische Heiligenverherung im urbanen Kontext am Beispiel von
Aleppo (Syrien), Berlin 1995.
Grabar, Oleg, The earliest Islamic commemorative structures. Notes and documents,
Ars Orientalis 6 (1966): 7–46.
al-Harawī, ʿAlī b. Abī Bakr, Guide des lieux de pèlerinage, trans. Janine Sourdel-Thomine,
Damascus 1957.
Hasluck, Frederick William, Christianity and Islam under the sultans, Margaret Hasluck
(ed.), vol. I and II, Oxford 1929, reprint Istanbul 2000.
Kaptein, N. J. G., Muhammad’s birthday festival, early history in the central Muslim lands
and development in the Muslim west until the 10th/16th century, Leiden, New York,
Köln 1993.
Kervran, Monique, Les structures funéraires et commémoratives en Iran et en Asie
centrale du 9e au 12e siècle, PhD dissertation, Paris-IV Sorbonne, 1987.
Ṣūfī Shrines 155

Kriss, Rudolf and Hubert Kriss-Heinrich, Volksglaube im Bereich des Islams. Vol. 1:
Wallfahrtswesen und Heiligenverehrung, Wiesbaden 1960–2.
Leisten, Thomas, Architektur für Tote. Bestattung in architektonischen Kontext in den
Kernländern der islamischen Welt zwischen 3/9 und 6/12 Jahrhundert, Berlin 1998.
Leisten, Thomas, Between orthodoxy and exegesis. Some aspects of attitude in the
shariʿa toward funerary architecture, Muqarnas VII (1990): 12–22.
Massignon, Louis, La cité des morts au Caire (Qarâfa—Darb al-Ahmar), BIFAO LVII
(1958): 25–79.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, The mulid of al-Sayyid al-Badawi of Tanta. Egypt’s legendary
Sufi festival, Cairo 2019.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, Pèlerinages d’Égypte. Histoire de la piété copte et musulmane
XVe–XXe siècle, Paris 2005.
Memon, Muhammad, Ibn Taymîya’s struggle against popular religion with an annotated
translation of his Kitâb iʾtiqâd al-sirat al-mustaqîm mukhâlafat ashâb al-jahîm, The
Hague 1977.
Meri, Josef W., The cult of saints among Muslims and Jews in medieval Syria, Oxford 2002.
Meri, Josef W. (trans.), A lonely wayfarer’s guide to pilgrimage. ʿAlī ibn Abī Bakr
al-Harawī’s Kitāb al-ishārāt ilā ma‌ʿrifat al-ziyārāt, Princeton 2004.
Metcalf, Barbara, Islamic revival in British India Deoband, 1860–1900, Princeton 1982.
Mulder, Stephennie, The shrines of the Alides in medieval Syria. Sunnis, Shiʾis and the
architecture of coexistence, Oxford 2014.
al-Muqaddasî, La meilleure répartition pour la connaissance des provinces (Aḥsan
at-taqāsīm fī maʿrifat al-aqālīm), trans. André Miquel, Damascus 1963.
Olesen, Niels H., Culte des saints et pèlerinages chez Ibn Taymiyya (661/1268–728/1328),
Paris 1991.
Pénicaud, Manoël, Dans la peau d’un autre. Pèlerinage insolite au Maroc avec les mages
Regraga, Paris 2007.
Peskes, Esther, Muḥammad b. ʿAbdalwahhāb, 1703–92, im Widerstreit. Untersuchungen
zur Rekonstruktion der Frühgeschichte der Wahhābīya, Berlin 1993.
Rāġib, Yūsuf, Les premiers monuments funéraires de l’islam, AI IX (1970): 21–36.
Reysoo, Fenneke, Pèlerinages au Maroc. Fête, politique et échange dans l’islam populaire,
Paris-Neuchâtel 1991.
Schimmel, Annemarie, Islam in the Indian subcontinent, Leiden-Köln 1980.
Siddiqui, Iqtidar Husayin, The early Chishti dargahs, in Christian Troll (ed.), Muslim
shrines in India (Delhi 1989; repr. 2003), 1–23.
Taylor, Christopher S., In the vicinity of the righteous. Ziyara and the veneration of
Muslim saints in late medieval Egypt, Leiden 1999.
Tirmizi, S. A. I., Mughal documents relating to the dargah of Khwaja Muʾinuddin
Chishti, in Christian Troll (ed.), Muslim shrines in India (Delhi 1989; repr. 2003),
48–59.
156 Mayeur-Jaouen

Troll, Christian, ed., Muslim shrines in India. Their character, history and significance,
Delhi 1989; repr. 2003.
Werbner, Pnina, Pilgrims of love. The anthropology of a global Sufi cult, Bloomington,
IN 2003.
Williams, Caroline, The cult of ʿAlid saints in the Fatimide monuments of Cairo,
Muqarnas III (1985): 39–60.
Zarcone, Thierry, La Turquie moderne et l’islam, Paris 2004.
 Chapter 7

Ṣūfī Lodges
Peyvand Firouzeh

1 Introduction

Zāwiya (Ar. ‘corner’ or ‘nook’), khānaqāh/khānqāh (P. ‘dwelling place’ or ‘place

of residence’), and tekke (Tk., from Arabic ittakā, ‘to rely on’ or ‘receive sup-
port’) refer to the institution and physical establishment of a group of Ṣūfīs
gathered around a master, known as pīr in Persian, and as shaykh in Arabic.
From modest single buildings to monumental complexes, the wide range of
structures denoted by these terms (and their variants) consist of spaces for
a variety of individual and collective functions that may include, but are not
limited to, meetings and large ritual assemblies, teaching sessions, residences,
burial places, prayers, retreats, and meals (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume;
for the application of the term khānaqāh to non-Ṣūfī establishments and in
non-Islamic contexts, see Böwering and Melvin-Koushki, 456–66). They may
act as charitable institutions, in which case, the same or additional designated
spaces may be used to make amenities accessible to the public, such as feed-
ing and accommodating the poor and travellers. The considerable range of
geographical and temporal variations, evident in the variety of buildings and
terms referring to similar buildings, demonstrate the prevalence of Sufism in
the everyday lives of rural and urban communities in Islamicate societies, and
also shows the social and political status of diverse Ṣūfī ṭarīqas (generally re-
ferred to as ‘Ṣūfī orders’).

2 Terminology and Its Temporal-Geographical Variations

A variety of terms, at times used interchangeably, refer to the buildings utilised

by Ṣūfī ṭarīqas. Apart from zāwiya, khānaqāh, and tekke, they include ribāṭ,
āstāna (‘doorway,’ ‘threshold’), dargāh, langar, ṣawmaʿa (‘hermitage’), and du-
wayra (lit., ‘little house’), among others. If we consider the Islamic world in its
entirety over a longue durée, the terminology used to refer to the various types
of institutions affiliated with Ṣūfī ṭarīqas, here collectively called ‘Ṣūfī lodges,’
has varied widely depending on the forms and functions of these buildings.
The fluidity of terminology is rooted in the linguistic diversity across Islamic

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_009

158 Firouzeh

lands, heterogeneous ascetic-mystic practices, and the physical characteristics

and developmental history of Ṣūfī lodges, which do not adhere to a fixed and
universal typology.
Broadly speaking, the term zāwiya is commonly used to denote large
Ṣūfī complexes in North Africa, whereas the same term is used in eastern
Islamic lands to refer to a smaller mosque or other spaces within a larger
complex reserved for Ṣūfī gatherings or retreats (Little, 91–105). In Khurāsān
and Transoxiana from the fourth/tenth century, the predominant term was
khānaqāh. Tekke is associated most strongly with Ottoman regions, while
khānaqāh, āstāna, zāwiya, and dargāh were also used in the same region to de-
scribe structures varying in scale and architectural functions (Lifchez, 75–76).
The latter term, dargāh (that usually implies the presence of a shrine or tomb
of a Ṣūfī) is most commonly associated with South Asia. In Iraq until the mid-
dle of the seventh/thirteenth century, residences of Ṣūfīs were called ribāṭs,
which, as an architectural term, referred to a look-out post, small fort, fortified
city, caravanserai, staging-post, or an urban establishment for mystics. (For the
prehistory of ribāṭ as a non-Ṣūfī establishment from the early Islamic period
and its subsequent evolution, see Bosworth, 284–6; Meier, 335–421; Hofer [Ṣūfī
Outposts] in this volume).
While some of these terms have a regional or temporal sphere of reference,
some were used in the same area contemporaneously. In eighth-/fourteenth-
century Cairo, for instance, a range of terms, including khānaqāh, ribāṭ, takiyya,
zāwiya, and even madrasa (‘teaching college’), were used concurrently to refer
to structures associated with the activities of Ṣūfī ṭarīqas (Behrens-Abouseif,
44; Sedgwick in this volume). Some terms obtained nuanced meanings de-
pending on the region, and thus referred to different types and scales of build-
ings in different geographical areas. The term āstāna is a case in point. While
in Ottoman lands and in early modern Central Asia, the term was often used to
refer to major complexes (Lifchez, 75–76; McChesney, 68), in South Asia it typi-
cally referred to a shrine or stopping-place of a revered Ṣūfī, a place marked
by a stone, tree, or small building. For example, several āstānas, including
those in Awrangabad and Srinagar, are associated with Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī
(d. 633/1236), a Ṣūfī of Ajmer, and ʿAbd al-Qādir Jīlānī (d. 561/1166) of Baghdad
(Green, Migrant Sufis, 498).
The transregional mobility of Ṣūfīs was another factor in the variety of ar-
chitectural terminology. For instance, in twelfth-/eighteenth and thirteenth-/
nineteenth-century Cairo, takāyā (s. takiyya) were distinguished from the
zawāyā (s. zāwiya) because they were ‘convents for Turkish and Persian Ṣūfīs.’
Some were reserved specifically for ṭarīqas from Turkish provinces, such
as the Mawlawiyya takiyya (Tk. Mevleviyye tekke), the Gulshaniyya takiyya
(Gülşeniyye tekke), and others (Delanoue, 249; De Jong, 214).
Ṣūfī Lodges 159

Beyond geographical and linguistic considerations, the physical nature of

Ṣūfī lodges also lends itself to terminological fluidity. Large complexes com-
monly consist of a combination of spaces or buildings with various purposes:
funerary buildings, teaching spaces, soup kitchens, travel lodges, ritual halls,
prayer halls, and mosques. The names for each of these spaces can refer to the
whole complex. Scale, too, could be a key factor in the choice of terminology.
For instance, from the tenth/sixteenth century onwards, in Ottoman Anatolia,
a tekke was commonly a building or complex specifically designed for the com-
munal life of a large and organised community of Ṣūfīs, and possibly controlled
by the state. In the same context, a zāwiya was usually associated with more
modest structures and mobile users: for example, a zāwiya could refer to a sec-
tion of a residential house or a mosque where Ṣūfīs assembled (Clayer, 416–17),
or complexes consisting of cells, a prayer hall, and other amenities reserved
for travellers, including itinerant Ṣūfīs. In Damascus, the term khānaqāh was
associated with larger institutions, and reflected the official patronage they
received, whereas the zāwiya accommodated more modest ṭarīqas that priori-
tised the principle of spiritual poverty (Geoffroy, 166–75). By contrast, in India,
the term takiyya applied to small-scale establishments (Gaborieau, 207). In gen-
eral, ṣawmaʿa or duwayra were mainly reserved for smaller structures as well.
As sacred sites, Ṣūfī lodges attracted elite and urban patrons, who trans-
formed the structures into a palimpsest of building and refurbishing cam-
paigns that manifested the site’s sociopolitical history. Oftentimes during these
processes, when spaces serving new functions were added, the primary term
used to denote the building no longer accurately represented the full spectrum
of its functions. Also, very commonly, a whole complex would be known by its
most venerated part, especially if it included the tomb of a Ṣūfī shaykh, such
that the terminology no longer necessarily reflected the nature and function of
all of the different parts of the complex. An example is the venerated site asso-
ciated with Shaykh Aḥmad-i Jām (d. 536/1141) in north-east Iran; it started as a
turbat (burial place, lit., ‘soil’) of the Ṣūfī and expanded into a multi-functional
institution with several buildings constructed around the grave (Golombek,
Chronology, 43) (fig. 7.1). The complex, and in fact the whole town, are named
after the first and most venerated part of the structure: Turbat-i Jām.

3 The Pre- and Early History of the Institution

While the prehistory and early phases of the evolution of the Ṣūfī lodge are
shrouded in uncertainty, its history as an organised physical institution with
rights of ownership is usually dated to the fifth/eleventh century. It is not clear
when the terms in question were first applied to Ṣūfī establishments, but we do
160 Firouzeh

Figure 7.1 View of the open-air burial and entrance portal from the courtyard of Turbat-i
Shaykh Aḥmad Jām
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh
Ṣūfī Lodges 161

know of a few scattered references to the buildings prior to the fifth/eleventh

century. For instance, the mediaeval geographer al-Muqaddasī (d. c. 380/991)
refers to the khānaqāh of the Karrāmiyya (the sect named after the preacher
Ibn Karrām (d. 255/869)) that flourished in the central and eastern parts of the
Islamic world from the third/ninth century. Al-Muqaddasī also speaks of Ṣūfī
groups linked to mosques and ribāṭs in the countryside (Chabbi). The early
ʿAbbāsid ribāṭs in ʿAbbādān are another group of institutions connected to the
prehistory of the Ṣūfī lodge (see Böwering and Melvin-Koushki; Gramlich, Die
Nahrung der Herzen, 1:476, 484; Böwering, 47–48; Gibb, 2:281).
Generally speaking, from the fifth/eleventh century, the development of
Ṣūfī lodges underwent a transition. First, the ruling elites under the Saljūqs,
Ghaznavids, Zangids, and Ayyūbids became involved in the patronage of spe-
cialised buildings for Ṣūfīs, a sign of the institutionalisation and politicisation
of the ṭarīqas. Second, the regulation of communal life at Ṣūfī lodges can be
attributed to this period, as we know, for example, from the writings of the Ṣūfī
Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) (Nicholson, 46).

4 The Ṣūfī Lodge: Narratives and Networks

A common thread among Ṣūfī lodges across Islamicate societies is the central
role of Ṣūfī bodies (living or dead) to the Ṣūfī lodge. Ṣūfī lodges were shaped
around the presence, or memory of the presence, of the Ṣūfī in that locale. This
includes his/her past or present space of retreat, the historic stopping place
of a renowned figure, or permanent burial (Green, Making space, 4–5; for an
example of a Ṣafavid dynastic shrine that grew from a modest zāwiya, see Rizvi,
24–56). The correlation between the sacredness of the space and the body is
evident in rituals related to a Ṣūfī’s burial place. For instance, in South Asia,
materials that came into contact with the grave of a Ṣūfī were treated as relics.
The flower petals, the surrounding earth, or the water used to wash the graves
could all be ingested to circulate the baraka (blessing) of the Ṣūfī (Flood, 472).
Narratives—oral, hagiographic, and epigraphic—played an indispensable
role in making a Ṣūfī lodge a sacred place, and connecting the body of the Ṣūfī
with the site and its audience (on the correlation between the development
of sacred sites and the writing of hagiographies, see Yürekli; Green, Making
space, 18). The Ṣūfī’s trajectory before and after their sojourn at the site pro-
vided key aspects (such as genealogies, chains of initiation, education, and
travels) of these narratives. On the one hand, the building commemorating
the body or former presence of a Ṣūfī was physically embedded in a locale, and
its connection to the place was strengthened by texts. On the other hand, the
162 Firouzeh

same narratives situated a Ṣūfī lodge as a node on the map of the wider Islamic
world and beyond. It was connected to people, places, and times near and far.
In this sense, Ṣūfī lodges were both local and global.
Ṣūfī lodges were thus grounded in an interplay of mobility and stasis. The
architecture, as a permanent structure, encouraged mobility among pilgrims,
rulers, travellers, merchants, and scholars by being part of regional and tran-
sregional networks of sacred sites. In addition to commemorating the sanctity
of Ṣūfīs’ teachings and miracles, the architecture and the narratives surround-
ing it also provided a place for the permanent commemoration of the Ṣūfīs’
mobility, a reminder of their origins and past travels.

5 The Architecture of Ṣūfī Lodges

Zāwiyas, khānaqāhs, and tekkes ranged from modest single buildings to grand
composite complexes consisting of several private or communal, residential
or non-residential spaces. A prototypical, large Ṣūfī complex could include a
ritual hall (called jamāʿat-khāna, dhikr-khāna, tawḥīd-khāna, or samāʿ-khāna,
sometimes also used as a mosque), a mausoleum for the founding Ṣūfī or other
important figures of the ṭarīqa, lodging for the Ṣūfī shaykh and his dependents,
cells for disciples and travellers, a mosque, library, bathhouse, hospital, gar-
dens, water reservoir, fountain, granaries, and a soup kitchen to feed residents,
travellers, and the poor.
Although not an indispensable element of the Ṣūfī lodge, the burial place
of the ṭarīqa founder was a common feature of both single buildings and larg-
er complexes. The tomb, in many cases one of the oldest parts of the com-
plex, sanctified the site and secured a larger following for the ṭarīqa through
pilgrimage.
With respect to the architecture of the burial areas, Ṣūfī establishments can
be divided into two groups: those that housed the cenotaph in a designated
covered space, such as a domed chamber (for example, the mausoleum of Shāh
Niʿmatullāh Walī, d. 834/1430–1, in Māhān), and those with open, uncovered
tombs. In the latter case, the gravestone, together with a tree or shrubs, would
oftentimes be placed on a raised platform (sometimes called takht, lit., ‘bed’ or
‘throne’), protected by a grilled enclosure (sometimes called ḥaẓīra, but this
term also concurrently refers to a domed structure, as O’Kane shows: O’Kane,
Tāybād, 96). While in many cases open-air burial places served to expand ex-
isting funerary structures, in other cases, they were the primary structures in
the complex, around which later expansions took place. Examples of the for-
mer are numerous and include the enclosure at the site of the mausoleum of
Ṣūfī Lodges 163

Shāh Khalīlullāh (d. before 858/1454), son of the Iranian Ṣūfī Shāh Niʿmatullāh
Walī in Bidar (fig. 7.2), and the raised platforms at Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband’s
(d. 791/1389) shrine complex in Bukhara (fig. 7.3). Some examples of the latter
in the greater Khurāsān region include the shrine at Gāzurgāh, the shrine of
Shaykh Aḥmad-i Jām in Turbat-i Jām (fig. 7.1), and that of Shaykh Zayn al-Dīn
Abū Bakr Tāybādī (d. 791/1389) in Tāybād (fig. 7.4) (Yazdani, 141–45; Golombek,
Chronology, 41–43; O’Kane, Tāybād, 96). While in some contexts the open-air
burial sites have been interpreted in terms of the prohibition of covering holy
graves, the existence of a direct, universal correlation between them is debated
(see, for example, O’Kane, Tāybād, 96).
A Ṣūfī ṭarīqa required that a primary space serve as a communal place for
gatherings, teaching sessions, and rituals. To this end, especially during the
early phases of the history of the ṭarīqa and the formation of their architec-
ture, any space could be adapted for this purpose. For instance, gatherings and
retreats could be held in private residences or mosques.
When organised teaching and lodging for large groups of followers and trav-
ellers became key functions of the ṭarīqas, the architecture of Ṣūfī lodges were
similar to structures like madrasas and caravanserais. These complexes con-
sisted of lodging cells arranged around an open courtyard, and incorporated

Figure 7.2 View of tomb enclosures added on the site of Shāh Khalīlullāh’s mausoleum
in Bidar; both as an independent structure, and attached to the main ninth-/
fifteenth-century mausoleum (right)
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh
164 Firouzeh

Figure 7.3 View of the raised platforms at the shrine complex of Bahāʾ al-Dīn
Naqshband at Bukhara
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh

Figure 7.4 View of open-air grave in front of the entrance īvān at the mausoleum
of Zayn al-Dīn Abū Bakr Tāybādī
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh
Ṣūfī Lodges 165

other elements for teaching, burials, and rituals, including, perhaps, a mosque
within or near the courtyard. Beyond these morphological similarities, the in-
stitutionalisation of Ṣūfī lodges was connected to the evolution of the madra-
sa under the state patronage of the Saljūqs and their elites, such as the vizier
Niẓām al-Mulk (d. 485/1092), and the Ayyūbids and Zangids in Syria, Palestine,
and Egypt. Under the patronage of the Ilkhanids, Timūrids, and Turkmens (for
instance Uzun Ḥasan Āq Qoyūnlū, r. 857–82/1453–78), and the Mamlūks of
Egypt, the madrasas and Ṣūfī lodges could be paired together in one complex.
An Ilkhanid example in Sivas included the lodge of the Ṣūfī Fakhr al-Dīn ʿIrāqī
(d. 688/1289) (Wolper, 11–12). Some Timūrid examples include the complexes
of Muḥammad Sulṭān (d. 806/1403) and Ulugh Beg b. Shāhrukh (d. 853/1449)
in Samarqand, those of Shāhrukh (r. 807–50/1405–47), Amīr Kukeltāsh
(d. 844/1440), Sulṭān Ḥusayn Bāyqarā (r. 873–911/1469–1506), Amīr Jalāl al-Dīn
Fīrūzshāh (d. 848/1444–5), and the Ikhlāṣiyya complex of Mīr ʿAlī Shīr Navāʾī
(d. 906/1501) in Herat, as well as the shrine complex of Khvāja ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī
(d. 481/1089) at Gāzurgāh, outside Herat (see Golombek and Wilber, I, nos. 29,
30, 56, 71–2, pp. 48, 260–4, 307–10, 448, supplementary catalogue nos. 60, 70,
77, 90–1, pp. 314–5, 449–50; O’Kane, Timurid architecture, no. 54, pp. 23, 339–43;
Allen, A catalogue, no. 427, p. 102; Subtelny, 44–7). Such hybrid complexes did
not necessarily belong to a specific Ṣūfī ṭarīqa, and were often patronised by
the state that controlled the affairs of the Ṣūfī lodge, for example, through the
appointment of the head of the complex.
During the Timūrid period there was also a shift away from the courtyard
model, in terms of the spatial arrangement of the Ṣūfī lodge. Large complex-
es were designed as one grand building under a single roof, for instance, the
monumental khānaqāh of Khwāja Aḥmad Yasawī (d. 562/1166) in Turkestan
(southern Kazakhstan) was built under the patronage of the dynasty’s founder,
Tīmūr (r. 771–807/1370–1405) (see Yusupova, 236–8). At the centre of this new
organisational model, also seen under the Shaybanids and the Tuqay-Timūrids,
there was often an assembly hall covered by a colossal dome with cells on dif-
ferent levels (Yusupova, 233); this lent a more monumental scale to the archi-
tecture of Ṣūfī lodges.
The composite nature of the complexes was the result of a variety of private
and communal functions, from solitary retreats to large ritual assemblies, as
well as the holiness of the sites themselves, which attracted the sort of elite
and urban chain patronage that could sustain several phases of development.
The primary structures of the sites, whether for ritual or funerary purposes,
or bound by other associations to a holy figure, were restored and expanded,
sometimes resulting in a completely different structure from the first phase of
the building. We can see these transformative processes in a few extant shrine
166 Firouzeh

Figure 7.5 Elevated view of the astāna of Shāh Niʿmatullāh Walī in Māhān
developed around the ninth-/fifteenth-century dome chamber
from the tenth/sixteenth through twentieth centuries
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh

complexes, such as those of Shaykh Aḥmad-i Jām in Turbat-i Jām (fig. 7.1),
Shaykh Ṣafī [l-Dīn Ardabīlī] (d. 735/1334) in Ardabil, Shāh Niʿmatullāh Walī
in Māhān (fig. 7.5), and Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (d. 672/1273) in Konya
(fig. 7.6). Such continuity makes the architecture something of a palimpsest,
marked by many layers of physical construction, and served to document and
shape architectural genealogies, urban dynamics, and sociopolitical history.
Ṣūfī Lodges 167

Figure 7.6 View of the Ṣūfī cells, tomb, and mosque at the tekke of Jalāl al-Dīn
Muḥammad Rūmī, and the Selīmīye mosque (right) in Konya
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh

6 Patronage and Financial Resources

The income of Ṣūfī lodges came from the alms tax (zakāt), donations from
urban or elite patrons, and awqāf (s. waqf, pious endowment), and in some
cases from begging (suʾāl). The endowments provided revenue from the pro-
duce of agricultural lands in places near or far, markets, water rights, and
other sources.
From as early as the Saljūq period, organised communities of Ṣūfī ṭarīqas
entered into diverse and complex relationships with ruling authorities, using
their sanctifying power to bless a ruler’s reign in exchange for just treatment
of their communities, and for financial support in the form of landed property,
real estate, and ceremonial gifts (see Safi; Peacock; Sabra in this volume). In re-
turn, rulers strengthened their legitimacy by presenting themselves as uphold-
ers of the sharīʿa and patrons of organised religion, or by affiliating themselves
to the supernatural forces associated with Ṣūfī masters (Manz, 192). The sway
they held with the public and their claims to intimacy with the divine meant
that Ṣūfīs had the cultural and political power to lend credibility to conquerors,
168 Firouzeh

would-be rulers, and sultans with ambitions to expand their dominion (some
well-documented examples of such patronage include the shrines of the
Ṣafaviyya and Bektāshiyya orders. See Rizvi; Wolper; Yürekli).
The bestowal of kingship on the ruler usually took place through a real or
imaginary encounter with a Ṣūfī, which sometimes occurred at a Ṣūfī lodge.
During these encounters, the Ṣūfī usually predicted what areas the ruler would
conquer and offered blessings for his reign (Digby, 75). Such politicisation of
Ṣūfī communities went hand in hand with financial support for Ṣūfī lodges.
Rulers went on pilgrimages to Ṣūfī lodges; these visits usually included the
ritual circumambulation of the tomb and donations to the shrine. Mughal rul-
ers, for instance, regularly visited the shrine of the Chishti Ṣūfī, Niẓām al-Dīn
Awliyāʾ (d. 725/1325) in Delhi (fig. 7.7) while on pilgrimage tours from their
capitals (Koch, 18–24; on Mughal patronage of shrines, see Green, Auspicious
foundations, 71, 80).
The decision of whether to support a Ṣūfī lodge, or accept the court’s support
for a Ṣūfī lodge, hinged on the dynamics of the personal and political relation-
ships formed between the community and court. While these decisions varied,
Ṣūfī lodges often acted as permanent material repositories of the temporary
alliances formed between Ṣūfīs and rulers (see Wolper, 19). On the whole, the
growth (in numbers and size) of Ṣūfī lodges, and their transformation from
humble structures to grand-scale monuments that increasingly dominated the
landscapes and townscapes of Islamicate societies testifies to the general con-
tinuity of patronage (for a discussion the role of Ṣūfī lodges in the transforma-
tion of urban landscapes in Anatolia, see Wolper).
Ṣūfī lodges played a significant financial role in the transformation of rural
areas by drawing pilgrims and attracting patronage from the local and transre-
gional elite. As Ṣūfī lodges expanded in urban settings they became important
nodes in the cityscape, alongside the palace and mosques. The relationship
between the palace and Ṣūfī lodge varied: sometimes the two stood in close
proximity, but tensions could also result in the expulsion of the Ṣūfī lodge from
the city proper. In India, Awrangabad, Firozabad, Fatehpur Sikri (fig. 7.8), and
Ajmer offer examples of proximity between the palace and Ṣūfī lodge (Green,
Making space, 23–5). By contrast, the Chishti Ṣūfī Gīsū Darāz (d. 825/1422)
had to relocate outside the city walls of Bahmanid Gulbarga. Similar relation-
ships existed between several royal funerary sites and Ṣūfī shrines: Humāyūn’s
tomb and the shrine complex of Niẓām al-Dīn Awlīyāʾ in Delhi, the tombs of
Awrangzeb and his son Aʿẓam Shāh within the shrine of Zayn al-Dīn Shīrāzī
(d. 771/1369) at Khuldabad, and the Bahmanid royal necropolises in the prox-
imity of the shrines of Gīsū Darāz in Gulbarga and Shāh Khalīlullāh, son of
Shāh Niʿmatullāh Walī in Bidar (Green, Making space, 23–5; Asher).
Ṣūfī Lodges 169

Figure 7.7 View of the tomb of Nizām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (centre) and the mosque (on the
left) at his shrine complex in Delhi
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh

Figure 7.8 View of Salīm Chishtī’s tomb within the great mosque of Fatehpur Sikri
(located in the southern part of the palace complex)
Photo by Peyvand Firouzeh
170 Firouzeh

7 Life at the Ṣūfī Lodge

The core human relationship at the Ṣūfī lodge was that between the Ṣūfī mas-
ter (pīr or shaykh) and the disciple or student (murīd). Members of the ṭarīqa
are referred to as ikhwān (‘brothers’), and akhawāt (‘sisters’). Regular rituals
of dhikr (Ar. ‘remembrance,’ recitation, or repetition of God’s name and other
sacred phrases), as well as samāʿ (Ar. ‘listening,’ also known as ḥaḍras, musical
sessions that could include singing, playing instruments, dancing, recitation
of poetry and prayers), ṣuḥbat (‘companionship,’ that is, instruction sessions),
and ʿurs (‘spiritual wedding,’ festival held on the death anniversary of Ṣūfīs)
brought the members together in ritual halls or in public areas (Papas, 9;
Frishkopf, 118–20).
Sources such as hagiographies, travelogues, and waqf documents shed light
on day-to-day life at the khānaqāh, which regularly acted as a charitable insti-
tution. Apart from members of the ṭarīqa, life at the Ṣūfī lodge also involved
travellers, pilgrims, and the poor who benefitted from food and lodging at the
site (see Gramlich, Das Sendschreiben, 104, 394, 400, 477). The ṭarīqa’s care for
the poor, strangers, and animals is evident from waqf documents that men-
tion funds allocated for food and clothing, sums for the burial of travellers who
died in the city, and food for birds. Ṣūfī lodges also served as commercial hubs
frequented by merchants, as in the case of the khānaqāh of Shāh Niʿmatullāh
Walī at Taft, or as sanctuaries offering refuge in times of war. As the use of Ṣūfī
lodges as public spaces grew, there was an increasing need to regulate codes of
behaviour; we see this in the works of Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr and Abū Ḥāmid
Muḥammad Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) (see, for instance, Pūrjavādī, 87–91). In addi-
tion to the institutions’ sources of income, waqf documents also tell us about
the professions connected to Ṣūfī lodges, such as the khādim (attendant) who
acted as a financial officer, and the mutawallī (keeper, guardian).
Life at Ṣūfī lodges has long been conditioned by the shifting dynamics be-
tween the lodges and the state, a dynamic that sometimes involved the state’s
desire to control the power of Ṣūfī lodges by policing and regulating its activi-
ties. Many Ṣūfī lodges around the world continue to perform ritual and chari-
table functions to this day. However, some modern states have subjected Ṣūfī
lodges to rigid regulations that sometimes resulted in the abolition of rituals,
the transformation of lodges into museums, and their partial or complete de-
molition. Examples include the suppression of operations at the tekke of Jalāl
al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī in Konya and its reopening as the Mevlana Museum,
and the banning of functions at the Niʿmatullāhī khānaqāhs in Iran.
Ṣūfī Lodges 171

Bibliography

Allen, Terry, A catalogue of the toponyms and monuments of Timurid Herat, Cambridge,
MA 1981.
Allen, Terry, Timurid Herat, Wiesbaden 1983.
Asher, Catherine, Architecture of Mughal India, Cambridge 1992.
Behrens-Abouseif, Doris, The takiyyat Ibrahim al-Kulshani in Cairo, Muqarnas 5 (1988):
43–60.
Böwering, Gerhard, The mystical vision of existence in classical Islam. The Qurʾānic
hermeneutics of the Ṣūfī Sahl at-Tustarī (d. 283/896), Berlin 1980.
Bosworth, C. Edmund, The city of Tarsus and the Arab-Byzantine frontiers in early and
middle ʿAbbāsid times, Oriens 33 (1992): 268–86.
Böwering, Gerhard and Matthew Melvin-Koushki, Ḵānaqāh, EIr, 15:456–66.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, K̲ h̲ānḳāh, EI2.
Clayer, Nathalie, Tekke, EI2.
De Jong, Fred, Les confréries mystiques musulmanes au Machreq arabe, in Alexandre
Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam. Cheminements
et situation actuelle (Paris 1986), 205–43.
Delanoue, Gilbert, Moralistes et politiques musulmans (1798–1882), vol. I, Cairo 1982.
Digby, Simon, The Sufi shaykh and the sultan. A conflict of claims to authority in me-
dieval India, Iran 28 (1990): 71–81.
Fernandes, Leonor E., The evolution of a Sufi institution in Mamluk Egypt, Berlin 1988.
Flood, Finbarr Barry, Bodies and becoming. Mimesis, mediation and the ingestion of
the sacred in Christianity and Islam, in Sally M. Promey (ed.), Sensational religion.
Sensory cultures in material practice (New Haven, CT 2014), 459–93.
Frishkopf, Michael, Venerating Cairo’s saints through monument and ritual. Islamic re-
form and the rise of the architext, in Michael Frishkopf and Federico Spinetti (eds.),
Music, sound, and architecture in Islam (Austin, TX 2018), 111–45.
Gaborieau, Marc, Les modes d’organisation, in A. Popovic and G. Veinstein (eds.), Les
voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui
(Paris 1996), 205–12.
Geoffroy, Eric, Le soufisme en Egypte et en Syrie sous les derniers Mamelouks et les pre-
miers Ottomans. Orientations spirituelles et enjeux culturels, Damascus 1995.
Gibb, Hamilton A. R., The travels of Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, 2 vols., Cambridge 1958.
Golombek, Lisa, The chronology of Turbat-i Shaikh Jām, Iran 9 (1971): 27–44.
Golombek, Lisa, The Timurid shrine at Gazur Gah, Toronto 1969.
Golombek, Lisa and Donald Wilber, The Timurid architecture of Iran and Turan, 2 vols.,
Princeton 1988.
Gramlich, Richard, Das Sendschreiben al-Qušayrīs über das Sufitum, Wiesbaden 1989.
172 Firouzeh

Gramlich, Richard, Die Nahrung der Herzen, 4 vols., Stuttgart 1992–5.

Green, Nile, Auspicious foundations. The patronage of Sufi institutions in the late
Mughal and early Asaf Jah Deccan, South Asian Studies 20, no. 1 (2004): 71–98.
Green, Nile, Making space. Sufis and settlers in early modern India, Oxford 2012.
Green, Nile, Migrant Sufis and sacred space in South Asian Islam, Contemporary South
Asia 12, no. 4 (2003): 493–509.
Kiāni, Moḥsen, Tārīkh-i khānaqāh dar Irān, Tehran 1990.
Koch, Ebba, Shah Jahan’s visits to Delhi prior to 1648. New evidence of ritual movement
in urban Mughal India, Environmental Design: Journal of the Islamic Environmental
Design Research Centre 1–2, ed. Attilo Petruccioli (Rome 1991): 18–29.
Lifchez, Raymond, ed., The dervish lodge. Architecture, art, and Sufism in Ottoman
Turkey, Berkeley, CA; Oxford 1992.
Little, Donald P., The nature of khānqāhs, ribāṭs, and zāwiyas under the Mamluks,
in Wael B. Hallaq and Donald P. Little (eds.), Islamic studies presented to Charles
P. Adams (Leiden 1991), 91–105.
Manz, Beatrice Forbes, Power, politics and religion in Timurid Iran, Cambridge 2007.
McChesney, Robert D., Waqf in Central Asia. Four hundred years in the history of a
Muslim shrine, 1480–1889, Princeton 1991.
Meier, Fritz, Almoravids and Marabouts, in Essays on Islamic piety and mysticism, trans.
John O’Kane (Leiden 1999), 335–421.
Nicholson, Reynold Alleyne, Studies in Islamic mysticism, Cambridge 1921.
Noth, Albrecht, Heiliger Krieg und heiliger Kampf in Islam und Christentum. Beiträge
zur Vorgeschichte und Geschichte der Kreuzzüge, Bonn 1966.
O’Kane, Bernard, Tāybād, Turbat-i Jām and Timurid Vaulting, Iran 17 (1979): 87–104.
O’Kane, Bernard, Timurid architecture in Khurasan, Costa Mesa, CA 1987.
Papas, Alexandre, No Sufism without Sufi order. Rethinking tarîqa and adab with
Ahmad Kâsânî Dahbidî (1461–1542), Kyoto Bulletin of Islamic Area Studies 2–1
(2008): 4–22.
Peacock, Andrew, Sufis and the Seljuk court in Mongol Anatolia. Politics and patronage
in the works of Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī and Sulṭān Walad, in Sara Nur Yildiz and Andrew
Peacock (eds.), The Seljuks of Anatolia. Court and society in the medieval Middle East
(London 2013), 206–26.
Pūrjavādī, Naṣr-Allāh, Du mujaddid. Pazhuhish-hā-yī darbāra-yi Muḥammad-i Ghazzālī
wa Fakhr-i Rāzī/Two Renewers of Faith. Studies on Muhammad-i Ghazzālī and
Fakhruddīn-i Rāzī, Tehran 2002.
Rizvi, Kishwar, The Safavid dynastic shrine. Architecture, religion and power in early
modern Iran, London 2011.
Safi, Omid, Bargaining with baraka. Persian Sufism, “mysticism,” and pre-modern poli-
tics, MW 90, no. 3–4 (2000): 259–87.
Ṣūfī Lodges 173

Subtelny, Maria Eva, A Timurid educational and charitable foundation. The Ikhlāṣiyya
complex of ʿAlī Shīr Navāʾī in 15th-century Herat and its endowment, JAOS 111,
no. 1 (Jan.–Mar. 1991): 38–61.
Wolper, Ethel Sara, Cities and saints. Sufism and the transformation of urban space in
medieval Anatolia, University Park, PA 2003.
Yazdani, Ghulam, Bidar, its history and monuments, London 1947.
Yürekli, Zeynep, Architecture and hagiography in the Ottoman empire. The politics of
Bektashi shrines in the classical age, Farnham 2012.
Yusupova, Mavluda, L’évolution architecturale des couvents soufis à l’époque timouride
et post-timouride, Cahiers d’Asie centrale nos. 3–4 (1997): 229–50.
 Chapter 8

Ṣūfī Outposts (ribāṭs)

Nathan Hofer

Ṣūfīs have generally used the term ribāṭ (pl. rubuṭ) to denote rural lodges or
outposts that housed itinerant Ṣūfīs, provided centres of instruction for novic-
es, or facilitated outreach to surrounding communities. Many ribāṭs combined
these functions. Beyond this general statement, however, it is not possible to
formulate a singular description or definition of the Ṣūfī ribāṭ that captures
its wide variations in form and function across time and space. This difficul-
ty is complicated further by the fact that the term itself predates Ṣūfī usage
and continued to develop in multiple ways in both Ṣūfī and non-Ṣūfī contexts
across the Islamic world (Picard and Borrut). In Arabic usage more broadly,
ribāṭ (from the root r-b-ṭ, ‘to tie’) may connote several abstract and concrete
nouns, all of which developed from the basic meaning of garrisoning horses
in preparation for battle (for a more detailed linguistic overview, see Chabbi
and Rabbat as well as Böwering and Melvin-Koushki). In the Qurʾān, the noun
and verb (rābaṭa) appear only once (Q 8:60 and Q 3:200, respectively), both in
the context of a divine command for the believers to prepare for battle against
their adversaries. This Qurʾānic mandate imbues an otherwise mundane activ-
ity with a strong sense of piety and divine favour. Not surprisingly, then, by the
post-conquest period, the idealised practice of ribāṭ as defensive warfare had
become enmeshed with the developing ideology of jihād and a life of militant
piety along the frontier (see, for example, al-Farāhīdī [d. 170/786] on Q 3:200
[al-Farāhīdī, 2:90–1]). The literary, lexicographical, and archeological evidence
suggests that by the end of the second/eighth century the term encompassed
not only militant piety in defense of Islam, but the physical outposts where
that defense took place as well, and in some cases travellers’ hospices (De la
Vaissière). Functionally and architecturally, many of the early ribāṭs developed
organically from Byzantine and Persian precedents along the northern Syrian
and Central Asian frontiers of the Islamic/ʿAbbāsid empire (Jallūl, 15–40).
The fundamental question concerning the history of the Ṣūfī ribāṭ is why
and by what discursive and practical means did Ṣūfīs take up this particular
term, and only in particular times and places, to designate structures for the
performance and propagation of Sufism? Ṣūfīs generally adopted the term
in those areas where its use was already widespread: frontier regions, coastal
areas, and along caravan routes. By the time Sufism appeared in Iraq in the

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_010

Ṣūfī Outposts ( ribāṭs ) 175

third/ninth century, many of these ribāṭs had already begun to serve as re-
treats for ascetics and devotees seeking divine favour in militant piety. By the
early third/ninth century at the latest, then, Muslims had begun to link the
figure of the frontier warrior (murābiṭ/mujāhid) with Late Antique ideals of
monasticism and renunciation (al-zuhd fī l-dunyā). The earliest example of
such linkage is the famous ḥadīth that the students of ʿAbdallāh b. al-Mubārak
(d. 181/797) transmitted widely: “The monasticism of my community is jihād”
(Ibn al-Mubārak, 67–8, nos. 15 and 16). Thus, we find many ribāṭs in this period
functioning as spaces for the performance of militant piety and renunciation.
It is worth noting here, however, that these early murābiṭūn took their name
from the practice of ribāṭ and not necessarily from the structures of the same
name. That is to say, while murābiṭūn often lived in ribāṭs, they also lived in
buildings known by other terms as well (e.g., qaṣr or ḥiṣn); it was the devo-
tion to militant piety, not the architectural setting, from which their name
derived (Picard and Borrut, 40). As for the aforementioned ribāṭs themselves,
they were undoubtedly associated with renunciants before Ṣūfīs adopted the
term. The fourth-/tenth-century ribāṭ at Guardamar on the southeast coast of
al-Andalūs is instructive of this period. The structure combines elements of the
frontier outpost with pious communal life: it includes individual devotional
cells (marked with mihrābs) as well as guest quarters for travellers (Ruiz 2004);
but there is no evidence to suggest a link with Sufism (see Green, 56–7). This
is not surprising, since it was during this same time period that early Ṣūfī au-
thors were just beginning to construct a coherent tradition for themselves in
Baghdad (Karamustafa, 1–37; Knysh, Islamic mysticism, 43–67; Green, 24–44).
The early doctrinal and biographical treatments of Sufism claim many of
the earlier pious frontier warriors as their own, as a means of legitimising their
nascent movement. While many of these figures were not actually Ṣūfīs, or
were only tangentially connected to the movement, a number of early Ṣūfīs
did travel to frontier outposts for devotional purposes. The uncle and teacher
of the famous al-Junayd (d. 298/910), Sarī l-Saqaṭī (d. 253/867), for example,
reportedly spent time on the frontier in Tarsus and at the ribāṭ in ʿAbbādān
(al-Iṣfahānī, 10:116–7 and 10:110–1, respectively). Simultaneously, these early
sources often describe the Ṣūfīs as mujāhids who battle the nafs (ego self) and
the material world, and as murābiṭs who join a community of like-minded in-
dividuals in order to patrol and surveil their spiritual states and progress along
the Ṣūfī path (Böwering, Règles, 139). In this vein, the etymologies of ʿUmar
al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234) regarding the Ṣūfī ribāṭ are quite clever: the ribāṭ is
where individuals tie themselves in obedience to God and where one defends
the pious against misfortune (al-Suhrawardī, 99–100; Grämlich, 107). These
etymologies are clearly a later gloss on a much longer process of conceptual
176 Hofer

development, the origins of which are obscure. That is, while the aforemen-
tioned practical and discursive processes by which Ṣūfīs incorporated and
associated themselves with the ribāṭ are more or less clear, it is much more
difficult to determine when and where the first explicitly Ṣūfī ribāṭ emerged.
There is scant evidence that Ṣūfīs lived together communally, in ribāṭs or oth-
erwise, prior to the early fourth/tenth century. Early Ṣūfī sources depict some
Ṣūfīs travelling together in small bands, and describe the mujāwirūn (tempo-
rary residents) of Mecca as pious collectivities with their own unique adab,
or rules of comportment (al-Sarrāj, 190 and 169, respectively; see also Ende on
the mujāwir). The Ṣūfīs of Baghdad often gathered together at the Shūnīziyya
Mosque in Baghdad (al-Qushayrī, 542 and 566; Knysh, al-Qushayrī’s epistle, 377
and 397). And while some individual Ṣūfīs did live on the premises, temporar-
ily or otherwise (e.g., al-Baghdādī, Ta‌ʾrīkh, 6:423–4 and 7:609), they did not live
communally (there was a Ṣūfī khānqāh on the site in later years [al-Ḥamawī,
3:374]). The famous ribāṭ at ʿAbbādān, an island in the Persian Gulf near Basra,
was originally a military garrison (see Elwell-Sutton; Knysh, ʿAbbādān). Once
the site was no longer militarily useful it became a devotional retreat asso-
ciated with the Sālimiyya of Basra. Sahl al-Tustarī (d. 283/896), credited with
the founding of the Sālimiyya, was a regular visitor to the ribāṭ (al-Tustarī, 106;
Keeler and Keeler, 29). But explicit evidence for its association with Ṣūfīs exists
only in the sixth/twelfth century (this from the testimony of an anonymous
copyist who passed through in 533/1138–9; Ibn Ḥawqal, 53). Similarly, there
is some sketchy evidence of a Ṣūfī hospice in the Palestinian city of Ramla
from the fourth/tenth century (Hofer, Sufism, 45), but the record is difficult to
interpret (e.g., Meier, Abū Saʿīd, 302–4). As an important coastal city, Ramla
contained multiple ribāṭs (al-Maqdisī, 164) and it is likely that one of these
developed into a Ṣūfī hospice. Later sources describe the Ramla hospice as a
khānqāh, while the earlier sources describe it as a duwayra (e.g., al-Sulamī’s lost
Taʾrīkh al-ṣūfīya, cited by Ibn ʿAsākir, 54:304–5). This last term tracks well with
the fact that al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) himself was also said to have a duwayra
in Nīshāpūr at roughly the same time (Thibon, 24). Another possible candi-
date for the first explicitly Ṣūfī ribāṭ, also known as a khānqāh in subsequent
years, is that belonging to Ibn Khafīf (d. 371/982) of Shīrāz (Sobieroj, Ibn Ḫafīf,
176–7). One of Ibn Khafīf’s students, Abū Isḥāq al-Kāzarūnī (d. 426/1033),
supposedly founded more than 60 ribāṭs in Central Asia; these were a com-
bination of Ṣūfī hospices and traveller’s lodges (Meier, Die Vita; Sobieroj,
Mittelsleute). Itinerant Ṣūfīs continued to use some of these outposts in the
eastern frontier regions as late as at the eleventh/seventeenth and twelfth/
eighteenth centuries (Papas, 173–4, 180). So, while we may not know precisely
when and where Ṣūfīs first lived communally in ribāṭs, it was almost certainly
Ṣūfī Outposts ( ribāṭs ) 177

in the East (most likely Khurāsān, where garrisons, outposts, and caravanserais
proliferated) and no earlier than the fourth/tenth century. Finally, we should
not discount the relevance of the Karrāmiyya, a devotional movement of the
peasant and working classes of Khurāsān who followed the teachings of Ibn
Karrām (d. 255/869) and often lived together in khānqāhs (Bosworth) (on the
khānqāhs, see Firouzeh in this volume).
Perhaps the most important development in the evolution of the Ṣūfī out-
post was the institutionalisation of rules specific to a particular shaykh and
the organisation of communal life that followed. The earliest indisputable
evidence for organised Ṣūfī life appears in the fifth/eleventh century with the
ten rules of Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049). These rules were clearly
designed to foster harmonious communal living in pious devotion (Ebn-e
Monavvar, 493–4; Meier, Abū Saʿīd, 310–1; the purportedly earlier “eight rules”
of al-Junayd are actually from the seventh/thirteenth century [Radtke]). While
Ibn Abī l-Khayr’s hospice was known as a khānqāh and not a ribāṭ, the inno-
vation of rule-based Sufism he pioneered was absolutely critical for the sub-
sequent development of Ṣūfī lodges and outposts. For it was émigrés from
Khurāsān who established the first urban ribāṭs in Baghdad to house visitors
from the East, especially Ṣūfīs (Chabbi, La fonction). It was in the ribāṭs of
Baghdad that Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī (d. 563/1168) and his nephew, Abū
Ḥafṣ al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), developed their “ribāṭ-based Sufism,” which
was far more organised, both socially and conceptually, than the earlier rule-
based Sufism (Ohlander). The ribāṭ-based Sufism of Baghdad had a profound
impact, in turn, on organised Sufism in Syria and Egypt (Hofer, The popularisa-
tion, 40–1). The rapid growth of ribāṭ-based Sufism across the Muslim world
after the early sixth/twelfth century owes a great deal to wealthy or ruling-class
patrons who built and endowed madrasas, khānqāhs, and ribāṭs on a grand
scale, providing room and board for Ṣūfīs of all kinds. These projects bolstered
the credentials of their patrons and, more importantly, opened up Ṣūfī spac-
es to increasingly large numbers of people, including in many cases women
(al-Ālūsī, 59–67; Karamustafa, 125–6). Fuelled by the wealth of elite donors,
ribāṭ-based Sufism spread rapidly across the Muslim world, appearing in both
urban and rural areas, from the Maghrib to South Asia, and attracting ever
larger segments of the population. It was the mass popularisation of increas-
ingly organised forms of Sufism that precipitated the emergence and develop-
ment of Ṣūfī brotherhoods after the seventh/thirteenth century (Popovic and
Veinstein (eds.)). But a fatwa by Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) on the per-
missibility of subsidised Sufism offers an early indication of the anxiety that
many scholars, even those with Ṣūfī propensities, felt regarding this elite pa-
tronage (Pūrjavādī, 96–100). These anxieties only increased during the period
178 Hofer

of mass popularisation. In particular, the ribāṭ-based Sufism that depended

on wealthy patronage came under scathing criticism from many sides for its
perceived excesses and contradictions (e.g., Ibn al-Jawzī, 254; Ibn Taymiyyya,
34; al-Subkī, 174–8; al-Udfuwī; Ibn al-Ḥājj, 3:184–93).
After the seventh/thirteenth century, the terminology of Ṣūfī lodges devel-
oped in roughly two geographical directions. In the east, a few Ṣūfīs continued
to use the term ribāṭ in urban centres like Baghdad (Jawwād), Mecca (Mortel),
and, to a lesser extent, Damascus (al-Nuʿaymī, 2:150–152) and Cairo (al-Maqrīzī,
4:793–805), but these were the exception. Broadly speaking, Ṣūfīs from the
Balkans to Central and South Asia overwhelmingly adopted the Persian term
khānqāh, the Arabic term zāwiya, and, in the wake of the Ottoman conquests,
the Turkish word tekke (see Firouzeh in this volume). In the west, Ṣūfīs in
North Africa and the Mahgrib continued to use the term ribāṭ, developing
a unique type of Ṣūfī outpost that then became influential in West and sub-
Saharan Africa. There is no solid evidence for early Ṣūfī usage of the word ribāṭ
in Ifrīqiyya or al-Andalūs, where the term retained its primary military valence
owing to the region’s susceptibility to constant raiding from Christian Europe.
In the far Maghrib, however, early (non-Ṣūfī) ribāṭs along the Atlantic coast,
from Māssa in the south to Nakūr in the north, served as centres of instruction
and communication hubs in rural areas and were instrumental in spreading
Mālikī Islam throughout the region. The earliest of these ribāṭs explicitly as-
sociated with Sufism was the Ribāṭ Tīṭ-n-Fiṭr of the Ṣanhāja Berbers and the
Ribāṭ Shākir of the Maṣmūda Berbers, both of which came to be associated
with Sufism after the fifth/eleventh century (Cornell, 40–54). It was from these
ribāṭs that Ṣūfī masters, many with ties to urban centres like Fez, spread organ-
ised Sufism throughout the Maghrib (Sanseverino). Given the autonomy, au-
thority, and large following of these Ṣūfī masters, these ribāṭs could also serve
an important political function in times of crisis, both in mobilising the popu-
lation and in providing shelter for combatants. For example, there is a well-
known tradition in the Maghrib that the Mahdī (an eschatological figure), will
appear at the ribāṭ in Māssa (Ibn Khaldūn, 6:369). And in fact, one claiming to
be the Mahdī organised a large Ṣūfī rebellion against al-Murābiṭ (Almoravid)
oppression in 541/1147 from that ribāṭ in Māssa (Ibn Khaldūn, 6:310). Perhaps
the most well-known case of a ribāṭ-based Ṣūfī revolt in the Maghrib was that
of the Jazūliyya Ṣūfīs and their jihād against Portuguese incursions in the
tenth/sixteenth century (Cornell, 233–45; 258–97). The ribāṭ in the Maghrib
was thus a fundamental element not only in the propagation of Sufism, but in
the sociopolitical character of the region through the colonial period.
Another region in which the ribāṭ as Ṣūfī outpost proliferated was Upper
Egypt during the Ayyūbid and Mamlūk periods (Hofer, The popularisation,
Ṣūfī Outposts ( ribāṭs ) 179

181–249). The usage of ribāṭ in this context is primarily due to two factors. First,
it was a refugee from the al-Muwāḥid (Almohad) revolt in the Maghrib—
ʿAbd al-Raḥīm al-Qināʾī (d. 592/1196)—who first brought Sufism to Upper
Egypt. Al-Qināʾī settled in the village of Qena, where he founded his own
ribāṭ that he used to develop a large network of disciples. These disciples in
turn founded ribāṭs up and down the Nile, where they propagated a uniquely
Maghribī-Egyptian fusion of Sufism beginning in the early seventh/thirteenth
century. Second, the Ṣūfīs of Upper Egypt saw themselves as moral regulators
of the region, commanding the good and forbidding the wrong in the face of
a weak state presence and large Christian and Shīʿī population (El-Leithy).
The Maghribī-style ribāṭ was the ideal vehicle for this project of political and
moral regulation.
The Ṣūfī traditions of the Maghrib were also critically important to the
development of Sufism in West and sub-Saharan Africa (Vikør, Sufi brother-
hoods, 442). Sufism first appeared in the Kingdom of Timbuktu as early as the
ninth/fifteenth century, although there is little evidence of Ṣūfī brotherhoods
in the region prior to the nineteenth century (Seesemann; Triaud; Vikør, Sufi
brotherhoods). Nevertheless, while Sufism appeared relatively late, by the
nineteenth century it had become massively popular and the Ṣūfī brother-
hoods constituted some of the most effective vehicles of anti-colonial resis-
tance throughout the region, albeit in a variety of forms (Vikør, Sufism and
colonialism). Not surprisingly, the type of ribāṭ that developed in Maghribī
Sufism also played an important role in the propagation and popularisation of
Sufism across sub-Saharan Africa. However, although most of the Ṣūfī lodges
and outposts across this region functioned like the Maghribī-style ribāṭ, they
did not usually adopt that name. Rather, with a few notable exceptions, these
lodges and outposts were known as zāwiyas or by words drawn from local
languages. A typical example of the development of the Maghribī-style ribāṭ
in West Africa is that of the Murīdiyya of Senegal. Over the latter part of the
nineteenth century Amadu Bamba (d. 1927) and his followers founded a large
number of hospices known in Wolof as daara tarbiyya [Ar. Dār al-tarbiya];
these functioned as centres of instruction, employment, and political activ-
ism, spreading Islam and Sufism into rural areas (Babou, 105–8). The use of the
term ribāṭ was widespread in the Sokoto Caliphate (1804–1903), where it was
used for fortified settlements or outposts that grew and developed into impor-
tant social and economic centres (Philips). Sufism was integral to the success
of the Sokoto jihād and these ribāṭs were critical to the growth and stability
of the caliphate (Salau). In the Sahara, Ṣūfī lodges were consistently known
as zāwiyas but functioned much like the Maghribī ribāṭ. They were scattered
180 Hofer

across trade routes and served as critical information hubs and centres of so-
cial outreach (Clancy-Smith, 102).
A final, contemporary example of the reach of the Maghribī-style ribāṭ is
the European branch of the Darqawiyya brotherhood led by the British-born
Ṣūfī Abdelqadir (né Ian Dallas). Abdelqadir converted to Islam in Morocco
and joined the Darqawiyya brotherhood in the late 1960s before establishing a
branch of the Darqawiyya in London. In a 1978 booklet, Jihad: A ground plan,
he laid out his vision for the establishment of an Islamic society by means
of the “Ribat model.” This model involved the training—both spiritually and
militarily—of murābiṭūn in his ribāṭ from where, once they were prepared,
they could engage in warfare against non-believers. While never actually pur-
suing the military portion of the project, he did found Ṣūfī ribāṭs of this type in
Norwich, Grenada, and Johannesburg (Sedgwick, 236–46; Hermansen, 483–9).

Bibliography

al-Ālūsī, ʿĀdil, al-Ḥayāt al-ṣūfīya wa-taqālīduhā fī l-mawrūth al-shaʿbī l-ʿarabī. Dirāsa

ta‌ʾrīkhīya fī l-rubuṭ wa-l-zawāyā l-Islāmīya, Cairo 2002.
Babou, Cheikh Anta, Fighting the greater jihad. Amadu Bamba and the founding of the
Muridiyya of Senegal, 1853–1913, Athens, OH 2007.
al-Baghdādī, Abū Bakr Aḥmad al-Khaṭīb, Ta‌ʾrīkh madīnat al-salām, ed. Bashār ʿAwwād
Maʿrūf, 17 vols., Beirut 2001.
Bosworth, C. E., Karrāmiyya, EI2.
Böwering, Gerhard, Règles et rituels soufis, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein
(eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à
aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 139–56.
Böwering, Gerhard and Matthew Melvin-Koushki, Ḵānaqāh, EIr online: http://www
.iranicaonline.org/articles/kanaqah, 2012.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, La fonction du ribāṭ à Baghdad du Ve siècle au début du VIIe siè-
cle, REI 42 (1974): 101–21.
Chabbi, Jacqueline and Nasser Rabbat, Ribāṭ, EI2.
Clancy-Smith, Julia, Rebel and saint. Muslim notables, populist protest, colonial encoun-
ters (Algeria and Tunisia, 1800–1904), Berkeley 1994.
Cornell, Vincent, Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism,
Austin 1998.
Ebn-e Monavvar, Moḥammad, The secrets of God’s mystical oneness, or The spiritual
stations of Shaikh Abu Saʿid, trans. John O’Kane, Costa Mesa, CA 1992.
el-Leithy, Tamer, Sufis, Copts, and the politics of piety: moral regulation in 14th-century
Upper Egypt, in Adam Sabra and Richard McGregor (eds.), The development of
Sufism in Mamluk Egypt (Cairo 2006), 75–120.
Ṣūfī Outposts ( ribāṭs ) 181

Elwell-Sutton, L. P., Ābādān i. History, EIr online: http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/

abadan -01-history 2016 [1982].
Ende, Werner, Mudjāwira, EI2.
al-Farāhīdī, al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad, Kitāb al-ʿayn, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd Hindāwī, 4 vols.,
Beirut 2003.
Gramlich, Richard, ed. and trans., Die Gaben der Erkenntnisse des ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī
(ʿAwārif al-maʿārif ), Wiesbaden 1978.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Malden, MA 2012.
al-Ḥamawī, Yāqūt, Muʿjam al-buldān, 5 vols., Beirut 1977.
Hermansen, Marcia, The ‘other’ Shâdhilîs of the west, in Éric Geoffroy (ed.), Une voie
soufie dans le monde. La Shâdhiliyya (Paris 2005), 481–99.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Hofer, Nathan, Sufism in Fatimid Egypt and the problem of historiographical inertia,
JIS 28.1 (2017): 28–67.
Ibn ʿAsākir, Abū l-Qāsim ʿAlī, Tārīkh madīnat Dimashq, ed. ʿUmar b. Gharāma al-
ʿAmrawī, 80 vols., Beirut 1995–2000.
Ibn al-Ḥājj, Muḥammad, al-Madkhal, Cairo 1960.
Ibn Ḥawqal, Muḥammad, Kitāb ṣūrat al-arḍ, Beirut 1992.
Ibn al-Jawzī, Abū l-Faraj ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Talbīs Iblīs, ed. Muḥyī l-Dīn Muḥammad
Baʿyūn, Beirut n.d.
Ibn Khaldūn, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Dīwān al-mubtada‌ʾ wa-l-khabar fī ta‌ʾrīkh al-ʿarab wa-
l-barbar wa-man ʿāṣarahum min dhawī l-sha‌ʾn al-akbar, ed. Khalīl Shiḥādah and
Suhayl Zakkār, 7 vols., Beirut 2001.
Ibn Taymiyya, Taqī l-Dīn Aḥmad, al-Ṣūfiyya wa-l-fuqarāʾ, ed. Muḥammad Jamīl Ghāzī,
Jeddah n.d.
al-Iṣfahānī, Abū Nuʿaym, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ wa-ṭabaqāt al-aṣfiyāʾ, 10 vols., Beirut 1996
[reprint of 1932 Cairo edition].
Jallūl, Nājī, al-Ribāṭāt al-baḥrīya bi-ifrīqīya fī l-ʿaṣr al-wasīṭ, Tunis 1999.
Jawwād, Muṣṭafā, al-Rubuṭ al-ṣūfiyya al-baghdādiyya wa-atharuhā fī l-thaqāfa
al-islāmiyya, Beirut 2006.
Karamustafa, Ahmet, Sufism. The formative period, Berkeley 2007.
Keeler, Annabel and Ali Keeler (trans.), Tafsīr al-Tustarī. The great commentaries on the
holy Qurʾān series, vol. iv, Louisville 2011.
Knysh, Alexander, ʿAbbādān, EI3.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2010.
Knysh, Alexander (trans.), al-Qushayri’s epistle on Sufism, Reading, UK 2007.
al-Maqdisī, Muḥammad, Aḥsan al-taqāsīm fī maʿrifat al-aqālīm, ed. M. J. de Goeje,
Leiden 1877.
l-Maqrīzī, Aḥmad b. ʿAlī, al-Mawāʿiẓ wa-l-iʿtibār fī dhikr al-khiṭaṭ wa-l-āthār, ed. Aymad
Fuʾād Sayyid, 5 vols., London 2002.
182 Hofer

Meier, Fritz, Abū Saʿīd-i Abū l-Ḫayr (357–440/967–1049). Wirklichkeit und Legende,
Leiden 1976.
Meier, Fritz, Die Vita des Scheich Abū Isḥāq al-Kāzarūnī, in der persischen Bearbeitung
von Maḥmūd b. ʿUthmān, Leipzig 1948.
Mortel, Richard, Ribāṭs in Mecca during the medieval period. A descriptive study
based on literary sources, BSOAS 61 (1998): 29–50.
al-Mubārak, ʿAbdallāh b., Kitāb al-jihād, ed. Nazīh Ḥammād, Jeddah 1983.
al-Nuʿaymī, ʿAbd al-Qādir, al-Dāris fī ta‌ʾrīkh al-madāris, 2 vols., Beirut 1990.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
Papas, Alexandre, Mystiques et vagabonds en islam. Portraits de trois soufis qalandar,
Paris 2010.
Philips, John Edward, Slavery on two ribāṭ in Kano and Sokoto, in Paul Lovejoy (ed.),
Slavery on the frontiers of Islam (Princeton 2003), 111–24.
Picard, Christophe and Antoine Borrut, Râbata, ribât, râbita. Une institution à recon-
sidérer, in Nicolas Prouteau and Philippe Sénac (eds.), Chrétiens et musulmans en
Méditerranée médiévale, VIIIe–XIIIe siècle: échanges et contacts (Poitiers 2003),
33–65.
Popovic, Alexandre and Gilles Veinstein, eds., Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques
dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui, Paris 1996.
Pūrjavādī, Naṣr Allāh, Du mujaddid. Pizhūhishhāyī dar bāra-ʾi Muḥammad-i Ghazālī va
Fakhr-i Rāzī, Tehran 2002.
al-Qushayrī, Abū l-Qāsim ʿAbd al-Karīm, al-Risāla al-qushayrīya, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm
Maḥmūd, Damascus 2003.
Radtke, Bernd, The eight rules of Junayd. A general overview of the genesis and devel-
opment of Islamic dervish orders, in Todd Lawson (ed.), Reason and inspiration in
Islam. Theology, philosophy and mysticism in Muslim thought, in honor of Hermann
Landolt (London 2005), 490–502.
Ruiz, Rafael Azuar, ed., Fouilles de la rábita de Guardamar I. El ribāṭ califal. Excavaciones
y estudios (1984–1992), Madrid 2004.
Salau, Mohammed Bashir, Ribats and the development of plantations in the Sokoto
Caliphate. A case study of Fanisau, African Economic History 34 (2006): 23–43.
Sanseverino, Ruggero Vimercati, Fès et sainteté, de la fondation à l’avènement du
Protectorat (808–1912). Hagiographie, tradition spirituelle et héritage prophétique
dans la ville de Mawlāy Idrīs, Rabat 2014.
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr ʿAbd Allāh, Kitāb al-lumaʿ, ed. Reynold Nicholson, Leiden 1914.
Sedgwick, Mark, Western Sufism. From the Abbasids to the new age, Oxford 2017.
Seesemann, Rüdiger, Sufism in West Africa, Religion Compass 4.10 (2010): 606–14.
Sobieroj, Florian, Ibn Ḫafīf aš-Šīrāzī und seine Schrift zur Novizenerziehung (Kitāb
al-iqtiṣād). biographische Studien, Edition und Übersetzung, Stuttgart 1998.
Ṣūfī Outposts ( ribāṭs ) 183

Sobieroj, Florian, Mittelsleute zwischen Ibn Khafīf und Abū Isḥāq al-Kāzarūnī, AS 51
(1997): 651–71.
al-Subkī, Tāj al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, Muʿīd al-niʿam wa-mubīd al-niqam, ed. David
Myhrman, London 1908.
al-Suhrawardī, Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar, ʿAwārif al-māʿārif, Cairo 2004.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, L’oeuvre d’Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, 325/937–412/1021, et la
formation du soufisme, Damascus 2009.
Triaud, Jean-Louis, L’Afrique occidentale et centrale, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles
Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des
origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 417–27.
al-Tustarī, Sahl, Tafsīr al-qurʾān al-ʿaẓīm, Cairo 2004.
al-Udfuwī, Kamāl al-Dīn Jaʿfar, al-Mūfī bi-maʿrifat al-taṣawwuf wa-l-ṣūfī, ed. Muḥammad
ʿĪsā Ṣāliḥīya, Kuwait 1988.
Vaissière, Etienne de la, Le ribāṭ d’Asie Centrale, in E. de la Vaissière (ed.), Islamisation
de l’Asie centrale. Processus locaux d’acculturation du VIIe et XIe siècle (Paris 2008),
71–94.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufi Brotherhoods in Africa, in Nehemia Levtzion and Randall Pouwels
(eds.), The history of Islam in Africa (Athens, GA 2000), 441–76.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufism and Colonialism, in Lloyd Ridgeon (ed.), The Cambridge compan-
ion to Sufism (Cambridge 2015), 212–32.
 Part 3
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs

⸪
 Chapter 9

The Social Role of Ṣūfīs

Rachida Chih

1 Introduction

More often than not, becoming a Ṣūfī means connecting with a living master
(shaykh, pīr, bābā, dede), establishing a direct and intimate relationship with
him, following the initiatory path (ṭarīqa) he teaches, and emulating him. It
also means establishing relationships with the other disciples of that mas-
ter: the ideal model is that of the Prophet Muḥammad and his Companions
(ṣaḥāba). The disciples emphasise not so much their affiliation with a particu-
lar initiatory path, but the quasi-filial ties to their master, and this filiation in-
fluences all aspects of their lives, spiritually and socially.
It is difficult to estimate how many disciples a master might have because
they form a nebula of groups that maintain more or less close ties to him. The
influence of a master radiates in concentric circles over a space that represents
his sacred territory: it could be a quarter or neighbourhood, a village, an entire
region; in short, it might be anywhere in the world where his disciples are. Such
a territory therefore fluctuates and is unstable, and it evolves in accordance
with the shaykh’s reputation during his lifetime and after his death. The circles
correspond to the degree of proximity that the disciples maintain with him:
the innermost circle is made up of his closest disciples, who sometimes bear
the title of lieutenant (khalīfa, naqīb, muqaddam) because they represent him
in his absence; a second circle is made up of those who have chosen to serve
the master and live permanently with him; this affords them a special status.
The other followers comprise the largest circle and represent the civitas (inde-
pendent community) as a whole; they visit the shaykh in weekly meetings or, if
they live far from him, at festivals celebrating the birth of the Prophet (mawlid)
or of the founders of the master’s sacred lineage. This large majority has not
necessarily been initiated into the path, but seeks the shaykh’s spiritual influ-
ence (baraka), his protection and intercession on earth and in the afterlife.
Whatever their degree of attachment and proximity to the master, all his
disciples and followers must respect rules of behaviour (ādāb) in relation
to his person. These can be summarised as absolute submission and obedience
to his authority in return for his grace and divine blessings, of which he is con-
sidered to be the source:

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_011

188 Chih

Do not think that spiritual openness is the result of your devotion, be-
cause it is only through your shaykh’s baraka that you will get to know
God. If you oppose your shaykh internally (bāṭinan) or openly (ẓāhiran),
you are opposing God and his Messenger. Your shaykh will not be able to
help you progress if you do not demonstrate your truthfulness to him.
al-Ṭāhir, 175

This quotation is taken from a thirteenth-/nineteenth-century Ṣūfī manual, a

literary genre which, since the appearance of the first treatises between the
third/ninth and fifth/eleventh centuries, has transmitted a behavioural ideal
specific to the Ṣūfī in relation to his master, to his brothers on the path, and
in the diverse circumstances and environments of social life. These manu-
als, combined with other sources, especially the hagiographies (manāqib,
tadhkirāt, malfūẓāt) that are rich in first-hand testimonies and often consist
of anecdotes about the manner in which a master runs his institution, allow
us to analyse the model of social life in Ṣūfī communities. This social model is
resilient and adaptable to the modern world, as shown in numerous anthropo-
logical fieldworks carried out on contemporary Ṣūfī orders in local and trans-
national contexts.
A discussion of the social role of the Ṣūfīs requires a three-fold approach:
textual, historical, and anthropological, without which the complexity of the
subject cannot be demonstrated or explained. In sociology, the social role rep-
resents the manner in which an individual should behave in order to be inte-
grated into his environment; it is intrinsically linked to another concept, that
of status. Therefore, it is initially necessary to define the status of the master
and examine the historical conditions surrounding the appearance of this fig-
ure of authority in order to understand the religious and social leadership he
exerts over his community. In a second stage, I present three terms that express
the master/disciple relationship in Sufism; these are ṣuḥba (companionship),
khidma (service), and shafāʿa (intercession/mediation). These polysemous
concepts refer to social, political, and religious relations; this chapter examines
only the social relations.

2 The Social Emergence of the Ṣūfīs

According to a classic understanding of sociology, “the role comprises at once

rights and obligations (which are associated with the status), as well as certain
attitudes and character traits often deemed to favour the tasks related to the
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 189

status” (Rocheblave-Spenlé). Between the third/ninth century and the fifth/

eleventh century, the evolution of Sufism toward collective ways of life took
place concurrently with the affirmation of the spiritual master’s authority and
his function, particularly in the transition from shaykh taʿlīm (the teaching
shaykh) to shaykh tarbiya (the shaykh of spiritual direction) (Meier, Khurāsān;
Silvers-Alario). The respective status of both master and disciple, their rights,
and obligations are defined by a documented set of norms of behaviour.
From the beginning of institutionalised Sufism in the fifth/eleventh cen-
tury, drawing on Qurʾān 35:32, which discusses three types of believers, Ṣūfīs
established a hierarchy in relation to God; this was comprised of the com-
mon believers (ʿāmma), the spiritual elite (khāṣṣa), and the elite of the elite
(khāṣṣat al-khāṣṣa) that they identified with. They considered themselves a
separate and superior group: al-qawm (people of divine knowledge) (al-Sarrāj;
J. Brown). Claiming to embody God’s attributes or ethics (takhalluq bi-akhlāq
Allāh) based on their victory over their carnal souls in the battle (mujāhada)
against it, Ṣūfīs designated themselves as the awliyāʾ (“friends of God”) from
the verse (Q 10:62–5), (awliyāʾ is the plural of walī, a polysemic term that im-
plies a subtle intertwining of spiritual and earthly functions). According to
Michel Chodkiewicz, the word walī, based on the verb waliya, which means
assistance, protection, sanctuary, kinship alliance, and proximity, expresses
this dual relation of divine friendship and protection, like that reflected in the
Roman notion of amicitia, identified and studied by Peter Brown in relation to
Late Antiquity (Chodkiewicz).
The first doctrinal elucidation of the concept of walāya was undertaken
by al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī (died probably 298/910); with his theory of sanctity
(walāya) and its relation to prophecy (nubuwwa) developed during a period of
weakening of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate, al-Tirmidhī gives the mystic prerogatives
similar to those of the Prophet, of whom he is heir. This set the Ṣūfīs in compe-
tition with other religious groups on the long-debated issue of authority. Nelly
Amri, a historian of sainthood in Islam, writes that al-Tirmidhī brought the
walī into the religious and historical conscience of the Muslims:

Between those who feel invested and manifest themselves to their con-
temporaries, those who recognise such signs—or on the contrary deny
those men such qualities—, and then those who project onto them their
ideal of human perfection, their need for assistance and relief in mate-
rial and moral adversity, and the assurance or at least the promise of
salvation.
Amri, Walī et awliyāʾ, 30
190 Chih

Raised to the status of protector, the Ṣūfī/walī came to be seen as someone

with whom it was desirable or preferable to establish a relationship.
The social role of Ṣūfīs, despite local variants, is highly consistent, though
certain political circumstances have been considered turning points, during
which times Ṣūfīs were called on for assistance, comfort, and relief in adver-
sity. The hagiographical sources reveal that men tend to submit to a saint not
so much because he is a model of perfection, but for the blessings (baraka) he
offers. This blessing benefits those who journey toward God and then return to
the human world to guide and intercede on behalf of its inhabitants, spread-
ing both happiness on earth and eschatological hope. What men seek in the
company of a living saint reveals much about their hopes and expectations,
but also their anxieties. Testimonies from ancient sources or those collected
currently in the field reflect the disciples’ belief that any good occurring in
their lives (plentiful crops, healing, fertility, success in exams, in their careers,
marriage) is a divine reward for service rendered to a “friend of God” and for
obedience to his orders, and respect for the rules of companionship, which
were first conceived in the fourth/tenth century in the Ṣūfī communities of
Khurāsān, in Iran.
The swift success of the maxim pronounced by the master of Nishāpūr Abū
Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād (d. between 265/879 and 270/883) and reported by al-Sulamī
(d. 412/1021), biographer of Ṣūfīs, to the effect that “Sufism is based entirely
in good manners” (al-taṣawwuf kullu-hu ādāb) indicates the importance as-
signed to the rules of proper behaviour of the masters and their disciples, even
above asceticism and the study of religious science. From about the fourth/
tenth to fifth/eleventh century, Sufism expanded beyond the major centres
of intellectual life and began to spread to smaller towns and the countryside.
Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj (d. 378/988), originally from Ṭūs (Iran), was a great travel-
ler who toured the Muslim world from Khurāsān via Baghdad to Egypt. He
learned from the heritage of his predecessors (Dhū l-Nūn al-Miṣrī, al-Junayd,
al-Bisṭāmī, al-Shiblī) and was the first to document (in al-Lumaʿ fī l-taṣawwuf,
The radiant lights on the science of Sufism) the rules of behaviour specific to
Ṣūfīs in all the circumstances of religious and social life. This included the rit-
ual acts (ablutions, prayers, fasting, pilgrimage); ways of eating and dressing;
the manners of travel, marriage, and professional life; the spiritual audition
(samāʿ); relations with family and children; occupations; and illness. He also
devoted a section to the ādāb of companionship (ādāb al-ṣuḥba) the founda-
tions of which are compassion, commiseration, love, solidarity, mutual aid,
good understanding, and the prohibition of any kind of egotism (“avoid the
company of those who say ‘my shoes’”) (Sarrāj, ch. 63 to 88). Subsequently,
other works of this genre appeared, generally these were edited by heads of
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 191

khānqāhs/khānaqāhs, whose establishments welcomed the poor and travel-

lers. These heads included, for example, Abū Isḥāq Kāzarūnī (d. 426/1033) in
Kāzarūn, west of Shiraz and Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) in Mīhana,
Khurāsān, where the future modalities of Ṣūfī paths were established in their
institutional and organised forms (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume; Firouzeh
in this volume).
During this period in which the Islamic sciences were being established and
defined, these figures worked to integrate Sufism into Sunnī culture in a didac-
tic and apologetic style. They showed that the actions and behaviour of the
Ṣūfīs were in perfect harmony with Qurʾānic precepts and reflected the exem-
plary behaviour of the Prophet and his Companions, as reported in the ḥadīths.
Ṣūfī manuals incorporated the social codes of the various religious currents
that began to gain importance in the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh centuries
in Iran, especially in Nīshāpūr: the organisational model of the Karrāmiyya,
who were likely the founders of the first khānqāhs; the concept of ta‌ʾdīb (the
importance of adab in mastering the soul) of the Malāmatiyya, the “people of
blame” (a group that Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād is said to have begun); and the chiv-
alrous attitude of the futuwwa (connected to chivalry and companionship),
whose cardinal virtue is īthār (preferring others to oneself) (Thibon, Adab et
éducation spirituelle; Ridgeon; McGregor in this volume).
Furthermore, manners and social relations prevalent in lay society were
transposed onto Sufism, granting them a spiritual finality of sorts. The anal-
ogy to the circles of power and princely courts is very powerful (Papas in this
volume; Patrizi in this volume): social relations in Sufism are based on recipro-
cal loyalty and solidarity between the master and disciple; this draws on the
sultan’s relations of loyalty with his subjects (access to the divine presence
is equated with appearing before kings). The master expects absolute obedi-
ence from his disciple, who should therefore behave appropriately. Al-Tirmidhī
had already developed the idea that God treats His chosen ones in the same
way kings educate their servants (Radtke, Drei Schriften, 65). The title of the
anonymous fourth-/tenth-century treatise Adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq
al-taṣawwuf (The conduct of kings or the Exposition of the realities of Sufism)
clearly addresses this parallel between Ṣūfīs and kings and treats the “poor”
( fuqarāʾ) as the kings of this world and the next. The famous master from
Baghdad, al-Junayd (d. 298/910), noted of Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād: “You educated
your companions according to the sultans’ etiquette” (addabta asḥābaka ādāb
al-salāṭīn). He replied: “No, Abū l-Qāsim, for the excellence of the outer adab
reflects the excellence of the inner adab” (al-Sulamī, Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba, 86).
Al-Sulamī’s work represents a pivotal moment for Sufism in the second
half of the fourth/tenth century and the turn of the fifth/eleventh century:
192 Chih

he summarised its early formulations and revealed the importance that the
figure of the master had acquired in his time, and his function in the life of
the emerging Ṣūfī communities. In his writings, al-Sulamī demonstrates this
evolution of mysticism, in which the education of the soul no longer depends
on asceticism as in the first centuries of Islam, but rather on social life elevated
to the status of a spiritual discipline (Thibon, L’œuvre d’Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān
al-Sulamī). His works, Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba (Treatise on the etiquette of com-
panionship) and Jawāmiʿ ādāb al-ṣūfiyya (Compendium of Ṣūfī etiquette) state
that the progress of the aspirant on the spiritual path results from his attitude
toward his master, and that attitude is determined by adab and is not the re-
sult of any spiritual discipline. However, there is an evolution toward a greater
authority of the masters, which is linked to their clearly defined status as suc-
cessors of the Prophet. While al-Sulamī refers to customs alien to Arab culture,
he also refers extensively to the ḥadīth in order to illustrate various rules; adab
is linked to the Prophet, who, having been educated by God, represents the
supreme model. Al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072), al-Sulāmī’s disciple in Nishāpūr
and the author of the Risāla, produced a highly effective synthesis of all the
preceding literature; in it, he addressed both masters and disciples, a fact that
explains the manual’s great success to this day.
Two centuries later, at the end of the sixth/twelfth century, the codes that
articulated social relations in Sufism were fixed definitively and did not change
again: Sufism had achieved its social integration. Khānqāhs and zāwiyas spread
in the urbanised quarters of inner cities or, when no space was available, they
were built in still empty areas on the outskirts of cities, and very soon thereaf-
ter new quarters grew around them (Clayer in this volume). In rural environ-
ments, saints and their descendants became central to the identities of villages
and tribal communities (Ocak in this volume). The well-known manual by
ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), ʿAwārif al-maʿārif (The benefits of intimate
knowledge) represents what historians call an age of transition (Ohlander,
Sufism), during which the great mystical paths (the rise of the ṭarīqa) emerged,
along with a more strongly established institutionalisation of Sufism (Knysh,
Islamic mysticism). During this period, when the ʿAbbāsid caliphate was weak,
on the eve of the Mongol invasion and their capture of Baghdad in 656/1258,
Ṣūfīs of the central and eastern regions of the caliphate established their iden-
tity and their role in society, and were strengthened by an increasing number
of followers, and by the patronage of political elites.
During his long reign, the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–
622/1180–1225) attempted to fight against the disintegration of the caliphate
and supported al-Suhrawardī’s project to open his ribāṭ in Baghdad to the
whole population, that is, to those who were not affiliated but sought the Ṣūfī’s
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 193

blessing (tabarruk). The master assigned everyone in the ribāṭ a status and
a role according to their degree of participation in the activities of the com-
munity and established the rights and obligations of each role. Al-Suhrawardī
granted the non-affiliated people many dispensations (rukhṣa, pl. rukhaṣ), in-
cluding not submitting to the strict spiritual discipline. In this, he followed
the line established by his uncle Abū l-Najīb (d. 563/1168) in Ādāb al-murīdīn
(Book of aspirants’ manners); thus, he was able to integrate into his commu-
nity whole segments of the urban population that lived outside the walls of the
ribāṭ and extend his influence to society at large (Ohlander, Sufism, 243). These
“possessors of dispensations” (arbāb al-rukhṣa), however, were subject to a
minimum of moral instruction (adab), as described in his famous manual. The
rapid and widespread success of the ʿAwārif, especially in India and Central
Asia, is linked to its style and form: it is a practical guide with a clear message
for novices, who first familiarised themselves with all the external aspects of
Sufism, then embarked on the path of spiritual progress. It contains a set of
rules of exterior manners (ādāb al-ẓāhira) that are closely linked to the seeker’s
inner development. These rules cover travel, eating habits, behaviour at the
table and generally in public, and attire. The shaykh’s recommendations in-
volve the disciple’s private and family life, a tendency also found in subsequent
Persian manuals, such as the treatise by Yaḥyā Bākharzī (d. 736/1335–6), Awrād
al-aḥbāb wa-fuṣuṣ al-ādāb (Litanies of the beloved and bezels of good man-
ners) which gives advice relative to the Ṣūfī environment. Shaykh Bākharzī,
who headed a khānqāh in Bukhara, taught his disciples values that were meant
to include their ordinary family and social circles: among other things, ad-
vice on how to treat women and educate children (Feuillebois-Pierunek, ʿIzz
al-Dīn Kāshānī).
The fall of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate reinforced the authority of the Ṣūfīs, as
evidenced by the increase in numbers of hagiographies describing a world
order in which the true masters are the saints who form an invisible govern-
ment with a council (dīwān) and its own hierarchy, above which is the pole
or supreme recourse (quṭb, ghawth) (Papas in this volume). In addition to po-
litical upheavals, socioeconomic factors, such as the economic crisis and the
profound changes impacting the countries around the Mediterranean in the
eighth/fourteenth and ninth/fifteenth centuries (for example, the Black Death,
Bedouin acts of pillage, ruralisation) drove people to seek the comfort and pro-
tection of the shaykhs, who, in turn, complained that they no longer had true
disciples. In the context of these crises, the zāwiyas experienced a great resur-
gence; some of them were transformed into large complexes that served as a
means of integrating the rural population into the urban social fabric. The es-
tablishment of zāwiyas around the city of Kairouan, for example, was directly
194 Chih

linked to the desertion of villages by their populations in Ifrīqiyya during the

Middle Ages (seventh/thirteenth to ninth/fifteenth centuries) that resulted
from social problems and insecurity. The masters took on the function of thau-
maturges and faced increasingly concrete expectations from their contempo-
raries, as evidenced by numerous miracles attributed to them in hagiographic
documents. They were credited with miraculous healings, aiding travellers,
releasing prisoners, and protecting the needy. The provision of hospitality and
nourishment became major functions of the zāwiya complexes (Amri, Zāwiya
et territoire). In Egypt, the Ṣūfī al-Shaʿrānī (d. 973/1565), who witnessed the
collapse of the Mamlūk state and the Ottoman occupation in 922/1517, be-
lieved that the shaykhs of the zāwiya played a vital role in society. His own
zāwiya, built around 930/1524 by Qāḍī Muḥyī l-Dīn Uzbekī in the quarter of
Bāb Shaʿriya, on the edge of the old Fāṭimid Cairo, was endowed with sufficient
resources to enable him to feed two hundred residents per day and welcome
seventy temporary guests (Garcin, L’insertion de Shaʿrānī; Winter, 46–50). In
his Ṣūfī manual, al-Anwār al-qudsiyya fī maʿrifat qawāʿid al-ṣūfiyya (Holy lights
on the knowledge of the rules of the Ṣūfīs), which mixes spiritual ethics and
sociability, al-Shaʿrānī updates the rules of adab from the classical literature of
Sufism, and illustrates them with living examples adapted to his time.
The peak period for the Muslim, Mughal, Ottoman, and Safavid empires be-
tween the ninth/fifteenth and eleventh/seventeenth centuries was likely also
the acme of Sufism, during which it completed and consolidated its integration
into society. The prominent Ṣūfī orders spread along with military conquests
and the patronage of the political elites; such was the expansion of some, for
example, the Naqshbandiyya in Central Asia and India, and the Khalwatiyya
in the Ottoman Empire, that it had important consequences for the organisa-
tion and even the very structure of the Ṣūfī orders concerned. New manuals
on ādāb showed greater codification and hierarchy, and ultimately affirmed
the specific identity and exclusivism of each order. These were written by mas-
ters such as the Naqshbandī Aḥmad Kāsānī Dahbidī (d. 949/1542), author of
Risāla-yi ādāb al-ṣiddīqīn (Treatise on the rules of the truthful) and Muṣṭafā
al-Bakrī (d. 1162/1749), the initiator of the renewal of the Khalwatiyya in Egypt
and a prolific author who specialised in handbooks for aspirants (Papas, No
Sufism; De Jong).
The nineteenth century and the direct contacts between Muslim countries
and colonial Europe do not represent so much a rupture in the history of Sufism
as a continuation of the period of great Muslim empires. Exchanges intensi-
fied and brought about the expansion of new or revived Ṣūfī orders such as
the Naqshbandiyya-Khālidiyya of Mawlānā Khālid al-Baghdādī (d. 1242/1827),
the Tijāniyya of Aḥmad al-Tijānī (d. 1230/1815), and the paths associated with
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 195

the teachings of the Moroccan Ṣūfī Aḥmad Ibn Idrīs (d. 1253/1837). These or-
ders were founded by Ṣūfī figures with the status of ‘renewers’ (mujaddid) or
‘seal of the saints’ (khatm al-awliyāʾ), directly initiated by the Prophet. Within
those orders a certain exclusivism set in, along with the adoption of specific
ritual practices that served as marks of identity and community membership.
For example, the recitation of a special prayer upon the Prophet in the branch-
es of the Tijāniyya in West Africa, or the introduction of the forty-day retreat in
the Khālidiyya (Triaud and Robinson; Abu-Manneh).
The first quarter of the twentieth century, however, represents a turn-
ing point. The Saudi dynasty in Arabia, driven by the Wahhābī ideology and
hostile to Ṣūfīs, seized power. Along with the development of fundamentalist
religious movements and the rise of nationalisms, they terminated the pre-
dominant position that the Ṣūfīs had held for centuries in the mental universe
of the Muslims. In the 1960s, sociologists even predicted the protracted and
inexorable decline of the social role of Ṣūfīs. While we cannot deny the nega-
tive impacts on Ṣūfī practices that stemmed from the Salafisation and growing
secularisation in contemporary Muslim societies, field studies conducted over
the past twenty years from Morocco to Indonesia, including Egypt, Turkey, and
Pakistan, but also Europe, show that the model of social life that Ṣūfīs prac-
ticed is resilient and even experienced a new vitality in the last quarter of the
twentieth century of, as it adapted to modernity.
This historical perspective shows a parallel evolution between the growing
role of Ṣūfīs in society, which resulted from historical circumstances and pa-
tronage from political elites, and the role they created for themselves as spiri-
tual guides through their writings, a role that was recognised by their followers.
The model of the ideal community developed by the Ṣūfīs in the khānqāhs
and the zāwiyas, with their rules of behaviour stemming from the Sunna and
customs (notably, courtly culture), gradually extended to the rest of society,
and integrated all believers, even as the Ṣūfī institutions met the increasingly
concrete social demands for protection, assistance, and mediation, and main-
tained their initial vocation as a place for spiritual retreat and the initiation
of novices.

3 Sufism as a Model of Social Life: Companionship, Service,

and Mediation

In Sufism, the relationship between a master and his future disciple (murīd)
is generally sealed by a pact during a ceremony, one of the first descriptions
of which can be found in the Risāla by al-Qushayrī. When making the pact
196 Chih

(akhdh al-ʿahd), the novice takes an oath of allegiance (bayʿa) to the shaykh,
demonstrating his submission. The term bayʿa, which denotes the act of shak-
ing hands (muṣāfaḥa) with a crossing of fingers (mushābaka) peculiar to cer-
tain initiation rites, also carries the idea of an agreement between a seller
and a buyer. Thus, in the Qurʾān the term ʿahd can mean both “testamentary
designation” or “contract.” Indeed, the pact requires reciprocity: the act of
submission on the part of the disciple and the duty to transmit knowledge
on the part of the master. It establishes between the two a relationship of
companionship (ṣuḥba), modelled on the relationship between the Prophet
and his Companions (Gril, Le modèle prophétique). As a social relationship,
this attachment to the shaykh is subject to certain rules of behaviour and du-
ties; henceforth, books on Sufism speak of the “rights of the master” (ḥaqq
al-murshid) and the “rights of the disciple” (ḥaqq al-murīd) as reciprocal “du-
ties” (shurūṭ wa-ādāb). These rules must be respected by the body of believers,
even those who attach themselves to the master but have not made the pact
with him, but only hope to benefit from his blessings (tabarruk).
The strict etiquette observed in the presence of the master reinforces the
sacred character of his person (ḥurmat al-shaykh), whose word should be,
for his disciple, “like a call from God and his Messenger.” This formulation by
al-Suhrawardī was taken even further by an Egyptian Ṣūfī in the eighteenth
century, for whom “the presence of the shaykh is the presence of God Himself”
(ḥaḍrat al-shaykh ḥaḍrat Allāh) (al-Samanūdī, 107). Surrounding the shaykh
are interdicts that the disciple must respect, inwardly and outwardly, to adhere
to the pact, which is a pact made with God. Whoever breaks the code of sub-
mission must be banished, because to disobey the master is to disobey God;
his attitude equates with ingratitude, which is similar to kufr (impiety), and he
must be excluded as he endangers the community.
For Ṣūfīs, the attitude of the disciples toward the master is based on the
Qurʾān and the Sunna, just as the figure of the master draws its model from
the Prophet, of whom he is heir on earth. The chapter on the rules of conduct
of the novice toward his master in al-Suhrawardī’s ʿAwārif al-maʿārif is a com-
mentary on Q 49:1–5:

O you who believe, do not raise your voice above that of the Prophet and
do not address him in a loud voice as you do among yourselves, for fear
that your works will be invalidated, without your realising it … Certainly
those who call you from outside your private apartments, most of them
do not understand.
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 197

Thus, on the basis of these verses, many rules were established that relate to
respecting the privacy and personal space of the master.
The disciple must present himself before his shaykh in a state of ritual pu-
rity (muṭahharan), wearing his most beautiful clothes, and in a state of repen-
tance. According to al-Qushayrī, Abū ʿAlī l-Daqqāq (d. 405/1015) stated that he
never attended a session with his master al-Naṣrabādhī (d. 367/977–8) with-
out first performing the major ablution (al-Qushayrī, Risāla, bāb al-ṣuḥba).
Al-Qushayrī himself adopted this behaviour, in addition to the practice of fast-
ing. The disciple should not knock at his master’s door but make his presence
known by invoking God out loud, and wait for the latter to allow him to enter
or leave. In the presence of his shaykh, the disciple should not sit until invited
to do so and, once sitting, should remain silent, head down, and speak only if
asked to by the shaykh. If the disciple is authorised to speak, he should do so
without raising his voice; he must not take leave until authorised and, when
exiting, should never turn his back on his shaykh, rather he should leave the
room stepping backwards. He should not walk in front of his shaykh (except at
night), nor sit at his table unless invited; he should not tread upon his prayer
mat, sleep in his bed, wear his clothes or his shoes, and he should not use his
prayer beads. He must not spy on his shaykh, nor try to find out how long he
sleeps or what he eats, or what relations he maintains with women (al-Ṭāhir,
121–7; Chih, Le soufisme, 231–2). These rules are modelled on those that the
believers were asked to obey with respect to the Prophet according to the
Qurʾān 53:33:

O, you who believe, do not enter into the Prophet’s apartments unless
you have been given permission, without looking at his plate. But if you
are called, enter, and once you have eaten, disperse and refrain from
speaking with familiarity; that would annoy the Prophet, who would be
ashamed to tell you, but God is not ashamed of the truth.
Gril, Le modèle prophétique, 348

The disciple must abandon all personal will and place himself in the hands of
the shaykh to become like a “cadaver in the hands of the washer of the dead”
(a phrase attributed to the Iraqi master Sahl al-Tustarī (d. 283/896)). With re-
gard to his spiritual training, and in all aspects of his private life (travel, mar-
riage, and work), he should not undertake anything without first consulting
his master, as only he knows what is appropriate for the disciple. Finally, he
should not conceal any of his thoughts or actions from his shaykh. In al-Anwār
198 Chih

al-qudsiyya, al-Shaʿrānī gives many examples of this hayba (reverential fear)

that takes hold of disciples before their master, who is a being touched by God’s
grace and gifted with clairvoyance ( firāsa), so much so that disciples cannot
bear his gaze and are obliged to look down. This attitude evokes in the Ṣūfīs
the reverential fear that the Companions felt in the presence of the Prophet,
before whom they stood motionless and silent “as if they had birds perched on
their heads” (al-Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ, jihād 37, no. 2842). The followers of a contem-
porary master from Upper Egypt confess feeling like children in the presence
of their shaykh, before whom they always appeared looking down, afraid of
having violated orders, and thus being deprived of his confidence (Chih, Le
soufisme, 233). The masters say that they themselves educated their disciples
like sons, expecting from them a respect and obedience similar to those that a
son must express toward his father. The pact is described as a second birth, a
new spiritual existence (wilāda maʿnawiyya); this explains the use of the terms
of paternity and maternity in master-disciple relations: the master is both the
progenitor in matters of the spirit (ab maʿnawī) (al-Suhrawārdī; Ohlander,
Sufism) and a nurturing mother, according to the well-known statement by
Najm al-Dīn Rāzī, translated here:

Just as the infant drinks milk at the breast of its mother or wet-nurse, re-
ceiving from them the sustenance without which he would perish, so too
the infant of the spirit drinks milk of the path and Truth from the nipple
of the mother of prophethood, or the mother of sainthood (walāya), re-
ceiving from both the prophet or the shaykh who stands in place of the
Prophet, the sustenance without which he would perish.
Algar, 223–4

The Egyptian Ṣūfī al-Shaʿrānī, following the death of his master al-Shinnāwī,
was spiritually weaned, as he himself described it, under the guidance of
al-Khawwāṣ (Geoffroy, 192). The attitude of the shaykh toward his disciple is
also the subject of a chapter in the Ṣūfī manuals; it must reflect both the quali-
ties of the father and mother: that is, authority and firmness, but also affection,
benevolence, accessibility, and tenderness. Furthermore, the shaykh should
adopt behaviour that inspires the disciple to respect him and his authority, and
emulate him; he should be a model, not only in the spiritual realm but also in
social behaviour, as was the case with the Prophet and his Companions (Knysh
(trans.), al-Qushayri’s epistle).
Sufism repurposes family ties by transposing them to another plane and
directing them to a different goal. Malamud’s anthropological reading of the
Ṣūfī manuals from the classical period and Hammoudi’s analysis of modern
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 199

hagiographies examine the dyadic and hierarchical relationship between mas-

ters and disciples as modelled on the relationships of power, authority, and
gender in mediaeval societies: normative relations among Ṣūfīs reproduce nor-
mative relations in the larger world in order to reinforce those social forms of
submission, inequality, and dependence by connecting them to a divine origin.
Hammoudi sees the master/disciple relationship as the foundation of authori-
tarian power in contemporary Arab societies. This unequal relationship finds
its fulfilment in khidma (service), a concept with varied contents that refers to
productive, domestic, and ritual activities (khādim means both domestic ser-
vant and a client) (Touati, 255). Yet, we see that the concept of khidma, mean-
ing service rendered to a shaykh, as it appears in a ḥadīth, became a common
adage in Ṣūfī circles. “Sayyid al-qawm khādimu-hum” (The lord of a group is he
who is at their service) is two-fold: the disciples are at the service of the shaykh
and he is at the service of his disciples.

3.1 Serving the Master

“Abū Manṣūr al-Maghribī was asked: ‘How long have you accompanied Abū
ʿUthmān (al-Ḥīrī d. 298/910)?’ He replied: ‘I have served him, but I have not
accompanied him. Companionship relates to brothers and pairs; with the mas-
ters it is a matter of service’” (Gril, Maîtres, 554). The Ṣūfī Ibn Ṭāhir al-Maqdisī
(sixth/twelfth century) prioritised service rendered to the shaykh ahead of re-
ligious duties: the disciple must be ready to respond to the demands of his
master first, even before he goes to pray (Massignon, 117). In Sufism, service
to the master and to the companions is a way to exercise one’s humility and
abnegation, and forget one’s rank and social status.
Khidma consists of serving the shaykh but also his visitors and the in-
habitants of the village or neighbourhood who gravitate around the zāwiya,
khānqāh, or tekke. Since their inception, Ṣūfī establishments served as places
to welcome and provide hospitality to travellers and pilgrims (sāʾiḥūn) under-
taking their initiatory voyage; indeed, such establishments were often built at
transit points, on the outskirts of towns or in places within the cities where
travellers arrive, for example, in the caravanserais (Ephrat and Pinto in this
volume). Outside the shaykh’s family, a limited number of people live perma-
nently in these places where Ṣūfīs congregate. In the khānqāh of Shaykh Niẓām
al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (eighth/fourteenth century), only the most advanced disciples,
the nephews of the shaykh and the administrators of the khānqāh, lived in
small cells or in homes located near the establishment. The novices studied,
prayed, and slept on the ground in the main hall, the jamāʿat-khāna (Matringe,
77; Ernst and Lawrence). As the numbers of disciples grew, the master began
delegating some of his duties to those among them who were more advanced
200 Chih

in age and experience; he granted them his teachings so that they, in turn, could
train aspirants. Al-Suhrawardī gave them the title of khādim (pl. khuddām) and
described them as superintendents with multiple roles: to solicit and collect
donations for the ribāṭ, receive complaints from the residents, feed the trav-
ellers, and serve the population in general (al-Suhrawardī, ch. 11; Ohlander,
Sufism). In the Egyptian Khalwatiyya, founded by Muḥammad al-Ḥifnī in the
eighteenth century, these roles were played by the naqīb al-nuqabāʾ (chief at-
tendant), also called naqīb al-ḥaḍra or naqīb al-jamāʿa because he was, among
other duties, responsible for the smooth running of the dhikr sessions (ḥaḍra).
The naqīb al-nuqabāʾ was described as the repository of the shaykh’s secret, the
door through which he may be accessed (maḥall sirr al-shaykh wa-bābuhu),
his representative in his absence; he brought the novices close to the master to
perform the pact and replaced the shaykh during dhikr sessions. He must pos-
sess a certain maturity and experience, show good character (ḥusn al-khuluq),
a conciliatory nature, and perfect honesty. He must set an example for others
by showing great spiritual energy (himma). He must enquire about his broth-
ers if they are absent, and the brothers must respect and carry out his orders,
even if they are older than he is. He often acts as a supervisor and attendant,
according to al-Suhrawardī. He must be learned, knowledgeable about the
path and its rules, and ensure that the disciples respect those rules, especial-
ly those related to behaviour toward the master and those connected to the
dhikr. He must be able to relate to everyone and speak to them gently, without
raising his voice or joking with them, or staring at them. If the disciple needs
some information regarding the customs of the zāwiya, he should not address
the shaykh directly, rather he should enquire through the naqīb; however, with
regard to a vision, a dream, or an inspiration, he must wait until the master
has retired privately and speak only to him, after receiving his authorisation
(al-Samanūdī; al-Dardīr).
At present, in the Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya order in Morocco, as in the
Naqshbandī branch of Shaykh Zindapir in Pakistan, the khulafāʾ are treated
with great respect by the master, whom they provide with comprehensive ser-
vices: they belong to literate urban circles and are, through their writings and
in practice, those who spread his teachings; they take care of a local zāwiya
(which can be a private home) where dhikr sessions are organised on a weekly
basis; finally, they are in charge of the enormous organisation of the mawlid
(celebration of the Prophet’s birthday), or ʿurs, death anniversary, in Pakistan,
which draws thousands of visitors from the entire country and from abroad
each year (Chih, Sufism; Werbner).
In addition to the naqīb al-jamāʿa, the Khalwatī manuals of the eighteenth
century also mention a group of nuqabāʾ responsible for domestic tasks; they
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 201

help and assist the shaykh (muʿāwinū l-shaykh). Given the selflessness of their
tasks, they are compared to the Prophet’s Anṣār, the original Companions who
protected and shared their homes with him and his Companions (al-Samanūdī,
151). Four nuqabāʾ suffice for the zāwiya to work and the role of each is subject
to precise rules, mainly related to food and table manners. The practice of eat-
ing together has inspired a great number of texts on ādāb, undoubtedly due
to its strong social dimension. The rules of the Khalwatiyya were copied di-
rectly from mediaeval treatises, particularly from al-Ghazālī and al-Suhrawardī
(Feuillebois-Pierunek, La maîtrise du corps). At the bottom of the hierar-
chy, but spiritually the highest, is the person in charge of the sandals (naqīb
al-niʿāl): he is responsible for the cleaning, maintenance, and arrangement of
the sandals according to the individual’s rank (rutba), which he must attend
to, without mistaking their owners. He must fulfil his task for God with humil-
ity. Above him is the brother responsible for the transport and distribution of
water (sāqī l-māʾ): he is charged with the cleaning of the jugs and goblets, and
subject to a strict hygienic lifestyle, he must keep his hands and clothes clean,
should not blow his nose or spit; and while distributing water, he should not
deny it to anyone, even to those who do not belong to the community of broth-
ers. When distributing water, he must always begin with whomever is sitting to
the right of the master and end with whomever sits to his left. He must know
the etiquette of drinking (ādāb al-shurb), so that he can teach it to others; for
example, one needs to drink while sitting, to grasp the jug with the right hand,
and take only three mouthfuls, breathing after each one, and remember to re-
cite the basmala (“In the name of God”) and the ḥamdala (“Praise to God”)
with each mouthful. Finally, the person in charge of the water is responsible
for washing the clothes of the disciples; he must do this without resentment,
without balking at the task.
The person responsible for the table must be skilful, energetic, clean, virtu-
ous, a good cook, and a model of scruples and asceticism (wariʿan wa-zāhidan).
When serving meals, he must recite Sūrat al-Fātiḥa, inwardly request divine
permission for that meal and its blessing following an established formula. He
then sets the table according to a prearranged scheme (he is assisted by the
water carrier, as the two tasks are closely related), all the while reciting Sūrat
al-Ikhlāṣ (Q 112), which chases demons away. During the meal, he must remain
standing, ready to serve the brothers, while inwardly reciting Sūra Quraysh
(Q 106) against the abdominal problems that food may cause. At the end of
the meal he gathers the leftovers to share them with the person in charge of
the water. When clearing the table, he praises God for the meal and hopes that
it will bring strength, health, light, and purity to those who have partaken in
it. He must always ensure that some food remains for a potential visitor and,
202 Chih

after serving him, he should never let him eat alone, but should sit with him.
He must not touch the dishes before serving them, except to taste them, and
he must not show favouritism, as that would compromise his commitment to
the path and warrant his dismissal.
If someone were to make a donation to the zāwiya, he must not keep any of
it for himself but bring it to the master, to dispose of as he wishes. He must, of
course, know good table manners in order to teach them to the novices. There
are many table manners, for example, one must sit on one’s knees or stretch
out only the right leg, take small bites and chew them at length, not blow his
nose or spit during the meal, and turn his face away if he feels the need to
cough or sneeze, and not place on the plate anything that might have been in
his mouth, not lean over or stretch at the table, not stick meat or cheese in the
bread, or tear off pieces of bread with his teeth, but instead break it off with
his hands, limit himself to the necessary amount of food (neither too much
nor not enough), not begin eating before being authorised to do so, not throw
anything to the ground (such as watermelon rinds, which should be placed
before oneself), eat with only three fingers, and finally, begin and end the meal
by taking a bit of salt, if there is any available (this custom was thought to ward
off illnesses).
Since their foundation, Ṣūfī establishments welcomed a very diverse popu-
lation: “One of the best examples of this is the khānqāh of Abū Saʿīd b. Abī
l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) where ‘ordinary people, poor folk and labourers, urban
and rural … [and] even the most ostracized outcasts of society, such as a
wretched young drunkard in one instance’ received hospitality” (Graham, 122).
At every stage of their expansion, these establishments, built in urban environ-
ments or on the outskirts of towns, served as places where the rural population
could be integrated. In addition to the initiatory knowledge, the population
was instilled with a minimum of customs and the good manners of the liter-
ate and urbanised men, a milieu from which arose the Ṣūfīs who created these
rules of behaviour and set them in writing with an increasingly wider audience
in mind.
In return for the service rendered to the shaykh, the disciples had access
to his friendship and trust. According to a ḥadīth qudsī (sacred tradition) nar-
rated by al-Bukhārī, “My servant does not approach Me for something more
dear to me than the obligations that I have imposed upon him” (al-Bukhārī,
Ṣaḥīḥ, book 76, 509). God brings close to him those He loves, and so the shaykh
draws his disciples close or drives them away. According to accounts collected,
for the disciples, the love and trust of the master are a source of empowerment,
a driving force; in turn, those who are entrusted with important tasks gain a
certain aura, or respect, within the group. In a contemporary zāwiya, such as
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 203

that of Muḥammad al-Ṭayyib in Qurna, Upper Egypt, one can see young people
working at different tasks; often they are students and, once married and set-
tled into their professional life, they leave their places to other young students.
Sometimes, one may split his time between his studies and serving the master
in his zāwiya (called a sāḥa in Upper Egypt):

It is my shaykh who made me what I am,” he says, “he is my educator

(murrabī), he knows me inside out, I keep no secrets from him. He en-
trusts me with responsibilities in the sāḥa and often seeks my opinion re-
garding its management. This confidence is the result of the many years
I have served him.
Chih, Le soufisme, 234

The intimate relationship created between the master and his disciple ren-
ders the latter completely open and transparent in the eyes of the master,
who can then assign him responsibilities. It is easy to imagine the tensions,
rivalry, and envy that this pursuit of the shaykh’s trust can generate among
the disciples, but also the consternation that the loss of this trust can cause
(Werbner, 136–40).
Certain disciples remain khādim of the shaykh their entire lives and for-
sake founding a family or pursuing a career. The anthropologist Abdallah
Hammoudi refers to this as social atypism, citing the example of a nineteenth-
century Moroccan Ṣūfī: “But at the age when other young men married women,
probably in order to be served by them, he did the opposite and began serving a
master. This decision constitutes an inversion of the ‘normal’ course of life and
can definitely be regarded as a ‘transgression’” (Hammoudi, 94). These servants
are closest, on a day-to-day basis, to the saint and perform tasks that give them
more access to his private life: bringing him water, preparing his meals, getting
his clothes, making his bed. This proximity to so many aspects of the master
confers on this servant a special status among the disciples; some even seek
the servant’s blessing (baraka) or ask him to make a talisman (ḥijāb), because
he has become a master at the art of “spiritual healing” (ʿilāj rūḥānī), that is,
healing through the baraka of saints. In the Moroccan Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya
Ṣūfī order, a certain Sīdī Bābā served as a caretaker of the mosque and the mau-
soleum of the master’s ancestors, and lived permanently in the zāwiya, where
he received visits from women who, with a photo or a bottle of water, request-
ed cures for cases in which traditional medicine had failed, often the cause
is then attributed to spirits ( jinn) or to the evil eye (Dominguez Diaz, 187).
Although his master Sidī Ḥamza (d. 2017) did not grant talismans, he did pres-
ent himself as a doctor of the soul (ṭabīb al-nafs), an expression that appeared
204 Chih

in Sufism as early as the fourth/tenth century, perhaps because spiritual de-

velopment involves a profound mental and psychological transformation, and
the Ṣūfīs have written about these powerful effects on men (al-Qushayrī, Tartīb
al-sulūk, trans. by Meier, A book of etiquette). Nowadays, people come with dif-
ferent kinds of problems—those of the modern individualistic and materialis-
tic world; yet the shaykh still presents himself as a refuge.
Serving the shaykh requires a certain reciprocity and the shaykh is also
bound to achieve what his followers expect of him. In some ways, companion-
ship (ṣuḥba) evokes a clientelism relationship underlying premodern Muslim
societies. In the scholarly circles of Damascus (Chamberlain), as in the ruling
class of Iran (Paul, Khidma; Mottahedeh), the relationship of subordination
implies mutual obligations of loyalty, along with the resulting economic, social,
and political advantages. The Ṣūfī technical terms of adab, tarbiya (education),
majlis (assembly), and ḥaḍra (presence) originally refer to the courtly etiquette
related to the entourage of the sultans. By donning the attributes of power, the
Ṣūfīs assert their own power, although it is not intrinsically earthly, rather it
is a metaphysical power that extends into the afterlife. Like the Prophet with
his community, in cities, the Ṣūfīs exert interior and exterior authority, such
that certain mediaeval hagiographies, most notably in the Maghrib and Egypt,
ascribed to them a specific territory. The relation is understood and lived as a
gift (that is, allegiance, recognition, and service rendered to the saint) and as
a counter-gift (to guarantee salvation) (Elboudrari, Allégeance, 269). We have
mentioned the concept of a contract contained in the terms for realising the
pact (bayʿa and ʿahd): support and help versus loyalty and attachment; such
are the two poles of the reciprocal relations on which the ṣuḥba is based.

3.2 Mediation and Arbitrage

Only a limited number of disciples join the order to pursue the spiritual path
whereas, for the neighbourhood or village, the shaykh is perceived more as an
intercessor and a patron. In return for the service and loyalty rendered to him,
he assists his followers in their daily lives: he feeds them, heals them, and re-
solves conflicts. Generally, as the reputation of a master’s sainthood spreads,
his wealth also increases through the donations of his followers. In the past
and even the present, visitors to the zāwiya, if they have the means, rarely ar-
rive without gifts, while those without wealth offer their service. The young
people who work free of charge in their shaykh’s fields during their summer va-
cation reply that it is a way of serving God (khidma li-Llāh) (Chih, Le soufisme,
339). The master’s duty to provide guidance is linked to another value, that of
hospitality and the dispensation of food; it is even the main social function of a
saint (itʿām al-taʿam “to provide food”). Thus, it is said of the Moroccan shaykh
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 205

ʿAbdallāh al-Sharīf (d. 1088/1678): “In a single night our shaykh fed fourteen
thousand visitors and before he died had left behind five hundred authentic
initiates (ʿārifūn), friends (awliyāʾ) and witnesses of God, capable of leading
[others] to Him” (Elboudrari, Quand les saints, 498). Thus, the image of the
saint that redistributes the donations given to him, without keeping any of
it for himself, is a hagiographic topos that reveals a mechanism for establish-
ing clientelist relations and for the social appropriation of a territory. Finally,
through the mediation that he performs in conflicts, the shaykh is a guarantor
of peace and social stability.
The master first performs mediation in his community of disciples and their
families. Given that the disciples are all pursuing intimacy as well as the in-
tellectual, spiritual, and physical proximity to the shaykh, they are subject to
competition and tension, as well as envy and resentment. The hagiographies
of the masters echo this and mention these feelings as a way to highlight the
education of their disciples. The hagiography of the Iranian Ṣūfī Abū Saʿīd b.
Abī l-Khayr states: “When a dispute occurred between two dervishes, it was our
Shaikh’s practice to remain silent until they had emptied their hearts. When
he knew that their interiors were cleansed, then he would say a few words and
effect a reconciliation and make peace between them” (Karamustafa, Reading,
242). In the Akhlāq matbūliyya by the Egyptian Ṣūfī al-Shaʿrānī, we discover
that the masters of the Aḥmadiyya ṭarīqa staged a weekly ritual, inspired by
ʿAbbāsid rituals, to end disagreements between the disciples: the shaykh

would sit behind a curtain, so as to not be seen by anyone during the

judgement session; the naqīb would intervene and make known what
the khalīfa had decided, conciliation (ṣulḥ), banishment (ḥajr) or reprisal
(qiṣāṣ, lex talionis). And the two opponents sat there, head lowered, with-
out one signaling to the other with the hand or the head.
Mayeur-Jaouen, 91

Anglo-Saxon anthropology has clearly demonstrated that intertribal arbitra-

tion was the function par excellence of the saintly founders of brotherhoods
in Morocco (Gellner). At the turn of the tenth/sixteenth and eleventh/seven-
teenth centuries in particular, it was exercised more frequently, because this
was a period of major political instability and insecurity, during which peas-
ants sought out the saints as authority figures comparable to those of the tribal
chiefs (Touati, 253). Arbitration, not just between tribes but also between the
tribes and central power (makhzen), became an essential nationwide function
for the zāwiya of Ouezzane: from the early twelfth/eighteenth century on, the
successors of the founder, ʿAbdallāh al-Sharīf, became specialists in the areas of
206 Chih

influence of their zāwiya, that is, in the Gharb, the Rif, and the Oriental region.
At the same time, in Iran and Central Asia, a similar tension appeared between
Naqshbandī saints and nomads in the system of patronage and protection es-
tablished by Khwāja Aḥrār (Paul, Forming a faction). In the border regions of
the Punjab and Sindh, Ṣūfīs established sanctuaries and served as mediators
and conciliators for transhumant nomads, farmers, and herdsmen who fought
over land and grazing rights; these Ṣūfīs and their descendants retained this
role until the early twentieth century (Kozlowski). In Tripolitania, Libya, the
Algerian Ṣūfī Muḥammad al-Sanūsī (d. 1276/1859) settled and founded zāwiyas
near the border between various tribal clans; then he and his khalīfas estab-
lished themselves as mediators and arbitrators (Evans-Pritchard).
The saint’s khidma means the exercise of his walāya/wilāya over his sacred
territory; he represents the ideal patron, as defined by Peter Brown in relation
to the Christian holy men of Late Antiquity: “He is a man who uses his ‘power’
to smooth over the thorny issues of village life … He would arrange the cancel-
ling of debts, he would settle disputes among the villagers on the spot, and so
save them the long trek to the local town to conduct their litigation” (P. Brown,
85). According to J. S. Trimingham, the Ṣūfī shaykhs were able to mediate in the
conflicts of traditional, tribal, and clan societies; but that role was said to have
disappeared with the establishment of a modern state, the breakdown of tradi-
tional social structures, and the creation of a bureaucracy that took charge, in
the cities and in the countryside, of functions of justice traditionally entrusted
to the Ṣūfī shaykhs. The anthropological fieldwork carried out in the 1990s in
Upper Egypt shows that the shaykhs continued to arbitrate and offer hospi-
tality in this region, especially when the state failed to resolve conflicts that
brought into play the honour and reputation of the parties, namely vendettas.
Arbitration by the shaykhs is called ṣulḥ (“conciliation,” “accommodation”); the
solution to a conflict should also lead to a peace agreement between the par-
ties to ensure that the conflict does not resurface. Aḥmad Raḍwān (d. 1967),
a Ṣūfī from the region of Luxor, thus defined the sāḥas: “The sāḥas are every-
where in Upper Egypt because they serve as places of worship, for welcoming
visitors, for the arbitration of conflicts and conciliation” (Chih, Le soufisme, 2).
These sāhas have open-air courtyards with covered or shaded areas to protect
from the sun; in these courtyards the shaykh, sitting on wooden benches or
mastabas (masonry benches), surrounded by notables and usually on a Friday
after the prayer and dhikr, received those who sought some material assistance,
advice or arbitration from him. As the shaykh was a recognised and respected
moral and religious authority, one of God’s elect, submitting to his arbitration
made it possible to avoid the shame (ʿār) that befell those who did not engage
in blood feuds with regard to matters of honour.
 The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 207

Figure 9.1 Servants at the zāwiya of Shaykh Raḍwān during the saint’s mawlid (Upper
Egypt)
Photo by Rachida Chih

Figure 9.2 Servants at the soup kitchen of the zāwiya of Shaykh Raḍwān during the
saint’s mawlid (Upper Egypt)
Photo by Rachida Chih
208 Chih

4 Sufism as a Form of Social Organisation and Identity

For al-Suhrawardī, the ṣuḥba (companionship) essentially refers to the rela-

tionship that unites the disciple and the master, whereas ukhuwwa (fraternity)
evokes the fraternal relations among brothers more specifically. However, he
sometimes uses ṣuḥba and ukhuwwa as synonyms. In the ʿAwārif, the links
between brothers are highly valued, the relationship of emotional closeness
between the disciple and the master must be transferred to the brothers, who
then perfect themselves through mutual help, while providing each other com-
fort, assistance, and friendship. Aware of the tension and envy that can arise
among brothers, the masters underscore (in their manuals) the importance of
solidarity and mutual aid, like the one that must exist in a family united under
a father’s watchful eyes. Al-Sarrāj illustrates this point by quoting al-Kharrāz
(d. c. 286/899): “I was a companion to the Sufis for fifty years and there never
occurred any acts of opposition between us” (al-Sarrāj, 177). Spiritual progress
is at once an individual and a collective matter; the path is also a community
ideal, in which everyone knows their place and how to behave toward others.
Generally, the disciple should not scrutinise the shortcomings of his brothers,
nor place himself above them; he must set a good example, help them, serve
them, and never forget them in his prayers. A disciple hoping to obtain for-
giveness from a brother he has offended should stand, uncover his head, place
his right hand over his left hand, express his repentance, and maintain that
position until God takes him into His mercy. For his part, the offended brother
should accept the repentance offered. It is very important for brothers who live
together and share the same space to maintain friendship among themselves.
Many stories about the lives of the Ṣūfīs emphasise the pilgrimage (siyāḥa),
that long initiatory voyage, a spiritual quest to meet the great masters. They
present the initiation as a free individual choice. However, such a case is rare;
normally families and whole villages and tribes are affiliated with the same
master over generations. The founding master sometimes becomes the patron
saint of craft guilds: the most striking example can be seen in the close ties
between the Bektāşiyye (Ar. Bektāshiyya) and the Akhīs voluntary organisa-
tions in Anatolia in the Middle Ages. These groups of merchants and crafts-
men, which existed in cities and villages, were modelled, structurally, on the
futuwwa organisations: they had a master (pīr), an initiation ritual dating back
to ʿAlī and the Prophet Muḥammad, an oath (ʿahd), and rules of companionship
(ṣuḥba). They practised one of the characteristics of the futuwwa: hospitality
toward travellers and solidarity with the poor (Mélikoff, 109). In other cases, re-
ligious identity was superimposed on tribal identity, where it reinforced social
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 209

cohesion: in Mauritania in the nineteenth century, a disciple of Aḥmad Tijānī,

Muḥammad al-Ḥāfiẓ, converted his entire tribe, the Īdaw ʿAlī, to the Tijāniyya.
After his death in 1830, these conversions continued, until belonging to the
Tijāniyya order was tantamount to belonging to the tribe. The Murīdiyya of
Amadu Bamba (d. 1927) in Senegal allowed the Wolof ethnic group to reconsti-
tute itself and regain a certain social and political cohesion after colonisation
(Hamès). In Tripolitania, the Sanūsiyya zāwiyas were integration and identi-
fication structures that transcended clan divisions and gave birth to the first
Libyan state. In India and Pakistan, until now the Ṣūfī orders remain impor-
tant; in village societies, the pīr-murīd relation is so deeply rooted that one who
does not have a pīr is considered to be on the wrong path and may be socially
ostracised. In Urdu, the adjective be-pīr (lit., “without pīr”) refers to someone
who is vicious, cruel, ruthless, and without empathy, in effect without morals
(Werbner, 131).
In the last quarter of the twentieth century, Sufism renewed its appeal among
the urbanised and educated middle classes who wished to return to Islam and
for whom it represented a more acceptable path than the strict fundamental-
ist Islam that was developing at the same time; it was also more suited to their
search for personal development. From the 1950s, the south to north waves
of immigration after World War II and decolonisation brought about a dias-
pora of Muslims in the West and, along with it, Ṣūfī orders (Geaves; Malik and
Hinnells (eds.)). The transnational Ṣūfī orders often recruit from the educated
middle- and upper-classes: the Chishtī Ṣābirīs studied by Rozehnal tend to be
“ethnically and geographically diverse with a minority of foreign Muslims”; the
Būdshīshiyya in Morocco and the Gümüşhanevi branch of the Naqshbandiyya
in Istanbul recruit from universities, among professors and students.
In a modern globalised world, where disciples rarely live near their mas-
ters and are sometimes even dispersed throughout the world because of mi-
gratory flows, how can the duty of ziyāra (visiting the master) be maintained
when the very existence of the path is based on that duty? Indeed, as noted
by the well-known Persian Ṣūfī ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī (d. 481/1089): “Visiting pīrs is
one of the duties ( farīḍa) of these people because by visiting pīrs they learn
things which they could not learn anywhere else” (Meier, Khurāsān, 194). In
the aforementioned regional and transnational brotherhoods in Morocco
and Pakistan, ziyāra is emphasised in order to consolidate and maintain the
relationship to the master but also between the brothers themselves. For the
Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya in Morocco, it is one of the pillars of the order: from
its birthplace of Madagh in the Moroccan northeast to the border with Algeria,
the brotherhood spread throughout Moroccan cities as far as Europe (with
210 Chih

Moroccan immigration and European converts); this explains why most fol-
lowers live far from their master. The date of the great annual meeting of the
members of the ṭarīqa in the zāwiya of Madagh overlaps with the celebration
of the birth of the Prophet (al-mawlid al-nabawī); it is a unique opportunity to
see the master and, for some, to meet him for the first time. This ziyāra, which
brings together several thousand people, is thus the subject of real organisa-
tion; buses are chartered for the occasion and it requires prior registration with
the muqaddam (the representative of the shaykh in a town or village), who
encourages the brothers to undertake the trip. In the opinion of many disci-
ples, this is a long journey with many participants—the zāwiya is located in a
remote region difficult to access; thus, it is an experience that brings them to-
gether. In the zāwiya, brothers and sisters show their respect and mutual con-
sideration: whatever their rank and social status, everyone is addressed with
the respectful title of lallā (“my lady”) or sīdī (“my master”), wears the djellaba
(long loose-fitting robe), eats the same food, and sleeps under the same roof:
the brotherhood is a structure of integration that transcends social divides
without eliminating them. The weekly sessions of dhikr in the local zāwiyas,
where mystical poems, verses of the Qurʾān, and prayers are recited and chant-
ed, sometimes to the rhythm of physical movements, carry a strong emotional
charge and are powerful elements that establish close ties among the disciples;
regular attendance at these sessions is strongly encouraged by the masters.
In Turkey, the closing of the tekkes after the prohibition of the Ṣūfī brother-
hoods by the new Turkish Republic in 1925 had a huge impact on the forms of
Ṣūfī communities, which had to be adapted and transformed to survive in a
new and hostile political context (Clayer in this volume). The concept of kh-
idma changed “into a new kind of community service corresponding with their
functioning as a benevolent association registered as a foundation (waqf ).
Sohbet also assumes new forms, even becoming a kind of ‘mediated sociabil-
ity’ when congregants listen to the shaykh via satellite then read his address
in the order’s monthly magazine” (Silverstein). At present, when joining a Ṣūfī
group the newcomer must be able to rely on the mutual aid and solidarity that
has always existed among the brothers in the path. For example, in order to
divert a young Egyptian from fundamentalist religious groups and persuade
him to join the Ṣūfīs, a Rifāʿī group put forward the argument that he would be
able to find Ṣūfī brothers in all the towns of Egypt and they would all offer him
hospitality (Hoffman, 152). The Ṣūfī path thus perpetuates its traditional role
of welcoming and offering hospitality, of moral and material support, but now,
through a network of regional and sometimes global establishments.
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 211

5 Conclusion

Sufism is a quest for inner development and a model of social life: its norms
dictate all aspects of spiritual and worldly life, which are inseparable; slightest
infringement of a norm governing an exterior act can negatively influence the
interior development. The shaykh represents the incarnation of the Prophet’s
model of spiritual perfection that he communicates to his disciples and all be-
lievers. The relationship with the master is voluntary and though it contains
the notion of a contract (ʿahd), it is not legally sealed: it derives its power from
the sacred strength of a shared belief, that the master’s baraka spreads to his
followers. Sufism contributed to the Islamisation of vast regions of the Muslim
world, through its capacity to integrate itself into the fabric of local societ-
ies where the Ṣūfī/saint constitutes a foundation to identify with, one based
on relations of loyalty, service, and protection. The search for the saint’s pro-
tection stems from his recognised role as mediator between God and men. In
exchange for the protective friendship of the Ṣūfī/walī, men pledge allegiance
to him and serve him. The connection to the master is considered sacred, and
breaking the pact is seen as equivalent to perjury.
The rules governing social relations in Sufism have changed little since their
earliest conception in the Middle Ages, despite the strong criticism they pro-
voked because they focus mainly on “blind” obedience to a master and this
is construed by critics as associationism (shirk) that leads to unbelief (kufr),
the greatest sin in Islam. The Ṣūfī path rests firmly on the relationship to the
master: he is its pivot, the axis around which concentric circles of disciples
and followers revolve. This very strong relationship is at once paternal and
maternal and, according to the disciples themselves, it is first and foremost a
relationship of love (maḥabba) that unites spiritual brothers in a community.
This explains why the death of the shaykh leaves a great void that is difficult
to fill. However, the relationship is not unidirectional. The shaykh must also
respond to the expectations, hopes, and human as well as spiritual needs of his
followers. In a sense, it is a collective creation that satisfies a social and histori-
cal demand for a supernatural spiritual power that manifests itself in mental
attitudes and way of life (Dupront, Du sacré).
Finally, it must be emphasised that the formative period of Sufism, with its
doctrines and practices and its institutionalisation in the orders also brought
about the expansion of other concurrent forms of spiritual life that adopted
social behaviours often judged to be outside social and religious norms. As
a reaction to institutionalised Sufism, groups such as itinerant dervishes,
212 Chih

Qalandars, Ḥaydarīs, and other “enraptured” with God (majdhūb; majnūn),

or marginal mystics, practiced begging and renounced worldly matters. They
developed and maintained their own forms of community (Ephrat, Purifying
Sufism; Karamustafa, God’s unruly friends; Papas, Mystiques et vagabonds).
From the fourth/tenth century, voices warned against the religious and so-
cial conformism imposed by the normalisation of spiritual life such as that of
Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Abū l-ʿAbbās (d. 309/921–2), for whom “violating the rules of proper
behavior amidst its upholders is itself [a sign] of proper behavior!” (Knysh
(trans.), al-Qushayri’s epistle, 295). This maxim is indicative of unresolved ten-
sion between the ideal of detachment from the world, self-denial, and mystic
itinerancy as a path of sanctity and the temptation to play a role in society and
assume the status of the founder and patron. In many cases, when the master’s
reputation as God’s friend (saint) grew and spread, donations poured in, and
wealth and social status changed; and this cannot but influence Ṣūfī behaviour.
It is then easy to understand the social divide that may arise between those
notable Ṣūfīs and the majdhūbs (those enraptured by God), who are linked
to the poorest and most marginalised. Certainly, social relations in Sufism re-
produce and even seem to reinforce the differences in class and background,
yet the proposed universal ideal of solidarity and fraternity (ukhuwwa) under
the authority of a man of God is resilient and adaptable to all environments
and all periods, in the sense that, by reproducing and renewing the relation-
ship, both individual and collective, that existed between the Prophet and
his Companions, it carries a strong sacred aura in the religious conscience of
Muslim societies.

Bibliography

Abu-Manneh, Butrus, Khalwa and rābiṭa in the Khālidī suborder, in Marc Gaborieau,
Alexandre Popovic, and Thierry Zarcone (eds.), Naqshbandis. Cheminements et situ-
ation actuelle d’un ordre mystique musulman (Istanbul and Paris 1990), 281–94.
Algar, Hamid (trans.), Path of God’s bondsmen. From origin to return. A Sufi compendium
by Najm al-dīn Rāzī Known as Dāya, Delmar 1982.
Amri, Nelly, Walī et awliyāʾ dans l’Ifrīqīya “médiévale”. De l’activité originelle d’une no-
tion aux modalities historiques de son activation, SI 90 (2000): 23–36.
Amri, Nelly, Zâwiya et territoire en Ifriqiya du VIIe/XIIIe siècle à la fin du IXe/
XVe siècle, in Juliette de La Genière, André Vauchez, and Jean Leclant (eds.), Les
sanctuaires et leur rayonnement dans le monde méditerranéen de l’antiquité à
l’époque moderne (Paris 2010), 243–94.
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 213

Ballanfat, Paul, La direction spirituelle chez Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (357–440/967–
1049), in Geneviève Gobillot and Jean-Jacques Thibon (eds.), Les maîtres soufis et
leurs disciples (Beirut 2012), 245–89.
Basu, Helen and Pnina Werbner, eds., Embodying charisma. Modernity, locality and
performance of emotion in Sufi cults, London and New York 1998.
Böwering, Gerhard, The adab literature of classical Sufism. Ansarī’s code of conduct,
in Barbara D. Metcalf (ed.), Moral conduct and authority. The place of adab in South
Asian Islam (Berkeley 1984), 62–90.
Brown, Jonathan, The last days of al-Ghazzālī and the tripartite division of the Sufi
world, MW 96 (2006): 89–113.
Brown, Peter, Society and the holy in late antiquity, London 1982.
al-Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ, ed. Muḥammad ʿAlī Subayh, Cairo, n.d.
Chamberlain, Michael, Knowledge and social practice in Damascus, 1190–1350, Cam-
bridge 1994.
Chih, Rachida, Le soufisme au quotidien, Paris 2000.
Chih, Rachida, Sainteté, maîtrise spirituelle et patronage. Les fondements de l’autorité
dans le soufisme, Archives de sciences sociales des religions 125 (Jan.–March 2004):
79–98.
Chih, Rachida, Sufism, education and politics in contemporary Morocco, JIS (special
edition: Reform and tajdīd in Islamic Africa) 32 (2012): 24–48.
Chodkiewicz, Michel, Le Sceau des saints. Prophétie et sainteté dans la doctrine d’Ibn
Arabî, Paris 1986.
al-Dardīr, Aḥmad, Tuḥfat al-ikhwān fī ādāb ahl al-ʿirfān, Beirut 2011.
De Jong, Frederik, al-Bakrī, EI2.
Dominguez Diaz, Martha, Women in Sufism. Female religiosities in a transnational
order, London and New York 2015.
Dupront, Alphonse, Du sacré. Croisades et pèlerinages, Paris 1987.
Eaton, Richard M., Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700. Social roles of Sufis in medieval India,
Princeton 1978.
Eickelman, Dale F., Moroccan Islam. Tradition and society in a pilgrimage center,
Austin 1976.
Elboudrari, Hassan, Quand les saints font la ville. Lecture anthropologique de la pra-
tique sociale d’un saint marocain au XVIIe siècle, Annales. Économies, Sociétés,
Civilisations 3 (1985): 489–508.
Elboudrari, Hassan, Allégeance, ordre et constance. L’éthique d’un saint fondateur
maghrébin, in Hassan Elboudrari (ed.), Modes de transmission de la culture reli-
gieuse en Islam (Cairo 1993), 251–80.
Ephrat, Daphna, Purifying Sufism. Observations on the marginalization and exclusion
of undesirable and rejected elements in the earlier middle period (late fourth/tenth
to mid-seventh/thirteenth centuries), al-Qantara 35/1 (2014): 225–76.
214 Chih

Ephrat, Daphna, Spiritual wayfarers, leaders in piety. Sufis and the dissemination of
Islam in medieval Palestine, Cambridge, MA 2008.
Ernst, Carl W. and Bruce B. Lawrence, Sufi martyrs of love. The Chishti order in South
Asia and beyond, New York 2002.
Evans-Pritchard, Edward, The Sanusi of Cyrenaica, Oxford 1949.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, The tekke of Haci Bektaş. Social position and economic activities,
IJMES 7/2 (1976): 183–208.
Feuillebois-Pierunek, Ève, ʿIzz al-Dīn Kāshānī and Abū l-Mafākhir Yaḥyā Bākharzī.
Proper Sufi conduct (adab) through the eyes of two Persian authors from differ-
ent brotherhoods in the 13th–14th centuries, in Francesco Chiabotti, Catherine
Mayeur-Jaouen, Ève Feuillebois-Pierunek, and Luca Patrizi (eds.), Ethics and spiri-
tuality in Islam. Sufi adab (Leiden 2017), 449–78.
Feuillebois-Pierunek, Ève, La maîtrise du corps d’après les manuels de soufisme
(Xe–XIVe siècles), REMMM 113–114 (2006): 91–107.
Gaborieau, Marc, Les oulémas/soufis dans l’Inde moghole. Anthropologie historique de
religieux musulmans, Annales. Économies, Sociétés, Civilisations 44 (1989): 1185–1204.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, L’insertion de Shaʿrânî dans le milieu cairote, in Colloque interna-
tional sur l’histoire du Caire (Cairo 1973), 159–69.
Garcin, Jean Claude, Les soufis dans la ville mamelouke d’Égypte. Histoire du soufisme
et histoire globale, in Richard J. McGregor and A. Sabra (eds.), Le développement du
soufisme en Égypte à l’époque mamelouke (Cairo 2006), 11–40.
Geaves, Ron, Sufism in Britain, London 2013.
Gellner, Ernest, Saints of the Atlas, London 1969.
Geoffroy, Éric, Le soufisme en Égypte et en Syrie sous les derniers Mamelouks et les pre-
miers Ottomans. Orientations spirituelles et enjeux culturels, Damascus 1995.
Gilsenan, Michael, Saint and Sufi in modern Egypt, London 1973.
Graham, Terry, Abū Sa‌ʿīd ibn Abīʾl-Khayr and the school of Khurāsān, in Leonard
Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. Classical Persian Sufism from its origins to
Rumi (700–1300), vol. 1 (Oxford 1993), 83–135.
Gril, Denis, Le modèle prophétique du maître spirituel en islam, in Giovani Filoramo
(ed.), Maestro e disciple. Temi e problemi della direzione spirituale tra VI secolo a.c. e
VII secolo d.c. (Brescia 2002), 345–60.
Gril, Denis, Maîtres, disciples et compagnons, d’après quelques extraits de Suhrawardī,
in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mys-
tiques dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 547–68.
Hamès, Constant, Confréries, sociétés et sociabilité, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles
Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des
origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 231–41.
Hammoudi, Abdallah, Master and disciple. The cultural foundations of Moroccan au-
thoritarianism, Chicago 1997.
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 215

Hoffman, Valerie, Sufism, mystics, and saints in modern Egypt, Columbia 1995.
Karamustafa, Ahmet, God’s unruly friends. Dervish groups in the Islamic later middle
period 1200–1550, Cambridge 2006.
Karamustafa, Ahmet, Reading medieval Persian hagiography through the prism of
adab. The case of Asrār al-tawḥīd, in Francesco Chiabotti, Ève Feuillebois-Pierunek,
Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen, and Luca Patrizi (eds.), Ethic and spirituality in Islam.
Sufi adab (Leiden 2017), 131–41.
al-Kharkūshī, ʿAbd al-Mālik b. Muḥammad, Kitāb Tahdhīb al-asrār, Abu Dhabi 1999.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Knysh, Alexander (trans.), al-Qushayri’s epistle on Sufism, Reading, UK 2007.
Kozlowski, Gregory, Muslim endowments and society in British India, Cambridge 1985.
Malamud, Margaret, Gender and spiritual self-fashioning. The master-disciple re-
lationship in classical Sufism, Journal of the American Academy of Religion 64/1
(1996): 89–117.
Malik, Jamal and John Hinnells, eds., Sufism in the west, London 2006.
Massignon, Louis, Essai sur les origines du lexique technique de la mystique musulmane,
Paris 1954.
Matringe, Denis, Ādāb al-ṣūfīya. Les règles de vie dans les couvents soufis de l’Inde
mediévale, JA 289/1 (2001): 67–86.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, Le cheikh scrupuleux et l’émir généreux à travers les
Akhlāq matbūliyya de Sha‘rānī, in Rachida Chih and Denis Gril (eds.), Le saint et
son milieu (Cairo 2000), 83–116.
Meier, Fritz, A book of etiquette for Sufis, in Fritz Meier, Essays on Islamic piety and
mysticism (Leiden 1999), 49–92.
Meier, Fritz, Khurāsān and the end of classical Sufism, in Fritz Meier, Essays on Islamic
piety and mysticism (Leiden 1999), 189–219.
Melchert, Christopher, Khargūshī, Tahdhīb al-asrār, BSOAS 73/1 (2010): 29–44.
Mélikoff, Irène, Hadji Bektach: un mythe et ses avatars, Leiden 1998.
Metcalf, Barbara D., ed., Moral conduct and authority. The place of adab in South Asian
Islam, Berkeley 1984.
Milson, Menahem (trans.), A sufi rule for novices. Kitāb ādāb al-murīdīn of Abū al-Najīb
al-Suhrawardī, Cambridge 1975.
Mottahedeh, Roy, Loyalty and leadership in an early Islamic society, Princeton 1980.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
Ohlander, Erik S., Ādāb in sufism, EI3.
Papas, Alexandre, Mystiques et vagabonds en islam. Portraits de trois soufis qalandar,
Paris 2010.
216 Chih

Papas, Alexandre, No Sufism without Sufi order. Rethinking tarîqa and adab with
Ahmad Kâsânî Dahbidî (1461–1542), Kyoto Bulletin of Islamic Area Studies 2–1
(2008): 4–22.
Paul, Jürgen, Khidma in the social history of Pre-Mongol Iran, JESHO 57/3 (2014):
392–422.
Paul, Jürgen, Forming a faction. The ḥimāyat system of Khwaja Ahrar, IJMES 23/4
(1991): 533–48.
Radtke, Bernd, Drei Schriften des Theosophen von Tirmidh, Beirut and Stuttgart 1992.
Radtke, Bernd, ed., Adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq al-taṣawwuf, Stuttgart and Beirut
1991.
Raudvere, Catharina, The book and the roses. Sufi women, visibility, and zikir in contem-
porary Istanbul, London 2003.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Morals and mysticism in Persian Sufism. A history of Sufi-futuwwat in
Iran, Abingdon 2010.
Rocheblave-Spenlé, Anne-Marie, Rôles et statuts sociaux, Encyclopædia Universalis
online.
Rodriguez-Manas, Francisco, Charity and deceit. The concept of itʿām al-taʿām in
Moroccan Sufism, SI 91 (2000): 59–90.
Rozehnal, Robert, Islamic Sufism unbound. Politics and piety in twenty-first century
Pakistan, New York and Basingstoke 2007.
Samanūdī, Muḥammad, Tuḥfat al-sālikīn wa-dalāʾil al-sāʾirīn li-manhaj al-muqarrabīn,
Cairo 2008, Beirut 2009.
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr, al-Lumaʿ fī l-taṣawwuf, ed. R. A. Nicholson, Leiden 1914.
al-Shaʿrānī, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, al-Anwār al-qudsiyya fī maʿrifa qawāʾid al-ṣūfiyya,
Beirut 1992.
Silvers-Alario, Laury, The teaching relationship in early Sufism. A reassessment of Fritz
Meier’s definition of the shaykh al-tarbiya and the shaykh al-taʿlīm, MW 93/1 (2003):
69–97.
Silverstein, Brian, Sufism and modernity in Turkey. From the authenticity of experi-
ence to the practice of discipline, in Martin Van Bruinessen and Julia D. Howell
(eds.), Sufism and the modern in Islam (London 2007), 39–60.
al-Suhrawardī, Shihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar, ʿAwārif al-maʿārif, Beirut 1999.
al-Sulamī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba, ed. M. J. Kister, Jerusalem 1954.
al-Sulamī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Ṭabaqāt al-ṣūfiyya, ed. Muṣṭafā ʿAbd al-Qādir ʿAṭā, Beirut
1998.
al-Ṭāhir, Aḥmad, Sharḥ al-kashf al-rabbānī ʿalā-l-mawrid al-raḥmānī, Cairo 1889.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, Adab et éducation spirituelle (tarbiya) chez les maîtres de
Nīshāpūr aux IIIe/IXe et IV e/Xe siècles, in Francesco Chiabotti, Ève Feuillebois-
Pierunek, Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen, and Luca Patrizi (eds.), Ethics and spirituality
in Islam. Sufi adab (Leiden 2017), 102–30.
The Social Role of Ṣūfīs 217

Thibon, Jean-Jacques, L’œuvre d’Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (325/937–412/1021) et la

formation du soufisme, Damascus 2009.
Touati, Houari, Entre Dieu et les hommes. Lettrés, saints et sorciers au Maghreb
(XVIIe siècle), Paris 1994.
Triaud, Jean-Louis and David Robinson, eds., La Tijāniyya. Une confrérie musulmane à
la conquête de l’Afrique, Paris 2000.
Trimingham, John Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1971.
Werbner, Pnina, Pilgrims of love. The anthropology of a global Sufi cult, Karachi and
Oxford 2005.
Winter, Michael, Society and religion in early Ottoman Egypt. Studies in the writings of
ʿAbd al-Wahhāb āl-Shaʿrānī, New Brunswick, NJ 1982.
 Chapter 10

Ṣūfī Altruism
Richard McGregor

The idea of selflessness, the willing forfeiture of one’s interests for another,
seems to have pervaded cultural and religious systems throughout history. We
might rightfully start to explore this idea by distinguishing between actions
and motivations that serve others, and those that serve ourselves. Any discus-
sion of the concept of altruism, however, quickly encounters a conundrum.
Why, for example, should a Muslim pay zakāt, the obligatory tax for the poor?
Why should anyone give charity in any form? Why be patient and forgiving
with friends? And why do we love our children? It seems that whatever form of
altruism we examine, the boundary between serving others and ourselves, is in
fact murky. On closer inspection, we might question who exactly benefits from
charitable giving. Beyond improving the situation of the poor, the benefactors
profit at several levels: they have a clear conscience in the face of economic in-
equality, they may live in a socially peaceful, less hostile public space, and earn
heavenly credit against their sins, and improve their own afterlife. Selflessness
toward family and friends might occasion a similar quandary about altruism:
the happiness and success of friends enriches our lives, and the sacrifices we
make for children are long-term investments in a thriving family, which re-
flects well on us.
But we can muddy the waters around altruism further, by questioning if
any act can be truly selfless. Acts of selflessness are taken quite seriously in
several branches of Islamic knowledge. The practice of Islamic law, with its
institutions of pious endowments (waqf, pl. awqāf ) and its charitable giving
(zakāt and ṣadaqa), recognises and regulates altruism. Yet, it is in the field of
Sufism that the complexities of altruism are most carefully explored. Here the
term īthār, with its sense of privileging or preferring the other, is key. As we
see, Ṣūfī thinkers followed various strands of the idea, which together form a
multi-layered understanding of altruism. The first of these strands centres on
the obligations imposed by religious law, obligations that demand the disci-
pline of the self in return for divine favor and ultimate reward in the afterlife.
The second strand embraces altruism as the religio-cultural virtue of chival-
ry, benevolence, and humility. Building on this chivalry, the third dimension
moves beyond any sense of transactional reward for virtue, and transforms

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_012

Ṣūfī Altruism 219

selflessness into a mystical experience that decentres the subject’s selfhood,

and ultimately collapses that self into its relationship with the divine.
In Arabic, the notions of altruism and selflessness (īthār) include such terms
as akrama (to treat with reverence, to honor), faḍḍala (to give preference), and
qaddama (to set another forward). An overview of the terminology used by
exegetes and philologists (Ohlander, Altruism) is based on key scriptural refer-
ence, such as Qurʾān 59:9, which states, “And they prefer them to themselves,
although they are indigent.” The context for this passage is the welcome ex-
tended by the Muslims of Medina (the Anṣār), despite the hardship, to their
coreligionists (the Muhājirūn) fleeing Mecca.
The moral value of this selflessness is recognised in the Qurʾānic revelation,
which, in several instances, recasts worldly wealth in terms of its metaphysi-
cal import, most clearly by enjoining charity. The common understanding that
zakāt is the obligatory tax paid yearly, in contrast to ṣadaqa, which is voluntary
giving, is not born out in the Qurʾānic text (see, for example, 9:103–4). Later
legal discourse, however, confirms these conceptual boundaries, projecting
them back into the Qurʾānic material (see Wier and Zysow). Regardless, the
Qurʾān claims that God recognises all charitable giving: “Those who spend
their wealth (in God’s way) by night and by day, secretly and publicly—they
will have their reward with their Lord. And no fear shall they have, nor will
they grieve” (Q 2:274). The heavenly credit such giving accrues will be counted
against the record of one’s misdeeds: “If you give publicly, this is beneficial. But
if you conceal your giving to the poor, that is better, for it will atone for some of
your sins. God is well-informed of all that you do” (Q 2:271). Thus, while social
recognition of one’s altruism is desirable, one’s account with heaven is primary.
Beyond these worldly calculations, however, an ethical claim is made upon the
conscience. All such giving must be done with mindful selflessness; the Qurʾān
tells us that kind words are better than alms followed by reproachful or hurtful
words (Q 2:263–64).
The various pre-Islamic conceptions of virtue, which celebrated heroic no-
tions of selflessness, hospitality, loyalty, and generosity were important sources
for Ṣūfī altruism. The great poets of pre-Islamic Arabia often boasted that they
were unmatched in gift-giving; their friends were rewarded in good times, and
the poor and hungry were sustained in times of need (Homerin, 67–9). The
term futuwwa denoted this virtuous condition, which Sufism appropriated
early in its history. Al-Sulamī’s (d. 412/1021) Kitāb al-futuwwa (Book of chiv-
alry) is replete with hagiographical stories of altruistic Ṣūfīs, while ʿAbdallāh
al-Harawī (d. 481/1089) describes three levels of futuwwa. First, one abandons
fractious quarreling, and forgets the faults and offences of others. Ascending
220 McGregor

to the second stage, one seeks reconciliation with estranged companions, and
honours (without prejudice) those who have caused offense or outrage. At the
third level, one seeks no reward for one’s generosity, forgives one’s enemies,
and seeks neither apology nor retribution from those who have caused offence
(al-Harawī, 84). Al-Harawī’s definition of Ṣūfī chivalry resonates well with the
definition of altruism, which maintains that one can be selfless in relation to
others and move toward an ethics in which the tensions and friction are re-
moved from such calculations. Much of this selfless ethics was mirrored in the
Persian concept of jawānmardī, which was also incorporated variously into the
Ṣūfī tradition (Ridgeon, Morals and mysticism, 5–6; Ridgeon, Reading Sufi his-
tory, 384–5).
Like the pre-Islamic image of the selfless hero, the Muslim figure of the Ṣūfī
shaykh, often at significant personal risk, defended the poor and the exploited.
Several examples can be enumerated. In the Egyptian context, Muḥammad
al-Ḥifnāwī (d. 1181/1768) embraced his role as a defender of the masses; this
became a central component of his profile as a saintly figure (Clancy-Smith,
152). Interceding to protect victims of oppression might also require defend-
ing individuals higher up the social ladder. In 1201/1786, the Ottoman repre-
sentative in Egypt, Ḥasan Pasha, took to openly extorting money and women
from prominent Cairene families. The only successful resistance was mounted
by a group of Ṣūfī shaykhs. Abū l-Anwār (d. 1228/1813) (Winter, 142), head of
the Wafāʾiyya Ṣūfī order, Aḥmad al-ʿArūsī (d. 1208/1794) (Winter, 119–24), and
Aḥmad al-Dardīr (d. 1201/1786), then head of the Khalwatiyya order in Egypt,
banded together to march to the citadel and deliver a letter of protest to the
ruler (al-Jabartī, 2:196).
Many a Ṣūfī shaykh was known for charity toward the hungry. The seventh/
thirteenth-century Maghribī saint, Abū Marwān al-Yuḥānisī, was famous for
his generosity during the yearly celebrations of the Prophet’s birthday (mawlid
al-nabī), during which he typically fed the needy multitudes for eight con-
secutive days (al-Qashtālī, 105–7). In the same region, the Ṣūfī hagiographer
Ibn Qunfudh (d. 810/1407) claimed that, for many Ṣūfīs, feeding the poor was
essential to their spiritual discipline and training (Ibn Qunfudh, 23; Berque
makes much the same point in regard to the Ṣūfī zāwiya [lodge] generally, see
Berque, 127). In Cairo, the yearly saint day commemorating Aḥmad al-Dardīr
has long been an occasion during which his zāwiya distributes significant alms
to the poor, in the form of money and food (Waugh, 66). In Iran and India, the
langar played much the same public charitable role (Papas, 23–4).
Such altruism not only benefits the needy, but is an organizing principle
for the Ṣūfī’s relationship to those in power with worldly possessions. In the
Indian context, a twelfth-/eighteenth-century hagiography presents Bābā
Ṣūfī Altruism 221

Palangpūsh’s retort to the criticism that he spends too much time with the
wealthy of this world:

I have been licensed and appointed by God—may He be exalted and

glorified!—to make money from the wealthy for my visiting them, and
bestow it upon the indigent. Truly the lion goes out in search of food after
three days, when his hunger has grown. He does not set up his authority
over lesser animals until he has brought a massive prey into his claws.
After eating something, he leaves what remains for those beneath him
like jackals and foxes and so on, and in his accustomed manner turns
back to his rest!
Digby, 61

The shaykh likens his charity to the acquisitiveness of a predator who leaves
scraps for the animals below him in the food chain. In the same period, an-
other Ṣūfī teacher explains that tradition calls on the shaykh to act simply as
a conduit between the wealthy and the poor. This is reflected in the term faqīr
(lit., ‘impoverished’), a common term for Ṣūfīs in the Persian-speaking world.
Bābā Musāfir, who was known for visiting the sick and helping widows in dis-
tress, declared, “A faqír should not own anything. If God … sends something
from nowhere, he should spend it immediately. If anything remains, it is the
custom of a faqír not to keep it with him … This has been the way of faqírs of
former times” (Digby, 106).
Social assistance is also formalised through the institution of the waqf, or
perpetual endowment. Here, wealth established permanent service institu-
tions, typically for the poor, and in formalised Ṣūfī communities (Sabra in this
volume). Waqfs can be found throughout the Islamic world, but given its size
and wealth, Cairo was particularly well-endowed. Ribāṭs or Ṣūfī hostels were
established in the Mamlūk period to house Ṣūfī communities, or to provide
wider social services. One example, from the middle of the ninth/fifteenth cen-
tury, was the Ribāṭ Zawjat Ināl, intended specifically to house destitute widows.
Zaynab, the wife of Sultan Ināl (r. 857–65/1453–61) established the ribāṭ near
the Ṣūfī zāwiya of the Sādāt al-Wafāʾiyya, and appointed Ḥusnāʾ (d. 888/1483)
the daughter of one of the order’s founding figures ʿAlī Wafāʾ (d. 807/1405) as
its first director (McGregor, 58).
A much larger waqf had been established a century earlier by Sultan Baybars
al-Jāshnakīr (d. 710/1310). This consisted of an assemblage of institutions that
included a khānqāh, a ribāṭ, and a qubba funerary complex. The khānqāh pro-
vided housing for one hundred Ṣūfīs, who attended daily prayers and devotion-
al exercises in return for a monthly stipend. The ribāṭ served as a hospice for
222 McGregor

one hundred Muslims, chosen from among the poor of the city, thirty of whom
resided there; all received a monthly stipend, and a daily ration of bread and
meat. Additional funds were earmarked for manumitting slaves, providing bail
for poor Muslims in jail, providing shrouds for those who died destitute, and
buying medicine for the poor (Fernandez, 24–7; Firouzeh in this volume). In
this configuration, charity was inseparable from the practice and institution-
alisation of Sufism. The charitable function of a waqf supported other types
of religious activities. In the eleventh/seventeenth century, Shāhīn Aḥmad en-
dowed a sabīl-kuttāb (public fountain and Qurʾān school) that included money
in perpetuity to cover school fees, along with food and clothing, for students
who were orphaned (Badr and Crecelius, 83). Another foundation provided
for the needs of blind students studying at al-Azhar, and for local Muslim poor
(Crecelius, 135).
Alongside the waqf and related charitable institutions, Ṣūfī theorists have
explored altruism for its role in spiritual training. These reflections took place
beyond the transactional relationship of divine reward and punishment; they
focus instead on the transformative possibilities of selflessness. A prominent
theme was that of begging, which was generally seen as beneficial for the
Ṣūfī novice. Not all Ṣūfī shaykhs agreed, however, for example, Abū l-Ḥasan
al-Shādhilī (d. c. 656/1258) forbade his followers from begging for alms. This
position set a tone for his order, which expanded across the Islamic world and
asserted its independence in part through its financial autonomy. Al-Shādhilī
is reported to have worn fine clothes to signal his independence from worldly
political powers (Ibn al-Ṣabbāgh, 98). Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049), an
early Persian Ṣūfī master, defended his wealth, saying that God put some Ṣūfīs
at the station of contemplation (which includes wealth), and others at the sta-
tion of mortification (al-Hujwīrī, 346).
Another prominent teacher claimed that, for some Ṣūfīs, service to their
shaykh and the community is more beneficial to their spiritual training than
any of the supererogatory devotions Ṣūfīs were famous for (Chih in this vol-
ume). This was the context in which Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī (d. 563/1168)
said, “Service (khidma) is a rank second only to that of shaykhood” (Ohlander,
Sufism, 207). Al-Suhrawardī’s position on begging, however, recognised the
multiple levels at which khidma operated. He allowed it for his followers on
two conditions: when it benefited fellow Ṣūfīs, and when the Ṣūfī him/herself
was in need. He supported this with the rationale that begging restrained the
pride of one’s ego (al-Suhrawardī, 71). Since disciplining the ego is a central
concern in mystical training, the humiliation concomitant with begging could
be a useful tool in a Ṣūfī’s training. The Khurāsānī Ṣūfī master Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj
(d. 378/988) relates a number of stories in which adepts were enjoined to beg,
Ṣūfī Altruism 223

in order to decrease their pride and arrogance (al-Sarrāj, 191–2). The influential
Ṣūfī author al-Hujwīrī, popularly known as Dātā Ganj Bakhsh (d. c. 467/1074),
relates stories from early Ṣūfī history on the usefulness of begging as an exer-
cise in self-effacement. Begging should be done for the sake of discipline, not
for profit; thus, aspirants curb their egos by learning that they are nothing in
the eyes of others (al-Hujwīrī, 360).
The third dimension of altruism continues with this focus on inner benefits.
More precisely, the ultimate import of īthār is that it bridges the divide between
the seeker and the divine. Al-Harawī lists the three levels of preference that
culminate in a transcending of the self. At the first level, īthār is manifested as
preferring others, respecting their rights, and aspiring to noble acts, generally.
This is followed by a level at which the seeker prefers God’s satisfaction above
all others, even if that entails burdens of poverty or his own anguish. At the
last stage, ‘preference’ as we normally understand it, is abandoned, since it pre-
serves the distance of the subject-object relationship. Rather than struggling
to discern God’s preference, and exerting oneself in its pursuit, the boundaries
break down, and the Ṣūfī leaves behind that very struggle (al-Harawī, 44–5).
Al-Hujwīrī identifies the school of Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Nūrī (d. 295/907), as-
sociated with al-Junayd’s school of ‘sober’ Sufism, as one that is centrally con-
cerned with the concepts of companionship and altruism. For al-Nūrī, the
Ṣūfī path was a place shared by a community (although some teachers would
disagree with him) and thus retirement (ʿuzla) is an inferior and even baleful
practice. In an echo of the Neoplatonists’ struggles against the lower self, with
its worldly desires and appetites, for al-Nūrī, Ṣūfī altruism is the key to proper
conduct, and thus the key to eternal life. But beyond the rewards of paradise,
which are predicated on distance between the individual and God, a higher
altruism leads to union with the divine, and a collapsing of that distance
(al-Hujwīrī, 189–93).
To illustrate the depths of Ṣūfī preference, the story is told of a convert to the
Ṣūfī path, Aḥmad Ḥammadī. Inspired but discomfited by the Qurʾānic verse,
“They prefer them to themselves, although they are indigent” (Q 59:9), Aḥmad
had set off into the desert with his camels, intent on staying as long as needed
to attain to some insight. He tells of a hungry lion that killed one of his camels,
but rather than eating it, the lion withdrew to a nearby high ground and roared.
Foxes, jackals, wolves, and others gathered to eat, but the noble lion kept his
distance until they had eaten their fill. Then he approached the remains with
the intention of satiating his hunger, but seeing a lame fox on the horizon, the
lion withdrew again until the unfortunate fox had eaten. After eating what was
left of the kill, the lion turned to Aḥmad and said, “Even a lowly dog can prefer
others over itself in the matter of food; but a great person sacrifices even in
224 McGregor

matters of spirit, and life itself” (al-Hujwīrī, 193). The lion’s lesson for Aḥmad
clearly points beyond any calculation or reward for one’s altruism, and toward
one’s spiritual orientation on the mystical path.
Al-Nūrī himself embodied this insight in his own saintly acts. One day the
caliph was set to execute three Ṣūfīs for heresy and al-Nūrī stepped forward to
offer himself to the executioner, saying,

Yes, my doctrine is founded on preference (īthār). Life is the most pre-

cious thing in the world: I wish to sacrifice for my brethren’s sake the few
moments that remain. In my opinion, one moment of this world is better
than a thousand years of the next world because this is the place of ser-
vice (khidma) and that is the place of proximity (qurba), and proximity
is gained by service.
al-Hujwīrī, 191

In a subsequent exchange with the chief judge, al-Nūrī won mercy for the
Ṣūfīs by describing their intimate connections with God. After he exonerated
them, the caliph asked them what they would like from him, to which they
responded, “The only boon we ask of thee is that thou shouldst forget us, and
neither make us thy favorites nor banish us from thy court, for thy favour and
displeasure are alike to us” (al-Hujwīrī, 191). Thus, al-Nūrī’s path of īthār not
only signals indifference to the material things of this world, but also that such
selfless indifference gives meaning to proximity with God—the goal of all Ṣūfīs
in both this life and the next.
The Maghribī Ṣūfī saint, Abū l-ʿAbbās al-Sabtī (d. 601/1205) represents
another model of sanctity connected to altruism. Inspired by the Prophet’s
Sunna, and Qurʾānic passages, including “They prefer them to themselves,
although they are indigent” (Q 59:9), he concludes that īthār is an essential
part of the Prophet’s legacy. Al-Sabtī resolved to put it into practice, in his life
and teachings; he vowed to only ever accept one-seventh of any gift ever given
to him, and to leave the rest to his fellow Ṣūfīs and the poor. He notes that
after decades of practicing this altruism, his spiritual capacities were greatly
increased. Whatever the saint’s thoughts resolved upon, inevitably came to
pass. Whenever he called on God, the divine voice would immediately attend
to him, announcing labbayka—here I am, at your service! (al-Tādilī, 460).
The tri-fold structure of altruism that has emerged from this survey close-
ly mirrors the observations that we can make of the Ṣūfī treatment of other
key concepts. For example, we can see in the concept of tawakkul (complete
trust in God) much the same dynamic—of a movement from a preliminary
Ṣūfī Altruism 225

transactional level, to a spiritually reflective position—that turns toward the

self, and ultimately to a mystical harmonisation of the individual with the di-
vine (al-Tustarī, 104–5). It should come as no surprise that we can find a similar
progression in the early Ṣūfī conceptions of asceticism (zuhd). The Ṣūfī master
of Baghdad Abū Saʿīd al-Kharrāz (d. 286/899) identified three dimensions, the
highest of which transcends any transactional reward, bringing the seeker into
an all-encompassing love and submission to the divine (al-Kharrāz, 43).

Bibliography

Badr, H. and D. Crecelius, The waqfs of Shahin Ahmad Agha, AI 26 (1992): 79–114.
Berque, Jacques, Al-Youssi : problèmes de la culture marocaine au XVII ème siècle, Paris
1958.
Clancy-Smith, J., The man with two tombs. Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Rahman, founder
of the Algerian Rahmaniyya, ca. 1715–1798, in G. Martin and C. Ernst (eds.), Manifes-
tations of sainthood in Islam (Istanbul 1993), 147–70.
Crecelius, D., The waqfiyah of Muhammad Bey Abu al-Dhahab II, Journal of the
American Research Center in Egypt XVI (1971): 125–46.
Digby, Simon, Sufis and soldiers in Awrangzeb’s Deccan. Malfuzat-i Naqshbandiyya,
London 2001.
Fernandez, L., The foundation of Baybars al-Jashankir. Its waqf, history, and architec-
ture, Muqarnas 4 (1987): 21–42.
al-Harawī, ʿAbdallāh al-Anṣārī, Les étapes des itinérants vers Dieu : édition critique,
avec introduction, traduction, et lexique (Manāzil al-sāʾirīn), ed. and trans. S. de
Beaurecueil, Cairo 1962.
Homerin, E., Altruism in Islam, in J. Neusner and B. Chilton (eds.), Altruism in world
religions (Georgetown 2005), 67–88.
al-Hujwīrī, The kashf al-mahjúb. The oldest Persian treatise on Sufism, trans. R. A.
Nicholson, London 1911.
Ḥusayn b. Qunfudh, Aḥmad b., Uns al-faqīr wa ʿizz al-ḥaqīr, ed. M. Fāsī, Rabat 1965.
al-Jabartī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Jabartī’s history of Egypt (ʿAjāʾib al-āthār),
ed. T. Phillip and M. Perlman, 4 vols., Stuttgart 1994.
al-Kharrāz, Abū Saʿīd, al-Ṭarīq ilà Allāh. Kitāb al-ṣidq, ed. ʿAbd al-Halīm Maḥmūd,
Cairo 1985.
McGregor, Richard, Sanctity and mysticism in medieval Islamic Egypt, Albany 2004.
Ohlander, Erik S., Altruism, EI3.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardi and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
226 McGregor

Papas, Alexandre, Vagrancy and pilgrimage according to the Sufi Qalandari path, in
M. Boivin and R. Delage (eds.), Devotional Islam in contemporary South Asia. Shrines,
journeys and wanderers (New York 2016), 15–30.
al-Qashtālī, Aḥmad b. Ibrāhīm, Tuḥfat al-mughtarib bi-bilād al-Maghrib, ed. F. de la
Granja, Madrid 1974.
al-Qushayri, Al-Qushayri’s epistle on Sufism, trans. A. Knysh, Reading 2007.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Morals and mysticism in Persian Sufism. A history of Sufi-futuwwat in
Iran, New York 2010.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Reading Sufi history through ādāb. The perspectives of Sufis,
Jawānmardān and Qalandars, in F. Chiabotti et al. (eds.), Ethics and spirituality in
Islam. Sufi adab (Leiden 2016), 379–401.
al-Ṣabbāgh, Muḥammad b. Abī l-Qāsim b., Durrat al-asrār wa tuḥfat al-abrār, Cairo
2001.
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr, The Kitāb al-lumaʿ, ed. and trans. R. A. Nicholson, Leiden 1914.
al-Suhrawardī, ʿAbd al-Qāhir b. ʿAbdallāh, Ādāb al-murīdīn, Cairo n.d.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Kitāb al-futuwwa, ed. S. Ates, Ankara 1977.
al-Tādilī, Abū Yaʿqūb Yūsuf b. Yaḥyā, Akhbār Abī l-ʿAbbās al-Sabtī, appended to his
al-Tashawwuf ilā rijāl taṣawwuf, ed. A. al-Tawfīq, Rabat 19972.
al-Tustarī, Sahl, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿaẓīm, ed. M. Geratallah, 3 vols., Cairo 2002.
Waugh, Earl, Visionaries of silence. The reformist Sufi order of the Demirdashiya al-
Khalwatiya in Cairo, Cairo 2008.
Wier, T. H. and A. Zysow, Ṣadaḳa, EI2.
Winter, Michael, Egyptian society under Ottoman rule, 1517–1798, New York 1992.
 Chapter 11

Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities

Nathalie Clayer

Ṣūfīs and their institutions have played a role in urbanisation processes in two
ways: sometimes, directly or indirectly, they were at the origin of city founda-
tions and urban developments; at other times, they were active in the integra-
tion of individuals and groups in the urban fabric, and participated in urban
affairs, including in the life of contemporary megacities, in a wide variety
of ways.
Contrary to the idea that Sufism should be limited to world-renouncing
mysticism or folk Islam, naturally rooted in isolated and rural settings rather
than in urban spaces, the relationship between Ṣūfīs and cities has long been
and remains very close. As Ahmet Karamustafa has shown, Sufism as an interi-
orised mode of piety appeared in the educated urban milieus of Baghdad, the
ʿAbbāsid capital, in the second half of the third/ninth century and spread into
a variety of urban places, thanks to the activities of the disciples of Baghdadi
masters, first in Lower Iraq, Iran, and Central Asia (Karamustafa). There, the
educated urban groups eventually merged with the followers of other inward-
looking mystical movements that operated in urban spheres, especially those
of the Malāmatiyya (lit., the “path of blame”) that had spread among traders
and craftsmen and was linked to futuwwa groups (chivalry associations of
young urbanites) (Afshari in this volume).
With the formation of local communities, including charismatic masters
(shaykhs) and their disciples, Sufism in cities acquired a high level of social
visibility. From the fourth/tenth century onward, the process of Sufism’s inte-
gration into city life was strengthened by the establishment of lodges that bore
various names, including ribāṭ, khānaqāh, dargāh, zāwiya, or tekke) (Ephrat
and Pinto in this volume; Firouzeh in this volume). Since the Ṣūfī concept of
sainthood gave urban Ṣūfī leaders, dead or alive, a charisma based on their
proximity with God (walāya), they became foci of attraction for people beyond
the circle of initiated disciples or the urban middle and upper classes. From
the fifth/eleventh century on, partly through the cult of saints and partly the
development of antinomian mystical currents, Sufism spread, largely outside
cities and towns, to villages, steppes, oases, and deserts (Ocak in this volume).
That is, Sufism was not exclusively an urban phenomenon. However, with the

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_013

228 Clayer

spread of Islam and because or, maybe, despite the transformations of societ-
ies, Ṣūfīs remained, in many cases, key actors of urbanisation processes and the
development of urban sociabilities.

1 Ṣūfīs and Urbanisation Processes

Ṣūfīs have been actors of urbanisation, whether as participants in the forma-

tion of urban centres and their modelling, or in the integration of individuals
or groups into the urban fabric. For instance, Ethel Sara Wolper has shown
that, in mediaeval Anatolia, with the collapse of the Saljūqs and the rise of
local principalities in the mid seventh/thirteenth century, Ṣūfī lodges became
physical structures around which the cities of Sivas, Tokat, and Amasya were
re-organised (Wolper). However, according to Maxime Durocher, if during
the seventh/thirteen to ninth/fifteenth century, in Tokat particularly, several
urban and peri-urban lodges were erected, it is difficult, because of the lack of
sources, to determine the exact place and function of such institutions in the
urban development (Durocher). The Ottomans, who emerged as a new power
in the region in the mid eighth/fourteenth century and established a huge em-
pire encompassing the Balkans and the Arab lands, cultivated close relations
with various Ṣūfī groups and saints. In some cases, this relation put Ṣūfīs at the
heart of city formation. For example, the foundation of Babadağ, in Dobruja
(in today’s Romania), which at that time was located in a newly conquered
region, resulted from a decision of sultan Bāyezīd II (r. 886–918/1481–1512) in
the 890s/1480s to create a city centre around the tomb of the saint Ṣārı Ṣaltūq
(who was active in the Balkans in the second half of the seventh/thirteenth
century). According to the legend, the sultan saw the saint in a dream. The
sultan endowed the future city through a pious foundation (waqf ) and offered
tax exemptions to would-be settlers. A new mausoleum (türbe) was erected,
as well as a dervish lodge (tekke), a mosque, a madrasa, an imaret (popular
kitchen), a caravanserai, a public bath (ḥamām), and even streets (Kiel).
Further west, in Bosnia, Ṣūfī institutions were also active in developing and
Islamising mediaeval Christian towns or expanding new Islamic towns after the
Ottoman conquest of the ninth/fifteenth century. Tekkes were the first Islamic
institutions erected in mediaeval towns such as Visoko, Rogatica, and Zvornik
(Aščerić-Todd). In at least two cases, urban centres emerged as the result of the
activity of Ṣūfīs, with or without the support of political-administrative figures.
The town of Skender-Vakuf was founded by the dervish ʿAlī Dede Iskender
who had received a tract of land (tīmār). But the most significant case is that
of Sarajevo itself. The future Bosnian metropolis probably emerged from the
Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 229

foundation of a Ṣūfī lodge (the Ghāzīler tekke) by dervishes who came with
the Ottoman troops during the conquest and settled there in the 830s/1430s.
Later, in 866–7/1462, the local Ottoman governor, ʿIsā Beg, often considered
the city founder, made a donation for the construction of another Ṣūfī lodge
and additional buildings, including a mosque, which gave to Sarajevo a real
urban character. In the early tenth/sixteenth century, another local governor,
Ghāzī Khusrev Beg, also endowed the town with a complex of buildings com-
prising a khānaqāh for the Khalwatī/Halvetī dervishes. Many toponyms in the
city remind us that several Sarajevo neighbourhoods grew around Ṣūfī lodges
or shrines.
Similar processes took place elsewhere in the Muslim world, where Ṣūfī
shrines, in particular, formed the core of new cities. Eric Ross, who cites the ex-
amples of Mawlay Idriss Zerhoun and Ouazzane in Morocco, and Khuldabad
in the Deccan (in the Indian subcontinent), uses the concept of “shrine-town”
(Ross, Sufi, 3). In Shīʿī areas, certain Ṣūfī shrines had equally symbiotic rela-
tions with urban settlements. Such was the case of Ardabil (in northern Iran),
where the tomb and the zāwiya of Shaykh Ṣafī l-Dīn Ardabīlī (d. 735/1334), situ-
ated in the bazaar area, grew and changed along with the city (Rizvi).
The example of sub-Saharan Africa, where Jean-Louis Triaud observed
three types of encounter between Islam and cities—urban Islamic enclaves,
cities around Islamic courts, and saintly cities—is particularly striking in that
it shows that, even in (partially) nomadic societies, Ṣūfīs also contributed to
urbanisation. In these regions, from the second half of the twelfth/eighteenth
century, that is, during the second wave of the Islamisation of sub-Saharan
Africa, Ṣūfīs who had already been active among nomadic tribes were influ-
ential in the foundation of many cities, for religious, but also for economic
and political reasons (Triaud; Hamès). Leaders of the Sanūsiyya Ṣūfī order
in Cyrenaica considered the construction of zāwiyas (Ṣūfī lodges) not only a
means to sanctify the space and to foster religious activities, but also to ad-
vance education, trade, crafts, and politics. Their centre was the new city of
al-Jaghbūb (in present-day Libya). The Tijānī Ṣūfīs were responsible for the de-
velopment of various cities (Tivouane and Kaolack in Senegal, Nioro in Mali,
Kano in Nigeria), whereas other Ṣūfī shaykhs in Mauritania built zāwiyas that
became the nuclei of sedentarisation and urbanisation. The Murīds, who built
the holy city of Touba (in Senegal), represent an extreme example: Shaykh
Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke (1853–1927) founded the city in 1887, but it developed
mainly during the twentieth century. Touba remained a city entirely managed
by the disciples of this charismatic leader, and its urban design is the product
of the application of Ṣūfī principles and concepts symbolised by the “Touba,”
that is the “tree of paradise,” according to certain prophetic ḥadīths (Ross, Sufi).
230 Clayer

If Ṣūfī networks play a role in urbanisation processes, it is also because of

the links between the shaykh (the charismatic leader) and his disciples, and
between the disciples themselves; these links contribute to the integration of
individuals and groups into the urban fabric. In the Indian case, Ṣūfī shrines,
and the production of Ṣūfī writings that publicised and promoted them, medi-
atised mobility from the eighth/fourteenth century onwards. These buildings
and texts have been part and parcel of the geography of migration in the urban
topography (Green). More recently, in sub-Saharan Africa, urban and trans-
national migrations appear to have been facilitated by Ṣūfī networks, which
provided access to housing and helped newcomers integrate into local com-
mercial networks (Riccio; Fall). Thus Ṣūfī institutions acted not only as cores
and markers of urban spaces, they were also loci of sociability.

2 Ṣūfīs and the Urban Social Fabric

On the one hand, Ṣūfīs were very active in the religious and social life of cities.
On the other hand, the evolution of urban settings also altered patterns of Ṣūfī
organisations and practices.
Paradoxically perhaps, Ṣūfī lodges within cities have been places of retreat
and isolation from the outer world. In some cases, special rooms or cells built
inside lodges were devoted to seclusion (khalwa). This was particularly (but
not exclusively) true in establishments belonging to Ottoman Halvetī groups,
which placed seclusion at the heart of their practices, because spiritual lead-
ers and some elected members engaged in individual khalwas as part of their
regular spiritual exercises, and other members occasionally did so as well
(Curry). Nevertheless, most of the religious practices held in Ṣūfī lodges or in
other spaces (private places, mosques, madrasas) were collective and implied
a religious sociability, during religious festivals and pilgrimages, as well as
in everyday life, including pious and meditative visits to saints’ tombs, prac-
tices of devotion to shaykhs, prayers, and communal rituals such as the dhikr
(remembrance of God through a repetition of formulas and divine names).
Generally, this sociability of several circles of initiated and non-initiated peo-
ple around the spiritual master (and sometimes his family) was hierarchical,
codified, and often gendered (Clayer, Life; Le Gall). As places of initiation of
the disciples by the spiritual master, Ṣūfī establishments and other Ṣūfī spatial
arrangements were also sites for education and transmission not only of Ṣūfī
creeds, ethics, and principles, but also of Islamic knowledge, as well as the pro-
fane sciences and arts (literature, poetry, calligraphy, and so on). For instance,
the transmission of the Mathnavī-yi maʿnavī (the well-known mystical poem
Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 231

written by Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī, d. 672/1273) was central to the diffusion of the
Naqshbandī Ṣūfī path in tenth-/sixteenth-century Istanbul, and took place to-
gether with the transmission of the teachings of Ibn al-ʿArabī (the well-known
Andalusian Ṣūfī, d. 638/1240) and the rigorous observance of the sharīʿa (Le
Gall). Therefore, rich libraries can be found in such places (for example, at
Timbuktu, on which see Ross, A historical), even though oral transmission
(through formulas, tales, poetry, and religious hymns) remained central in the
diffusion of beliefs for most followers.
Similarly, Sufism could be connected with the urban economy in a num-
ber of ways. In premodern Anatolia and the Balkans, and probably also in the
Arab lands, urban crafts and trade guilds were influenced, for a long period,
by futuwwa and Ṣūfī principles inherited from the tradition of the Akhī guilds
(Kara; Aščerić-Todd). Urban craftsmen and traders shared with them a broth-
erhood organisation, as well as a religious ethics and esoteric principles. Ṣūfī
lodges were often located in bazaars or their vicinity, attesting to their intimate
links to economic activities. Through the system of pious foundations (waqf,
pl. awqāf ) and donations made by powerful patrons or more modest followers,
dervish establishments were founded, maintained, and embellished, and their
religious staff rewarded from the revenue of shops, mills, agricultural lands,
etc. Thus, Ṣūfī institutions became small enterprises managed by an adminis-
trator (mütevellī in Turkish), often a descendant of the founder.
From a social point of view, many Ṣūfī lodges also functioned as inns, offer-
ing hospitality to travellers, and to villagers coming from the countryside to the
city for administrative or economic purposes. They served as homes for social
assistance: food and material support were given to various groups of the urban
population, well beyond the circles of initiated members. As in rural areas, the
charisma of shaykhs made them not only spiritual guides, but also advisers in
social matters and arbitrators in conflicts. People came to ask the shaykhs for
advice concerning their families, their personal lives, and their professional
activities. Places of contacts and sociability, the dervish lodges may also have
been places of disputes. On the one hand, conflicts regularly happened over
the shaykh’s succession (Zarcone, Shaykh) or competition occurred between
spiritual leaders; on the other hand, Ṣūfīs were involved in sociopolitical
factions for the territorial control of cities or their neighbourhoods, as in me-
dieval Iran (Rahimi).
Ṣūfī lodges and other spatial arrangements, such as gates and pathways,
were the nucleus of sociability in and beyond the neighbourhoods where they
were located. The study of the tekke of Imrahor founded in the Yedikule quar-
ter in Istanbul at the beginning of the tenth/sixteenth century shows that, in
the course of the nineteenth century, among the dervishes who were initiated
232 Clayer

by the shaykh, some lived inside the lodge itself while others were artisans and
religious servants living around and in nearby neighbourhoods. Other initiated
dervishes were employed in the sultan’s palace. A few fellow disciples had a
common name indicating their provincial origin (Clayer and Vatin). If the local
dimension is often predominant, the fact remains that some lodges were still
connected to social networks that went far beyond the city itself, ensuring the
function of shelters for ethno-regional mobile networks. In this case, the urban
Ṣūfī establishments became nodes of mobility between different places in the
Muslim world and its holy places. Ṣūfīs opened tekkes in Istanbul, Konya, Bursa,
Antakya (Antioch), Aleppo, Damascus, and Jerusalem to welcome Indian
and Central Asian pilgrims on a hajj (for the “Hindi” and “Özbek” tekkes, see
Zarcone, Histoire; Zarcone, Sufi; Can; Choudhury). In the Middle East and in
the city of Cairo in particular, the Ṣūfī lodges of the Mevlevīs and the Bektāşīs
likewise served as hubs for Turkish-speaking sociability, while other establish-
ments attracted people from the Maghrib. In addition to these long distance
networks, urban Ṣūfī lodges were also part of shorter distance networks that
allowed for the integration of villagers or inhabitants of small towns into larger
urban centres and facilitated the life of neo-urbanites when urbanisation pro-
cesses were at work. Perhaps more in the cities than elsewhere, Ṣūfī places of
worship were often used as meeting places for various religious groups, despite
the great differences in practices, beliefs, and imaginary. This frequently oc-
curred in Anatolia and is still quite visible in India. However, in times of crisis,
such places also became sites of tensions, disputes, and conflicts among con-
fessional communities and sectarian groups (Werbner, Globalising).

3 The Impact of the City on Ṣūfī Institutions

The process of integrating Ṣūfīs and their institutions into urban societies was
changing. In so far as they were influenced by local as well as global transfor-
mations, Ṣūfīs themselves underwent changes by becoming involved in new
forms of urban sociability or tensions. Here it is not possible to analyse every
local or regional change. Among global processes in the premodern epoch, we
should mention the spread of the consumption of coffee that was imported
from the Arabic Peninsula in the tenth/sixteenth century. Dervish circles,
which began to use the virtues of coffee to stay awake during night vigils, pro-
moted the new beverage. The drinking of coffee became ritualised. In some
lodges, spaces were dedicated to its preparation and consumption, and reli-
gious duties were associated with it. In the Ottoman capital, it is significant
that Ṣūfīs using coffee were attacked by ʿulamāʾ who considered the practice
Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 233

to be illicit (Zilfi; Baer). In his epistolary correspondence, the Damascene Ṣūfī

scholar ʿAbd al-Ghanī l-Nābulusī (d. 1143/1731) felt the need to discuss, using
religious arguments, the habits of urban sociability in relation to coffee con-
sumption (Akkach). Later transformations, such as trans-imperial mobility, af-
fected urban Sufism as well. According to Choudhury, over the “long” twelfth/
eighteenth century, the lodges erected for Indian dervishes in Istanbul and
other cities of the Ottoman Empire might be considered Ottoman institu-
tions, since their users interacted with the urban society and the local authori-
ties. And as such, “international” tekkes were places where imperial subjects
of various ethnic and linguistic backgrounds found a new way of identifying
themselves in the context of the decentralization of the Ottoman Empire and
trans-Asiatic imperialist rivalries (Choudhury).
The nineteenth century saw major changes in the Muslim world. The spread
of printing in cities was an innovation that brought changes in the Ṣūfī circles,
as well as between Ṣūfī circles and other urban and foreign actors. In particu-
lar, the production of lithographs and printed books, a practice that mostly
was confined to cities and towns led to the standardisation, systematisation,
and popularisation of certain forms of Sufism (Chih, Mayeur-Jaouen, and
Seesemann (eds.)). Above all, global phenomena, such as new methods of gov-
ernance that imposed a stronger state discipline on social groups and bodies,
and the efforts of colonial powers and local urban reformers to “modernise”
cities, to control their population, and to deal with public health issues had
a strong impact on the place of Ṣūfīs in the urban fabric. The state reorgan-
isation of urban Sufism in Egypt (De Jong) and in the central Ottoman lands
(Silverstein) was significant in this respect. This reorganisation was aimed at
imposing stricter control on Ṣūfīs, while also regulating the presence of Ṣūfīs
in urban public spaces and controlling visitation to Ṣūfī lodges. These reform-
ist agendas were often associated with criticism expressed by political and
administrative authorities and westernised intellectuals who denounced Ṣūfī
lodges as places that condoned laziness, the consumption of drugs, etc. In fact,
reformist Ṣūfīs themselves advocated, in one way or another, the adaptation to
“modernity.” This was the case, for example, of the Xidaotang, a Ṣūfī group in
northwest China that, at the turn of the twentieth century, was heavily involved
in economic activities (Hille). Some other new currents, e.g., the Malāmatiyya/
Melāmīs in the central Ottoman lands and the Tijānīs in North Africa, went so
far as to reject the principle of having specific spaces and promoted new types
of sociability, as described later on in this chapter.
In a somehow related spirit, modernisation and secularisation theories pre-
dicted the impending demise of Ṣūfī orders and institutions in modern cit-
ies and their survival in rural areas, where they were perceived as remnants
234 Clayer

of a premodern archaic social and economic order. However, recent studies

have demonstrated that such predictions were premature. Ṣūfī groups have
continued to be active in major cities, in private as well as in public spheres.
Devotional life in urban Ṣūfī sacred places continued and even intensified in
the colonial and post-colonial contexts, as Alexandre Papas argues in his study
of the Bombay megalopolis (Papas). For his part, Constant Hamès, discussing
the case of Nouakchott in Mauritania, points out that Ṣūfīs made their way
into colonial and post-colonial cities that were founded and planned without
any Islamic or Ṣūfī reference (Hamès). Sufism also spread to major cities in
western Europe and the United States, where the first Ṣūfī organization ap-
peared around 1915 (Malik and Hinnells (eds.); Raudvere and Stenberg (eds.);
Sedgwick). In continuity with the evolution that took place from the end of
the nineteenth century, two kinds of transformation, somewhat contradictory,
affected the Ṣūfī milieus and their status in the city. First, Ṣūfīs adopted new
forms of institutionalised and bureaucratised sociability, such as voluntary as-
sociations and political parties (Papas in this volume); consequently, the hori-
zontal links between members sometimes became stronger than the vertical
link between the master and the disciples. Second, some spiritual leaders be-
came guru-like authorities and some Ṣūfī currents hybridised, becoming part
of the so-called “New Age” religiosity.
In the global urban context, the evolution of Ṣūfī networks toward voluntary
associations can be observed in many areas of the Muslim world. In the case of
Indonesia, several Ṣūfī orders, which are kinds of voluntary associations but re-
tain the vertical charismatic authority of the shaykh over his disciples, applied a
bureaucratised model of modern civic association and political party that had
appeared there since 1912 (van Bruinessen). In the Balkans, Ṣūfī associations
were established in the Albanian capital city of Tirana during the interwar pe-
riod, with the goal of controlling and reforming several Ṣūfī brotherhoods. In
Yugoslavia, similar associations were formed in Sarajevo and Prizren by der-
vishes themselves during the socialist period, as a means of joining forces to
resist the anti-Ṣūfī mood of the official socialist Islamic institutions. In Turkey,
we find a similar evolution, both despite and due to the fact that tekkes were
closed in 1925 and ṭuruq (Ṣūfī orders) are still officially banned. Although Ṣūfī
networks survived in secrecy, after 1925, neo-brotherhood networks developed
around clandestine readings and teachings of the Qurʾān (the Süleymancıs)
and the writings of Said Nursi (the Nurcus). From the 1960s onwards, under
the umbrella of voluntary associations (vakıf ) or as congregations (cemaat)
various Ṣūfī groups openly re-emerged in urban localities, notably in the
ever-expanding megalopolis of Istanbul (today over 15 million inhabitants).
More than ever before, Ṣūfī shaykhs serve as patrons, providing resources and
Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 235

guidance in a changing urban environment, especially in the historical part of

the city that includes the Stambul Peninsula and Üsküdar (Atacan). Today, Ṣūfī
activists are increasingly visible in the public sphere, organising a variety of
events such as lessons and conferences, and becoming involved in economic
as well as political activities (Silverstein; Özdalga).
In the countries in which Ṣūfī orders were not banned, such as in Egypt, so-
ciopolitical transformations led to changes similar to those mentioned above.
According to Rachida Chih’s investigations, networks appeared around new
social settings that differed from the original Ṣūfī lodges (Chih). In Egyptian
cities, even in the sprawling Cairo (almost 20 million inhabitants), institutions
have been created exclusively for disciples. The primary links are now among
the disciples themselves and not between the master and his followers. The
disciples meet in private apartments, in mosques, and in so-called gardens
(sing. rawḍa). The rawḍa is a building that contains (at least) a large room
for gatherings, but can also serve as a social and cultural centre, a mosque,
a Qurʾān school, and occasionally, a clinic or even a hospital. In Africa, the
Murīdiyya, the Tijāniyya, and other Ṣūfī orders also developed a form of local
voluntary association, the daaira (from the Arabic dāʾira, lit. “circle”), which
provides mutual support for urban members. In Senegal these organisations
made their way into factories, universities, administrations, and various neigh-
bourhoods where Ṣūfī rituals and festivals are organised (Villalón).
The institutionalisation of Sufism observed in the urban settings of various
countries can be intertwined with the rise, in the same spaces, of a more char-
ismatic form of Sufism. For example, in Indonesia, tensions erupted between
the charisma of certain Ṣūfī shaykhs and the political parties they were close
to. In the 1980s, mystic figures and healers emerged and successfully estab-
lished urban circles of followers, then, in the 1990s, saintly figures multiplied
on the local scene (van Bruinessen). Esoteric knowledge and miracle-working
seem to be the principal asset of these new religious personalities that attract
either the urban poor, as in Mali (Soares), or dislocated migrants, like those liv-
ing in western Europe. However, the research of Pnina Werbner among South
Asian Ṣūfīs in Britain shows that, even around the same charismatic figures,
urbanites or neo-urbanites look for different things, and that each Ṣūfī group in
a given city may have different characteristics (more or less political, more or
less in relation with the local authorities) and different ways to build person-
al and collective identities (Werbner, Intimate). In a similar vein, Alexandre
Papas’ study on the megacity of Bombay stresses the development of “parochi-
al” and spiritual lifestyles around Ṣūfī shrines in response to a violent environ-
ment characterised by social inequalities, overpopulation, poverty, pollution,
and interreligious tensions (Papas).
236 Clayer

To sum up, Sufism is still extremely active in urban settings throughout the
world, and surely capable of adapting itself to ever-changing local sociopoliti-
cal and global contexts and contributing to these changes.

Bibliography

Akkach, Samer, Letters of a Sufi scholar. The correspondence of ʿAbd al-Ghanī

al-Nābulusī (1641–1731), Leiden 2010.
Aščerić-Todd, Ines, Dervishes and Islam in Bosnia. Sufi dimensions to the formation of
Bosnian Muslim society, Leiden 2015.
Atacan, Fulya, Sosyal değişme ve tarikat. Cerrahiler, Istanbul 1990.
Baer, Marc David, Honored by the glory of Islam. Conversion and conquest in Ottoman
Europe, Oxford 2008.
Can, Lâle, Connecting people. A Central Asian Sufi network in turn-of-the-century
Istanbul, Modern Asian Studies 46/2 (2012): 373–401.
Chih, Rachida, What is a Sufi order? Revisiting the concept through a case study of the
Khalwatiyya in contemporary Egypt, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell
(eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York 2007), 21–38.
Chih, Rachida, Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen, and Ruedigger Seesemann, eds., Sufism,
literary production and printing in the nineteenth century, Würzburg 2015.
Choudhury, Rishad, The hajj and the Hindi. The ascent of the Indian Sufi lodge in the
Ottoman empire, Modern Asian Studies 50/6 (2016): 1888–1931.
Clayer, Nathalie and Nicolas Vatin, Un établissement de derviches stambouliote. Le
tekke d’Imrahor, Anatolia Moderna/Yeni Anadolu VI (1997): 31–82.
Clayer, Nathalie, Life in an Istanbul tekke in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
according to a ‘menakibnâme’ of the Cerrahi dervishes, in Suraiya Faroqhi and
Christoph Neumann (eds.), The illuminated table, the prosperous house. Food and
shelter in Ottoman material culture (Würzburg 2003), 219–35.
Curry, John, The transformation of Muslim mystical thought in the Ottoman empire. The
rise of the Halveti order, 1350–1650, Edinburgh 2011.
De Jong, Fred, Ṭuruq and ṭuruq-linked institutions in nineteenth century Egypt, Leiden
1978.
Durocher, Maxime, Zāwiya et soufis dans le Pont intérieur, des Mongols aux Ottomans.
Contribution à l’étude des processus d’islamisation en Anatolie médiévale (XIIIe–
XVe siècles), PhD dissertation, Sorbonne Université, Paris 2018.
Fall, Abdou Salam, Les liens religieux confrériques, réseaux privilégiés d’insertion ur-
baine à Dakar, in Adriana Piga (ed.), Islam et villes en Afrique au sud du Sahara (Paris
2003), 325–44.
Sufism, Urbanisation, and Sociability in Cities 237

Green, Nile, Making space. Sufis and settlers in early modern India, Oxford 2012.
Hamès, Constant, Islam et urbanisation dans l’espace nomade oust-saharien, in
Adriana Piga (ed.), Islam et villes en Afrique au sud du Sahara (Paris 2003), 195–206.
Hille, Marie-Paule, Le Xidaotang, une existence collective à l’épreuve du politique.
Ethnographie historique et anthropologique d’une communauté musulmane chi-
noise (Gansu, 1857–2014), PhD dissertation, EHESS, Paris 2014.
Kara, Mustafa, Tekkeler ve zaviyeler, Istanbul 1977.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Kiel, Machiel, Ottoman urban development and the cult of a heterodox Sufi saint.
Sari Saltuk Dede and towns of Isakçe and Babadağ in the northern Dobrudja, in
Gilles Veinstein (ed.), Syncrétismes et hérésies dans l’Orient seldjoukide et ottoman
(XIV e–XVIIIe siècle) (Paris 2005), 283–298.
Le Gall, Dina, A culture of Sufism. Nasqhbandis in the Ottoman world, 1450–1700, New
York 2005.
Malik, Jamal and John Hinnells, eds., Sufism in the West, London and New York 2006.
Özdalga, Elisabeth, Transformation of Sufi-based communities in modern Turkey.
The Nakşibendis, the Nurcus, and the Gülen community, in Celia Kerslake, Kerem
Öktem, and Philip Robins (eds.), Turkey’s engagement with modernity (New York
2010), 69–92.
Papas, Alexandre, Bombay mystical city. Muslim shrines and saints in the urban fab-
ric from 1800 to present, in Daphna Ephrat, Ethel Sara Wolper, and Paulo G. Pinto
(eds.), Saintly spheres and Islamic landscapes. Emplacements of spiritual power
across time and place (Leiden 2020), 335–65.
Rahimi, Babak, Theater state and the formation of early modern public sphere in Iran,
Leiden 2012.
Raudvere, Catharina and Leif Stenberg, eds., Sufism today. Heritage and tradition in the
global community, London 2009.
Riccio, Bruno, L’urbanisation mouride et les migrations transnationales sénégalaises,
in Adriana Piga (ed.), Islam et villes en Afrique au sud du Sahara (Paris 2003), 359–75.
Rizvi, Kishwar, The Safavid dynastic shrine. Architecture, religion and power in early
modern Iran, Edinburgh 2010.
Ross, Eric, Sufi city. Urban design and archetypes in Touba, Rochester 2006.
Ross, Eric, A historical geography of the trans-Saharan trade, in Graziano Krätli and
Ghislaine Lydon (eds.), The trans-Saharan book trade. Manuscript culture, Arabic
literacy and intellectual history in Muslim Africa (Leiden 2011), 1–34.
Sedgwick, Mark, Western Sufism. From the Abbasids to the new age, Oxford 2017.
Silverstein, Brian, Sufism and governmentality in the late Ottoman empire, Comparative
Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 29/2 (2009): 171–85.
238 Clayer

Soares, Benjamin F., Saint and Sufi in contemporary Mali, in Martin van Bruinessen
and Julia Day Howell (eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York
2007), 76–91.
Triaud, Jean-Louis, L’islam en Afrique de l’Ouest. Une histoire urbaine dans la longue
durée, in Adriana Piga (ed.), Islam et villes en Afrique au sud du Sahara (Paris 2003),
129–48.
van Bruinessen, Martin, Saints, politicians and Sufi bureaucrats. Mysticism and poli-
tics in Indonesia’s new order, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell (eds.),
Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York 2007), 92–112.
Villalón, Leonardo A., Sufi modernities in contemporary Senegal. Religious dynamics
between the local and the global, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell
(eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York 2007), 172–91.
Werbner, Pnina, Globalising the Asian Muslim umma. Alternating movements
East–West of spirituality, reform and militant jihad, in Bryan S. Turner and Oscar
Salemink (eds.) Routledge handbook of religions in Asia (London 2015), 385–401.
Werbner, Pnina, Intimate disciples in the modern world. The creation of translo-
cal amity among South Asian Sufis in Britain, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia
Day Howell (eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York 2007),
195–216.
Wolper, Ethel Sara, Cities and saints. Sufism and the transformation of urban space in
medieval Anatolia, University Park 2003.
Zarcone, Thierry, Histoire et croyances des derviches turkestanais et indiens à Istanbul,
Anatolia Moderna/Yeni Anadolu II (1991): 137–200.
Zarcone, Thierry, Shaykh succession in Turkish Sufi lineages (19th and 20th century).
Conflicts, reforms and transmission of spiritual enlightenment, Journal of Asian
and African Area Studies 7/1 (2007): 18–35.
Zarcone, Thierry, Sufi pilgrims from Central Asia and India in Jerusalem, Kyoto 2009.
Zilfi, Madeline C., The politics of piety. The Ottoman ulema in the postclassical age,
Minneapolis 1988.
 Chapter 12

Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments

Ahmet Yaşar Ocak

1 Introduction

Islamic mysticism, with its institutionalised form, the ṭarīqas (orders), has
become one of the most well-studied topics in the historiography of Islam.
It is noteworthy that the majority of the literature that has appeared until now
tends to focus on urban mystic thought, the great Ṣūfīs who generated it, and
the ṭarīqas that began to emerge from the sixth/twelfth century onward. We
have far fewer studies about Sufism in rural settings. However, since roughly
the 1980s, the eastern and western Islamic world have seen an increase in in-
terest in Sufism in the rural environment, and the number of anthropological
studies of rural Sufism has grown considerably, as evidenced by this chapter.
We should point out that historians of this field of mysticism are not as fortu-
nate as scholars of urban Sufism, as they face a lack of firsthand sources.
Before commencing with our topic, we must define “rural environment” and
“rural Sufism.” It generally refers to what takes place outside cities, even if it
has social and economic ties with them, albeit limited; thus, “rural environ-
ment” means, first, nomadic and tribal, and second, countryside. Sociological
and anthropological studies have long provided many examples showing that
the culture of these two settings relies mostly on oral tradition and greatly
emphasises mythology. Hence, it should be underscored that “rural Sufism”
is intended to designate Sufism and Ṣūfīs among nomadic tribes and villages
and villagers, which represent the two types of lifestyle in the rural context. In
these surroundings, the essential character of Sufism undoubtedly suits the
abovementioned social, economic, and cultural basis and naturally generates
notions and practices according to it. Consequently, this topic relates to the
practical rituals that take place in the rural environment and the mythological
beliefs taken up in miracle stories, rather than the more theoretical or doc-
trinal written texts of urban Sufism. This distinction should certainly not be
exaggerated and it is important not to be too rigid in our analysis (Peacock
and Yıldız (eds.), Introduction; Gril). Still, we focus on the specificities of rural
contexts, as opposed to what is characterised by cities (Clayer in this volume);
moreover, we must keep in mind that, in the mediaeval and early modern pe-
riods, the institutions of knowledge (schools, colleges, libraries, and so forth)

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_014

240 Ocak

were concentrated in cities and the level of illiteracy was extremely high in
the countryside.
The primary problem in rural Sufism is one of sources. Aside from the limit-
ed written sources that are rarely produced in this setting, the oral nature of the
topic clearly makes it difficult to effectively comprehend Ṣūfī Weltanschauung,
belief, and culture. As stressed above, the reason for this is the environment—
in rural settings, oral culture predominates over written culture. Despite the
plentiful, varied sources on urban Sufism in the Islamic world today (as op-
posed to the Middle Ages), attaining these resources presents certain difficul-
ties. Since it would be challenging to trace the overall history of rural Sufism in
mediaeval and modern Islam, in this chapter I emphasise the Turkish world,
with occasional mention of other areas. Lastly, I cover mainly the mediaeval
and early modern periods, and occasionally modern times, because contem-
porary rural Sufism has become less differentiated (although it did not van-
ish, as the development of the Maijbhandarī ṭarīqa in Bangladesh shows, see
Harder, chs. 1–2) for a number of reasons: the disappearance of nomadism,
rural exodus, the absorption of villages into cities, and the modernisation of
agriculture (e.g., in Egypt, see Chih).

2 Rural Geography, Socioeconomic Conditions, and Sufism

Perforce, the term “rural Sufism” requires consideration of a geographical fac-

tor along with physical, societal, and economic factors. Accordingly, but with-
out falling into geographical determinism, it is important to remember that
Ṣūfīs in rural settings were moulded by such factors and rural Sufism reflected
a world that embodied a mystical mentality, beliefs, and practices. In Mamlūk
Egypt, an interesting group of rural saints lived in the Nile Delta; they were
composed of poor peasants and servants whose ascetic spiritual lives and at-
tachment to terroir reflected their frugal, rooted lifestyle; their miracles re-
sponded to the fears of peasants at that time—land spoliations by powerful
elites, robberies by Bedouin highwaymen, attacks on cattle by wild animals,
and natural and health disasters (Mayeur-Jaouen). Likewise, a singular feature
of existence in nomadic societies was the necessity of establishing regularity
in the course of life, according to natural conditions (i.e., searching for new
pastures and water for camels, horses, and sheep, the principal means of live-
lihood; remaining there until resources are depleted; and then migrating to
other places).
After the Arab conquests in roughly the first/seventh and second/eighth
centuries, Islam quickly took hold in the countryside. It spread at a time of fear
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 241

and anxiety generated by the first clashes between Muslim conquerors and
local peoples in Syria and Egypt. The Ṣūfīs’ lenient, receptive approach played
a significant role in the emergence of this new way of life. Though some Ṣūfīs
were educated in large cities such as Cairo, Damascus, Aleppo, Baghdad, Kufa,
Basra, Nīshāpūr, Shiraz, and Isfahan, others were not necessarily in metropo-
lises and shared their encounters and thought with the nomadic tribes and
villagers among whom they lived in the remote deserts and steppes. Some of
these educated Ṣūfīs spread Islam through mysticism to, for instance, Turkish
villages and nomadic tribes of Transoxiana. Aḥmad Yasawī (d. 562/1166) is one
of the few whose names and backgrounds are known today.

3 The Case of Aḥmad Yasawī and the Yasawiyya

It can be said that the Turks became acquainted with Islam and Sufism simul-
taneously. It is also known that the Qarakhānids (382–609/992–1212), who
formed a confederated state with Turkish nomadic tribes in fourth-/tenth-
century Transoxiana, were Muslims; Iranian Ṣūfīs had introduced them to
Islam. Aḥmad Yasawī and his ṭarīqa, the Yasawiyya, are an early example of rural
Sufism in that period (Köprülü, Ahmed Yasavi; Eraslan; DeWeese, Foreword).
After receiving training in the Islamic sciences at the foremost centres of the
Islamic world, Yasawī embraced mysticism by affiliating himself with Khwāja
Yūsuf Hamadānī (d. 535/1140), one of the most important Ṣūfīs of the era, and
with Arslān-bāb (Bābā), a shaykh apparently from Yasawī’s place of origin, the
southern Kazakh steppe. His teaching, later synthetised in the Dīwān-i ḥikmat
(Collection of wise sayings) that expresses a philosophy of Ṣūfī life, spread ex-
tensively among the nomadic Turkish tribes (Yasawî; Köprülü, Early mystics,
127–40; DeWeese, Ahmad Yasavi). This influence persisted, and after roughly
a century, Yasawī’s legacy was transferred to the Naqshbandiyya (Yaman). In
what is now Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, the culture generated by Yasawī con-
tinued throughout early modern times (DeWeese, The Yasavî presence).
Aḥmad Yasawī and others like him, who had received an excellent Islamic
education and abandoned a comfortable urban existence to live in the steppes
of Central Asia among nomadic Turkish tribes and villagers, must have sought
to convert the inhabitants of these regions to Islam. Surrounded by many dis-
ciples, Yasawī continued his mission up to his death, at the tekke on the site
of the large khānaqāh (head lodge), which was rebuilt in 791/1389 by Tīmūr
(r. 771–807/1370–1405) in the city of Turkestan (old Yasī), in modern-day
Kazakhstan. Yasawī was especially successful in spreading Islam in Khwārazm
and the Qipchāq territories, through the widespread propaganda activities of
242 Ocak

the Yasawiyya ṭarīqa he founded, and through his successors, such as Ḥakīm
Ātā, also known as Sulaymān Bāqirghānī (d. 582/1186–7), whom he had taught
(DeWeese, The Yasavî presence).
It has been suggested that in the 610s/1210s, at the beginning of the
Mongol incursion into Central Asia, some Yasawī dervishes migrated to India
and some nomadic Turkish tribes journeyed to Anatolia via Iran (Köprülü,
Anadolu’da). This theory has come under criticism recently. It has been pro-
posed that the Yasawīs did not come to Anatolia; this new theory is based
on the lack of primary evidence and the silsila (the chain of descent of the
order’s shaykhs) of the ṭarīqa (Karamustafa). However, we know that tenth-/
sixteenth- and eleventh-/seventeenth-century Ottoman sources, particularly,
indicate the existence of Yasawīs (even a small number) in rural areas of cen-
tral Anatolia (Muṣṭafā ʿAlī, 5:58–61; Evliya Çelebi, 2:134–5, 3:237). With regard to
the Islamisation of the territory of the Golden Horde, legends hold that Bābā
Tükles (considered of Yasawī descent) converted Özbek Khān (r. 712–42/1313–
41) during the eighth/fourteenth century, and through him, Mongol nomads
(DeWeese, Islamization).

4 Ṣūfīs in Villages and among Villagers

Among the most important examples of Sufism are the Naqshbandīs, who
evolved and expanded from the Yasawīs’ village social base in Central Asia,
in modern-day Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan (former Transoxania) especially.
The Naqshbandiyya most often emerged among rural villagers, especially land-
owning farmers. The Khwājagān shaykhs in the Naqshbandī line of descent in
Transoxania from the eighth/fourteenth century on took over the teachings
of the Naqshbandiyya order (Algar), and their activities encompassed the re-
gion’s villages and their environs. The lodges and mausoleums of these shaykhs
still exist in Bukhara and its surrounding towns. One of these tombs from the
ninth/fifteenth century, that of Khwāja ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār (d. 895/1490), dem-
onstrates how far the Naqshbandiyya had spread in rural Central Asia, par-
ticularly among farmers in villages (Gross). Agricultural production was the
basis of the economic activity of Khwāja Aḥrār’s disciples, and agricultural
lands comprised the majority of their property holdings. In addition to his
Ṣūfī activities, Khwāja Aḥrār provided assurances to the people vis-à-vis the
state by developing a system in which landowners of small- and medium-size
holdings voluntarily ceded their lands, through waqfs (pious foundations), to
him or the order, and in this way, the villagers came into his circle of disciples
(Paul). Perceived as a protective mechanism, the order prevented arbitrary
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 243

interference by local political authorities. Khwāja Aḥrār served as a patron for

those villagers who turned over their lands to him, as he could prevent the
confiscation of their produce for non-payment of taxes. He protected them
and benefitted the ṭarīqa; it is clear that, as the apparent owner of wealthy ag-
ricultural lands (apparent in the sense that the shaykh controlled the waqf, but
the farmers continued farming the land), he became very prominent in this
rural setting and a powerful shaykh.
Khwāja Aḥrār’s influence in the rural environment was not solely because
of his position as a Ṣūfī, but perhaps more because he could defend the rural
populace from the onslaught of political power (Tīmūr’s successors). Books of
legends and works by the shaykh’s contemporaries, such as ʿAbd al-Raḥmān
Jāmī (d. 898/1492), refer to Khwāja Aḥrār’s vast lands; for instance, Jāmī relates
in his Yūsuf u Zulaykhā that he made provisions for the road to paradise with
produce taken from thousands of fields (Jāmī, 2:31).
In southeast Anatolia in the seventh/thirteenth century, the Wafāʾī shaykh
Dede Garkın offers a similar example. He established the Garkınī ṭarīqa, a
branch of the Wafāʾiyya order, first in Elbistan and later at a lodge in the village
near Urfa that took his name, and he gathered a wide circle of disciples. His
mausoleum is still there, and a surviving charter lists him as the owner of more
than twenty-four villages (Ocak, Ortaçağ, 236). The lodges in these villages were
centres of agricultural activity in the fullest sense, and the order’s disciples
consisted entirely of village farmers and nomadic tribes that came to the area
during the summer months to pasture their sheep and camels. Dede Garkın’s
chief successor, Bābā Ilyās Khurāsānī (d. 638/1240), was active in the lodge he
established at Çat, near Amasya. Initially, he established a good rapport with
the Saljūq administration, and ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Kayqubād I (r. 616–34/1220–37) gave
him fourteen villages as a waqf. However, his relationship became strained
under Ghiyāth al-Dīn Kay Khusraw II (r. 634–44/1237–46), and he was killed
in the rebellion of 638/1240. His successor, Hacı Bektaş Veli, served until his
death (d. c. 669/1270) as religious leader and head of the Bektāshiyya, in the
lodge he founded in the central Anatolian village of Sulucakaraöyük (today’s
Hacıbektaş, in the district of Nevşehir) (Beldiceanu-Steinherr).

5 Sufism, Nomadic Tribes, and Tribal Saints

As noted, the perception of Islam among the nomadic tribes differed from the
understanding of Sufism that derived from the more formal, theoretical Ṣūfī
thought that developed in the written culture of urban Ṣūfī institutions. This
variance was fostered by the difficult natural conditions that shaped the lives
244 Ocak

Figure 12.1 Shrine of Dede Garkın in Dedeköy near Mardin (eastern Anatolia)
Photo by Ahmet Yaşar Ocak

Figure 12.2 Exterior of Bābā Ilyās shrine near Amasya (Black Sea Region)
Photo by Ahmet Yaşar Ocak
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 245

Figure 12.3 Interior of Bābā Ilyās shrine near Amasya (Black Sea Region)
Photo by Ahmet Yaşar Ocak

of the nomads and their oral cultures and narrative writings tended to focus on
myths. Few Ṣūfīs affiliated with nomadic tribes produced mystical theories like
their urban counterparts, but they (i.e., those affiliated with nomadic tribes)
created a situation suited to the structures of Ṣūfī culture in which disciples
transmitted thought from the successors (khalīfas) of the great Ṣūfīs. In these
circumstances, tales of the shaykhs were a more effective means of transmis-
sion than sophisticated speculative doctrines. Close examination shows that
these oral traditions and narrative texts describe relations between the no-
mads’ societal structures and their view of the world and themselves. They are,
on the one hand, mystical stories and, on the other, “oral texts” that perform a
sociological function in nomadic society.
Dede Garkın, the aforementioned Wafāʾī shaykh in Anatolia and leader of
the Turkmen Garkın clan, was a significant, influential figure in northern Iraq
and southeast Anatolia, particularly among the Turkmen and Kurdish tribes
(Ocak, Ortaçağ, 44–5). In contrast, among the Turkish and Mongol tribes that
lived largely in Qipchāq lands north of the Black Sea and in the Balkans, reli-
gious authority was vested in the Yasawīs, Ḥaydarīs, and Qalandars. Although
these groups found support among the nomads and the villagers, the difficult
life Ṣūfī groups led as a result probably played a role in their loose adherence
246 Ocak

to Sunnī principles. The Turkmen tribes that settled in Anatolia were governed
by individuals who acted as chiefs and religious leaders; they used winter and
summer pastures granted to them by the Anatolian Saljūqs in accordance with
traditional principles of shared property (Cahen, 572–5). Though they also paid
a specific annual tax (Turan), they often avoided it, either by refusing to pay
the tax collectors or by rebelling. The Bābāʾī revolt (to which we return) was
apparently triggered by an attempt to collect taxes (Elvan Çelebi, 146). In addi-
tion to Turkmen, but fewer in number, there were a number of tribes: Qarluqs,
Khalajs, Qanghlıs, and Qipchāqs. These nomads spread throughout eastern,
southeast, and central Anatolia, bringing with them their traditional tribal
organisation, customs, and traditions. To prevent likely revolts, the Anatolian
Saljūqs divided the tribes into small groups and settled them in different areas.
Over time, the nomads adopted a sedentary life and began to work in agricul-
ture and establish villages. These “tribal villages” were usually named after the
heads of the tribes, who were Ṣūfīs and can be called “tribal saints.”

6 The Functions of Rural Ṣūfī Institutions

6.1 Settling Uninhabited Lands: Farms and Villages

Ṣūfī circles in rural areas generally comprised villagers and tribal disciples.
Ṣūfī leaders in ṭarīqa centres situated in large cities were sent to the country-
side. When tribal Ṣūfīs settled in uninhabited areas along roads and opened
lodges, the central political authorities supported them through charitable
endowments. Nomadic tribal Ṣūfīs occupied vacant lands, cultivated the area
by planting fields, and building personal farms, from which they gained their
livelihoods. Over time, many farmers also settled near Ṣūfī lodges and be-
came affiliated with the ṭarīqa, establishing new farms and villages in turn. It
is apparent that from the sixth/twelfth century onwards, the ṭarīqas began to
spread across uninhabited lands from North Africa to Syria and in India and
Central Asia by means of this remarkable process (Ibn Jubayr, 240, 245, 265–6,
271–4; Nizami; Drague; Taeschner; Barkan). Eastern and central Anatolia ex-
perienced the same course of settlement along a westward path concurrent
with the Saljūq conquests. Extant written and archival sources also attest that
the same process took place in the Balkans, and coincided with the Ottoman
conquests beginning in the eighth/fourteenth century. Ottoman archival docu-
ments describe the settlement of vacant lands and the opening of lodges as
şenlendirme, which means “to populate and make prosperous” (Faroqhi).
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 247

6.2 Security for Roads and Mountain Passes

In addition to their crucial functions of spreading Sufism and populating un-
inhabited regions, Ṣūfī lodges had two other purposes (i.e., securing roads and
protecting mountain passes) that were a natural result of these functions,
whether in North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, Saljūq and Ottoman
Anatolia, or the Ottoman Balkans. Lodges were not established randomly, but
in locations chosen according to specific criteria and usually with the knowl-
edge of ruling powers. Naturally, the land had to possess the minimal require-
ments for subsistence, including fertile soil, a source of water, and proximity to
a road. Shaykhs only established lodges in such places. Since political authori-
ties were obligated to protect roads and mountain passes (derbend in Ottoman
documents) to safeguard travel and commerce, they viewed the lodges as vital
entities to help accomplish this task and insisted on their establishment in
such locales (Barkan).

6.3 Lodging and Feeding Travellers

Another critical role of the lodges was providing food and accommodation for
travellers, Muslim or non-Muslim, including merchants, dervishes, students,
and others. Guests received all the necessities they required (such as food and
drink) free for three days, during which time they could complete preparations
for their onward journey. In exchange for this service and under the condition
that income from their agricultural activities was used solely for the upkeep
and repair of their lodges, and for their own needs and those of wayfarers (ex-
pressed in Ottoman sources as āyende ve ravāndeye iṭʿām-i ṭaʿām, which means
“to feed notables and travellers”), dervishes were exempt from paying taxes to
the governing authority (Barkan). We find the same function and terminol-
ogy in other regions, for example, in Morocco throughout the tenth/sixteenth
century. There, prolonged warfare had resulted in the stagnation of agricul-
ture, peasants’ migration, and poverty—these problems were eased by the Ṣūfī
institutions of the Jazūliyya order, which not only provided food and tempo-
rary shelter but also settled desolate lands (mawāt) and revived agriculture.
Interestingly, certain lodges performed educational roles and struggled against
illiteracy (Rodriguez-Manas).

6.4 Healthcare and Education

The combination of Ṣūfī charitable activities and education among rural com-
munities developed in the nineteenth century onwards. For instance, in north-
ern Jordan, when the Ottoman administration provided few public services,
248 Ocak

peasants relied on Ṣūfī brotherhoods that offered charity health care and re-
ligious education, albeit limited, in elementary Qurʾānic schools. The fami-
lies of shaykhs benefited from a new system, co-opted by the Ottomans, that
allowed them to acquire the most lucrative agricultural lands (Walker). Facing
the rising influence of Wahhābī groups, as in east Africa at the beginning of the
twentieth century, Ṣūfī orders were particularly active in educating and pros-
elytising the semi-illiterate rural population. We may mention the Qādiriyya of
Somalia, whose scholars propagated a cosmological view along with orthoprax
models of behaviour in brief, simple, and straightforward printed works used
by itinerant “bush preachers” (Reese, ch. 6). Today, we still find a form of village
Sufism in various countries where Qurʾānic schools run by Ṣūfīs predominate
over state institutions. Such is the case in rural Senegal, where daaras founded
by Tijānīs attract more pupils than “French schools” (Smith, 60–84).

7 Non-conformism, Mahdist Revolts, and Rural Sufism

Because of its distance from centres of religious authority and political power,
rural Sufism also had a “non-conformist” dimension, perhaps more than Sufism
in urban contexts. In general, in historical studies “non-conformism” is under-
stood to mean that which does not fit acceptable, commonly recognized soci-
etal rules, and it is used to describe the attitudes of those groups frequently in
conflict with the political authority. It is especially applicable to Sufism, since
some rural Ṣūfīs rebelled against pressure from the ruling power for a variety
of reasons (particularly tax burdens).
Depending on location, uprisings of non-conformist Ṣūfī shaykhs in rural
areas were referred to as qiyām (revolt) or ʿiṣyān (rebellion); these were almost
always fuelled by mahdist, i.e., messianic (from the Arabic mahdī, “the rightly
guided one”), ideologies. Facing opposition to tax impositions, disruption of
law and order, episodes of pillaging, and loss of control, the political authori-
ties preferred to suppress these disturbances with military force, and massacres
sometimes occurred. Political authorities faced with such uprisings generally
proclaimed that those involved were heretics and then cowed them into sub-
mission by force of arms or by burdening them with hefty taxes. Though the
authorities sought to exert greater control, this was not easy to achieve, given
that nomads were accustomed to an autonomous lifestyle and often revolted
against the constraints of the governing power.
In Anatolia, nearly a dozen revolts occurred in the Saljūq and Ottoman peri-
ods alone. These revolts were usually inspired by mahdist ideologies and their
leaders were mostly tribal chiefs with religious charisma who were viewed as
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 249

mahdīs. As emphasised, rural Sufism not only involves differences of belief but
also issues related to economic and social conflicts with political powers and
settled areas. During the Middle Ages, the most striking mahdist movement
in Turkish history (in terms of “non-conformist” Sufism), the effects of which
extended to later centuries, was the so-called “revolt of the Bābāʾīs” (Ocak, La
Révolte). Moreover, in 819/1416, an eminent scholar of Muslim jurisprudence in
the Balkans, shaykh Badr al-Dīn/Bedreddīn (d. 819/1416), led a movement with
mahdist overtones that attracted Muslim and Christian villagers. This Balkan
uprising ended in failure, and the shaykh was executed (Balivet). Unsure of
the fate of their lands and seeking to maintain their livelihoods, the villag-
ers had regarded shaykh Badr al-Dīn as a mahdī and a saviour. His disciples
also included former Balkan landowners whose properties had been seized
by the Ottomans.
A somewhat similar situation took place in the ninth-/fifteenth-century
Maghrib, where the autonomy of rural Ṣūfī communities (ṭāʾifa) brought them
into conflict with Marīnid powers (Geoffroy, 209–10).

Bibliography

Algar, Hamid, A brief history of the Naqshbandî Order, in Marc Gaborieau et al. (eds.),
Naqshbandîs. Cheminements et situation actuelle d’un ordre mystique musulman
(Istanbul 1990), 3–44.
ʿAlī, Muṣṭafā, Kunh al-akhbār, vol. 5, Istanbul 1277/1861–2.
Balivet, Michel, Islam mystique et révolution armée dans les Balkans ottomans. Vie du
Cheikh Bedreddîn le “Hallâj des Turcs” (1358/59–1416), Istanbul 1995.
Barkan, Ömer Lutfi, İstila devrinin kolonizatör Türk dervişleri ve zâviyeler, Vakıflar
Dergisi 2 (1942): 279–304, arşiv belgeleri, 304–53.
Beldiceanu-Steinherr, Irène, Les Bektâşî à la lumière des recensements ottomans
(XVe–XVIe siècles), WZKM 81 (1991): 21–79.
Cahen, Claude, Le régime de la terre et l’occupation turque en Anatolie, Cahiers
d’histoire mondiale 2 (1955): 566–80.
Çelebi, Elvan, Menâkıbu’l-kudsiyye fî menâsıbi’l-ünsiyye, ed. İsmail E. Erünsal and
Ahmet Yaşar Ocak, Ankara 2014.
Çelebi, Evliya, Evliya Çelebi seyahatnamesi, vol. 2 and 3, Istanbul 1314/1898–9.
Chih, Rachida, What is a Sufi order? Revisiting the concept through a case study of the
Khalwatiyya in contemporary Egypt, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell
(eds.), Sufism and the “modern” in Islam (London 2007), 21–38.
DeWeese, Devin, Islamization and native religion in the Golden Horde. Baba Tükles and
conversion to Islam in historical and epic tradition, University Park 1994.
250 Ocak

DeWeese, Devin, Yasavī “šayḫs” in the Timurid era. Notes on the social and political
role of communal sufi affiliations in the 14th and 15th centuries, OM 15 (76/2) (1996):
173–88.
DeWeese, Devin, Foreword, in Fuad Köprülü, Early mystics in Turkish literature, New
York 2006.
DeWeese, Devin, Ahmad Yasavi and the divan-i hikmat in Soviet scholarship, in Michael
Kemper and Stephan Conermann (eds.), The heritage of Soviet oriental studies
(New York 2011), 263–90.
DeWeese, Devin, The Yasavî presence in the Dasht-i Qipchaq from the 16th to 18th cen-
tury, in Niccolo Pianciola and Paolo Sartori (eds.), Islam, society and states across the
Qazaq Steppe, 18th–early 20th centuries (Vienna 2013), 27–66.
Drague, Georges [Georges Spillman], Esquisse d’histoire religieuse du Maroc, Cahiers
d’Afrique et d’Asie 2 (1950): 1–35.
Eraslan, Kemal, Ahmed-i Yesevî, TDVIA 2 (1989): 159–61.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, XVI–XVIII. yüzyıllarda orta Anadolu’da şeyh aileleri, in Osman
Okyar (ed.), Türkiye iktisat tarihi semineri. Metinler, tartışmalar, 8–10 Haziran 1973
(Ankara 1975), 197–226.
Geoffroy, Eric, Le soufisme en Égypte et en Syrie sous les derniers mamelouks et les pre-
miers ottomans, Damascus 1995.
Gril, Denis, Saints des villes et saints des champs. Etude comparée de deux vies de
saints d’époque mamelouke, in Rachida Chih and Denis Gril (eds.), Le saint et son
milieu ou comment lire les sources hagiographiques (Cairo 2000), 61–82.
Gross, Jo-Ann, Khoja Ahrâr. An interpretative approach to understanding the roles
and perceptions of a Sufi shaykh in Timurid society, in Marc Gaborieau et al. (eds.),
Naqshbandîs. Cheminement et situation actuelle d’un ordre mystique musulman
(Istanbul 1990), 109–22.
Harder, Hans, Sufism and saint veneration in contemporary Bangladesh. The Maijbhan-
daris of Chittagong, London 2011.
Ibn Jubayr, Riḥlat ibn Jubayr, ed. M. J. De Goeje, Leiden 1907.
Jāmī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Yūsuf u Zulaykhā, in Aʿlākhān Afṣaḥzād et al. (eds.), Haft Awrang,
vol. 2, Tehran 1378/1999.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Origins of Anatolian Sufism, in A. Yaşar Ocak (ed.), Sufism and
Sufis in Ottoman society (Ankara 2005), 78–84.
Köprülü, Mehmed Fuad, Anadolu’da İslamiyet, Dâr al-Funûn Edebiyat Fakültesi
Mecmuası 4 (1338/1922): 282–311, 5 (1339/1923): 385–420, 6 (1340/1924): 457–86.
Köprülü, Mehmed Fuad, Ahmed Yesevi, IA 1 (1941): 210–5.
Köprülü, Mehmed Fuad, Early mystics in Turkish literature, New York 2006.
Ṣūfīs in Rural Environments 251

Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, Les Compagnons de la Terrasse; un groupe de soufis ru-

raux dans l’Égypte mamelouke, in Denise Aigle (ed.), Hagiographies médiévales
comparées, 1. Saints orientaux (Paris 1995), 169–79.
Nizami, Khaliq Ahmad, Some aspects of khānqah life in medieval India, SI 8 (1957):
51–69.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, La révolte de Bâbâ Resul ou la formation de l’hétérodoxie musulmane
en Anatolie au XIIIe siècle, Ankara 1989.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Ortaçağ Anadolu’sunda iki büyük yerleşimci derviş. Dede Garkın ve
Emîrcî Sultan, Ankara 2011.
Paul, Jürgen, Forming a faction. The ḥimāyat system of Khwaja Ahrar, IJMES 23 (1991):
533–48.
Peacock, Andrew C. S. and Sara Nur Yıldız (eds.), The Seljuks of Anatolia. Court and
society in the medieval Middle East, London 2013.
Reese, Scott, Renewers of the age. Holy men and social discourse in colonial Benaadir,
Leiden 2008.
Rodriguez-Manas, Francisco, Agriculture, Ṣūfism and the state in tenth/sixteenth-
century Morocco, BSOAS 59/3 (1996): 450–71.
Smith, Gina Gertrud, Medina Gounass. Challenges to village Sufism in Senegal,
Copenhagen 2008.
Taeschner, Franz, Das Heiligtum des Elvan Çelebi in Anatolien, WZKM 56 (1960):
227–31.
Turan, Osman, Le droit terrien sous les seldjoukides de Turquie, REI 16 (1948): 43–5.
Walker, Bethany, Rural Sufism as channels of charity in nineteenth-century Jordan, in
Nefissa Naguib and Inger Marie Okkenhaug (eds.), Interpreting welfare and relief in
the Middle East (Leiden 2007), 217–34.
Yaman, Ali, Orta Asya’da Yesevilik. Allahçılar Laçiler, Ankara 2017.
Yasawî, Ahmad, Dîvân-i hikmet, ed. Hayati Bice, Istanbul 1993.
 Part 4
Sufism and Worldly Powers

⸪
 Chapter 13

Sufism and Worldly Powers

Alexandre Papas

In spite of the repeated warnings by Ṣūfīs about the dangers of political power
and those who wield it, a continual relationship has existed between spiritual
authorities and worldly powers; in fact, Sufism has been so useful to rulers that
the institutionalisation of Islamic mysticism may appear to be the creation of
rulers and states, and Sufism itself has eventually acquired its own hierarchi-
cal organisations and structures of power. Paradoxically, the political commit-
ment of certain individuals or groups did not hinder them from preaching an
ideal of world renunciation. This continuous oscillation between quietism and
activism, religious authority and political power, transcendence and imma-
nence should not be understood to indicate that Sufism was an instrument of
worldly powers or spirituality was diluted by exclusively temporal concerns.
In terms of their political and doctrinal aspects, Ṣūfīs have long discussed the
very meaning of the power that God has given to some of them.
This chapter explores five successive yet overlapping topics that have gener-
ated scholarly debates.
(1) The early and high mediaeval period (from the second/eighth to the
sixth/twelfth century) saw the expansion of Islam westward as well as east-
ward. Ascetics (zāhid, pl. zuhhād), then Ṣūfīs, confronted “infidel” regimes but
also Muslim rulers they saw as illegitimate. This casus belli, which led to a re-
flection on war ( jihād, ghazawāt) as a pious act, was later discussed by the
theologian Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) who became a major reference
in Ṣūfī political thought. Yet, Muslim mystics maintained an ambivalent rela-
tionship of distance and proximity with the state apparatus of the ʿAbbāsids
and the Būyids.
(2) The second section covers the period from the seventh/thirteenth to the
ninth/fifteenth century. The emergence of Ṣūfī orders was closely observed,
even fostered, by royal courts in the Maghrib, the Mashriq, Anatolia, Iran,
Central Asia, and India. The sultans’ patronage of Ṣūfīs was as much pragmat-
ic as religious, given the widespread belief in the supernatural power of holy
men (walī, pl. awliyāʾ) who made predictions ( firāsa) and provided support
(madad) for rulers. A subgenre of the Ṣūfī ‘mirror for princes’ literature devel-
oped in letters and treatises, especially in Persian.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_015

256 Papas

(3) The Islamic millennial shift, during the tenth/sixteenth and the eleventh/
seventeenth centuries, accentuated this tendency towards saintly rulership.
In this regard, three Ṣūfī dynasties are emblematic: the Jazūliyya in Morocco,
the early Ṣafaviyya in Iran, and the Naqshbandiyya in eastern Turkestan.
The theories of an “esoteric government” (dawla bāṭiniyya, dīwān al-awliyāʾ)
derived from the concept of the sanctity (walāya) of governorship (wilāya),
and is based on the thought of al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī (d. 298/910) and Ibn al-
ʿArabī (d. 638/1240s), as found in later elaborations.
(4) In the chapter’s fourth section, covering the twelfth/eighteenth and
thirteenth/nineteenth centuries, we discuss the Ṣūfī view of the rise of colonial
powers across the Muslim world. Whereas some saintly leaders sought accom-
modation with the new authorities, notably in Africa, others, such as Sayyid
Aḥmad Barelwī (d. 1246/1831), Imām Shāmil (d. 1288/1871), and ʿAbd al-Qādir
al-Jazāʾirī (d. 1300/1883), led armed resistance movements and called for jihād.
In the historical context and the institutional history of Islamic mysticism,
Muslim states like Egypt introduced modern administrative practices into Ṣūfī
orders (ṭuruq).
(5) In the last section, we propose to call what emerged from the twentieth
century onwards a “baraka bureaucracy.” This refers to Ṣūfī officials, if not ap-
paratchiks, for example in Soviet Uzbekistan and in Syria, or Ṣūfī associations
( jamāʿas) pursuing political agendas, as in Indonesia, Turkey, and western
Europe. Lastly, we can observe the explicit backing, even the creation, of politi-
cal parties by Ṣūfī lineages in Senegal, the Sudan, Iraqi Kurdistan, and Pakistan,
a practice that can be interpreted as an attempt to give a spiritual dimension
to nationalist ideologies.

1 Ṣūfīs and Mediaeval States

The distrust of scholars towards political power manifested itself very early
in Islamic intellectual history. In addition to the ḥadīth stating, “God hates
nothing more than a Qurʾān reader who visits a ruler (amīr)” (Wensinck, I,
397b7), many statements often repeated by mystics warn that “the worst rul-
ers are those most remote from the scholars, and the worst scholars are those
closest to the rulers” (Rosenthal, 330). According to Baghdad masters such as
the celebrated al-Junayd (d. 298/910), political life contradicted the spiritual
quest, and involvement in politics constituted opposition to the divine de-
cree (Junayd). The Khurāsān Ṣūfī milieu, in the person of the influential Ṣūfī
theorist al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021), gave birth to the legend of Ibrāhīm b. Adham
(d. c. 161/777–8) who is said to have abdicated his throne in Balkh to lead an
Sufism and Worldly Powers 257

ascetic life (Jones). Despite advice, ideals, and legends designed to discourage
mystics from worldly powers, mutual necessity between the two persisted. A
high official at the ʿAbbāsid court in Sāmarrāʾ (in present-day Iraq), al-Shiblī
(d. 334/946) is a vivid example of a Muslim who abandoned his post to become
a Ṣūfī under the supervision of al-Junayd, but neverthless, remained close to
court circles in Baghdad until the end of his life (Sobieroj). More profoundly,
the tragic course of events and the weight of the corrupt and injust world,
forced ascetics and gnostics to take part in temporal affairs.
The first and greatest challenge was the preservation of Islam itself, the
spread of which took dramatic turns in the frontier lands (thughūr) between
dār al-Islām (“the abode of Islam”) and dār al-ḥarb (“the abode of war”).
Interestingly, the “real” Ibn Adham probably engaged in military operations
on the border with Byzantium in greater Syria, whereas his student Shaqīq
al-Balkhī (d. 194/810) led a jihād against Turks in Central Asia (Mojaddedi;
Ephrat and Pinto in this volume). The life and the writings of ʿAbdallāh b.
al-Mubārak (d. 181/797) reveal that he was an ascetic who shunned worldliness,
yet did not shun the world itself. Later sources depict him as a scholar teaching
ḥadīth, and a warrior who travelled from Iran to the Arab-Byzantine frontier
to fight for the sake of God. In his foundational treatise, the Kitāb al-jihād, he
presents holy war as not simply a legal concept, but as a spiritual discipline,
dependent on pure intentions and equivalent to intensive worship and piety
(Salem, 76–104). The struggle for Islam continued until the fifth/eleventh
century: the Ṣūfī moralist, proselyte and benefactor Kāzarūnī (d. 426/1033)
used to dispatch fighters (ghāzī, pl. ghāziyān) to Asia Minor to wage war on
the Christians of Byzantium, while he himself combatted Zoroastrians in Fārs
and negotiated the tensions between religious communities with the Būyid
vizier in Shiraz (Meier, Persian text ch. 17 and 23). What we might label the
“ascetic jihād” of early mediaeval times defies the common assumption among
scholars that Ṣūfīs distinguished between the “lesser” (aṣghar) jihād and the
“greater” (akbar) jihād, and emphasised the latter over the former; this was not
the case until the spiritualising theories of al-Ghazālī and Ibn al-ʿArabī; and
despite their legacy, in subsequent centuries, these theories were exceptions
rather than the rule (Cook, Jihad, ch. 2; see below on the Ṣūfī jihād in moder-
nity; Cook in this volume).
The Islamic states, rather than the “infidels,” were equally problematic for
pious Muslim individuals. In Ifrīqiyya (modern Tunisia) under the Shīʿī dynas-
ty of the Fāṭimids, the provocative saint Abū Isḥāq al-Jabanyānī (d. 369/979)
challenged the political authorities with his insults and miracles. According
to one hagiographical tradition, the patron saint of Tunis, Muḥriz b. Khalaf
(d. 413/1022), defended Sunnī orthodoxy against official Shīʿīsm and encouraged
258 Papas

the condemnation and execution of the Shīʿīs of Tunis under the Ḥammādids
(r. 405/1015 to 515 or 518–47/1121 or 1124–52), a dynasty that severed its relations
with the Fāṭimids (Idris; Pellat). There was no question of holy war; instead,
Ṣūfīs supported a part of the population’s resistance against what they per-
ceived to be illegitimate or oppressive powers.
This political stance often found its moral justification in the Qurʾānic pre-
cept of “commanding right and forbidding wrong” (al-amr bi-l-maʿrūf wa-l-
nahy ʿan al-munkar) (from Q 3:104 and other verses). The precept was known
as ḥisba (censorship, lit. “accountability”), according to al-Ghazālī, in his Iḥyāʾ
ʿulūm al-dīn (Revival of the religious sciences) in Arabic and his Kīmiyā-yi
saʿādat (Elixir of happiness) in Persian. It was previously invoked by ascetic
fighters to validate extending their self-discipline to the environment around
them; it was also used by the Arab-Iranian Ṣūfī Sahl al-Tustarī (d. 283/896),
who conceptualised a religious leader assigned by God to, among other things,
forbid wrong and command right. Concerning the wrongdoing of rulers and
the duty to rebel, al-Ghazālī defended the right to exhort, to oppose verbally,
and to sacrifice one’s life for the cause; and if necessary, the recourse to force
was admissible without the rulers’ permission. Here again, the idea of doing
something for God’s sake without personal or worldly motives was decisive
(Cook, Commanding, 427–68).
Though not specifically a Ṣūfī viewpoint, these subtly radical ideas cata-
lysed a series of factors in the Muslim West, and these factors converged to give
Sufism an unprecedented political significance. Considered a blameworthy in-
novation (bidʿa) by many Mālikī jurists in the Maghrib, the Iḥyāʾ was prohib-
ited in Fez and Marrakesh in the sixth/twelfth century and publicly burnt in
509/1103 on the order of the qāḍī of Cordoba, Ibn Ḥamdīn (d. 508/1114). Yet
this book continued to be read and deeply effected its Ṣūfī readers; al-Murābiṭ
authorities increased their pressure. Al-Ghazālī’s revival project was accom-
panied by messianic expectations among Ṣūfīs, and this concerned the local
rulers. Thus, the renowned Andalusian master Abū Madyan (d. 589/1193 or
594/1198), who read and spread the doctrines of the Iḥyāʾ, avoided conflicts
with political authorities but was denounced to the sultan as a threat to the
dynasty (dawla) because he was seen by the populace as a potential messiah
(mahdī) and, moreover, his disciples were widespread (García-Arenal, 105–
14). The Ṣūfī idea of a saintly elite with access to God contributed to Mahdist
hopes and convinced followers that among this elite a guide would emerge for
the community of the faithful. Although what some scholars called the Ṣūfī
“school of Almeria” did not exist as such, its personalities corresponded with
one another by letter, and this was sufficient to arouse suspicion among juridi-
cal and political authorities. In 536/1141, the al-Murābiṭ sultan in the Maghrib
Sufism and Worldly Powers 259

and southern Spain ʿAlī b. Yūsuf b. Tāshufīn (r. 500–37/1106–43) ordered

the arrest of three leading Ṣūfīs, namely Abū Bakr al-Mayūrqī (d. 537/1143),
Ibn Barrajān (d. 536/1141), and Ibn al-ʿArīf (d. 536/1141). The first escaped, but
apparently the other two were put to death (García-Arenal, ch. 5).
The political involvement of these two figures has not been firmly estab-
lished by historians. According to classical Muslim sources, Ibn Barrajān was a
rebellious Mahdist leader who claimed to be an Imam and obtained the alle-
giance of 130 villages. His opposition to the inquisition of the al-Murābiṭ jurists
( fuqahāʾ) led to a resistance movement. Surnamed “al-Ghazālī of al-Andalus,”
the master was a recognised scholar in ḥadīth, theology (kalām), and Sufism.
Ibn al-ʿArīf is presented as a close disciple of Ibn Barrajān, though less com-
promised by “subversive activities” than his master. Author of the Maḥāsin
al-majālis (Attractions of mystical sessions), a short treatise on the spiritual
stages of the gnostic, Ibn al-ʿArīf was also a respected scholar (Böwering and
Casewit, part 1; Faure). Rather than advancing political reasons for their ex-
ecutions, historians argued that the dramatic events described above were
the result of religious tensions caused by the rise of learned Ṣūfīs whom legal
scholars saw as rivals. The writings of these two Ṣūfīs are spiritual in nature
and do not suggest that they approved of rebellion against a ruling authority,
who was thought to be appointed by God and, therefore, legitimate. Likewise,
historical sources do not confirm the violent death of Ibn Barrajān (Bellver).
In terms of relationships with the state and political involvement, the case
of Ibn Qasī (d. 546/1151) is clear. In Algarve (now southern Portugal), the shaykh
built a fortified hermitage (rābiṭa) where he studied the works of al-Ghazālī and
adepts called murīdūn (disciples) assembled. In a climate of religious repres-
sion and political instability, Ibn Qasī preached revolt against the al-Murābiṭ
and seized the fortress of Mertola in 539/1144. The town officials pledged al-
legiance to the Ṣūfī who coined money and declared himself the Mahdī and
Imām, assuming temporal power (wilāya). Less than a year later, dissension
forced him to join the rising dynasty of the al-Muwāḥḥid who appointed him
governor of Shilb (modern Silves). Ibn Qasī was finally assassinated in 546/1151
(Dreher; Lagardère). Here, the scholarly debate concerns not the theological-
political nature of Ibn Qasī’s deeds but the distinctiveness of his thought. His
esoteric book Kitāb khalʿ al-naʿlayn (Book of the removal of the two sandals)
has been read as a political theosophy deeply influenced by Ismāʿīlī concep-
tions in which the saint takes on a messianic and eschatological mission on
earth (Ebstein).
Whatever the doctrine, the murīdūn revolt in Iberia seems to be the first
major insurrection led by Muslim mystics. Remarkably, another insurrection
was noted by historians. In 638/1240, the heterodox Ṣūfī sect of the Bābāʾīs led
260 Papas

by the Turkmen shaykhs Bābā Ilyās Khurāsānī (d. 638/1240) and Bābā Isḥāq
(d. 638/1240) challenged Saljūq rule in Anatolia. Although little is known about
the Bābāʾī doctrine, it was clearly imbued with Ṣūfī antinomianism and strongly
tinted by messianism. As for the political dimension, most experts consider the
insurrections to be a result of sociopolitical conflicts between semi-nomadic
groups and sedentary populations supported by the Saljūqs, while others em-
phasise local causes related to taxes and a regional feud with the Chalcedonian
Armenians (Ocak, Babaîler; Beldiceanu-Steinherr; Ocak in this volume).
Whereas the narratives of intercessory meetings between the Saljūq sultans
and fourth-/tenth- and fifth-/eleventh-century Qalandars (Kalenders) such
as Bābā Ṭāhir ʿUryān (d. 401/1010) (lit., “the naked”) and Darwīsh Āhū-pūsh
(lit., “the one covered by a gazelle skin”) are legendary (Ocak, Marjinal Sûfîlik,
18–22; Baldick), later, better attested cases show that the relationships between
Anatolian Ṣūfīs and power institutions tended to fluctuate between mutual
suspicion and common interests.
In terms of the literature produced by court authors in the Muslim East,
it depicts holy individuals as legitimising the reign of temporal rulers.
Hagiographers, for example, of the Khurāsānī saint Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr
(d. 440/1049), extrapolated the effectiveness of his power from the authority
he exercised over the political and military elite. To these authors, true sover-
eignty was in the hands of the saint, not those of the sultan. This explains why
the biographer of the Persian Ṣūfī Aḥmad-i Jām (d. 536/1141) described him as
the spiritual patron of the Saljūq sultan Sanjar b. Malikshāh (d. 552/1157). More
concretely, signs of contacts between Ṣūfīs and political figures are visible in
another kind of document that is crucial later: letters exchanged between the
Saljūq vizier Niẓām al-Mulk (d. 485/1092), who asks for advice and from two
Ṣūfīs, ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī l-Harawī (d. 481/1089) and Abū l-Ḥasan Bustī (d. ?).
This confirms the rapprochement between rulers and ascetics, though at this
point, it cannot yet be considered a relation of patronage and reciprocal ser-
vices (Karamustafa, 144–55, 176). An imaginary of Ṣūfī sainthood as similar to
governorship began to emerge, though these speculations only found their full
expression and institutional application in the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/
fourteenth centuries onwards.

2 Ṣūfīs and Sultans

Often explained by the Mongol invasions of the 610s/1220s onwards and the
resultant necessity of re-establishing social structures and restoring religious
authority, the rise of Ṣūfī orders in the Muslim East was also the result of a
Sufism and Worldly Powers 261

longer, less conjunctural, process. The royal patronage—including Mongol—

of Islamic asceticism-mysticism provided the economic basis for its institu-
tionalisation (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume). This patronage also introduced
new forms of collaboration between Ṣūfīs and sultans.
In Iran, the Ilkhānid Mongol ruling circles included spiritual masters who
played a part in the Mongols’ conversion to Islam. For a long time, the ori-
entalist scholarly tradition maintained that these figures who had the ear of
the khans were antinomian dervishes comparable to inner Asian shamans.
Mediaevalists showed that these Muslims in fact belonged to a legalist tra-
dition and were similar to the learned milieu of the ʿulamāʾ (Amitai-Preiss).
While Tegüder Aḥmad (r. 680–3/1282–84), son of Hülegü (d. 663/1265), convert-
ed to Islam under the influence of controversial Ṣūfīs like Kamāl al-Dīn ʿAbd
al-Raḥmān and Īshān Mengli (d. 690/1291), Ghāzān Khān (r. 694–713/1295–
1304) embraced the Muslim faith at the hands of the Kubrawī shaykh Ṣadr
al-Dīn Ibrāhīm Ḥammūya (d. 722/1322) and welcomed other Ṣūfīs at his court.
A certain shaykh Niẓām al-Dīn Maḥmūd was among a delegation of scholars
and officials who accompanied the khan to Syria in 699/1300. The relationship
between Ṣūfīs and the Ilkhānid rulers was perhaps less spiritual than educa-
tional and diplomatic; regardless of their motivations, leaders of Ṣūfī orders
were close to the sphere of power. According to his hagiography, Amīn al-Dīn
Balyānī (d. 745/1345), an admirer and memorialist of Kāzarūnī, considered
it his duty to struggle against the injustice of the authorities, but he did not
oppose temporal powers and supported the Īnjū dynasty (c. 725–54/1325–53)
of Fārs. The shaykh was the spiritual protector of the dynast Sharaf al-Dīn
Maḥmūd Shāh (r. 703–25/1304–25), and had a strong influence on him and his
son (Aigle). As for the Kart dynasty in eighth-/fourteenth-century Khurāsān,
the elite descendants of Aḥmad-i Jām, who were linked by marriage to the Kart
governors, played the role of mediators between the Karts and the Ilkhānids,
and eventually collaborated in governance. What they perceived as the inevi-
table rise of the Chaghatayids convinced the pragmatic shaykhs of Jām to be-
tray their kinsmen in favour of the new power (Potter). Beyond pragmatism,
the principle of loyalty to those in power (whoever they may be) superseded
the value of loyalty to a leader in an effort to avoid discord ( fitna).
The Iranian examples remind us that the sultans’ patronage of Ṣūfīs cannot
be reduced to a relationship of instrumentalisation of the Ṣūfīs by the rulers; in
fact, the political engagement of saints became institutionalised in a recipro-
cal and collaborative system.
Often buried next to one another, Ṣūfī shaykhs assumed a variety of roles
in relation to rulers in Central Asia, frequent tensions between these two par-
ties notwithstanding. One such role was proselytizing, as, for example, in the
262 Papas

episode of the conversion to Islam of Berke Khān (r. 655–65/1257–67) (the future
ruler of the Golden Horde) at the hands of Sayf al-Dīn Bākharzī (d. 659/1261), a
disciple of Najm al-Dīn Kubrā (d. 618/1221). Another role was that of educator
and spiritual mentor, as in the case of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1389),
the eponymous founder of the Naqshbandiyya Ṣūfī order who taught his spiri-
tual path to the prince of Herat Malik Ḥusayn (r. 732–71/1332–70). We also find
Ṣūfīs with more straightforward political roles, mainly as mediators resolving
political conflicts (e.g., when nomad armies attacked the Bukhara citadel and
Ṣūfīs mediated to avoid a massacre), and as kingmakers. For example, Ṣūfī mas-
ters allegedly asserted the legitimacy of Tīmūr (Tamerlane; r. 771–807/1370–
1405), predicted his domination, and participated in his enthronement (Paul,
Scheiche und Herrscher).
From the early modern period onwards, the political advent of the
Naqshbandiyya was an important element that had long-lasting consequenc-
es. The attitude of the early masters, known as Khwājagān, was initially qui-
etist and apolitical. The shaykhs issued statements such as “Do not sit with
rulers and sons of rulers,” recommended that their followers stay away from
the public sphere in general, cultivate patience (ṣabr), and apply a principle of
“solitude within society” (khalvat dar anjuman); that is, be socially active, but
remain inwardly focused on God. Towards the middle of the ninth/fifteenth
century, the Naqshbandī attitude changed radically when ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār
(d. 895/1490) led a Ṣūfī order that came to dominate Central Asian Islam; he
stated, “a good khwāja must benefit Muslims and must also mingle with amīrs
and sulṭāns….” Aḥrār acted accordingly (Paul, Solitude within society; Gross).
Among the elements that changed were the land tenure system, which al-
lowed religious figures to accumulate endowment properties; the weakening
of central authority in the Timūrid political structure; and the Islamic belief
system that attributed power and authority to Ṣūfī saints. Though hagiogra-
phers may have exaggerated Aḥrār’s political influence (for example, in ʿAlī
b. Ḥusayn al-Wāʿiẓ al-Kāshifī’s (d. c. 939/1532) influential work, Rashaḥāt ʿayn
al-ḥayāt (Tricklings from the fountain of life)), endowment (waqf ) deeds
and letters between the shaykh (or his trusted disciples) and sultans such as
Ḥusayn Bāyqarā (r. 873–911/1469–1506) document Aḥrār’s authoritarian role as
advisor to decision-makers at the court and as a mediator in disputes between
princes. He acted to ensure peace and unity and uphold the sharīʿa and a strict
Sunnism (Chekhovich; Gross and Urunbaev, 14–17, 24–36). With Aḥrār, the
“solitude within society” principle found a political significance; he shaped the
doctrinal framework to ensure that political involvement became not only licit
but spiritually rewarding (Algar, 145).
Sufism and Worldly Powers 263

The spread of the Naqshbandiyya, notably the Aḥrārīs, in India is among the
major, albeit late elements that may explain the confluence between Ṣūfīs and
sultans. In contrast to the idealised principle, according to which Indian Ṣūfīs
(particularly the Chishtiyya order) kept aloof from politics, we find a cross-study
of chronicles, hagiographies, conversations, and letters (all written in Persian),
that show to what extent saintly authority and courtly power ultimately
merged into a politico-religious interdependence. In contrast to exhortations
such as, “If you desire to attain the position of great saints, do not pay atten-
tion to princes” by the Chishtī master Farīd al-Dīn Ganj-i Shakar (d. 664/1265),
numerous narratives from the Delhi Sultanate made use of a different rhetoric,
which brought saints and sultans closer together (Auer, Intersections between
Sufis and power). In the chronicle Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī (Generations of [sultan]
Nāṣir) by Minhāj-i Sirāj Jūzjānī (d. after 659/1260) as well as in the hagiography
Fawāʾid al-fuʾād (Benefits of the heart) by Ḥasan Dihlavī (d. 737/1336) we find
tales about the predictions ( firāsa) of Ṣūfī shaykhs and descriptions of them
blessing rulers who then became sultans. Court chroniclers sought to establish
a sultan’s destiny as decided by God, while Ṣūfī authors sought to show that the
saint’s clairvoyance confirmed his role as maker of destiny and vehicle of God’s
will. Other historians and Ṣūfī biographers deliberately confused the two fig-
ures: on the one hand, Ṣūfī masters were called sultans, surrounded by a court
of disciples who received robes (khirqa) during a quasi-royal ceremony; on
the other, sultans were depicted as shaykhs who possessed the qualities of the
friends of God (awṣāf-i awliyāʾ); they were blessed and had miraculous powers.
Beyond the symbolic nature of a literary culture, this rhetoric reveals ways of
thinking and common conceptions and beliefs that resulted in actual practices
and institutional realities.
It is said that the sultan Shams al-Dīn Īltutmish (r. 607–33/1211–36) was re-
quired by his official historians to maintain his relations with Ṣūfī masters. He
seems to have been particularly pious and devout, not simply in his own reli-
gious practice but also in developing Delhi as an Islamic city. In the collective
memory of Indian Sufism, the sultan appears as a great patron of mysticism,
strongly supported by Chishtī shaykhs and influenced by Ṣūfīs in his policy of
accommodation with Hindus. Not all shaykhs promoted concord with Hindus:
the Chishtī Ṣābirī master ʿAbd al-Quddūs Gangohī (d. 944/1537) wrote let-
ters to the Mughal emperor Bābur (r. 932–6/1526–30), asking him to exclude
the “infidels” from high offices and deny them financial assistance from the
government (Alam, Languages, 84–8, 160–1). Concerning the Afghan Lodī dy-
nasty, ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq Muḥaddith Dihlavī’s (d. 1052/1642) hagiographical com-
pendium mentions a plethora of examples. Shaykh Muḥammad Mallāwah’s
264 Papas

(d. 900/1495) prayer made the harvest so abundant that the sultan Sikandar
Lodī (r. 894–923/1489–1517) thanked God for the saint’s presence; Malik Zayn
al-Dīn (d. 926/1520) was a noble (vakīl) at the court of a governor Khān Jahān
(cousin of Sikandar), and Zayn’s brother Shaykh Vazīr al-Dīn (d. 932/1526) fell
on the battlefield; some Ṣūfīs were consulted before combat to give their pre-
dictions while others were given diplomatic missions (ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq Dihlavī,
345–6, 414–5, 453–5, 585).
Regarding the mediaeval Deccan, historians have suggested that the ha-
giographical narratives—written much later—minimised the violence of the
Islamisation process in which Ṣūfīs participated. We have the onomastics like
shahīd (martyr) and asad al-awliyāʾ (lion of the saints), which reveal the pres-
ence of holy warriors alongside the military, and in at least two cases, promi-
nent Ṣūfī combatants, i.e., Ṣūfī Sarmast (d. 680/1281?) (a disciple of Niẓām
al-Dīn Awliyāʾ) fought Hindus in Maharashtra, and Pīr Maʿbar Kʾhandāʾit
(d. ?) joined a military expedition to South India against the Tamil in 710/1311.
However, other scholars argue that surnames were merely symbolic epithets
and, more importantly, the few sources available depict the Chishtīs’ social
role and mystical philosophy according to which most of them were religious
leaders not engaged in military activities; the “warrior Ṣūfī” was a later legend-
ary construction used to legitimise the Muslim conquest of the Deccan (Eaton,
19–44; Ernst, 99–105). This did not mean that Ṣūfīs were apolitical. The case
of the Khuldābād (in Maharashtra) Chishtīs epitomises the complex relations
of independence and interdependence, of proximity and distance that mys-
tics maintained with the powers-that-be (Ernst, 191–215). Integrated into the
patronage system, Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (d. 725/1325), his deputy (khalīfa) in
the Deccan Burhān al-Dīn Gharīb (d. 738/1337), and the latter’s successor Zayn
al-Dīn Shīrāzī (d. 771/1369), did not accept (in theory) the donations, but ad-
mitted them in practice under specific legal conditions. Administrators and
notables used to visit the shaykhs to take their opinions, to listen to sermons,
or to be initiated. After his initiation into the Chishtiyya, Qutlugh Khān, the
Tughluq governor of Daulatabad from 736/1335 to 745/1344, was reputed to be
a king outwardly but a Ṣūfī inwardly. The fact that his successor did not follow
the same path and Zayn al-Dīn saw him as an oppressor is a reminder that
the links between Ṣūfīs and rulers were tense and fragile. In addition to the
“Maussian gift” obligations (a theory of the French sociologist Marcel Mauss
on the threefold obligation to give, receive, and return, an obligation that then
creates social interdependence), Ṣūfī prayers for the emperor, the bestowal of
relics, and attendance at the enthronement, shaykhs tried to avoid personal
involvement with the court, though they encouraged their disciples to obtain
government posts.
Sufism and Worldly Powers 265

In India from the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries on-

wards, the reciprocal system of patronage facilitated the construction of
a large number of shrines and Ṣūfī lodges. These holy places and their sur-
roundings embodied, both spatially and socially, the jurisdiction (wilāya) of
the saint within which he could exercise direct influence. Such a political and
spiritual rule over a territory, or wilāya, challenged the patronage equilibrium
and could represent competition with the reigning sultan, at least as a rhe-
torical threat, and marked, in the intellectual history of Sufism, the rise of the
politico-religious understanding of the concept of sanctity (walāya). The con-
ceptual keystone of walāya as wilāya was transmitted to mediaeval Indian ha-
giographers and historians by the Ṣūfī thinker al-Hujwīrī (d. between 465/1072
and 469/1077) (Digby; Auer, Symbols, ch. 4); through Aḥmad-i Jām, too, in his
controversy with Mawdūd Chishtī (d. 527/1133) (Moayyad and Lewis, 154–60);
and it also surfaced in the mediaeval Middle East and was experienced at a
large scale in the early modern period.
Like the Mughals, the Ottomans patronised Ṣūfīs and contributed to
the institutionalisation of orders, three in particular. In this period, the
Naqşibendiyye were less involved in religious policy (Le Gall, 137–50); instead,
the proto-Bektāşiyye, through Otmān Bābā (d. 883/1478) for instance, partici-
pated in the armed Islamisation campaigns of western Anatolia and Thrace.
The association of the Bektāşīs with the Ottoman army may have been the ori-
gin of the creation of the elite Janissary regiment placed under their spiritual
guidance. In reciprocation, the sultans, especially Bāyezīd II (r. 886–918/1481–
1512), made significant donations to the order. Later, the highly centralised ad-
ministration of the Bektāşiyye seemed to mirror the organisational structure
of the Ottoman court, and in fact the Imperial Council (Dīvān-ı Hümāyūn)
confirmed or rejected the appointment of the heads of lodges (Faroqhi, 77–
92; Zarcone, Bektāşiyye). Another prominent and well-organised Ṣūfī order,
the Mawlawiyya/Mevleviyye benefited from the patronage of the Saljūqs and
the Ottomans over the long term. Inspired by the famous poet Mawlānā Jalāl
al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273) but established by his son Sulṭān Walad (d. 712/1312),
the family-run ṭarīqa was centred in Konya but spread, both geographically
and politically, toward the capital city Istanbul, with the help of successive sul-
tans such as Murād II (r. 824–48, 850–5/1421–44, 1446–51), Meḥmed II (r. 848–
50/1444–6 and 855–86/1451–81) and Bāyezīd II (Gölpınarlı, 267–78; Thāqıb
Dede, I: 139–49). The activities of a third brotherhood, the Khalwatiyya/
Halvetiyye were characterised by “Sunnitization,” rather than Islamisation.
The Ottomans privileged this rather urban Ṣūfī order, which cooperated with
them in the struggle to assert Sunnī Islam in Anatolia and the Balkans. Aq
Shams al-Dīn (d. 863/1459) was the spiritual counsellor of Meḥmed II; Ṣofyalı
266 Papas

Bālī Efendī (d. 960/1553) spied for the imperial authorities on the Ṣafavids and
on the “heretics”; and his successor Nūr al-Dīn Zāde (d. 979/1571) insisted that
advising state officials was more urgent than initiating the masses. This elit-
ist political position could not but be intertwined with loyalty conflicts and
regional enmities, leading rival shaykhs to very different fates and rendering
occult sciences (predictions, dreams, revelations, talismans, etc.) politically
sensitive (Clayer, Mystiques, 69–112; Karataş).
Sufism in the Middle East drew the attention of the state authorities long
before the Ottoman conquest. In 569/1173, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn or Saladin (r. 564–
89/1169–93) endowed the first Ṣūfī lodge in Cairo, named Saʿīd al-Suʿadāʾ (lit.,
“happiest of the happy”), and introduced the office of the “chief master” (shaykh
al-shuyūkh), on the model of the one established in Damascus under Nūr al-Dīn
Zangī (r. 541–69/1147–74). This marked the beginning of the Ayyūbids active in-
terest in Sufism. Prosopography confirms that, until 709/1309, this institution
remained in the hands of non-Egyptians who were more elite politicians than
mystics, and were well connected with the Ayyūbid and the early Mamlūk rul-
ing class. At the heart of this state-sponsored system, master shaykhs such as
ʿImād al-Dīn ʿUmar (d. 636/1239) or Taqī l-Dīn al-ʿAllāmī (d. 695/1295) acted
as viziers and diplomats, in addition to serving at the lodge, i.e. teaching law,
leading rituals, and overseeing everyday activities. Above all, the purpose of
the lodge was to spread the ideology of the state, in this case juridical Sufism
based on Sunnī Shāfiʿī Ashʿarī doctrine (Hofer, ch. 1; Gottschalk).
Other Ṣūfīs in Egypt, especially the Shādhiliyya order under the guid-
ance of Abū l-ʿAbbās al-Mursī (d. 686/1287) and Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Allāh al-Iskandarī
(d. 709/1309), remained aloof from the state. More informal movements in
Upper Egypt were even hostile to Mamlūk rule (Hofer, 128–36, 179–85). From
the perspective of religious history, whatever the balance of pragmatism and
personal interest that determined the attitudes of Ṣūfīs and sultans, a common
belief linked these figures throughout the late mediaeval period. According to
Qurʾān 25:12 (among many other verses), omnipotence belongs to God alone;
the delegation of sovereignty (mulk) to men is metaphorical, and sovereigns
(malik, pl. mulūk) come after the prophets, caliphs, and saints in the hierar-
chy of power. As a result, the position of Ṣūfīs vis-a-vis the state was fragile,
but the legitimacy of rulers was equally uncertain. Under the Mamlūks and
the Ottomans, in Syria and Egypt, the amīrs and sulṭāns believed (iʿtiqād) in
the sainthood of Ṣūfī shaykhs, through whom they saw the possibility of su-
pernatural assistance (madad), and the shaykhs, in turn, urged the rulers to
publicly seek spiritual advice, religious legitimacy, and occult intervention
(Geoffroy, 101–108).
Sufism and Worldly Powers 267

Conversely, although many Ṣūfīs were closely affiliated with rulers, various
prominent masters of the time expressed serious doubts. For instance, the il-
literate ʿAlī l-Khawwāṣ (d. 939/1532) maintained that Ṣūfīs should not actively
engage with temporal rulers to advance their own interests. Yet, seeking in-
tercession for someone else was considered laudable. Notably, the polymath
al-Suyūṭī (d. 911/1505), in his Mā rawā-hu al-asāṭīn fī ʿadam al-majīʾ ilā l-salāṭīn
(What has been transmitted by the authorities about not going to the sultans),
rejected contact with men of power on the grounds that, according to numer-
ous ḥadīths, scholars may be affected by proximity to worldly rulers who have
committed political misdeeds (Mauder). This debate among Ṣūfīs not only
challenged the legitimacy of this or that ruler, but it also challenged secular
rulership itself, such that Ṣūfī advice literature seemed to presage politico-
religious upheavals.

3 The Esoteric Government

The ancient genre of Islamic ‘mirrors for princes’ attracted Ṣūfī authors quite
early. Aside from a chapter of the Kīmiyā entitled “On governing and exercis-
ing authority,” the theologian al-Ghazālī is believed to have produced a major
reference work, the Naṣīḥat al-mulūk (Advice for kings, esp. part 1), on the
practices of statecraft and the spiritual ideals required for a ruler conceived
of as “viceregent of God” (khalīfat Allāh). Composed in Persian, it was trans-
lated into Arabic and Turkish, and was circulated widely. The Mirṣād al-ʿibād
min al-mabda‌ʾ ilā l-maʿād (The path of God’s bondsmen from origin to return,
esp. part 5, ch. 1–3) by the Kubrawī master Dāya Rāzī (d. 654/1256) was also
written in Persian then translated into Arabic and even Chinese. This work
offered kings, ministers, and deputies guidance on the spiritual path. Another
Kubrawī, Sayyid ʿAlī Hamadānī (d. 786/1385) from Iran wrote the Dhakhīrat
al-mulūk (The treasure for kings) in which he discussed the principles of gov-
ernance for Muslim rulers and state officials on the model of the Prophet and
the first caliphs (Bagley; Razi, 395–444; Riyāḍ). These popular works, which
were copied and spread in the Mamlūk, Saljūq, Ottoman, and Mughal courts,
remained in the conceptual frame of the Ṣūfī-sultan patronage system; they
also revealed the mystics’ growing interest in political involvement.
Beyond this, Central Asian Ṣūfīs of the Timūrid and post-Timūrid peri-
ods openly called for rulers to support Ṣūfī orders and “convert” to Sufism. If
Kāshifī’s (d. 910/1504–05) Akhlāq-i muḥsinī (The Muhsinian ethics) does not
bear Ṣūfī characteristics, the esoteric mirror for princes by the Herat polymath
268 Papas

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 898/1492), entitled Salāmān va Absāl urged the Āq
Qoyūnlū ruler to recognise that “authentic kingship” consists of becoming a
Ṣūfī ruler, that is, the “shadow of God” (ẓill Allāh) who repents (tawba) and
disciplines his ego (nafs). Another prolific Naqshbandī writer, Aḥmad Kāsānī,
known as Makhdūm-i Aʿẓam (d. 949/1542), explicitly argued that Ṣūfīs should
seek elite patronage to defend, beyond his own order, Sunnī Islam as a whole,
and that the patron-monarch should be a mystic animated by spiritual energy
(himmat) and devoted to the Almighty. Ultimately, the ruler is confronted with
the aporia of power in powerlessness and sovereignty in servitude. Kāsānī’s
reference to the four conditions of defending the Ṣūfī path—i.e. a unified com-
munity (ikhwān), a place (makān) to gather, a stable time period (zamān), and
the ruler’s (khān’s) religiosity—perhaps inspired Khazīnī, a tenth-/sixteenth-
century Yasawī shaykh who moved from Transoxiana to Istanbul and produced
(in Turkic and Arabic) the Manbaʿ al-abḥār fī riyāḍ al-abrār (The source of
waters in the gardens of the righteous), in which he mentions the same four
conditions (Lingwood; Papas, Cheikhs et sultans; Hazînî, 343–57).
With the exception of Makhdūm-i Aʿẓam’s descendants, as we see, it is
difficult to assess the impact of these treatises on the political behaviour of
that time. Other Ṣūfī authors wrote advice literature addressed to their fellow
Muslims in general rather than the rulers in particular, without any interest
in political commitment. In his al-Naṣīḥa al-kāfiya (The sufficient advice) and
elsewhere, basing himself on the Prophet’s traditions, the Mālikī jurist and
Shādhilī Ṣūfī from Fez, Aḥmad Zarrūq (d. 899/1494), urged the elite to obey
legitimate authorities and denied Ṣūfīs the role of kingmakers and the right to
oppose the sultan or justify actions against him (Kugle, 162).
The Jazūliyya lineage in Morocco was a main and concrete target of Zarrūq’s
denunciation. During the Marīnid period (614–869/1217/1465), Islamic mys-
ticism was institutionalised, organised fraternities were created, and the
Sharifian model of authority (an ideology derived from early Shīʿism, in which
the politico-religious authority rested on descent from the Prophet) was in-
troduced. Muḥammad al-Jazūlī (d. 869/1465) founded a Ṣūfī order that sought
to establish a saintly power structure in both word and deed. In a context of
moral crisis and social upheaval in Morocco, al-Jazūlī organised his Ṣūfī order
according to rigorous rules. His disciples applied a fourteen-step program
known as “rules of repentance” (shurūṭ al-tawba); this was followed by train-
ing to acquire ten attributes of self-discipline. Ṣūfīs were encouraged to visit
religious leaders to prepare Ṣūfī networks for political mobilisation. The quasi-
prophetic knowledge of the master made his disciples’ obedience absolute.
Al-Jazūlī cast himself as spiritual leader with social and political responsibili-
ties to whom authority (wilāya) was granted by his closeness to God (walāya).
Sufism and Worldly Powers 269

In the face of the disintegrating Marīnid state, which was threatened by rising
Portuguese power, the shaykh who called for holy war appeared to many as a
last recourse. Al-Jazūlī died before accomplishing his grande oeuvre but the
Jazūliyya realised it, at least in part (Cornell, ch. 6).
The ideology of the Jazūliyya order synthetised two concepts of saintly au-
thority: the above-mentioned Sharifian model and the imitatio Muḥammadi,
which consisted of following the Prophet’s example and governing Muslims ac-
cording to his directives. In a radical sense, the “Muḥammadan way” (al-ṭarīqa
al-Muḥammadiyya) the Jazūlī ʿAbdallāh al-Ghazwānī (d. 935/1528) presented
and the “sovereignty of saintly authority” (siyādat al-imāma) he theorised was
based on an eclectic collection of writings provided to the Ṣūfī saint of the
time with the prophets’ authority. The aim was to make him the vicegerent of
God on earth and the leader of people, a leader whose charisma resembled
that of the Shīʿī imam, though the order was based on mediaeval Ṣūfī theories
of sainthood. The Jazūlī doctrine concretised itself in social reality with the
involvement of its advocates in dynastic politics. Al-Ghazwānī recruited dis-
ciples among several tribes who were opposed to the Watṭṭāsid ruler who had
seized Fez from the Idrīsids. He then acquired the material support of local
tribal leaders and promoted himself as the paramount shaykh of Moroccan
Sufism and the true sultan of the masses. The shaykh definitively broke with
the Watṭṭāsids and the Idrīsids and joined the lesser-known Saʿdian sharīfs in
southern Morocco. As a jihād state struggling for the liberation of the Islamic
Maghrib from the yoke of foreign rule, the Saʿdian power reflected the ideology
of the Jazūliyya and indeed, in 961/1554, they succeeded in establishing a mon-
archy by divine right and in unifying Morocco; this was done by excluding its
Jazūlī intercessors from the circles of power, and finally persecuting the main
shaykhs (Cornell, ch. 7–8).
The nascent Ṣafavid state in Iran represents a second case of saintly ruler-
ship. The Ṣafaviyya Ṣūfī order, named after Ṣafī [l-Dīn Ardabīlī] (d. 735/1334),
a member of an old and influential family from Ardabil near the Caspian Sea,
grew into a religio-political movement under the successive leadership of
Ṣadr al-Dīn (d. 794/1391), Khwāja ʿAlī (d. 832/1429), Junayd (d. 864/1460) and
Ḥaydar (d. 893/1488). The Ṣūfī order was marked by missionary zeal and their
bellicose character; as early as 851/1447, they obtained the military support of
Qizilbāsh (lit., “red heads”) Turkmen tribes whose chiefs pledged allegiance to
the Ṣafavid shāh (“king”) as disciples of a spiritual master. Although it is diffi-
cult to reconstruct with precision, historians have shown that the creed of the
first Ṣafavids was drawn from various sources, among them, the Turkish poetry
collection of Shāh Ismāʿīl (d. 930/1524). To the usual Ṣūfī conception of mas-
ters as saints (awliyāʾ) performing miracles were added less common elements,
270 Papas

such as the value of spiritual chivalry ( futuwwa, javānmardī), the veneration of

ʿAlī and the Imams, and “extreme” (or rather syncretic) Shīʿī views (ghulūw) on
cyclic cosmic time and on the divine essence of Ṣafaviyya shaykhs whom their
followers considered to be “gods” (ilāh) or “sons of god” (ibn Allāh). Chroniclers
asserted that Junayd combined the temporal sultanate (sulṭanat-i ṣūrī) with
the spiritual sultanate (sulṭanat-i maʿnavī) (Mazzaoui, 41–82; Babayan, xv–lvi).
With the death of his father Ḥaydar and after a long period of isolation in
Lahijan (in Gilan province, northwestern Iran) under the protection of the re-
gional Zaydī Shīʿī ruling family, in 899/1494 Shāh Ismāʿīl became the master
of the Ṣafaviyya and transformed the movement into a Shīʿī dynasty inspired
by the millenarian and messianic spirit that animated Iranian society at that
time. With the assistance of their Qizilbāsh devotees, the Ṣafavids defeated the
Āq Qoyūnlū armies in western Persia and Azerbaijan. In Tabriz in 906/1501,
the young holder of saintly authority (wilāya) proclaimed himself shāh, as-
cribed to himself divine qualities as the representative of the Twelve Imams,
and established a theocracy that replicated a Ṣūfī order. Its militants, mainly
composed of Turkmen tribes, observed a code of “Ṣūfī conduct” (ṣūfīgarī),
that included, among other duties, absolute submission to the “perfect guide”
(murshid-i kāmil). Ultimately, the new state moderated its own revolutionary
tendencies, persecuted Sunnī populations, and repressed major Ṣūfī orders in
Iran, all of which vitally affected the institutions of Shīʿī heterodoxy and Sunnī
Islamic mysticism throughout the lands controlled by the Ṣafavids (Roemer,
209–27; Matthee).
The third historical case of a Ṣūfī temporal sovereignty took place in eastern
Turkestan (present-day Xinjiang). As early as the second half of the eleventh/
seventeenth century, one of the numerous descendants of the aforementioned
Makhdūm-i Aʿẓam, Āfāq Khwāja (d. 1105/1694), founded the Naqshbandiyya
Āfāqiyya, a well-established order in the Tarim Basin. After losing the sup-
port of the Chaghatayid Ismāʿīl Khān (r. 1080–90/1670–9), who patronised
the rival branch of the Naqshbandiyya Isḥāqiyya, Āfāq was exiled in 1081/1671.
Paradoxically, his nearly ten years of banishment were depicted as a transre-
gional initiatory and ascetic journey, and became not only a major step in the
construction of Āfāq Khwāja’s sanctity (both narrated by and producing a
rich poetical and hagiographical tradition in Persian and Turkic) but also lent
him an exceptional political status. Though arduous, Āfāq Khwāja’s itinerary,
likely took him through Kashmir, possibly Tibet, and no doubt northwestern
China, where he initiated disciples, appointed deputies, and opened lodges.
Legends reported that Āfāq Khwāja met the fifth Dalai Lama and the Qing em-
peror Kangxi (r. 1661–1722), thus raising the shaykh, already a Sharifian and a
Sufism and Worldly Powers 271

Chingizid by marriage, to the rank of an imperial saint, equivalent to the great

rulers of the neighbouring empires (Papas, Soufisme et politique, part 2). After
returning to his homeland, Āfāq Khwāja conquered the Tarim Basin with the
military support of Junghar Mongols. Ismāʿīl Khān and his court were exiled.
In exchange for an annual tribute to the Junghars, Āfāq became the “king saint”
(khān khwāja) of Kashgaria.
Distinct from a khanate and a caliphate, the kingdom of the Āfāqī saints
(named īshān) can be called an “ishanate,” that is, a politico-religious regime
ruled by Ṣūfī saints according to the institutions, practices, and ideology of the
Central Asian Naqshbandiyya. While Āfāq governed his ishanate from a central
lodge in Yarkand, his son Yaḥyā (d. 1106/169) sat in the holy complex in Kashgar
and received numerous visitors who pledged allegiance to the īshāns. Financial
resources came from pious endowments (waqf ), as well as from numerous do-
nations (nudhūr and mawqūfāt) and religious taxes (ṣadaqa and zakāt). Thanks
to these institutions, the model of Ṣūfī sociability and ethics based on manners
(ādāb) spread among the entire society headed by Āfāq as the chief guarantor
of the sharīʿa and Sunna. Naqshbandī spiritual practices, such as repetition
[of God’s names] (dhikr) and spiritual audition (samāʿ) became collective and
devotional acts aimed at creating a mystical sense of community where, ide-
ally, egos disappeared to allow for an experience of union with God and its holy
servants, the īshāns. Inspired by the ideal of the Muḥammadan community,
Āfāq Khwāja conceived of his kingdom as a Ṣūfī province (wilāya) established
around his own sanctity (walāya). According to Āfāqī doctrinal writings, which
echo the aporia of power in powerlessness discussed by Makhdūm-i Aʿẓam,
the Khwāja saints’ quest for power was doomed to impotence. Ultimately, its
political construction was viewed not as a state-building process but, on the
contrary, as a destruction of profane existence, a negation of worldly illusions,
and a journey to a sacred Ṣūfī land (safar dar vaṭan). The ishanate remained
an Islamic utopia (Papas, Soufisme et politique, part 3). After Āfāq’s death, Ṣūfī
power did not vanish and the Khwājas remained dominant actors in eastern
Turkestan throughout the twelfth/eighteenth century.
Some historians understood the Maghribi “Muḥammadan way” and the
Central Asian Khwājas as forerunners of neo-Sufism, a movement of Ṣūfī or-
thodox revival (tajdīd) that spread across the Muslim world as early as the
eleventh/seventeenth century. A closer reading of primary sources suggests a
much more complex phenomenon. Before and after the year 1000 of the Hijra
calendar (1591–2) the millenarism and messianism that marked the mystics’
perception of time intensified with the rise of non-Muslim worldly powers
in many regions of dār al-Islām. It is in this context that Ṣūfīs pursued their
272 Papas

long-standing reflection on saints’ power and the concepts of walāya and

wilāya confronted sociopolitical reality (Cornell, 226–7; Papas, Soufisme et poli-
tique, 11–12, 231–38).
It is not surprising that the mediaeval theory of an esoteric world govern-
ment found its most mature and sophisticated expression in the early modern
period. The Islamic hagiographical production of the time repeatedly refers to
an occult hierarchy of saints who preside over the affairs of this world; their
rule takes place within a subtle cosmology, but also on a societal and institu-
tional level. In charge of the divine lieutenancy on earth (khilāfa), holy individ-
uals hold supernatural power (taṣrīf, taṣarruf ) that is parallel or even superior
to the temporal power of the sultan. These saints form an esoteric government
(dawla bāṭiniyya) composed of apotropaic saints (abdāl) or “men of the invis-
ible realm” (rijāl al-ghayb) at the head of whom stands the pole (quṭb), also
known as master of time (ṣāḥib al-waqt) or succour (ghawth). The number of
the saints varies. According to the Cairene Ṣūfī al-Shaʿrānī (d. 973/1565), there
is even a turn of duty for the protection of the world. The “people of the turn”
(aṣḥāb al-nawba) are supposed to serve esoteric functions for a given time and
space. It is unclear whether they are real people or hidden figures. Saints sit in
council (dīwān al-awliyāʾ) of various jurisdictions (ʿamal) under the responsi-
bility of regional poles (aqṭāb). For instance, one or several masters of the city
(aṣḥāb al-balad) take care of Tunis; an assembly is located on the Muqaṭṭam
Hill in Cairo; another supervises Syria from a place near the grave of the
prophet Yaḥyā (John the Baptist) in the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus (Amri;
Geoffroy, 96–7, 109–12).
From the eleventh/seventeenth century onward, through collections of an-
ecdotes, the council of saints became a major topic in the hagiology of Fez.
These books documented concrete examples and cited witnesses to the real-
ity of the saints’ power. In a similar vein, certain Ṣūfīs were associated with
the founding of Fez and were believed to be involved invisibly in the adminis-
tration and the preservation of this Maghribi city. Viewed as a “city of saints”
(madīnat al-awliyāʾ), the capital was governed by a local assembly presided by
Mawlāy Idrīs (d. 213/828), the founder and patron saint of Fez (Vimercati, 51,
88, 113, 135, 290).
Significantly, it was ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Dabbāgh (d. 1132/1719), an inspired mys-
tic from the same locale, who gave one of the most detailed descriptions of the
council of godly men (dīwān al-ṣāliḥūn). His disciple, Aḥmad b. al-Mubārak
al-Lamaṭī (d. 1156/1743), devoted a book to him, in which an entire chapter
depicts that council. To sum up, the dīwān is located in the cave of Ḥirāʾ (in
the Ḥijāz, where the Prophet retreated to meditate); on the right of the sup-
port sit four Mālikī poles and, on his left, three other poles who represent the
Sufism and Worldly Powers 273

three other schools of jurisprudence. Around them, in concentric circles stand

various divine figures, including angels. A deputy (wakīl) speaks on behalf of
everyone. At the time of the council, some members are alive; others are dead.
Sometimes the Prophet is present and occupies the support’s position. The
council convenes at the time of the night when the Prophet was born, and
at this time, prayers are answered. On the “night of power,” once a year, when
the Prophet is present with his wives and Companions, the other prophets are
also present. The language used in the dīwān is Syriac, the language of the spir-
its and the angels. When the members gather, they determine what will hap-
pen in the world from that very moment until the same moment the next day
(al-Lamaṭī, ch. 4).
Such representations resisted modernity, at least in the collective memory,
if not in beliefs. A late chronicler, for example, the Tunisian Maḥmūd Maqdīsh
(d. 1228/1813), described the modus operandi of the assembly in his Nuzhat
al-anẓār (The delight of the eyes): if a request from the people is submitted,
the chiefs (nuqabāʾ) take it and invoke God, followed by the nobles (nujabāʾ),
the saints (abdāl), the elect (akhyār), then the pillars (ʿamad); if the wish is not
fulfilled, the ghawth takes care of it (Maqdīsh, 2:242).

4 Sufism in the Colonial Age and Modernity

A telling example of the European colonial perception of Ṣūfī orders is given

in the manual Les Confréries religieuses musulmanes (The religious Muslim
brotherhoods) published in 1897. In chapter 6, on the “political role of religious
brotherhoods,” the two French authors and administrators considered “the
maraboutic casts” as the agents par excellence of popular fanaticism, opposed
to any form of power in place—throughout the history of Islam. They state,
“No longer able to fight us openly [i.e. from 1240s/1830s to the 1300s/1890s]
today, secret societies act in the dark, on the masses, which they direct as they
wish and to which they are the support and the hope” (Depont and Coppolani,
259). The Ṣūfīs’ response to colonial rule, especially in Africa, differed, fluctu-
ated, and was sometimes ambivalent, and often also aimed at Muslim states
that Ṣūfī masters accused of infidelity. Above all, responses were debated to
a far greater extent than it appeared to the British, Dutch, French, or Russian
colonial observers.
The figure of ʿUthmān dan Fodio (d. 1234/1817), a reformer, prolific writer,
and Qādirī spiritual leader in northern Nigeria, was emblematic of this intel-
lectual dimension of responses, though he was not directly involved in the
colonial question. After receiving a classical Islamic education, the young
274 Papas

ʿUthmān was deeply influenced by the twelfth-/eighteenth-century Khalwatī

shaykh from Agadez, Jibrīl b. ʿUmar (d. after 1200/1785). The reformist master
taught his disciple about the perils of local syncretic forms of Islam and about
the politico-religious trends in Egypt and the Ḥijāz, more precisely the Ṣūfī
reply to Wahhābī criticism and European encroachment. Repeated mystical
visions convinced ʿUthmān dan Fodio to withdraw with his community, be-
yond the reach of the Hausa ruler; and in 1218/1804 he declared a holy war
against a kingdom that he considered corrupt and tyrannical. Facilitated by
the spread of Mahdist millennial expectations at the approach of the year
1200/1785–6 and the occasional support of Fulani pastoralist leaders, after four
years of struggle the Ṣūfī jihād was victorious. Dan Fodio constructed the town
of Sokoto and founded a reformed Islamic state based on the structures of a
caliphate (with viziers, judges, amīrs and so forth), not a Ṣūfī order. The appli-
cation of the Prophet’s model was salient in his ideology, especially the hijra,
a migration “from an abode of unbelief to the abode of Islam.” Later in the
century, the same argument became a standard doctrine for Muslim leaders in
Africa threatened by European colonialism (Martin, ch. 1–2; Vikør).
The epilogue of Dan Fodio’s experience is symptomatic of the Ṣūfīs’ diver-
gent attitudes, which ranged from reluctant involvement in worldly affairs
to concerted engagement in politics. After the conquest, ʿUthmān returned
to his scholarly activities and entrusted power to his brother and to his son
Muḥammad Bello (d. 1253/1837). The Sokoto Caliphate lasted until 1903. It was
not a single movement, since other jihāds in West Africa were also tied to the
authority of Dan Fodio. ʿUmar Tall (d. 1280/1864), a khalīfa of the Tijāniyya Ṣūfī
order that established the Tukulor Empire, led a jihād in Mali against “pagan-
ism” and the French, even though, originally, the order formed by Sīdī Aḥmad
al-Tijānī (d. 1230/1815) avoided politics in the Maghrib. In other words, the state
founder remained an inspiration, not a full-fledged political leader.
The oscillation of Ṣūfī authorities between quietism and activism in gen-
eral, and more specifically between accommodation and opposition to colo-
nial rule, continued in the historical legacy of Aḥmad b. Idrīs (d. 1253/1837).
Educated in Fez and affiliated to the Shādhiliyya ṭarīqa, he set off for the East
in 1213–4/1799 and resided in Mecca, the Sudan, and Ṣabyā (in southwestern
Arabia). He was hostile to Wahhābism and influenced by Ibn al-ʿArabī; in his
teaching, he set out (in more than fifty works) to elaborate on the concept of
the “Muḥammadan way” (al-ṭarīqa al-Muḥammadiyya). This was of two types:
the imitatio Muḥammadi and the act of receiving instruction from the Prophet
in person, as he was alive (O’Fahey, ch. 2–4; Radtke). Ibn Idrīs did not create a
Ṣūfī order, nor did he engage in politics, but several of his prominent disciples
established their own lineages, or even Islamic states.
Sufism and Worldly Powers 275

In 1911, after leading a revolt against the Ottoman forces, Ibn Idrīs’ grandson
Muḥammad b. ʿAlī l-Idrīsī (d. 1923) founded a short-lived state known as al-
dawla al-Idrīsiyya (the Idrīsid state) in ʿAsīr province. The political formation,
which did not survive the Wahhābī conquest in 1923, was not a Ṣūfī state, in
that it did not emerge from a Ṣūfī organisation with a hierarchy and institu-
tions, as was the case of the Sanūsiyya, another lineage inspired by Muḥammad
al-Idrīsī’s father. This major brotherhood was established by the disciple closest
to Aḥmad b. Idrīs, the Algerian-born Muḥammad b. ʿAlī l-Sanūsī (d. 1276/1859),
who set up a military-political organisation that opposed European forces
in Cyrenaica (present-day eastern Libya) and then evolved into an embry-
onic state. Colonial and early twentieth-century historiography stressed the
political and revivalist nature of the Sanūsiyya. Against this teleological the-
sis, scholars have shown that, although it was, originally, clearly apolitical,
the Sanūsiyya Ṣūfī order took political action for specific local reasons. Holy
war and political power did not serve a religious purpose, they were a prod-
uct of specific historical events. Replete with speculations in line with Aḥmad
b. Idrīs’ teaching, al-Sanūsī’s writings never mentioned jihād; in practice, he
implemented a regional network of missionary lodges (zāwiyas). In 1298/1881,
his successor Muḥammad al-Mahdī (d. 1902) undertook a long march (called a
hijra) and introduced the brotherhood in the Sahara and the Sudan. Attacks by
the French and Italians in 1911 forced the new shaykh Aḥmad al-Sharīf (d. 1933)
to declare jihād and to create an independent Sanūsī government (ḥukūma
sanūsiyya) in Cyrenaica. Aḥmad al-Sharīf was quickly defeated by the Italians,
abdicated, and took refuge in Turkey. The Sanūsiyya resurfaced in the 1950s
with the British recognition of Muḥammad Idrīs (d. 1969) as king of Libya. By
then, the Ṣūfī ṭarīqa had completed its process of tribal segmentation and sec-
ularisation (O’Fahey, ch. 5–6; Bang, ch. 5; Triaud, 1: introduction).
Comparisons have been made between the Sanūsiyya and the Naqshban­
diyya Khālidiyya in Kurdistan, largely because both movements proclaimed
jihāds and created organisational frameworks to counteract the centrifugal
tendencies of tribes. However, this framework seems to have been less crucial
than the role of the Ṣūfī shaykh as landlord and holy man, as in the case of
the Kurdish Khālidī Shaykh Saʿīd (d. 1925) who led an insurrection against the
Kemalist regime, in an effort to establish an independent state where Islamic
principles would be respected (Bruinessen, Agha, ch. 5). Even more striking
is the somewhat similar genesis of these two movements. During the early
nineteenth century, the Naqshbandiyya Khālidiyya spread rapidly in Kurdis-
tan under the influence of the Kurdish eponymous leader Mawlānā Khālid
(d. 1242/1827), whose missionary zeal and hostility toward European domina-
tion assured the popularity and legitimacy of his Ṣūfī branch. Then, driven by
276 Papas

specific circumstances rather than by a predetermined plan, Khālidī shaykhs

entered into politics. When the Ottomans under Maḥmūd II (r. 1223–55/
1808–39), backed by the European powers, destroyed the Kurdish emirates, the
chaos that ensued compelled the Ṣūfī leaders to take action and to support
the movement for independence. The authority acquired by the families of
these shaykhs or their descendants (such as the Bārzānīs) gave them key roles
in Kurdish nationalism (Bruinessen, Agha, ch. 4). In contrast, Mawlānā Khālid
himself was ambivalent on the question of political involvement. Accused of
being “power-thirsty” (ṣāḥīb-i ẓuhūr, lit. the “manifest master”) and in conflict
with the Bābān pashas (a local aristocracy) and their Qādirī supporters, the
shaykh nevertheless remained aloof from the rulers and only involved him-
self in lobbying the elite in Sulaymaniyya, then in Baghdad, and Damascus.
Mawlānā Khālid was less a theoretician than an active scholar (ʿālim ʿāmil) and
organiser who brought in, thanks to a simple initiation procedure, a large num-
ber of khalīfas who were dispersed in the eastern provinces of the Ottoman
Empire and were able to enhance the influence of the order (Hakim; Weis-
mann, Taste of modernity, 39, 47, 59–60, 94, 106).
Historical reconstructions of the careers of Ṣūfī “warlords” like Sayyid
Aḥmad Barelwī (d. 1246/1831), Imām Shāmil (d. 1287/1871), and ʿAbd al-Qādir
al-Jazāʾirī (d. 1300/1883) have often taken comparative approaches, given that
the last two figures were affiliated to the Khālidiyya and corresponded regu-
larly with each other.
When Sayyid Aḥmad was born in Awadh region in 1201/1786, the Mughal
emperor still reigned in Delhi and the nawab ruled in Lucknow, though their
power was largely nominal. The British did not interfere with the social order
but their presence increasingly influenced the everyday life of Indian Muslims.
The shaykh was initiated into the Naqshbandiyya Mujaddidiyya (founded in
India by Aḥmad Sirhindī, d. 1034/1624), the Qādiriyya, and the Chishtiyya. He
promoted a specific form of Islamic reformism, because he was of opinion
that the British Raj had made India a dār al-ḥarb (“abode of war”). Therefore,
his duty was to emigrate (hijra), then declare a jihād. In 1241/1826, as narrated
in hagiographies and letters, Sayyid Aḥmad and his 500 combatants travelled
to Afghanistan, and from Peshawar launched a jihād against the local Sikhs,
then attacked the British. He was killed by the Sikh army in Kashmir, without
fulfilling his politico-religious mission (Gaborieau, ch. 1–3, 8). Behind these
dramatic events, his writings reveal several doctrinal points that can be sum-
marised as follows: Sayyid Aḥmad Barelwī viewed himself as the “man of the
call” (ṣāḥīb-i daʿwat), that is, the providential figure elected by God to conduct
a sacred battle and impose the divine law; far from establishing an Islamic state
in a specific territory, his utopian project was to recreate, somewhere between
Sufism and Worldly Powers 277

India and Transoxiana, the perfect (tāmma) imamate of the first caliphs, under
his leadership (as a messiah or mahdī); thus, he intended to transcend the tem-
poral rulers, without replacing them (Gaborieau, ch. 9–10).
As a faithful member of the Naqshbandiyya Khālidiyya, Imām Shāmil
(originally Shamwīl) was compelled to respond to the Russian advance on his
homeland and their subsequent imposition of colonial laws in place of Islamic
law and values. Imām Shāmil took over the political engagement from his
Khālidī predecessors. Before him, in 1246/1830, his friend Ghāzī Muḥammad
(d. 1248/1832) had proclaimed holy war against the colonial empire; he was
declared imam then killed. Shāmil survived and, after the assassination of the
second imam Ḥamza(t) Bek (d. 1250/1834), was recognised as the third imam
of Daghestan. His military victories enabled him to unify the Caucasian moun-
tain tribes under one banner. From an institutional perspective, Shāmil was at
the top of a well-organised theocratic state administered by a council (dīwān)
and regional deputies (nāʾibs). The sharīʿa was scrupulously applied by the
learned class, which consisted of muftīs and judges. The army, which played
a central role, included a corps of 400–500 “warrior disciples” (nāʾib murīds).
In 1276/1859 Shāmil was captured and placed under house arrest in Kaluga
(southwest of Moscow) then in Kiev; in 1285/1869, he went on pilgrimage, and
died and was buried in Medina. Imām Shāmil was more a practitioner of Sufism
than a thinker; within his circle of followers, he acted as and was perceived as a
spiritual leader who performed the Naqshbandī rituals, though his Ṣūfī model
of community never materialised in a large scale in north Caucasian society
(Gammer, ch. 5–8, 21–24; Knysh, S̲h̲āmil).
Around the same time (during a long ḥajj between 1241/1826 and 1243/1828)
ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jazāʾirī, the offspring of a Sharifian family of notables be-
longing to the Qādiriyya order, was initiated into the Khālidiyya by Mawlānā
Khālid. He then intended to retire to the solitude of his lodge in Oued al-
Hammam (Wādī l-Ḥammām in northwestern Algeria). But in 1246/1830, he
was stirred into action by the French conquest of Algeria, which had dire ef-
fects on local legal and religious values. Thus, he took action and endeavoured
to unite Algerian chiefdoms to struggle against the French. After negotiating
a provisional status, ʿAbd al-Qādir established an embryonic theocracy with
Tagdempt as capital, where legislative and moral codes were defined by the
sharīʿa. The main currency was named Muḥammadiyya, khalīfas administered
the regions, and Ṣūfī lodges were used to promote devout public behaviour.
He was defeated in 1264/1847, imprisoned, then forced into exile: the man
who had been called, in 1248/1832, sultan and amīr al-muʾminīn (“commander
of the faithful”), ended his life in Damascus as a spiritual master surrounded
by disciples from various countries; he declined all French offers to assume
278 Papas

a political role in Syria. His body was buried next to the grave of his spiritual
“ancestor” Ibn al-ʿArabī, whose thought fuelled ʿAbd al-Qādir’s monumental
book entitled Kitāb al-mawāqif (The book of stations). In the 372 chapters
articulating three essential pivots, i.e. God ad intra and ad extra, the created
world of the human servant, and the intermediate sphere between God and
his servant there is no discussion of later history or politics (Bouyerdene, 19,
44, 73–76, 133; D̲ j̲azâʾirî, 1:3–20).
The commonality between Imām Shāmil and ʿAbd al-Qādir and a Ṣūfī lead-
er like Sayyid Aḥmad Barelwī is based on the fact that they all waged jihāds
against colonial forces, and were supported by combatants whom sources de-
scribe as disciples (murīds). Whereas Shāmil and ʿAbd al-Qādir adopted the
titles imām or amīr al-muʾminīn, only Aḥmad Barelwī claimed the title mahdī;
and all three practiced Sufism through introspection, a strict adherence to the
divine law, or direct communication with the Prophet. More generally, schol-
arly debate about these “jihād states” concentrated on the issue of Islamic
mysticism as a primary motivating force. In contrast to a paradigm known as
maraboutisme (in French) or miuridizm (in Russian), which appeared at the
same time as the events they described, the primary sources that emerged
from the colonial administration and the Ṣūfī actors themselves suggest a dif-
ferent scenario (Gaborieau, 177–9, 275–8; Knysh, Sufism). The militancy of the
Ṣūfīs at that time were the acts of individual community leaders, who act after
some hesitation and soul-searching, as they were caught up in the turmoil of
historical events that were often marked by doomsday predictions and mes-
sianic expectations.
Less spectacular but no less influential in the long run, in the course of the
nineteenth century, modernity (in the sense of public administration) en-
tered Ṣūfī orders. The Egyptian ṭuruq, which were institutionalised from the
top-down by the Ottoman state, then under the khedival (khıdīvī, “viceregal”)
government, is a well-studied example. In 1812, a firman issued by Egypt’s
pasha Muḥammad ʿAlī (r. 1220–64/1805–48) created a central authority for
Ṣūfī groups, and assigned as its first head Muḥammad al-Bakrī (d. 1271/1855), a
shaykh of an old ashrāf family who claimed descent from the first caliph Abū
Bakr. With the active support of government agencies, al-Bakrī’s administra-
tive power increased. The hereditary charge passed to ʿAlī l-Bakrī (d. 1297/1880)
who reinforced the hierarchical rules in the ṭuruq administration, and integrat-
ed the heads of lodges (mashāyikh al-takāyā) and heads of shrines (mashāyikh
al-aḍriḥa) into that administration. In 1298/1881 under pressure from the khe-
dive al-Tawfīq (d. 1309/1892), reforms of rituals and interference in the shaykhs’
management provoked a crisis of authority. In 1312/1895 a council of the minis-
try of the interior promulgated a series of regulations; these were completed in
Sufism and Worldly Powers 279

1905 as the “Internal Rules for the Sufi orders” (al-lāʾiḥa al-dākhiliyya lil-ṭuruq
al-ṣūfiyya), and were designed to institute a rudimentary bureaucratic system
(De Jong, 39, 95, 124, 187–8). During the twentieth century, whatever the share
of political instrumentalisation or even corruption of the ṭuruq administra-
tion, the adoption of modern administrative practices brought Ṣūfī institu-
tions closer into the state machinery, not only through interpersonal contacts
between Ṣūfī administrators and state bureaucrats, but also in the use of paper-
work, procedures, legal statuses, decision processes, official titles, and so forth.

5 The Baraka Bureaucracy

The establishment of socialist regimes in mainly Muslim-inhabited areas and

countries had an immediate impact on Ṣūfī institutions. Over the longer term,
though, it caused less secularisation than bureaucratisation; this was done de-
liberately, to inhibit potentially subversive expressions of Sufism.
Among the republics of the Soviet Union, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan boast-
ed a long history of theorising, practicing, and organising Islamic mysticism.
Before and after the repression of charismatic leaders and the police control of
Ṣūfī activities that started in 1926, Soviet authorities created departments, such
as the Spiritual Directory of the Muslims of Central Asia (known as SADUM)
founded in 1943 and headquartered in Tashkent in order to administer Islam
more efficiently. These measures generally affected Sufism and its institutions
negatively. When local Ṣūfī orders lost substantial financial resources and their
institutional independence, they were forced to pursue their activities clan-
destinely in small groups or interact closely with state officials, or sometimes
both. Variations and volatility in attitudes were ongoing features of such ar-
rangements. Still, a sort of administrative establishment for Ṣūfīs eventually
emerged. The position of muftī at the head of the SADUM was held, successive-
ly, by members of the Babakhanov family, who descended from a Yasawī saint-
ly lineage, though they no longer practiced Ṣūfī rituals and even discouraged
Ṣūfī discipline and the transmission of Ṣūfī knowledge. In rural areas where
the kolkhoz system structured the local political hierarchies, it was common
for leaders of kolkhoz working units (brigades) to come from the sacred lin-
eages of local Ṣūfī masters, notably orders such as the Naqshbandī and Khwāja
(descendants of the four rightly-guided caliphs). In this capacity they managed
to sustain Islamic religious life and institutions in the region, but not necessar-
ily Sufism (Babajanov; Dudoignon and Noack, introduction).
Up until 1963 when the Arab Socialist Renaissance Party (Ḥizb al-Baʿth al-
ʿArabī l-Ishtirākī), which was founded in 1943 with the blessing of the Union of
280 Papas

Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), seized power, Syria had hosted important
Ṣūfī orders. Of course, its religious policy differed fundamentally from that
of the Bolsheviks. The state sponsored the Naqshbandiyya Kuftāriyya order,
headed by and named after the grand mufti of Syria, Aḥmad Kuftārū (d. 2004).
His role was to counter the Ikhwān al-Muslimūn (the Muslim Brotherhood,
a politico-religious movement founded in Egypt by Ḥasan al-Bannāʾ, d. 1949)
and promote an “official [version of] Islam” (al-islām al-rasmī), though in fact
many Ṣūfī masters and their disciples joined the anti-Baʿth opposition and
maintained close ties with the local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. In the
1970s, Kuftārū and other leaders were supported by Ḥāfiẓ al-Asad’s (d. 2000) re-
gime, by virtue of which they controlled the religious establishment, fostered a
quietist, spiritual, and educational form of Sufism. The Syrian religious leader-
ship toyed with the idea of eliminating some Ṣūfī terminology, an idea that was
introduced into Syria by the Indian Nadwat al-ʿUlamāʾ, a reformist “Council of
Religious Scholars” founded in 1891. Thus, the Kuftāriyya developed as a trans-
national Ṣūfī movement. Its key institution, the Abū al-Nūr Islamic Center in
Damascus included schools, universities, prayer halls, offices, a library, meet-
ing rooms, and so on, with branches in other Syrian cities, Lebanon, the United
States, and Europe (Böttcher; Weismann, Sufi Fundamentalism).
The bureaucratisation of Ṣūfī institutions also occurred under anti-
communist regimes, such as that in Indonesia under the New Order instituted
by Suharto (d. 2008), which lasted from 1967 to 1998. Sharīʿa-oriented Sufism
replaced syncretistic mysticism, first in rural areas where Ṣūfī leaders became
political figures, then among urban classes as traditional Ṣūfī communities
(tarekat) were gradually supplemented by formal associations. Influenced by
Ṣūfī doctrines and practices, but also by European spiritualities (Theosophy,
Freemasonry), some esoteric (kebatinan) movements adopted a structure
resembling that of associations with administrators who assisted spiritual
teachers. In the 1950s and early 1960s they were allied with the left. In addi-
tion to them, leaders of local tarekats participated in associations, mainly
the Nahdlatul Ulama (Awakening of Scholars) and the Persatuan Tarbiyah
Islamiyah (Union for Islamic Education) which became political parties.
One of these leaders, Haji Jalaluddin, created his own association, the Partai
Politik Tarekat Islam, which became an institution of Ṣūfī bureaucrats who
lacked major shaykhs. Later, in the 1970s, Musta’in Romly (d. 1984), the leader
of the Qadiriyya wa-Naqshbandiyya, established a Jam’iyyah Ahlith Thoriqah
Mu’tabaroh (Association of the Members of Respectable Orders) to represent
“orthodox” Sufism; they were recognised by the central government. Engaged
in electoral politics, he campaigned on behalf of the government party, the
Golkar, while officials of the Nahdlatul Ulama issued fatwās (legal opinions)
Sufism and Worldly Powers 281

to vote for the rival party block, the United Development Party, which was
composed of Muslim parties. Musta’in lost control over the tarekat network
and his opponents inaugurated a second association, the Jam’iyyah Ahlith
Thoriqah Mu’tabaroh al-Nahdliyyah, which was closer to the Nahdlatul Ulama
(Bruinessen, Saints). On the one hand, conflicts around the Jam’iyyah show the
increasingly political role of Ṣūfī orders, but on the other hand, they reveal the
varied understandings of this role: in 1984, the Nahdlatul Ulama decided not
to participate directly in politics and shaykhs of other groups acted more as
spiritual mentors than as political entrepreneurs.
In the Turkish Republic, Islam entered politics institutionally in 1974 when
Necmettin Erbakan (d. 2011), the leader of the Milli Selamet Partisi (National
Salvation Party) and a follower of the Nakşibendi (Naqshbandī) shaykh
Mehmed Zahid Kotku (d. 1980), was elected as a legislator in the national gov-
ernment. During legislative elections, Erbakan’s party members obtained im-
portant ministerial offices. For example, in 1977, the Nakşibendi Korkut Özal
(d. 2016) was appointed minister of the interior. His elder brother Turgut Özal
(d. 1993), a disciple of Kotku and of his successor Esat Coşan (d. 2001), created
the Anavatan Partisi (Motherland Party), became prime minister in 1983, then
president in 1989. Özal’s government promoted Islamic ethics and values, and
legitimised charitable donations so that religious communities (cemaat) like
Ṣūfī orders (which had been forbidden by Mustafa Kemal in 1925) could de-
velop as official foundations. Ṣūfī brotherhoods, with their hierarchy of char-
ismatic powers, formed a matrix for political Islam in Turkey: the Refah Partisi
(Welfare Party) cofounded by Erbakan was administered in the manner of a
cemaat whose supreme chief, surnamed “master” (hoca), maintained quasi-
mystical relationships with his subordinates by granting blessings; more broad-
ly, many Islamic movements were modeled on Ṣūfī communities. They had
three levels, i.e. an internal discipline based on loyalty and hierarchy, Ṣūfī lead-
ers with religious charisma, and a model of Muslim civil society. This did not
prevent divisions and conflicts. Several shaykhs disavowed Erbakan because of
his autocratic practices. From the 1990s onwards, Ṣūfī cemaats that favoured
indirect lobbying over direct political action, set up influential networks and
well-organised institutions to provide Qurʾān courses, social services, residen-
tial schools (yurts), nurseries, and clinics, and made use of various medias
(Zarcone, La Turquie moderne, 188–226). In sum, along with the bureaucratisa-
tion of spirituality, the spiritualisation of bureaucracy also occurred.
In the post-communist Balkans, especially in Albania, Bektāshī institu-
tions were re-established, thanks to an association called the Komuniteti
Bektashian Kryegjyshata Botërore Bektashiane (Bektashi Community–World
Bektashi Chief Grandfather Centre), headquartered in Tirana. In the wake
282 Papas

of three congresses held in 1993, 2000, and 2005, and successive drafts of de-
tailed statutes, the organisation defined itself with a clear hierarchy of mem-
bers ranging from aspirants to high clerics (babas/prindës, dedes/gjyshs, and a
dedebaba/kryegjysh). It also had a spiritual, administrative, and economic
management run by various councils, headed by the dedebaba Reshat Bardhi
(d. 2011). The Bektashi Community had international ambitions, in that it
claimed authority over lodges (tekkes) situated in Macedonia, Kosovo, Greece,
and the United States (in Taylor, Michigan, opened in 1954). In reality, this
authority was rather pan-Albanian. Despite the high centralisation of the
community, struggles for power and authority took place at the top as well as
the bottom. Baba Selim Kaliçani (d. 2001) opposed Baba Reshat Bardhi and
in 2002 under the authority of a baba close to Baba Selim, a competing re-
gional organisation was officially registered in Skrapar district. The registration
was cancelled by a court decision, but the fact remains that Bektashi institu-
tions were and still are largely autonomous at the local level. Divergences
also arose between Ṣūfī bureaucrats and local believers regarding the defini-
tion of Bektashism itself: Ṣūfī leaders stressed the commonality of Sufism and
Sunnism, whereas local opponents highlighted the differences between these
two interpretations of Islam (Clayer, The Bektashi).
The Turkish and the Albanian cases illustrate that baraka bureaucracy
was not exclusively a product of twentieth-century states seeking to control
spiritually-oriented groups; it also concerned Ṣūfī groups themselves, at least
their elites, who sought to adopt the modern techniques to maintain their sta-
tus and power. The phenomenon of baraka bureaucracy even produced quasi-
autonomous political entities and parliamentary religious parties.
Contemporary Senegal serves as an emblematic example. In the heteroge-
neous world of Ṣūfī brotherhoods in the Republic of Senegal, two major orders
stand out, the Murīdiyya and the Tijāniyya, each of which claims several mil-
lion followers worldwide. Founded by Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke (d. 1927), the
Murīdiyya order accepted an exchange for services (échange de services) with
the French colonial system, an arrangement that continued after the indepen-
dence of Senegal in 1960. In short, in return for producing groundnuts (a major
cash crop at the time) on an industrial scale and supporting the colonial ad-
ministration, the French authorities (and later the Senegalese state) granted
the Murīds a certain degree of autonomy in the capital city of Touba. Affected
by the economic crisis in the 1970s, this modus vivendi between the state and
the Murīds faltered, causing shifts in the “voting instruction” (ndiggël) given
by the Khalifa Général to his disciples. The political power of the holy men
blessed with baraka and the administrative autonomy of the rural commu-
nity in Touba did not mean that the Murīds exercised political domination
Sufism and Worldly Powers 283

or that all the Murīds agreed on the exercise of political power. If the 2000
election of Abdoulaye Wade, surnamed le Président Mouride, marked a re-
turn to the exchange for services system, some Murīds still aspired to remain
neutral and distance themselves from the state. This dissonance may mark a
return to Aḥmadu Bàmba’s emphasis on spiritual training and self-discipline
(tarbiya) as the genuine purpose of Ṣūfīs’ worldly action (Loimeier; Babou, 5,
62–66, 81–84).
Among the Tijāniyya of Senegal, the Niasse family also faced and survived
colonial rule. In 1931, outside of Kaolack the Medina community founded by
Ibrāhīm Niasse (d. 1975) became a transnational path known as the Jamāʿat
al-Fayḍa (Community of the divine flood). Furthermore, Niasse established the
Jamʿiyyat Anṣār al-Dīn (Association of the helpers of the religion) to further
the cause of Muslims by organising local sections led by steering committees.
A leader of international stature, in 1957, Niasse (together with Cheikh Tidjane
Sy [b. 1925], a member of the Sy family network), cofounded the short-lived
Parti de la Solidarité Sénégalaise. Tidjane Sy, with his son Muṣṭafā (b. 1952),
founded a separate Tijānī branch with a highly territorialised administration,
the Dāʾirat al-Mustarshidīn wa-l-Mustarshidāt (Circle of the seekers of guid-
ance); from the 1990s onwards, it played a prominent, albeit shifting, role in
encouraging voting. In 2000, Muṣṭafā Sy ran for president under the banner of
the Parti de l’Unité et du Rassemblement, but withdrew his candidacy a few
days later. Beyond partisan strategies described by political scientists, intellec-
tual historians have pointed out that an organisation like Niasse’s was designed
to reform the socioreligious identity of common believers through the secret
transmission of spiritual training (tarbiya) and mystical experience ( fayḍa)
(Seeseman, The Divine Flood, ch. 2–3, epilogue; Samson, ch. 2).
Outside a democratic, or electoral, setting, the Tijāniyya faced the
Islamist regime in the Sudan after the coup d’état of 1989, as did two popu-
lar Ṣūfī orders, the Khatmiyya (founded by Muḥammad ʿUthmān al-Mīrghānī,
d. 1269/1853) and the Mahdiyya or Anṣār (founded by Muḥammad b. ʿAbdallāh,
d. 1302/1885), and their respective political parties, the Democratic Unionist
Party and the Umma Party. Under the influence of the Islamist leader Ḥasan
al-Turābī (d. 2016), the government of ʿUmar al-Bashīr tried to involve the
Ṣūfī orders in state politics by creating, in 1995, the Majlis al-Qawmī lil-Dhikr
wa-l-Dhākirīn (National assembly of remembrance and those who remember).
Headed by a shaykh affiliated with the Qādiriyya, the institution raised funds
for projects run by Ṣūfī orders, facilitated visits of masters and pilgrims from
abroad, and promoted public relations. In relation to the government, Ṣūfī au-
thorities were torn between two positions, cooperation or silent disagreement.
In the Tijāniyya, the Nigeria-born Ibrāhīm Ṣāliḥ (b. 1939) walked hand in hand
284 Papas

with the government of Khartoum, even during the bloody jihād against south-
ern Sudan, whereas other shaykhs rejected the politicised understanding of
Islam, citing al-Tijānī’s statement “politics is a Kaʿba around which all evil cir-
cumambulates” (al-siyāsa kaʿba yaṭūfu bihā jamīʿ al-shurūr). Ṭarīqa members
in contemporary Sudan were thus once again faced by the classical challenge
of choosing between Ṣūfī spirituality and worldly power (Seeseman, Between
Sufism and Islamism; Maruyama).
The bureaucratisation of Ṣūfī institutions did not preclude Ṣūfī members
from reconsidering the significance of the mission that God assigned to them,
especially when confronted with competing modern ideologies. While they
responded to contemporary Islamism, Ṣūfīs also redefined nationalism in
their own terms by imparting a spiritual dimension, a supplément d’âme one
might say, to the political body shaped by nation-building processes. Thus, in
Pakistan, the religious policies of Ayyub Khan (Ayyūb Khān, 1958–69), Zulfikar
Ali Bhutto (Dhū l-Fiqār ʿAlī Bhutto, 1971–7), and Zia ul-Haq (Ḍiyāʾ al-Ḥaqq,
1977–88) were no different in this respect. The three governments were unani-
mous in their caution about the mobilisation power of Ṣūfī shrines and living
saints (pīrs); they attempted to instrumentalise them by availing themselves
of baraka and making the sacred nature of the saints a state ideology of sorts.
In a tangible sense, the governments took control of the physical institutions
of Ṣūfīs—i.e., shrines, lodges, and related properties—to undercut the po-
litical power of the hereditary pīr families, and to demonstrate that the state
could fulfil the same caretaking and ritual functions. As a result, Ṣūfī saints
and shrines became a prominent component of Pakistan’s state machinery.
Paradoxically, Ṣūfī leaders themselves were involved in the construction and
the ideological support of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The Chishtī-Ṣābirī
shaykhs Muhammad Zauqi (Muḥammad Dhawqī, d. 1951), Shahidullah Faridi
(Shahīd Allāh Farīdī, d. 1978), and Wahid Bakhsh Sial Rabbani (Wāḥid Bakhsh
Siyāl Rabbānī, d. 1995) were ardent nationalists. They sacralised Pakistan in
the name of the purported ḥadīth, “Love of the homeland is a part of faith”
(ḥubb al-waṭan min al-īmān), and defined their Ṣūfī lineage as a sacred com-
munity antecedent of the nation-state. Zauqi, who joined the Muslim League,
had close contacts with nationalists and exchanged letters with Ali Jinnah (ʿAlī
Jinnāḥ, d. 1948), and was later eulogised as the esoteric founder of Pakistan
(Ewing; Rozehnal, ch. 3). This was perhaps reminiscent of the concept of
dawla bāṭiniyya.
A more obvious and recent echo of the concept can be found in the dis-
course of the members of the Kasnazāniyya order in Iraqi Kurdistan; in 2005
they referred to a “spiritual state” (dawla rūḥiyya), a hypothetical state that
would be governed by the Kasnazānī shaykhs. This branch of the Qādiriyya,
Sufism and Worldly Powers 285

established by the Kurd ʿAbd al-Karīm Shāhī Kasnazān (d. 1316/1899) in Sulay-
maniyya, created the political party Tajammuʿ al-Waḥda al-Waṭaniyya al-ʿIrāqī
(Coalition of the Iraqi National Unity) in 2003, right after the fall of Ṣaddām
Ḥusayn’s (d. 2006) regime and the subsequent opening of multi-party system.
Composed of Kurdish, Turkmen, and Arab disciples, of Sunnī as well as Shīʿī
extraction, the Ṣūfī order and its party sought to transcend ethnic and con-
fessional boundaries to promote the as yet unachieved unity of Iraq. Highly
bureaucratic, the Kasnazāniyya is supervised by a presidency (riyāsat) based
in the central lodge of Sulaymaniyya, with offices and commissions across the
country; these regularly report their activities in written communiqués and
correspond with each other by telephone and internet. In the 2014 legislative
elections, the party won two seats in parliament. In addition to their strictly
economic and political agenda, Kasnazānīs present themselves as representa-
tives of modern Sufism, antithetical to both Islamism and religious communi-
tarianism (Salihi, part 3 and 5).
In the 2000s, Islamism, in the form of the Islamic Salvation Front (dissolved
in 1992) or jihadist groups, prompted the Algerian government of Abdelaziz
Bouteflika (ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Bū Taflīqa, b. 1937) to rehabilitate Ṣūfī institutions
and to promote them as an antidote against manifestations of political Islam.
Lodges (zāwiyas) and attached religious classrooms were encouraged to take
an active role in society, among the youth in particular; the ministry of reli-
gious affairs allowed Ṣūfīs to distribute publications to mosques and schools;
monuments were erected or restored with government funding (Muedini,
57–66). Research centres with the support of the ministry of culture—but
also self-funded zāwiyas—organised large events that combined cultural, aca-
demic, and religious presentations and presented Islamic mysticism as quiet-
ist, apolitical, and peaceful. Despite this state instrumentalisation of Sufism,
some cultural or intellectual actors, academic scholars of Islamic studies, and
Ṣūfī practitioners tried to use Ṣūfī institutions to voice critical opinions. They
pointed out that, throughout its history, Ṣūfīs have vacillated in regard to the
issue of being involved in politics, and wavered between an irrepressible “will
to power” and its very negation.
This brief survey of the political history of Islamic mysticism shows that
worldly powers were often attracted by Ṣūfīs, and that Ṣūfīs, in a reciprocal
sense, were close to power institutions, and they themselves sometimes pro-
duced institutions of power. In the early mediaeval period, Muslim mystics
and states found a common terrain of, alternatively, exchange and tensions in
jihāds, messianic expectations, and social justice. Simultaneously, Ṣūfī think-
ers laid the foundations for a concerted and systematic reflection on power.
From the seventh/thirteenth century onward, Ṣūfīs and sultans benefited from
286 Papas

a reciprocal system of patronage, which secured material support for the Ṣūfīs
and religious legitimacy for sultans. Beyond the interests of Ṣūfī leaders and
sultans, the majority, as well as the elite (whether political or religious elite),
expressed their belief in the possibility of political sovereignty for saints. It
is significant that, during the early modern era, saintly Ṣūfī lineages have es-
tablished theocratic regimes that appear to be the political “translation” of
mediaeval and post-mediaeval theories that describe the saints’ hidden gov-
ernment of the world. While the domination of many Muslim countries by
European colonial states seems to have put an end to such attempts, Ṣūfī lead-
ers responded to the new historical situation. Inspired by the prophetic expe-
rience of migration and sometimes claiming direct communication with the
Prophet, Muslim mystics retreated before waging jihād on the colonisers, and
occasionally founded full-fledged Islamic states, which were usually devoid
of distinctly Ṣūfī trappings. Finally, the bureaucratisation of institutions that
characterised twentieth-century societies has also affected Sufism in both its
organisational modes and its construction of authority and charisma. Ṣūfī
political parties have reflected this new reality, while seeking to maintain the
spiritual ideals of premodern Sufism.

Bibliography

ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq Muḥaddith Dihlavī, Akhbār al-akhyār fī asrār al-abrār, ed. ʿAlīm Ashraf
Khān, Tehran 1383Sh/2005.
Aigle, Denise, Le soufisme sunnite en Fārs. Šayḫ Amīn al-Dīn Balyānī, in Denise Aigle
(ed.), L’Iran face à la domination mongole (Tehran 1997), 231–60.
Alam, Muzaffar, The languages of political Islam. India, 1200–1800, London 2004.
Algar, Hamid, Political aspects of Naqshbandî history, in Marc Gaborieau, Alexandre
Popovic, and Thierry Zarcone (eds.), Naqshbandis. Cheminements et situation actu-
elle d’un ordre mystique musulman (Istanbul and Paris 1990), 117–46.
Amitai-Preiss, Reuven, Sufis and shamans. Some remarks on the Islamization of the
Mongols in the Ilkhanate, JESHO 42/1 (1999): 27–46.
Amri, Nelly, Le pouvoir du saint en Ifrîqiyya aux VIIIe–IXe/XIVe–XVe siècles. Le « très
visible » gouvernement du monde, in Henri Bresc, Georges Dagher, and Christiane
Veauvy (eds.), Politique et religion en Méditerranée, moyen âge et époque contempo-
raine (Paris 2008), 165–96.
Auer, Blain A., Symbols of authority in medieval Islam. History, religion, and Muslim le-
gitimacy in the Delhi sultanate, London 2012.
Sufism and Worldly Powers 287

Auer, Blain A., Intersections between Sufis and power. Narrating the shaykhs and
sultans of northern India, 1200–1400, in John J. Curry and Erik S. Ohlander (eds.),
Sufism and society. Arrangements of the mystical in the Muslim world, 1200–1800
(London 2012), 17–33.
Babajanov, Bakhtiyar, Le renouveau des communautés soufies en Ouzbékistan, Cahiers
d’Asie centrale 5–6 (1998): 285–311.
Babayan, Kathryn, Mystics, monarchs, and messiahs. Cultural landscapes of early mod-
ern Iran, Cambridge 2002.
Babou, Cheikh Anta, Fighting the greater jihad. Amadu Bamba and the founding of the
Muridiyya of Senegal, 1853–1913, Athens, OH 2007.
Bagley, Frank R. C., Ghazālī’s book of counsel for kings, London 1964.
Baldick, Julian, Bābā Ṭāhir (ʿUryān), EI3.
Bang, Ann K., The Idrīsī state in ʿAsīr, 1906–1934. Politics, religion and personal prestige as
statebuilding factors in early twentieth-century Arabia, Bergen 1996.
Beldiceanu-Steinherr, Irène, La “révolte” des Baba’î en 1240, visait-elle vraiment le ren-
versement du pouvoir Seldjoukide?, Turcica 30 (1998): 99–118.
Bellver, José, “Al-Ghazālī of al-Andalus.” Ibn Barrajān, mahdism and the emergence of
learned Sufism on the Iberian Peninsula, JAOS 133/4 (2013): 659–81.
Böttcher, Annabelle, Official Sunni and Shiʿi Islam in Syria, EUI Working Papers (2002):
3–25.
Bouyerdene, Ahmed, Abd el-Kader. L’harmonie des contraires, Paris 2008.
Böwering, Gerhard and Yousef Casewit, A Qurʾān commentary by Ibn Barrajān of Seville
(d. 536/1141). Īḍāḥ al-ḥikma bi-aḥkām al-ʿibra (Wisdom deciphered, the unseen discov-
ered), Leiden 2016.
Bruinessen, Martin van, Agha, shaikh and state. The social and political structures of
Kurdistan, London 1992.
Bruinessen, Martin van, Saints, politicians and Sufi bureaucrats: Mysticism and poli-
tics in Indonesia’s new order, in Martin van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell (eds.),
Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London 2007), 92–112.
Chekhovich, Olga D., Samarkandskie dokumenty xv–xvi vv. O vladeniakh Khodzhi
Akhrāra v Srednei Azii i Afghanistane, Moscow 1974.
Clayer, Nathalie, Mystiques, État et société. Les Halvetis dans l’aire balkanique de la fin du
XV e siècle à nos jours, Leiden 1994.
Clayer, Nathalie, The Bektashi institutions in southeastern Europe. Alternative Muslim
official structures and their limits, WI 42 (2012): 183–203.
Cook, David, Understanding jihad, Berkeley 2005.
Cook, Michael, Commanding right and forbidding wrong in Islamic thought, Cambridge
20022.
288 Papas

Cornell, Vincent J., Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism, Austin
1998.
De Jong, Frederick, Ṭuruq and ṭuruq-linked institutions in nineteenth century Egypt. A
historical study in organizational dimensions of Islamic mysticism, Leiden 1978.
Depont, Octave and Xavier Coppolani, Les Confréries religieuses musulmanes, Algiers
1897.
Digby, Simon, The Sufi shaykh and the sultan. A conflict of claims to authority in me-
dieval India, Iran 28 (1990): 71–81.
Dreher, Josef, Das Imamat des islamischen Mystikers Abūlqāsim Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥusain
Ibn Qasī, Bonn 1985.
Dudoignon, Stéphane A. and Christian Noack, eds., Allah’s Kolkhozes. Migration, de-
stanilisation, privatisation and the new Muslim congregations in the Soviet realm
(1950s–2000s), Berlin 2014.
Eaton, Richard M., Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700. Social roles of Sufis in medieval India,
New Delhi 19962.
Ebstein, Michael, Was Ibn Qasī a Ṣūfī?, SI 110 (2015): 196–232.
Ernst, Carl W., Eternal garden. Mysticism, history, and politics at a south Asian Sufi
center, Albany 1992.
Ewing, Katherine, The politics of Sufism. Redefining the saints of Pakistan, JAS 44/2
(1983): 251–68.
Faroqhi, Suraiya, Der Bektaschi-Ordern in Anatolien (vom späten fünfzehnten Jahr-
hundert bis 1826), Vienna 1981.
Faure, A., Ibn al-ʿArīf, EI2.
Gaborieau, Marc, Le Mahdi incompris. Sayyid Ahmad Barelwî (1786–1831) et le millé-
narisme en Inde, Paris 2010.
Gammer, Moshe, Muslim resistance to the Tsar. Shamil and the conquest of Chechnia
and Daghestan, London 1994.
García-Arenal, Mercedes, Messianism and puritanical reform. Mahdīs of the Muslim
West, Leiden 2006.
Geoffroy, Éric, Le soufisme en Égypte et en Syrie sous les derniers mamelouks et les pre-
miers ottomans. Orientations spirituelles et enjeux culturels, Damascus 1996.
Gölpınarlı, Abdülbâki, Mevlânâ’dan sonra Mevlevîlik, Istanbul 1983.
Gottschalk, Hans L., Die Aulād Šaiḫ aš-šuyūḫ (Banū Ḥamawiya), WZKM 53 (1957):
57–87.
Gross, Jo-Ann, Multiple roles and perceptions of a Sufi shaikh. Symbolic statements
of political and religious authority, in Marc Gaborieau, Alexandre Popovic, and
Thierry Zarcone (eds.), Naqshbandis. Cheminements et situation actuelle d’un ordre
mystique musulman (Istanbul and Paris 1990), 103–15.
Gross, Jo-Ann and Assom Urunbaev, The letters of Khwāja ʿUbayd Allāh Aḥrār and his
associates, Leiden 2002.
Sufism and Worldly Powers 289

Hakim, Halkawt, Confrérie des Naqshbandis au Kurdistan au XIXe siècle, PhD disser-
tation, Paris 1983.
Hazînî, Menbaʿuʾl-ebhâr fî rizâziʾl-ebrâr, ed. Mehmet Mâhur Tulum, Istanbul 2009.
Hofer, Nathan C., Sufism, state, and society in Ayyubid and early Mamluk Egypt, 1173–
1309, PhD dissertation, Atlanta 2005.
Idris, Hady Roger, Manāqib d’Abū Ishāq Al-Jabanyānī par Abū l-Qāsim Al-Labīdī,
Manāqib de Muhriz b. Halaf par Abū l. Tāhir Al-Fārisī, Paris 1959.
al-Jazâʾirî, ʿAbd al-Qâdir, Le Livre des haltes (Kitâb al-mawâqif ), trans. Michel Lagarde,
3 vols., Leiden 2000.
Jones, Russell, Ibrāhīm b. Adham, EI2.
Junayd, Enseignement spirituel. Traités, lettres, oraisons et sentences traduits de l’arabe,
présentés et annotés par Roger Deladrière, Paris 1983.
Karamustafa, Ahmet, Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Karataş, Hasan, The Ottomanization of the Halveti Sufi order: A political story re-
vealed, Journal of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association 1/1–2 (2014): 71–89.
Knysh, Alexander, S̲h̲āmil, EI2.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism as an explanatory paradigm. The issue of the motivations of
Sufi resistance movements in Western and Russian historiography, WI 42/2 (2002):
139–73.
Kugle, Scott, Rebel between spirit and law. Ahmad Zarruq, sainthood, and authority in
Islam, Bloomington 2006.
Lagardère, Vincent, La tarîqa et la révolte des murîdûn en 539h/1144 en Andalus, Revue
de l’Occident Musulman et de la Méditerranée 35 (1983): 157–70.
al-Lamaṭī, Aḥmad b. al-Mubārak, Pure gold from the words of Sayyidī ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz
al-Dabbāgh, trans. John O’Kane and Bernd Radtke, Leiden 2007.
Le Gall, Dina, A culture of Sufism. Naqshbandīs in the Ottoman world, 1450–1700, Albany
2005.
Loimeier, Roman, Sufis and politics in sub-Saharan Africa, in Paul L. Heck (ed.), Sufism
and politics. The power of spirituality (Princeton 2007), 59–101.
Maḥmūd Maqdīsh, Nuzhat al-anẓār fī ʿajāʾib al-tawārīkh wa al-akhbār, ed. ʿAlī Zuwarī
and Muḥammad Maḥfūẓ, 2 vols., Beirut 1988.
Martin, Bradford G., Muslim brotherhoods in 19th-century Africa, Cambridge 1976.
Maruyama, Daisuke, Sufism and tariqas facing the state. Their influence on politics in
the Sudan, Orient 46 (2011): 5–28.
Matthee, Rudi, Safavid dynasty, EIr.
Mauder, Christian, Al-Suyūṭī stance toward worldly Power. A reexamination based on
unpublished and understudied sources, in Antonella Ghershetti (ed.), al-Suyūṭī, a
polymath of the Mamlūk period (Leiden 2017), 81–97.
Mazzaoui, Michel M., The origins of the Ṣafawids. Šīʿism, Ṣūfism, and the ġulāt, Wiesba­
den 1972.
290 Papas

Meier, Fritz, Die Vita des Scheich Abū Isḥāq al-Kāzarūnī, in der persischen Bearbeitung
von Maḥmūd b. ʿUt̲mān, Leipzig 1948.
Moayyad, Heshmat and Franklin Lewis, The colossal elephant and his spiritual feats.
Shaykh Ahmad-e Jâm, Costa Mesa 2004.
Mojaddedi, Jawid, Shaqīq al-Balkhī, EI3.
Muedini, Fait, Sponsoring Sufism. How governments promote ‘mystical Islam’ in their
domestic and foreign policies, New York 2015.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Osmanlı imparatorluğu’nda marjinal sûfîlik: Kalenderîler (XIV–
XVII. Yüzyıllar), Ankara 19992.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Sufi milieux and political authority in Turkish history. A general
overview (thirteenth–seventeenth centuries), in Paul L. Heck (ed.), Sufism and poli-
tics. The power of spirituality (Princeton 2007), 165–95.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Babaîler isyanı. Alevîliğin tarihsel altyapısı, Istanbul 20115.
O’Fahey, Rex S., Enigmatic saint. Ahmad Ibn Idris and the Idrisi tradition, Evanston 1990.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Etude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan oriental, Paris 2005.
Papas, Alexandre, Cheikhs et sultans en Asie centrale au XVIe siècle. Une analyse de
la Risâla-yi tanbîh al-salâtîn d’Ahmad Kâsânî Dahbîdî, in Nathalie Clayer, Alexandre
Papas, and Benoît Fliche (eds.), L’autorité religieuse et ses limites en terres d’islam.
Approches historiques et anthropologiques (Leiden 2013), 11–31.
Paul, Jürgen, Scheiche und Herrscher im Khanat Cagatay, Der Islam 67 (1990): 278–321.
Paul, Jürgen, Solitude within society. Early Khwājagānī attitudes toward spiritual
and social life, in Paul L. Heck (ed.), Sufism and politics. The power of spirituality
(Princeton 2007), 137–63.
Pellat, Charles, Muḥriz b. K̲ h̲alaf, EI2.
Potter, Lawrence G., Sufis and sultans in post-Mongol Iran, Iranian Studies 27/1 (1994):
77–102.
Radtke, Bernd, Aḥmad b. Idrīs, EI3.
Razi, Najm al-Din, The path of God’s bondsmen from origin to return, trans. Hamid Algar,
Boulder 1980.
Riyāḍ, Muḥammad, Aḥvāl va āthār va ashʿār-i Mīr Sayyid ʿAlī Hamadānī, Islamabad
1370Sh/19912.
Roemer, Hans R., The Safavid period, CHIr, vol. 6.
Rosenthal, Franz, Knowledge triumphant. The concept of knowledge in medieval Islam,
Leiden 20072.
Rozehnal, Robert, Islamic Sufism unbound. Politics and piety in twenty-first century
Pakistan, New York 2007.
Salem, Feryal, The emergence of early Sufi piety and Sunnī scholasticism. ʿAbdallāh b.
al-Mubārak and the formation of Sunnī identity in the second Islamic century, Leiden
2016.
Sufism and Worldly Powers 291

Salihi, Awaz, Le passage d’une confrérie soufie au politique. La Kasnazâniyya au

Kurdistan-Irak (1979–2014), PhD dissertation, Paris 2016.
Samson, Fabienne, Les marabouts de l’islam politique. Le Dahiratoul Moustarchidina
wal Moustarchidaty, un mouvement néo-confrérique sénégalais, Paris 2005.
Seeseman, Rüdiger, Between Sufism and Islamism. The Tijāniyya and Islamist rule
in the Sudan, in Paul L. Heck (ed.), Sufism and politics. The power of spirituality
(Princeton 2007), 23–57.
Seeseman, Rüdiger, The divine flood. Ibrāhīm Niasse and the roots of a twentieth-century
Sufi revival, New York 2011.
Sobieroj, Florian, al-S̲h̲iblī, EI2.
Thāqıb Dede, Sefīne-i nefīse-i mevleviyān, Cairo 1283/1866.
Triaud, Jean-Louis, La légende noire de la Sanûsiyya. Une confrérie musulmane sahari-
enne sous le regard français (1840–1930), 2 vols., Paris 1995.
Vimercati Sanseverino, Ruggero, Fès et sainteté, de la fondation à l’avènement du
Protectorat (808–1912). Hagiographie, tradition spirituelle et héritage prophétique
dans la ville de Mawlāy Idrīs, Rabat 2014.
Vikør, Knut S., Jihād in West Africa. A global theme in a regional setting, in Leif Manger
(ed.), Muslim diversity. Local Islam in global contexts (London 1999), 80–101.
Weismann, Itzchak, Taste of modernity. Sufism, Salafiyya, and Arabism in late Ottoman
Damascus, Leiden 2001.
Weismann, Itzchak, Sufi fundamentalism between India and Middle East, in Martin
van Bruinessen and Julia Day Howell (eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam
(London 2007), 115–28.
Wensinck, Arent Jan, Concordance et indices de la tradition musulmane, 8 vols., Leiden
1936–69.
Zarcone, Thierry, Bektāşiyye, EI3.
Zarcone, Thierry, La Turquie moderne et l’islam, Paris 2004.
 Chapter 14

Ṣūfī Terminology of Power

Luca Patrizi

In the technical language of Sufism, it is common to find loanwords from the

classical terminology of political power used in a metaphorical way. Given the
close relations between temporal and spiritual institutions of power in Islamic
societies, Muslim mystics integrated the doctrine of royalty into their system
of thought. As certain specialists have pointed out, this process of integration
occurred in conjunction with the historical dynamics of political power, and
developed as part of the progressive decline or transformation of the institu-
tion of the caliphate. A first major turning point came in the fifth/eleventh
century, with the Sunnī revival that took place under the Saljūq dynasty;
this revival gave the Ṣūfīs a position of power in society, in particular under
the vizierate of Niẓām al-Mulk (d. 485/1092). The capture of Baghdad by the
Mongols in 656/1258 certainly represents another turning point. Likewise, the
power of the Mamlūks and the genesis of the great Muslim empires (Mughul,
Ṣafavid, Ottoman) during the eighth/fourteenth to tenth/sixteenth centuries
also marked a decisive period, perhaps even the pinnacle of the symbolic and
real power of Ṣūfī shaykhs (Garcin, Les soufis, 19; Garcin, Le sultan 267–8; Papas
in this volume; Vikør in this volume).
This being said, a certain correlation between the terminology of power
and that of Sufism existed before the fifth/eleventh century. Indeed, just as the
Latin word patronus primarily indicates a master in relation to a freed slave
and later the patron saint of a town or a neighbourhood, it is well known that
the root w-l-y (walī, saint, or wālī, governor; walāya, sainthood, or wilāya, ter-
ritorial power) contributed to these ambiguities from the beginning of medi-
aeval Sufism (Chodkiewicz, 33–9).

1 The Metaphor of Royalty in Islam

The use of metaphor is common in the religious domain, particularly in mys-

ticism. The literature of the Muslim world, and particularly its poetry (a pre-
ferred mode of mystical expression) makes frequent use of metaphors. An
analysis of the technical terminology of Sufism displays a recurrent use of the
metaphor or royalty. The majority of ancient civilisations elaborated complex

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_016

Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 293

doctrines of royalty that were strictly tied to theological and metaphysical con-
cepts (Brisch; Gonda). In the Semitic and ancient Middle Eastern context, the
metaphor of royalty was frequently applied to God, particularly by Judaism
and later by Islam. Several interesting studies address this doctrine of royalty in
Judaism, as it is inscribed in the context of the ancient Middle East (Brettler).
Christianity used biblical formulas, and developed its own distinctive
interpretation of the metaphor of royalty through the well-known notion
of Christ, as the King, in the New Testament, where he is referred to in the
following forms: as “King of Israel or King of the Jews,” “King of the World,”
“King of the Universe,” “King of kings” (Beskow). In Byzantine iconography,
from the sixth to the seventh century, we again find Christ as the Pantocrator,
“Sovereign of the Universe,” just as it appears in the mediaeval images of the
“Majestas Domini,” where Christ is seated on a celestial throne. In various des-
ignations the Holy Virgin is often named “Queen,” and from the thirteenth cen-
tury, one of the Gothic iconographies of the Virgin represents her coronation
as Regina Coeli.
Medieval Islamic thought inherited many of these historical, cultural, and
theological perspectives. In Islam, one of the names of God is Mālik, “King,”
and Mālik al-mulk, “King of the kingdom.” Whereas Judaism unites the image
of the prophets with that of kings, as shown by the examples of David and
Solomon, the same is not true with regard to the Islamic tradition, which did
not embrace the exaltation of temporal power, rather it specifically rejected
the kings from ancient Arabia, the Byzantine basileus, and the Iranian shāh.
A ḥadīth of the Prophet Muḥammad affirms: “On the day of resurrection, the
name that God will dislike the most is the one held by a man who gave him-
self the title King of Kings (malik al-amlāk)” (al-Bukhārī, 4:129). While the
Sassanids may have influenced the Islamic empire in terms of state protocol,
its very elaborate doctrine of royalty was not applied unaltered to the new
Middle Eastern political reality. It must, however, be highlighted that certain
ʿAbbāsid sovereigns, such as al-Ma‌ʾmūn (r. 198–218/813–33), were influenced
by Sassanid culture, in an obvious political and symbolic continuity with the
ancient Persian empire (Frye, 4–56; Khaleghi-Motlagh). Finally, the doctrine
of royalty in the pre-Islamic Middle East exerted a strong influence on Islamic
medieval thought, particularly in the Persian environment. Sufism integrated
it in a metaphorical way, building part of its doctrinal system and hierarchical
structure on it, as we can see from an analysis of its technical terminology.
Yet, even before its appearance in Ṣūfī literature, in a passage of the Rasāʾil
Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ (Epistles of the Brethren of Purity), presumably written in Basra
during the second half of the fourth/tenth century, the notion of royalty had
a metaphorical meaning; the Rasāʾil uses technical mystic terminology in a
294 Patrizi

surprising way, clearly indicating a correlation between the etiquette of the

court and religious and mystical rules (adab):

And there are those that consider it obligatory for the sages, when they
desire to open the door to wisdom for the scholars and unveil the se-
crets for the disciples, that they first exert themselves, perfect their souls
through education to purify them, [and] purify their morals, because
wisdom, like a bride, needs a solitary encounter, and it is one of the trea-
sures of the hereafter. Then, if the sage does not put into practice what
is obligatory for him, in terms of wisdom, regarding the asceticism of the
sages before the secrets of wisdom are revealed to them, in this he is like
the chamberlain of the king that allows foolish people to come before
the king without respect for the rules of hierarchy, and that therefore de-
serves punishment.
Rasāʾil Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ, 4:13

2 Sufism and Power: Adab and the Metaphor of Royalty

Among the various manifestations of this metaphor in the context of medi-

aeval Sufism, two aspects are noteworthy: the metaphorical integration of the
technical terminology of power and the practice of the ancient royal banquet.
Early Sufism rejects, in principle, seeking temporal power and the company
of the powerful of this world. In this regard, the model of Ibrāhīm b. Adham
(d. c. 161/777–8), who, legend asserts, was a king of Balkh who abdicated his
power to lead the ascetic life of the Ṣūfīs in Syria, is continually invoked.
Mediaeval authors, however, acknowledge an affinity between the parallel lev-
els of earthly and spiritual royalty. These two points of view only appear to be
contradictory. Starting with the ancient sources, like the Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba
by al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) and the Kitāb tahdhīb al-asrār by al-Kharkūshī
(d. 407/1016), it seems that the school of Baghdad and the school of Khurāsān
deal with this question from different perspectives. We can observe the opin-
ion of the two schools in the following account reported by these two authors;
though the confrontation seems more rhetorical than real, its value remains
as a testimony of the proximity between the rules of the court and the rules
for Ṣūfīs: “Junayd said to Abū Ḥafṣ: ‘You educated your companions with the
rules of the sultans (addabta aṣḥābaka ādāb al-salāṭīn).’ He replied: ‘No, Abū
l-Qāsim, the excellence of the external adab reveals the excellence of the inter-
nal adab’” (al-Sulamī, 86; al-Kharkūshī, 213).
Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 295

Note that Junayd (d. 298/910) is the representative, par excellence, of the
school of Baghdad, whereas Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād al-Nīshāpūrī (d. c. 270/883)
is originally from Khurāsān. This may suggest that the school of Khurāsān was
more influenced by the Sassanid heritage than was the school of Baghdad.
Sufism of the mediaeval period consciously used the analogy between tem-
poral power and spiritual power. In the Kitāb adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq
al-taṣawwuf (“The book of the rule of the kings concerning the explanations of
the realities of Sufism”), an anonymous text that dates to the fourth/tenth cen-
tury, we find the metaphor of royalty applied to Sufism and named al-mulūkiyya
al-ṣūfiyya (the royalty of Ṣūfīs). The most significant passages follow here.

I called it “the rule of the kings,” because the Sufis renounced all second-
ary earthly causes, and have become kings … Why, then, should not the
definition of “kings” rightly be applied to them, since for them only God
is important and, in this life, [they] are content with little? … They have
become the kings of this world and the hereafter. They educate them-
selves according to the Sunna and, internally, they put effort into service.
They preserve the superior realities of divine sacredness, and thus have
become kings of both worlds, kings of the two dwellings, kings of para-
dise. It has been reported by Abū Hurayra that the Prophet said: “The
kings of paradise are men with messy hair, covered in dust and dressed
in rags, to whom no one pays attention, and if they were to merely swear
by God, their oath would be realised.” Such are the characteristics of the
Sufis and of royalty, attested by every single one of their movements. Part
of the reality of the royalty of Sufis is the fact of their dislike of the world,
in accordance with God…. Royalty is realised in them because they do
not move, except for His sake…. They are the real kings, and how could
the name of royalty not be applied to them since God gave men the name
of “kings” for what He has given them in terms of the beauty of this world
and its graces? God said: “He made you kings after having given you what
had never been given to anyone in the worlds” [Q 5:20]…. It is reported
that Ibrāhīm b. Adham said one day: “Miserable are the sovereigns of
this earth! If they had known what we are they would have killed us.”
Certain sages have affirmed: “Renounce this world, and you will be a king.
Renounce the hereafter and you will be crowned king.” The condition of
royalty on earth, is to renounce it, and you will be prince and master of
everything you renounce. It has been reported in a tradition that God
said to the garden of Eden: “Rejoice for the dwellings of the kings,” which
is intended to mean the houses of the ascetics and the prodigies of the
296 Patrizi

soul. I described the reality of the states of royalty according to the spe-
cific realities of the kings of the people of spiritual courtesy (adab): they
are the Sufis, those who educate themselves according to the Sunna with
the goal of performing real service to God.
Kitāb adab al-mulūk, 7–8

In the earliest Ṣūfī sources, it is possible to discover other references to royalty

that are equally ambivalent. Two examples from the biographical encyclopae-
dia by Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 430/1038) are noteworthy: “A man was ask-
ing Muḥammad b. Wāsiʿ for advice. He answered: I invite you to be king in
this life and the hereafter. The man asked: and how can I achieve that? He
replied: Give up this lower world” (al-Iṣfahānī, 2:350–1), and “Sunayd b. Dāwūd
al-Miṣṣīṣī transmitted: I asked Ibn al-Mubārak: who are the real men? He an-
swered: the scholars. I asked him: and who are the kings? He replied: the ascet-
ics” (al-Iṣfahānī, 8:167).
To these examples, we may add an interesting excerpt from al-Qushayrī
(d. 465/1072):

He [God] arranged the Muslims according to ranks. The masses are like
subjects of the king. The hadith collectors are like the treasurers of the
king. The people of the Qur’an are like the guardians of the registries and
valuables [of the king]. The jurists are the king’s trustees, because the
jurist [adjudicates] for God. The scholars of the roots (‘ulama’ al-usul) are
like the chiefs and commanders of the armies. The awliya’ are like pillars
of the [palace’s] gate, while the lords of hearts (arbab al-qulub) and the
people of the purity (ashab al-safa’) are like the elect of the king and his
companions.
Knysh, 72

It is highly significant that the Qaṣīda al-rāʾiyya by Abū Madyan al-Shuʿayb

(d. 589/1193 or 594/1198) starts with the following passage: “There is no pleasure
in life outside of the company of Sufis / They are the sultans, lords and princes”
(Cornell, 150–6). Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 638/1240), in his own doctrinal elaboration
on adab, defines adab al-khidma, as “adab of service,” specifying explicitly that
its origins are from royal etiquette. He then adds: “Finally, the king of the men
of God is God himself, who instituted for us different types of adab for His
service” (Gril, 231). ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Shaʿrānī (d. 973/1565) similarly express-
es this analogy in his work: “When God decreed sainthood for a creature, the
same way as the kings of earth decree the functions of their subordinates, He
granted him invocation (dhikr) as a kind of ordainment, in order to make his
sainthood manifest” (al-Shaʿrānī, 1:21).
Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 297

One of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s works, entitled Kitāb al-tadbirāt al-ilāhiyya fī iṣlāḥ al-
mamlaka al-insāniyya (The book of divine management in the reformation
of the human kingdom), focuses on the metaphor of political power and de-
scribes the spiritual microcosm of man, in which the spirit (rūḥ) is the king
(malik) who rules the “city of the body” (madīnat al-jism) (Ibn al-ʿArabī).
At the foundation of the institution of the Sunnī caliphate we find, ide-
ally, the uninterrupted transmission of the khilāfa, the legacy of Prophet
Muḥammad to his successors. In the same way, the foundation of Sufism in the
transmission of initiation resides in prophetic transmission, and the initiatory
pact between master and disciples is an esoteric transposition of the temporal
pact in Islam. The lieutenant of a spiritual Ṣūfī lineage in fact often takes the
name khalīfa; this started from as early as the sixth/twelfth century. The termi-
nology of the initiatic pact closely follows the terminology of the caliphal pact;
the pact taken with the khalīfa is referred to as ʿahd, bayʿa, mubāyaʿa (De Jong,
K̲ h̲alīfa (iii)).
In Sufism, another fundamental term of temporal power, sulṭān, is used
to identify those with remarkable spiritual mastery (Kramers). We can point
out some representative figures who, among others, have been qualified with
this title: Ibrāhīm b. Adham, who was called sulṭān al-ʿārifīn (“sultan of the
gnostics”) has already been mentioned; Abū Yazīd al-Bisṭāmī (d. 261/874 or
264/877–8) was also nicknamed sulṭān al-ʿārifīn; the Shāfiʿī jurist and Ṣūfī ʿIzz
al-Dīn b. ʿAbd al-Salām al-Sulamī (d. 660/1262) was called sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ
(“sultan of the scholars”); Jalāl al-Dīn al-Rūmī’s (d. 672/1273) father, Bahāʾ
al-Dīn Walad (d. 628/1231), was also called sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ; his grandson was
known as Sulṭān Walad (d. 712/1312); Ibn al-Fāriḍ (d. 632/1235), a poet and Ṣūfī,
was called sulṭān al-ʿāshiqīn (“sultan of the lovers”); Ibn al-ʿArabī was sulṭān al-
ʿārifīn; Muḥammad al-Ḥanafī (d. 847/1443), an Egyptian Ṣūfī, was commonly
called sulṭān Ḥanafī (Sabra, 219, 231).
In Persian, the analogous term khwāja was used to designate the sovereigns
of ancient Persia, particularly in the Shāh-nama of Firdawsī (d. 411/1020). This
term is used equally among Ṣūfīs in the Persian- and Turkish-speaking regions
to designate important masters, from Khwāja ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī (d. 481/1089),
to the chain of Naqshbandiyya masters that are known by the denomination
khwājagān. According to legend, this denomination comes from one of the
first masters of this Naqshbandī chain, ʿAbd al-Khāliq Ghijduwānī (d. 617/1220),
who appeared to Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1391) in a vision in which he
was seated on a large throne behind a green curtain, surrounded by khwājagān
(Molé, 38–9).
The terminological parallel extends to the hierarchical structure of Sufism
and to ceremonial power. In fact, the spiritual hierarchy in Sufism is influ-
enced by the categories of temporal power: the dīwān al-awliyāʾ, the “council
298 Patrizi

of the saints,” is clearly derived from the government institution of the dīwān
(Chodkiewicz, 113–15). Above the Ṣūfī hierarchy lies the quṭb, the “pole,” who
is endowed with the same attributes of a temporal monarch, but in a spiri-
tual sense, according, for example, to Ibn al-ʿArabī and his school (De Jong,
al-Ḳuṭb (2)).
With regard to investiture ceremonies, al-Shaʿrānī says that the khirqa
(the initiatory mantle transmitted from master to disciple) was analogous
to the robe of honour (al-khalʿa) given by kings to those in his entourage
(al-Shaʿrānī, 1:21).

figure 14.1
ʿAbd al-Qādir Jīlānī
sitting upon a throne,
Mughal, eighteenth
century
Courtesy of
Victor & Albert
Museum, South &
South East Asia
Collection
Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 299

figure 14.2
Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī holding a globe, detail
of miniature by Bichitr from Minto Album,
c. 1610–18, India
Courtesy of Chester Beatty Library

3 From Metaphor to Ritual: The Banquet

The second modality in which the metaphor of royalty is integrated into Sufism
is the incorporation of the practice of the ancient royal banquets, in particular
the Iranian bazm (Melikian-Chirvani, 95–119). In this case, the usage is no lon-
ger just literary, but also ritual, the banquet is part of a sacred representation.
During the ʿAbbāsid period, the court of Baghdad integrated the practice of the
Iranian bazm, but referred to as a majlis (Shaked, 75–91; Khaleghi-Motlagh).
Ṣūfīs, then, because of their familiarity with the terminology and etiquette of
power, integrated the ʿAbbāsid majlis by transposing its principal characteris-
tics into symbolic practices. At the centre, the master takes on the role of king,
while the master’s entourage, that must conform to the rules (ādāb), is analo-
gous to the king’s court. Finally, both music and chants were used in the court
majlis and in the Ṣūfī majlis. In the latter, the cupbearer (sāqī), who brings the
wine that leads to intoxication, is metaphorical; it appears in song lyrics and in
Persian and Arabic Ṣūfī poetry.
The majlis takes place in the khānqāh, the headquarters of Ṣūfī life in the
Persian environment. According to the testimony of the Andalusian traveller
300 Patrizi

Ibn Jubayr (d. 614/1217), who traveled in the Middle East in the late sixth/
twelfth century, the ribāṭs or khawāniq of Damascus were like palaces whose
members, the Ṣūfīs, are kings whom God has raised above mundane things, to
render them free from material attachments, so that they could dedicate them-
selves to the service of God and the samāʿ (Trimingham, 9–10).
Another Persian term, dargāh (threshold or palace), was especially wide-
spread in the Indian environment; it denotes the seat of a fraternity and the
shrine of a great saint (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume). In this case the origi-
nal meaning is also linked to the court of the caliphs in Baghdad and Samarra,
and was directly inspired the court’s organisation (P., bār, bādrgāh, dargāh,
darbār; to refer to “meeting place,” lit., “where one sits,” i.e., or the “seat of
power”). The former was imbued with a pre-Islamic influence (Bosworth).
Judging by the sources, this integration of court etiquette into Sufism can be
attributed to Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049), who certainly played a key
role in the process of institutionalising the collective forms of Ṣūfī sociability
(Graham). The first stage of Abū Saʿīd’s life was characterised by a strong ascet-
icism that led to a series of spiritual openings. After this, his attitude changed
radically: he founded a khānqāh and established collective assemblies (majālis)
with all the characteristics of court assemblies. Dressed in silk like a king, he
is described resting on cushions. The disciples sometimes knelt down in front
of him. According to sources, it was Abū Saʿīd who introduced the practice of
chanting poetry and the use of musical instruments into the majālis, and al-
lowed for the presence of young men in the meetings, similar to the image of
the cupbearer in the Iranian bazm, and the Greco-Roman symposium (Ritter).

4 Conclusions

The use of the terminology of power in Sufism appears to be more than a sim-
ple rhetorical artifice that reflected an aspect of the confrontation between
temporal and spiritual institutions in Islamic societies. Likewise, this use of
political terms cannot be read solely as an attempt by Ṣūfī authorities to share
temporal power, a fortiori to replace it. In fact, in Islamic mysticism, the pro-
cess of integrating this technical terminology began very early and went hand
in hand with the integration of the technical notion of adab, a notion that
was also influenced by the etiquette practiced at the Persian Sassanid court.
The proof that it relates not only to a rhetorical device or a simple element
of historical conjecture can be found in the complex system of Sufism that is
at once doctrinal and ritual, of which this terminology represents just a small
part. Finally, this system seems to have efficiently adapted itself to the elitist
Ṣūfī Terminology of Power 301

and hierarchical structure of Sufism that had developed by the end of the me-
diaeval period.

Bibliography

Sources
al-Bukhārī, al-Jāmiʿ al-ṣaḥīḥ, 4 vols., Cairo 1980.
Ibn al-ʿArabī, Kitāb al-tadbirāt al-ilāhiyya fī iṣlāḥ al-mamlaka al-insāniyya, Casablanca
2015.
al-Iṣfahānī, Abū Nuʿaym, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ wa-ṭabaqāt al-aṣfiyāʾ, 2 vols., Beirut 1988.
al-Kharkūshī, Kitāb tahdhīb al-asrār, Abu Dhabi 1999.
Kitāb adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq al-taṣawwuf, ed. B. Radtke, Beirut and Stuttgart
1991.
Rasāʾil Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ wa-khullān al-wafāʾ, 4 vols., Cairo 1997.
al-Shaʿrānī, al-Anwār al-qudsiyya fī maʿrifa qawāʾid al-ṣūfiyya, 2 vols., Beirut 1992.
al-Sulamī, Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba, Jerusalem 1954.

Studies
Beskow, Per, Rex gloriae. The kingship of Christ in the early church, Stockholm, Gothen-
burg, Uppsala 1962.
Bosworth, Clifford Edmund, Courts and courtiers iii. In the Islamic period to the
Mongol conquest, EIr.
Brettler, Marc Zvi, God is king. Understanding an Israelite metaphor, Sheffield 1989.
Brisch, Nicole, ed., Religion and power. Divine kingship in the ancient world and beyond,
Chicago 2008.
Chodkiewicz, Michel, Le sceau des saints. Prophétie et sainteté dans la doctrine d’Ibn
Arabî, Paris 1986.
Cornell, Vincent J., The way of Abū Madyan. Doctrinal and poetic works of Abū Madyan
Shuʿayb ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Anṣārī (c. 509/115–594/1198), Cambridge 1996.
De Jong, Frederick, K̲ h̲alīfa (iii)—in Islamic mysticism, EI2.
De Jong, Frederick, al-Ḳuṭb (2) in mysticism, EI2.
Frye, Richard Nelson, ed., The Cambridge history of Iran. Vol. 4: The period from the
Arab invasion to the Saljuqs, Cambridge 1975.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Les soufis dans la ville mamelouke d’Égypte. Histoire du soufisme
et histoire globale, in R. J. McGregor and A. Sabra (eds.), Le développement du sou-
fisme en Égypte à l’époque mamelouke (Cairo 2006), 11–40.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Le sultan et le pharaon (le politique et le religieux dans l’Égypte
mamluke), Hommages à François Daumas (Montpellier 1986), 1:261–72.
Gonda, Jan, Ancient Indian kingship from the religious point of view, Leiden 1969.
302 Patrizi

Graham, Terry, Abū Saʿīd Abī ’l Khayr and the School of Khurāsān, in Leonard
Lewisohn (ed.), The heritage of Sufism. Classical Persian Sufism from its origins to
Rumi (700–1300), vol. 1 (Oxford 1993), 83–135.
Gril, Denis, Adab and revelation, or one of the foundations of the hermeneutics of Ibn
ʿArabi, in S. Hirtenstein and M. Tiernan (eds.), Muhyiddin Ibn ʿArabi. A commemora-
tive volume, Shaftesbury 1993.
Khaleghi-Motlagh, Djalal, Adab i. Adab in Iran, EIr.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism. A new history of Islamic mysticism, Princeton and Oxford
2017.
Kramers, Johannes Hendrik, Sulṭān, 4. In mysticism, EI2.
Melikian-Chirvani, Assadullah Souren, The Iranian bazm in early Persian sources, in
R. Gyselen (ed.), Banquets d’Orient, Res Orientales (Bures-sur-Yvette 1992), 4:95–119.
Molé, Marijan, Autour du Dare Mansour. L’apprentissage mystique de Bahāʾ al-Dīn
Naqshband, REI 27.1 (1959): 35–66.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Étude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan oriental, Paris 2005.
Ritter, Hellmut, Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-K̲ h̲ayr, EI2.
Sabra, Adam, From artisan to courtier. Sufism and social mobility in fifteenth-century
Egypt, in R. E. Margariti, A. Sabra, and P. M. Sijpesteijn (eds.), Histories of the Middle
East. Studies in Middle Eastern society, economy and law in honor of A. L. Udovitch
(Leiden 2011), 213–32.
Shaked, Shaul, From Iran to Islam: On some symbols of royalty, JSAI 7 (1986): 75–91.
Trimingham, John Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1971.
 Chapter 15

Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors

Neguin Yavari

Political notables seeking advice is a commonplace motif in premodern his-

toriography from around the world. Haman advised the Pharaoh, Alexander
relied on Aristotle’s perspicacity to conquer the world, and closer to home, me-
diaeval Islamic historians underline the lackluster rule of the ʿAbbāsids follow-
ing the demise of the fabled Barmakid viziers in the mid third/ninth century.
Equally pervasive is the exhortation of mindfulness of the corrupting nature
of power. Often the most strident warnings against it are offered by those clos-
est to the king (Yavari, Advice for the sultan, 7–44). Thus, the back and forth
between the urge, or even the duty, to correct wrongs and the futility of even
the most delicately calibrated and best-intentioned attempts at edification
continues unabated in the records of human civilisation. In recent years, even
presidents of modern democracies have been encouraged to benefit from the
advice of mediaeval “mirrorists” (Koziol, 197–8).
The provision of advice was not limited to courtiers and those vested in the
exercise of power. In fact, the advice of unworldly exemplars who otherwise
pointedly shunned the company of rulers was a particularly prized commod-
ity across political and cultural boundaries. In the mediaeval Islamic world,
interactions between Ṣūfī luminaries and those in positions of political power
are noted, beginning in the fourth/tenth century, when they began to make
an impact. In the collected biographies dedicated to local notables, for ex-
ample, the absolute number of Ṣūfīs mentioned does not exceed ten per cent
until late in the fifth/eleventh century; before the third/ninth century there
are none (Bulliet, 90–1). In earlier times, a fabled Ṣūfī was one who suffered
political persecution, the martyred Ṣūfī master and poet Manṣūr al-Ḥallāj, ex-
ecuted at the caliph’s order in 309/922 is a prominent example. By contrast,
in fifth-/eleventh-century Iran, Ṣūfī masters were regularly visited, and gener-
ously patronised by the vizier Niẓām al-Mulk (d. 485/1092), the de facto ruler
of the Saljūq empire (431–591/1040–1194). Shaykh Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr
(d. 440/1049), for example, foretold Niẓām al-Mulk’s auspicious future when
the latter was still a child; this according to the late sixth-/twelfth-century ha-
giography written by his grand-nephew (Muḥammad Ibn Munawwar, I: 59;
Yavari, The future of Iran’s past, 68, 121–2). The elusive Ṣūfī master Abū ʿAlī
l-Fārmadhī (d. 477/1084), ʿAbd al-Karīm al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072) and others

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_017

304 Yavari

were among Niẓām al-Mulk’s trusted counselors (Yavari, The future of Iran’s
past, 118–25). In these Ṣūfī luminaries the vizier found powerful allies commit-
ted to curbing confessional strife.
The ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir al-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–622/1180–1225), another po-
litical ruler who, like Niẓām al-Mulk, hoped to capitalise on the authority wield-
ed by religious leaders (Ohlander, 19), and cultivated a close relationship with
the Ṣūfī master Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234). In 577/1181,
al-Nāṣir installed al-Suhrawardī as director of the Ribāt al-Ma‌ʾmūniyya in
Baghdad. Nine years later, the caliph sent al-Suhrawardī on a diplomatic mis-
sion to the court of the Shāh-i Armanid ruler Begtimur (r. 581–9/1185–93), to
secure his support against the last Saljūq sultan, Tughril III (r. 571–90/1176–94),
although al-Nāṣir had previously relied on Shāfiʿī jurists for such diplomatic
initiatives (Ohlander, 90–2). Another diplomatic initiative, this time to the
Ayyūbid (564/1169 to end of ninth/fifteenth century) court in Damascus began
in 604/1207–8 (Ohlander, 94–6). Mediaeval historians report with great fanfare
al-Suhrawardī’s reception at the court—further testimony to the growing in-
fluence of Ṣūfī masters by the early seventh/thirteenth century. In 614/1217–8,
al-Suhrawardī received his most critical charge, to repel the advance of ʿAlāʾ
al-Dīn Muḥammad Khwārazm Shāh (r. 596–617/1200–20) on Baghdad and
to save the caliph’s throne. Al-Suhrawardī met with the Khwārazm Shāh in
Hamadān, and pleaded with him to refrain from harming a descendant of the
Prophet. ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad refused to heed the Ṣūfī master’s exhorta-
tions. He received his just deserts, however, when a heavy snowfall confounded
his army, and a few months later, he was left to defend his throne from the
invading Mongols (Ohlander, 98–104). Al-Suhrawardī also played an important
role in al-Nāṣir’s short-lived attempt to rejuvenate the caliphate as an umbrella
institution alone capable of accommodating the competing interests of jurists
( fuqahāʾ), Ṣūfīs, and brotherhoods ( fityān), as well as Ḥanbalīs, Shīʿīs, and
Ashʿarīs (Ohlander, 291–303).
In these early examples, the relationship between Ṣūfīs and politicians took
place as a one to one encounter in which the king or vizier met the Ṣūfī, or
the ascetic or the ascetic Ṣūfī. Unlike the advice to the king from his vizier in
Niẓām al-Mulk’s Siyar al-mulūk, this performance is designed to exhibit power
on both the temporal and spiritual planes. Hence, the stage directions vary as
well. The mystic often refuses to come to the court, compelling the prince to
journey to the Ṣūfī’s threadbare abode; as depicted in countless illustrations in
mediaeval manuscripts. Unlike other advisors, such as viziers or amīrs (mili-
tary leaders), and apart from a few notable exceptions, Ṣūfīs, reluctant advi-
sors, enjoyed a long life and died in their own beds, and even had shrines built
in their honour.
Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 305

figure 15.1 Youth and Dervish, Isfahan, second quarter of the seventeenth century
Courtesy of Metropolitan Museum, Rogers Fund, 1911

Significantly, the advice comes in the form of isolated anecdotes rather than
chapters and books. The tone of advice is also different and not as deferen-
tial as that of bureaucrats offering counsel. Rūmī’s father Bahāʾ al-Dīn Walad
(d. 628/1231), dubbed sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ (king of the scholars/clerics) by later
hagiographers, frequented the company of the Saljūq sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn
Kayqubād (r. 616–34/1220–37). On one occasion, he is quoted as saying to the
king: “You are a sultan and I am a sultan; your reign will last for as long as your
eyes remain open, mine will begin when I shut them forever” (Sipahsālār, 14).
Bahāʾ al-Dīn Walad’s son Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273) characterised thus
the edifying relationship between Ṣūfīs and rulers:

Such is the custom of kings: you might have heard this before, if you
recall.
The paladins stand on their left hand, because the heart is on the left side.
On the right hand are the chancellors and the secretaries, for the art of
writing and bookkeeping belongs to this hand.
They make the Sufis face them, for they are a mirror of the soul, and bet-
ter than a mirror,
306 Yavari

Since they have polished their hearts in commemoration of God and

meditation, that the heart’s mirror may receive the pristine image.
Whoever is born beautiful from the loins of Creation, a mirror must be
placed before him.
The beautiful face is in love with the mirror: it is a polisher of the soul
and kindles the fear of God in all hearts.
a slightly modified translation from Rūmī, 194

Still, the scale and impact of these early encounters were modest. Both the
texture and the tenor of Ṣūfī involvement in political life changed dramati-
cally in the altered landscape of the Islamic world in the post-Mongol period,
in Egypt, Iran, Asia Minor, Central Asia, and India (Potter, 77–82; Gross, The
Naqshbandīya, 14–7). This transformation is the focus of the remainder of this
chapter. It explores Ṣūfī engagement with rulers and courtiers to better under-
stand the scope and evolution of Islamic thought in the early modern period.
Accordingly, the emphasis is on the writings of prominent Ṣūfīs in royal service
rather than enumerating individual Ṣūfīs who served in such capacities. How
did Ṣūfīs themselves describe and legitimate political influence? For spiritual
figures who claimed—almost by definition—to eschew mundane affairs in
favour of nobler gratifications, Ṣūfī masters placed a heavy premium on prox-
imity to power. This conundrum is nicely captured in a collected biography
of Naqshbandī shaykhs by the Egyptian Ṣūfī master and poet Yāsīn b. Ibrāhīm
al-Sanhūtī (d. 1935). The Ṣūfī worldview, he holds, is one that rests on shunning
worldliness, but at the same time, it is instructed to uphold justice, to ensure
that governors act in accordance to the law of God, and to promote public
welfare (Sanhūtī, 130).
Ṣūfī writings of the post-Mongol period engaged with a wider audience and
amplified a universal message. The increasingly assertive authorial voice in
Ṣūfī hagiographies, ethical and theological treatises, poetry, mirrors for princ-
es, and collected biographies, is difficult to miss. Ṣūfī masters laid out their
views and provided guidance on religious issues, good rule, and the adab (eti-
quette) of engagement with foes and foreign potentates. Among the Ṣūfīs who
played an overtly political role and left behind a substantive body of writing
in the later Mongol period is ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla al-Simnānī (d. 736/1336), theolo-
gian, jurist, poet, and Ṣūfī master who wielded great power at the court of the
Īlkhānid Arghūn (r. 683–90/1284–91). His aristocratic family enjoyed eminence
at the court; his father was appointed governor of Iraq, one uncle was made
vizier and another served as chief judge (Martini, 5–9). Al-Simnānī’s career at
Arghūn’s court began early in his life. He served the sultan devotedly, and they
struck up a great friendship. In 683/1284, however, al-Simnānī experienced a
Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 307

spiritual conversion (Simnānī, al-ʿUrwa, 297–312, 496–8). Abandoning the wor-

ship of a false king, al-Simnānī’s own analogy, he left Arghūn’s court in pursuit
of moral edification. The bulk of his vast corpus establishes Ṣūfī rules of con-
duct and practice. On numerous occasions he interceded with the Īlkhānid
rulers to seek a pardon for uppity magnates and rebels (Martini, 92–7).
Although he was a formidable presence at the court of several Īlkhānid
rulers, most of al-Simnānī’s exhortations, often expressed during disputa-
tions with religious adversaries and even the ruler, emphasised orthodoxy
and good religion (Simnānī, Chihil majlis, 150; Martini, 47–52). True Islam,
al-Simnānī declares, is that of the Sunnīs, the most balanced of persuasions,
which praises the four rightly-guided caliphs, Abū Bakr (r. 11–3/632–4), ʿUmar
b. al-Khaṭṭāb (r. 13–23/634–44), ʿUthmān b. ʿAffān (r. 23–35/644–56), and ʿAlī
b. Abī Ṭālib (r. 35–40/656–61), and Muḥammad’s progeny (ahl al-bayt) and his
disciples; does not accuse any Muslim of disbelief; and respects all prophets,
scriptures, and angels, such that confessional prejudice is eschewed and vari-
ous communities can live in peace (Simnānī, “Zayn al-muʿtaqid” in Martini,
298–9). Although the primary audience for al-Simnānī’s exhortations was his
followers—as was the case with al-Suhrawardī’s—the marked political va-
lence in his denunciation of sectarian divide, prejudice, and factional zeal can-
not be ignored.
Al-Simnānī’s Chihil majlis clearly reflects the changed religious landscape of
the Mongol period and beyond. In sharp contrast to earlier ruling houses, the
Īlkhānids were receptive to spiritual advice from different sources, including
Christians, Buddhists (Bakshis), and Muslims. The scene described above, for
example, is not that of a ruler listening to the ex-cathedra pronouncements of a
Ṣūfī or a theologian but a spiritual tournament of sorts, performed at the court
between warring doctrines, with the ruler as the referee. In these settings, the
Ṣūfī’s karāmāt (miracles) are akin to the magical powers of the shamans. It is
therefore necessary to move beyond the rubric of advice to rulers, and classical
loci of such advice literature, to get at the heart of the political engagement of
Ṣūfī masters, which includes the call for a new religious order. In the context of
a refutation of philosophy, al-Simnānī, to take one example, presents the Ṣūfī
creed as the optimal antidote against fanaticism and sectarian strife, superior
to the Mālikī, Ḥanafī, Shāfiʿī, and Ḥanbalī creeds. The Ṣūfī madhhab (school/
doctrine), he writes, is the fifth and the most universal (Martini, 111–2). Likewise,
the prominent Naqshbandī scholar and well-known poet ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī
(d. 898/1492) is remembered in Niẓāmī Bākharzī’s (d. 909/1503) hagiographi-
cal account for intervening in several sectarian controversies to restore public
peace (Niẓāmī Bākharzī, 191–5; Gross, The Majmūʿa-yi murāsalāt, 32–4; Algar,
118–20).
308 Yavari

With the advent of Ṣūfī communities/lineages (silsilas), the Ṣūfīs were no

longer content with king-making—be it in the form of proffering advice, edu-
cating the prince, or interceding on behalf of a favoured contender (Potter,
92–5). Instead, they became directly involved in the design and practice of
politics. The Egyptian Ṣūfī master ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Shaʿrānī’s (d. 973/1565)
Advice for callow jurists and gullible mendicants on befriending emirs, is an ex-
ample of a book of rules for Ṣūfīs who engage with political authorities. In this
text, the Ṣūfī shaykh should not accept gifts, financial and otherwise, because
this undermines his standing as an impartial advisor. The amīr and the Ṣūfī
shaykh have a covenant (ʿahd), al-Shaʿrānī writes, and fidelity to it requires that
the shaykh remains independent of the amīr. The upright counselor must feel
free to admonish the sultan.

I will not befriend an emir unless I think that his love for me will in-
crease the more I rebuke him, the more severe I am with him, and the
more I point out his faults. If he is not like that, I send him away with
a kind phrase, for there is no value in a mendicant befriending an emir
except to admonish him and so that he may profit in this world and in
the Hereafter. In the absence of admonition, there enters deceit, and one
loses this world and the Hereafter.
al-Shaʿrānī, 58–9

The Ṣūfī shaykh must renounce the world wholeheartedly before he befriends
an amīr, so that he may know that his amīr and his amīr’s rival are equally
deserving of respect (al-Shaʿrānī, 71). In al-Shaʿrānī’s telling, it is the Ṣūfī who
decides whether or not a king is worthy of his advice.
Ṣūfī communities proselytised a new template of civil religion that gal-
vanised local populations, and relying on that popular support, engaged in
a traffic in authority with political elites. The new civil religion of the Ṣūfīs
also dislodged Arabic as the sole language of theology (in the eastern Islamic
lands), and upended the centuries-old template of maintaining distance from
rulers and politicians as a sine qua non of piety and exemplarity in the Islamic
mould. None among the silsilas achieved closer collaborations with governing
authorities than the Naqshbandiyya. Developed in the ninth/fifteenth century
with claims to significantly older historical roots, the Naqshbandī silsila spread
across a vast swath of Islamic lands, with a significant presence in Egypt, Iran,
Central Asia, and India.
The Naqshbandī savant Fakhr al-Dīn ʿAlī Kāshifī’s (d. 939/1532) account of
an encounter between two rival Tumūrid princes, Abū Saʿīd (r. 855–73/1451–
69) in Samarqand and Abū l-Qāsim Bābur (r. 851–61/1447–57), who ruled in
Khurāsān, is telling in this regard. Faced with an imminent attack from Bābur’s
Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 309

forces, Abū Saʿīd asked the influential Naqshbandī master, ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār
(d. 895/1490) for advice. The military commanders in his service had ruled out
resistance as futile, and advised the sultan to seek refuge in Turkestan. Aḥrār
disagreed, and said: “I have assumed the task of defeating Bābur. Rest assured:
I will fulfill my task.” The commanders protested, but the Ṣūfī shaykh prevailed,
because, we are told, the sultan was steadfast in his conviction. The command-
ers of Bābur’s army were also well aware that Abū Saʿīd’s forces would not
survive in battle against them. They were certain that his commanders would
arrange his escape from Samarqand, and planned their attack on that basis. As
Bābur’s army descended on the city, Abū Saʿīd’s soldiers were dispersed in vari-
ous neighbourhoods. The people of Samarqand put up a fierce resistance, and
as instructed, proceeded to cut off the nose and ears of each captured soldier.
Bābur’s army was in despair. And then, a cholera epidemic befell their horses
and the trenchant smell of decaying corpses exacerbated their misery. Bābur
sent an emissary to Aḥrār to sue for peace (Kāshifī, II: 522–4).
But the story does not end there. As the vanquished Bābur lay on his side
outside the city walls, he is said to have cried out: “It may be true that we did
not conquer Samarqand, but we did learn the truth about Khwāja Aḥrār, who is
not an ʿārif, for if he were, he would not have destroyed us so.” Aḥrār’s retort in
defence of his spiritual credentials elevated the status of Ṣūfī saints to that of
prophets: “Like prophets, ʿārifs are judged by the cause not the consequence of
their action. For if it weren’t so, justifying the destruction wrought by the likes
of Noah and Hūd who destroyed their own people by water and wind would be
a problem” (Kāshifī, II: 525–6.) To buttress his claim, Aḥrār cites Q 8:11, which
addresses the believers and claims that it was not they who killed the unbeliev-
ers, but God himself.
In this episode, Aḥrār emerges as the true ruler of Samarqand, the people of
the city his true army, and their truth confirmed by divine intervention. Rather
than advice to the sultan, the true meaning of this and numerous similar an-
ecdotes strewn across Ṣūfī writings of the period is that members of a Ṣūfī
silsila are sovereign actors beholden to and supported by the one true Lord.
Accordingly, rather than ethical conduct, the Ṣūfī shaykh advises the ruler on
matters of strategy and tactics in warfare.
Exercising the king to instill in him the virtues required for good rule
is only a secondary and derivative objective in the mirror for princes of the
Naqshbandī master, Aḥmad Kāsānī Dahbidī, better known as Makhdūm-i
Aʿẓam’s (d. 949/1542) Risāla-yi tanbīh al-salāṭīn, addressed to the Shaybānid
sultan ʿUbaydallāh b. Maḥmūd (r. 940–6/1534–9). Ensuring the primacy of
the Ṣūfī path (ṭarīqa), promoting and patronising Ṣūfī confraternities, and
protecting them from all enemies are the main exhortations delivered in
this treatise. Makhdūm-i Aʿẓam calls for the conversion of the sultan, such
310 Yavari

figure 15.2 Akbar and Jahangir in apotheosis (folio from the

St. Petersburg Album), attributed to Bichitr, about 1640.
Private Collection

that the sultan becomes a disciple of the Ṣūfī and the Ṣūfī rules the sultan
(Papas, 25).
Parity between king and Ṣūfī master is a perennial motif in early modern
Ṣūfī writings. Bahāʾ al-Dīn Walad was known as sulṭān al-ʿulamāʾ, as noted. The
early Ṣūfī master Junayd (d. 298/910), al-Shaʿrānī tells his readers, “used to say
to those who came to him seeking the path, ‘Have you served kings?’ If they
said ‘No,’ he would say: ‘Go serve them, then come back. The least demanding
Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 311

conduct with us is beyond the conduct you are obliged to follow with kings’”
(al-Shaʿrānī, 72–3). In fact, regal terminology abounds in Ṣūfī circles. One
prominent example is the term walī, used for Ṣūfī saints, which echoes the
wilāya, or authority of caliphs and princes (Patrizi, 199; Patrizi in this volume),
or references to the divine as the true sovereign (Patrizi, 200–11). In addition
to metaphors, Ṣūfī rituals mimic those found in the royal banquet, bazm (a
courtly practice) that travelled from pre-Islamic Iran to the ʿAbbāsid capital
(Patrizi, 205–11). Naqshbandī masters, to take another example, routinely ap-
pointed four men among their followers as a khalīfa (successor, anglicised as
caliph) charged with propagating their teachings (Kāshifī, I:14). The template
of non-hereditary leadership clearly emulates the ideals of governance that
prevailed in the early days of Islam, when the Prophet Muḥammad was suc-
ceeded by his closest disciples, the four rightly-guided caliphs mentioned ear-
lier. In the annals of mediaeval Islamic historiography, the ideal paradigm of
pious succession was considered to have ended in 41/661 when the Umayyads
instituted hereditary succession.
Similarly commonplace in the premodern sources is the centrality of su-
pernatural powers associated with Ṣūfī shaykhs to their efficacy as court ad-
visors. Effectively, the mediatory role often assumed by Ṣūfī masters rested
on their ability to deliver the favour of fortune to their patrons. ʿUbaydallāh
Aḥrār’s invocation of pestilence on an opposing army is one such example,
as is Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr’s oracular prediction, both mentioned above. In
fact, saintly miracles were considered on a par with the evidentiary miracles
attributed to prophets. Through his rectitude and his gift of revelation, the Ṣūfī
acquires power over the ruler, al-Shaʿrānī writes (al-Shaʿrānī, 74–5; Geoffroy,
304–8; Papas, 18). Unless the Ṣūfī master can avail victory, defeat enemies, or
heal the sultan’s friends, he will not be of any use to the ruler.
Approbation for engaging with politics and with princes, although clearly
manifest in Naqshbandī history and dogma, was by no means restricted to that
community. The politically-minded al-Shaʿrānī, for example, was strictly anti-
confessional; he never revealed his own affiliation, and enjoyed close relations
with both major Ṣūfī communities active in Egypt at the time, the Shādhilī
and Aḥmadī networks. Likewise in seventh-/thirteenth-century Anatolia,
where the Kubrawī Bahāʾ al-Dīn Walad (Lewis, 114–8) lorded over the kings,
and in ninth-/fifteenth-century Egypt, the Shādhilī Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad
al-Ḥanafī (d. 847/1443) held sway (Sabra, 218–26). Feted and generously re-
warded by Mamlūk sultans (648–922/1250–1517), Shams al-Dīn al-Ḥanafī
amassed great wealth in exchange for lending his good name and providing
prudent counsel to the kings. In one instance, when al-Nāṣir Faraj b. Barqūq
(r. 801–15/1399–1412, with a gap in 808/1405) was about to punish an adminis-
trator for an ill-conceived policy, al-Ḥanafī intervened to remind the sultan of
312 Yavari

his own role in formulating that measure. When the irritated king asked the
Ṣūfī shaykh whose kingdom it was, al-Ḥanafī is to have retorted: “The kingdom
does not belong to me or to you, it belongs to God …” (Sabra, 219)—a procla-
mation that could well have come from a Naqshbandī shaykh, as we have seen.
And in tenth-/sixteenth-century Iran, it was a Ṣafavī perfect master (murshid-i
kāmil) who inaugurated a new dynasty and ruled as Ismāʿīl I (r. 907–30/1501–
24), pīr (master) and prince united in one.
The new language of civil religion presented by Ṣūfī silsilas transformed the
political and religious landscape of the Islamic world in the tenth/sixteenth
and eleventh/seventeenth centuries, and had far-reaching consequences (for
example, in Central Asia, see DeWeese, 39–40). The increasing appeal of on-
tological monism among Islamic philosophers in the eleventh/seventeenth
century, for one example, “seems largely to have been linked to the spread in
the Arab East of Ṣūfī orders such as the Khalwatiyya from Anatolia and the
Shaṭṭāriyya and Naqshbandiyya from India” (El-Rouayheb, 235–6). On the po-
litical register, most states in the early modern Islamic world—the Āq Qoyūnlū
(eighth/fourteenth century until 907–8/1501–3), Ottoman (eighth/fourteenth
century–1922), Ṣafavid (907–1135/1501–1722), and perhaps even the Mughal
(932–1161/1526–1748, and as a much reduced polity until 1274/1857)—relied
heavily on the input of Ṣūfī masters.
Although Ṣūfī prospects diminished significantly in the modern period, their
influence at various Islamic courts persisted until the turn of the twentieth cen-
tury. The influential Ṣūfī Mīrzā Ḥājjī Āqāsī (d. 1265/1849), prime minister at the
court of Muḥammad Shāh Qājār (r. 1250–64/1834–48), is largely blamed for the
king’s failed attempts at modernising the army and effective rule (Amanat, 221–
2, 230–2). As opposition to absolutist rule and colonial encroachment gained
steam in the late nineteenth century, influential Ṣūfī shaykhs persisted in their
monarchical stance. Ṣūfī mirrorists such as Muḥammad Ḥusayn Naṣr Allāh
Damāwandī (fl. 1260s/1840s), Ṣafāʾ al-Salṭanah ʿAlī Khān Na‌ʾīnī (fl. 1301/1883),
and Dhū l-Riyāsatayn Qāḍī Muḥammad b. Jaʿfar Saryazdī (d. 1312/1894), active
at the court of Nāṣir al-Dīn Shāh Qājār (r. 1264–1313/1848–96), were vociferous
supporters of the king against the rising tide of activist clerics (Zargarīnizhād,
I: 64–7, 108–10, 123–7; II: 35–80; III: 388–99; IV: 241–67), a trend that continued
well into the twentieth century (Keddie, 211–30; Bos, 73–142).

Bibliography

Aḥrār, ʿUbaydallāh, The letters of Khwāja ʿUbayd Allāh Aḥrār and his associates, ed.
Jo-Ann Gross and Asom Urunbaev, Leiden 2004.
Algar, Hamid, Jāmī, Delhi 2013.
Ṣūfīs as Court Advisors 313

Amanat, Abbas, Iran. A modern history, New Haven 2017.

Bos, Matthijs van den, Mystic regimes. Sufism and the state in Iran, from the late Qajar
era to the Islamic republic, Leiden 2002.
Buehler, Arthur F., The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the rise of the mediating Sufi shaykh,
Columbia, SC 1998.
Bulliet, Richard W., Islam. The view from the edge, New York 1994.
DeWeese, Devin, Re-Envisioning the history of Sufi communities in Central Asia.
Continuity and adaptation in sources and social frameworks, 16th–20th centuries,
in Devin DeWeese and Jo-Ann Gross (eds.), Sufism in Central Asia. New perspectives
on Sufi traditions, 15th–21st centuries (Leiden 2018), 21–74.
El-Rouayheb, Khaled, Islamic intellectual history in the seventeenth century. Scholarly
currents in the Ottoman empire and the Maghreb, Cambridge 2015.
Garcin, Jean-Claude, Le sultan et le pharaon (le politique et le religieux dans l’Égypte
mamluke), in Hommages à François Daumas, vol. 1 (Montpellier 1986), 261–72.
Geoffroy, Éric, Attitudes contrastées des mystiques musulmans face au miracle,
in Denise Aigle (ed.), Miracle et karāma. Hagiographies médiévales comparées
(Turnhout 2000), 301–16.
Gross, Jo-Ann, The Naqshbandīya and Khwāja ʿUbayd Allāh Aḥrār, in Jo-Ann Gross and
Asom Urunbaev (eds.), ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār, The letters of Khwāja ‘Ubayd Allāh Aḥrār
and his associates (Leiden 2004), 1–22.
Gross, Jo-Ann, The Majmūʿa-yi murāsalāt as a source for the history of Mawarannahr
and Khurāsān in the late Timurid period, in Jo-Ann Gross and Asom Urunbaev
(eds.), ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār, The letters of Khwāja ʿUbayd Allāh Aḥrār and his associ-
ates (Leiden 2004), 23–55.
Ibn Munawwar, Muḥammad, Asrār al-tawḥīd fī maqāmāt al-Shaykh Abī Saʿīd, ed.
Muḥammad Riḍā Shāfīʿī Kadkanī, 2 vols., Tehran 1987.
Kāshifī, Fakhr al-Dīn ʿAlī b. Ḥusayn Wāʿiẓ, Rashaḥāt ʿayn al-ḥayāt, ed. ʿAlī Aṣghar
Muʿīniyān, 2 vols., Tehran 1977.
Keddie, Nikki R., The roots of the ulama’s power in modern Iran, in Scholars, saints,
and Sufis. Muslim religious institutions in the Middle East since 1500 (Berkeley 1972),
211–30.
Koziol, Geoffrey, Leadership. Why we have mirrors for princes but none for presidents,
in Celia Chazelle et al. (eds.), Why the middle ages matter. Medieval light on modern
injustice (Abingdon 2012), 183–98.
Lewis, Franklin D., Rumi. Past and present, east and west, London 2000.
Lingwood, Chad G., Politics, poetry, and Sufism in medieval Iran. New perspectives on
Jāmī’s Salāmān va Absāl, Leiden 2013.
Martini, Giovanni Maria, ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla al-Simnānī between spiritual authority and po-
litical power. A Persian lord and intellectual in the heart of the Ilkhanate, with a critical
edition and translation of al-Wārid al-šārid al-ṭārid šubhat al-mārid and a critical edi-
tion of its Persian version Zayn al-muʿtaqad li-zayn al-muʿtaqid, Leiden 2017.
314 Yavari

Niẓāmī Bākharzī, ʿAbd al-Wāṣiʿ, Maqāmāt-i Jāmī. Gushahā-yī az tārīkh-i farhangī wa

ijtimāʿī-i Khurāsān dar ʿaṣr-i Taymūrīyān, ed. Najīb Māyil Hiravī, Tehran 1992.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
Papas, Alexandre, Cheikhs et Sultans en Asie Centrale au XVIe siècle. Une analyse de
la Risâla-yi tanbîh al-salâtîn d’Ahmad Kâsânî Dahbidî, in Nathalie Clayer, Alexandre
Papas, and Benoît Fliche (eds.), L’autorité religieuse et ses limites en terres d’islam.
Approches historiques et anthropologiques (Leiden 2013), 11–32.
Patrizi, Luca, Adab al-mulūk. L’utilisation de la terminologie du pouvoir dans le sou-
fisme médiéval, in Francesco Chiabotti, Eve Feuillebois-Pierunek, Catherine
Mayeur-Jaouen, and Luca Patrizi (eds.), Ethics and spirituality in Islam. Sufi adab
(Leiden 2016), 198–215.
Paul, Jürgen, Forming a faction. The ḥimāyat system of Khwaja Ahrar, IJMES 23 (1991):
533–48.
Potter, Lawrence G., Sufis and sultans in post-Mongol Iran, Iranian Studies 27 (1994):
77–102.
Rūmī, Jalāl al-Dīn, The Mathnawí of Jalálu’ddín Rúmí, vol. I, ed. R. A. Nicholson, Leiden
1925.
Sabra, Adam, From artisan to courtier. Sufism and social mobility in fifteenth centu-
ry Egypt, in Eleni Roxani Margariti, Adam Sabra, and Petra M. Sijpesteijn (eds.),
Histories of the Middle East. Studies in Middle Eastern society and economy and law
in honor of A. L. Udovitch (Leiden 2011), 213–32.
Salvatore, Armando, Sufi articulations of civility, globality, and sovereignty, Journal of
Religious and Political Practice 4 (2018): 156–74.
al-Sanhūtī, Yāsīn b. Ibrāhīm, al-Anwār al-qudsiyya fī manāqib al-sādah al-
Naqshbandiyya, Cairo 1925.
al-Shaʿrānī, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb b. Aḥmad b. ʿAlī, Advice for callow jurists and gullible men-
dicants on befriending emirs, trans. Adam Sabra, New Haven 2017.
Simnānī, ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla, Chihil majlis, ed. Najīb Māyil Hiravī, Tehran 1987.
Simnānī, ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla, al-ʿUrwa li-ahl al-khalwa wa al-jalwa, ed. Najīb Māyil Hiravī,
Tehran 1983.
Sipahsālār, Farīdūn b. Aḥmad, Risāla-i Sipahsālār dar manāqib-i ḥaḍrat-i khudāwandgār,
ed. Muḥammad Afshīn-Vafāyī, Tehran 1996.
Yavari, Neguin, Advice for the sultan. Prophetic voices and secular politics in medieval
Islam, New York 2014.
Yavari, Neguin, The future of Iran’s past. Nizam al-Mulk remembered, New York 2018.
Zargarīnizhād, Ghulām Ḥusayn, ed., Siyāsatnāma-hāyi Qājārī. sī wa yik andarznāma-i
siyāsī-i ʿaṣr-i Qājār, 4 vols., Tehran 2017.
 Chapter 16

Sufism, the Army, and Holy War

David Cook

Sufism is the mystical strain of Islam which has its roots in both early Islamic
asceticism as well as the common Mediterranean and Middle Eastern ascetic-
mystical tradition. Jihād (“struggle, exertion”) is God-sanctioned warfare, while
ghazw (“raid”) is a term that, albeit used in Islamic literature, tends to be less
specifically religious in scope. Statements about jihād appear in the Qurʾān;
however, the primary development of the doctrine occurred during the first
Islamic centuries, most probably as a result of fighting during the conquests.
In general, jihād is said to have three distinct manifestations: jihād of the soul,
jihād of the tongue, and jihād of the sword.
The first, jihād of the soul, involves struggling against the soul’s lower
impulses, as in the Qurʾān the soul is said to be a locus of evil (Q 12:53) and
is presented in the sources as the starting point for true jihād. One who has
not overcome the soul’s temptations cannot participate in other forms of war-
fare, because that person’s motives will not be pure. The best-known ḥadīth
(tradition ascribed to the Prophet Muḥammad) associated with the jihād
of the soul is:

A number of fighters came to the Messenger of God, and he said: “You

have done well in coming from the ‘lesser jihād’ to the ‘greater jihād’.”
They said: “What is the ‘greater jihād’?” He said: “For the servant [of God]
to fight his passions.”

This tradition, while popular, is not attested in the canonical collections.

Although the jihād of the soul does not appear in the Qurʾān or in the early
ḥadīth, there are some verses (e.g., Q 25:52) and traditions that demonstrate
its intellectual and religious roots. A great many early Ṣūfī works discuss
the importance of combatting the soul, and its defects (e.g., Knysh (trans.),
al-Qushayrī, 118–22).
The second type of jihād, of the tongue, invokes the ḥadīth: “The best type of
jihād is to speak a word of justice in the face of an iniquitous ruler” (Ibn Māja,
Sunan, kitāb al-fitan, 20 [no. 4011]) and is used to reprove rulers and elites who
do not uphold the Islamic social order of “enjoining the right and forbidding

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_018

316 Cook

the wrong” (Q 3:104, 110). In practice, this type of jihād has been utilised by
preachers and reformers to mobilise movements to fight.
The third type of jihād, of the sword, is often augmented by the phrase “in
the path of God.” As a theory, it developed considerably during the first cen-
turies of Islam, and to some degree in the Qurʾān. By the period of ʿAbdallāh
b. al-Mubārak (d. 181/797), who authored the earliest surviving book on jihād,
the mythology associated with the term was complete, and included addition-
al references, such as specific rewards for martyrs who die in battle, spiritual
rewards for fighters, and admonitions concerning the protected status of fight-
ers’ families.
There are considerable connections between proto-Ṣūfīs during the first
centuries of Islam and warfare; these are exemplified by the figure of ʿAbdallāh
b. al-Mubārak, who wrote on jihād as well as asceticism, and was seen as a
figure of towering courage for his willingness to confront the ʿAbbāsid caliph
Hārūn al-Rashīd (r. 170–93/786–809) (an example of the jihād of the tongue).
A number of other proto-Ṣūfī figures, such as Fuḍayl b. ʿIyāḍ (d. 187/803) and
Ibrāhīm b. Adham (d. c. 161/777–8) also participated in all three types of jihād.
Most of these proto-Ṣūfīs fought in the border regions of northern Syria against
the Byzantines, or occasionally in the East. After this initial period (second/
eighth to third/ninth century) of Ṣūfī fighting there is not much evidence of
Ṣūfīs participating in warfare until the period of the crusades, which coincided
with the development of the great Ṣūfī brotherhoods. Many of the Ṣūfī brother-
hoods were closely linked with the practice of futuwwa (chivalry) or javānmardī
(Zakeri). Futuwwa brotherhoods involved physical preparedness (among other
things) and were mostly located in the Muslim heartlands of Iraq and Iran dur-
ing the period leading up to and including the crusades. During this period,
some of those in border regions (Sistan, Caucasus, and Central Asia) continued
earlier ascetic practices of fighting unbelievers.
Some of the Ṣūfī brotherhoods participated in the jihād against the crusad-
ers, most notably at the decisive Battle of Haṭṭin (583/1187), in which the cru-
saders were defeated. The historian Ibn Kathīr (d. 774/1372–3) states that these
Ṣūfīs were given the task of killing the Templar and Hospitaller knights after
the battle (Ibn Kathīr, xii, 321–2). The sources frequently speak of “volunteers”
(mutṭawiʿūn)—for example, at the siege of Acre in 690/1291—that helped the
regular troops by carrying wood for mangonels, or bringing supplies. While it
cannot be said conclusively that these were Ṣūfīs, the volunteers were usually
drawn from the audiences of popular preachers of this period.
Ṣūfī orders were also prominent in the nascent Ottoman Empire, where
they were known to have close connections with the Janissaries (elite Ottoman
Sufism, the Army, and Holy War 317

troops) (Birge, 74–5). Although a number of these Ṣūfī orders and so-called
“coloniser dervishes” were later deemed to be heretical, as they had possible
connections to the Shīʿa and even to ghulāt (extremist Shīʿī groups), their
importance—along with the more orthodox Muslims—for the conquests dur-
ing the period from the eighth/fourteenth to the tenth/sixteenth century can-
not be denied (Barkan; Clayer, part II). At a more symbolic level, Anatolian
and Iranian Ṣūfī groups under Shīʿī influence, especially the Bektāshīs and the
Khāksārs, borrowed objects from martial culture, such as ʿAlī’s sword (known
as dhū l-fiqar) and axe (tabar/tabarzīn) (Baḥraynī Ārānī; Raei; Zarcone).
The closest connections between Sufism and jihād were forged in Central
Asia and in India with the rise of the Naqshbandiyya brotherhood during
the tenth/sixteenth century and later. The Naqshbandiyya, which stressed
its adherence to mainstream Sunnī Islam—especially in the context of the
multi-faceted range of Indian Islam—proved to be an important ally for the
Mughal dynasty in its conquest of central India (Buehler, 8–9). The Malfūẓāt-i
Naqshbandiyya is an important document that attests to the ability of Ṣūfī
groups to work with imperial objectives, at least from the period of Awrangzeb
(d. 1119/1707). In spite of the mainstream affinities of the Naqshbandiyya, it
portrays a series of wars attended by holy figures who waged jihād, promoted
a popular Islam including healings and miracles, served the spiritual needs of
the troops, and gave legitimacy to the fighting. One figure stands out, Bābā
Palangpūsh (d. 1110/1699; lit., “leopard skin”); he is said to have had a vision
of the Prophet Muḥammad’s uncle Ḥamza (the paradigmatic Muslim mar-
tyr, killed in the Battle of Uḥud, 3/625), who gave him a sword, and told him:
“Take this sword … and go to the army of Mīr Shihāb al-Dīn in the land of
the Deccan” (Digby, 69–70). Many other incidents describe the Naqshbandīs
fighting in India. After the fall of the Mughal Empire, for the most part, the
Naqshbandiyya in India no longer involved themselves with jihād. Yet, we
know cases of Ṣūfī servicemen in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Awadh
(northwestern Uttar Pradesh) who served as soldiers in the cold season and as
pious mystics in the hot season (Papas, 127, 131, 135).
The Naqshbandiyya also heavily influenced the resistance of Turkic Muslims
to Chinese rule during the nineteenth century (Kim, ch. 2). An example of this
tendency can be seen in the Dungan revolt among the Hui (ethnic Chinese
Muslims) in 1279–94/1862–77, when a number of Naqshbandī teachers from
Central Asia who had been travelling among the Hui for at least a century,
brought about a revival not unlike that experienced by Indian Muslims. The
Dungan revolt also had an anti-colonial character, though strictly speaking, the
Hui were not colonised by the Chinese (Chu).
318 Cook

Many important manifestations of Sufism and jihād took place in Africa, es-
pecially in western Africa (see Vikør in this volume), which has a long Islamic
history, although in many regions of Africa Islam has been closely linked to
syncretistic practices. This linkage was especially true for the regions of what
is presently northern Nigeria and southern Niger, where, from the thirteenth/
eighteenth to the nineteenth century, the nomadic cattle-grazing Fulani peo-
ple scattered across the Sahel and intermixed with the much more populous
Hausas, who were settled farmers and traders. The Fulanis, led by the char-
ismatic preacher Shehu ʿUthmān Dan Fodio (d. 1234/1817), a member of the
Qādiriyya order, began a reformist jihād against the syncretistic Hausa in
1219/1804. This jihād was supposed to eradicate the non-Islamic beliefs and
systems that the Hausa monarchs tolerated and even encouraged, and to es-
tablish in its place a purely Islamic state. Ultimately, by 1227/1812, the fight-
ing foundered when the Fulani attacked the older Muslim polity of Borno
(northeastern Nigeria and western Chad), which did not feel that it was a le-
gitimate target for a jihād. Probably the most famous of all Dan Fodio’s visions
is one in which ʿAbd al-Qādir Jīlānī (d. 561/1166), the eponym of the Qādiriyya
brotherhood, appeared to him in a dream accompanied by the Prophet and
many other early Muslims, and gave him the ‘sword of truth’ by which to
fight and defeat the unbelievers (Hiskett, 66). Dan Fodio methodically dem-
onstrated precisely the spiritual preparations that should take place prior to
a jihād, namely, preaching and summoning to repentance and undertaking a
hijra, during the course of which all the believers gather to fight the unbeliev-
ers (Dan Fodio).
For northern Nigeria, and to some extent Islamic West Africa as a whole, the
numerous writings of Dan Fodio and his close family members have continued
to be normative until the present time. Thus, while some other Ṣūfī traditions,
such as the Indian and Turkish orders, have de-emphasized the use of mili-
tant jihād, the West African tradition has not. It should be further stressed that
while Dan Fodio’s jihād is frequently referred to as the “Fulani” jihād, because
it ended by empowering a series of Fulani emirates (which exist to the present
day), it also included a large number of Hausa who joined for religious reasons;
currently northern Muslims in Nigeria would see the jihād as a spiritual, not
ethnic, endeavor.
Most anti-colonial resistance movements in Islamic Africa during the nine-
teenth century were led by Ṣūfīs. This trend began with the Algerian figure
ʿAbd al-Qādir (also Abdelkader, d. 1300/1883), whose works include spiritual
writings as well as a number of practical discussions on jihād. In general,
French colonial authorities throughout West and North Africa associated Ṣūfī
brotherhoods, rightly and in many cases wrongly, with militancy. This trend is
Sufism, the Army, and Holy War 319

most obvious with the figure of ʿUmar Tall (d. 1280/1864), who was the most
consistent and successful opponent of the French in the area of Senegal and
Mauritania, and was a Tijānī. Like Dan Fodio, who was clearly his exemplar, he
preluded his jihād with a hijra, and ensured that he had completed his preach-
ing and invitations to his opponents to convert to Islam prior to initiating
violence. A later successor to Tall, but more closely associated with southern
Morocco and Mauritania, is the figure of Māʾ al-ʿAynayn (d. 1910), who was a
member of the Qādiriyya. Just as Dan Fodio and Tall before him, he undertook
lengthy preparations prior to initiating his jihād against the French in 1904.
Although he was eventually defeated, his movement, unlike the other two, had
a number of proto-nationalist affinities (Martin, ch. 5). There are a number of
other examples of Ṣūfī warrior brotherhoods, such as the Sanūsiyya throughout
North Africa, and individual fighters from the early resistance to colonialism.
However, it should be noted that some important figures, such as the
Senegalese Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke (d. 1927), founder of the Murīdiyya broth-
erhood, employed the language of jihād without its militancy. Merely utilising
the term brought about the hostility of the French authorities, and as a result
Bàmba spent much of his life in exile. The Murīds restricted the teachings of
Tall (above), and developed new interpretations of jihād, which included phys-
ical labor (Glover, 54).
Ṣūfī brotherhoods were also prominent in anti-colonial movements in East
Africa, but such brotherhoods were not quite as widespread there as they were
(and are) in West Africa. In Somalia, the figure of Muḥammad ʿAbdallāh Ḥasan
(d. 1920), known to his British opponents as the “mad mullah,” was the best
known of these. Ḥasan was not merely a Ṣūfī, but also channeled early forms
of Somali nationalism in his numerous poems, transmitted orally.
Militant forms of Sufism were weaker in the Arabic-speaking heartlands
during the Ottoman and early colonial periods, largely because, by the middle
of the eleventh/seventeenth century the Ottomans had severed the connec-
tions between the Ṣūfī brotherhoods and the Janissaries, and did not encour-
age fighting qualities among Ṣūfīs. Nonetheless, in both Egypt and greater
Syria, opposition to colonial rule was frequently marshalled by Ṣūfī broth-
erhoods, especially the Rifāʿīs. Interestingly, the Mevleviyye represent a late
military involvement of an Ottoman Ṣūfī order. During World War I, the sultan
established a regiment of Mevlevī holy combatants (mücāhidīn) who bore Ṣūfī
symbols and played music to support the troops in Syria in 1915 (Köstüklü).
In the Caucasus Mountains, for several decades the anti-Russian jihād of
Imām Shāmil or Shamwīl (d. 1288/1871) owed a great deal to the spread of
the Naqshbandiyya-Khālidiyya brotherhood throughout this region (Zelkina,
200–4). However, the exact nature of Shāmil’s affiliation with and personal
320 Cook

status in the local branch of this brotherhood remain a matter of dispute (Knysh,
Sufism as an explanatory paradigm).
At the present time, Sufism is not closely identified with fighting; however,
there are a number of recent conflicts in which Ṣūfīs have fought. These in-
clude both Afghanistan and Pakistan, where a number of Ṣūfī fighting groups
were prominent, for the most part in the war against the USSR (1978–89). In
post-2003 Iraq as well, the Jaysh Rijāl al-Ṭarīqa al-Naqshbandiyya (Men of the
Army of the Naqshbandiyya) was quite prominent among other groups, mostly
Salafī jihādīs, fighting against the United States’ forces (see their website: www
.alnakshabandia.net/army/). Ṣūfī organizations, however, have consistently
shunned the use of suicide bombings in their tactics.
For the most part, at the present time, Salafī jihādī trends in Islam iden-
tify Sufism as an enemy, and in conflicts in which Salafīs fight against a non-
Muslim enemy, such as Afghanistan or Chechnya, and the majority of the
local population is close to Sufism, one of the stated goals of such fighting is
to shift the local belief system away from Sufism. For this reason, today Sufism
is usually seen as a comparatively non-violent spiritual alternative to Salafism
(Knysh, Sufism, ch. 6). More recently, as a result of the backlash against the
Salafī jihādī use of indiscriminate violence, certain Ṣūfī groups, such as those
in Nigeria (in relation to Boko Haram), have been actively trying to redefine
even militant jihād away from the Salafī jihādī discourse, which claims that
anyone who does not support an Islamic state is an unbeliever and a legitimate
target for violence.
In summary, the militancy of certain strains of Sufism, especially those
located in South and Central Asia, the Caucasus, and in Africa, is well docu-
mented. Although Sufism overall has tended to be irenic, we cannot justifiably
state that Sufism precludes militancy or violence, or that the tradition of the
“greater jihād” against the soul necessarily restricts or precludes violence. It is
apparent, however, that the vast majority of more recent Ṣūfī jihāds have either
been associated with the Naqshbandīs or with African Ṣūfīs (mainly Qādirīs
or Tijānīs).

Bibliography

‫ز‬
Ārānī, Rāmesh Baḥraynī, Tabar/tabarzīn, Dāneshnāma-yi Jahān-i islām, online: http://
rch.ac.ir/article/Details?id=7344&&searchText=�‫ت� ب��ر�ی� ن‬
Barkan, Ömer Lütfi, Osmanlı imparatorluğunda bir iskân ve kolonizasyon metodu
olarak vakıflar ve temlikler I:iİstilâ devirlerinin kolonizatör türk dervişleri ve zâvi-
yeler, Vakıflar Dergisi 2 (1942): 279–386.
Sufism, the Army, and Holy War 321

Birge, John Kingsley, The Bektashi order of dervishes, London 1965.

Buehler, Arthur, Sufi heirs of the prophet. The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the rise of the
mediating Sufi shaykh, Columbia, SC 1998.
Chu, Wen-Djang, The Moslem rebellion in northwest China. A study of government mi-
nority policy, The Hague 1966.
Clayer, Nathalie, Mystiques, Etat et Société. Les Halvetis dans l’aire balkanique de la fin
du XV e siècle à nos jours, Leiden 1994.
Cook, David, Understanding jihad, Berkeley 2005.
Dan Fodio, ʿUthmān, Bayān wujūb al-hijra ʿalā al-ʿibād, trans. F. H. al-Masri, Khartoum
1985.
Digby, Simon, Sufis and soldiers in Awrangzeb’s Deccan, Oxford 2001.
Glover, John, Sufism and jihad in modern Senegal, Rochester 2007.
Hiskett, Mervyn, The sword of truth. The life and times of the Shehu Usuman dan Fodio,
Evanston, IN 1994.
Ibn Kathīr, al-Bidāya wa-l-nihāya, Beirut 1990.
Ibn Māja, Sunan, 2 vols., Beirut n.d.
Kim, Hodong, Holy war in China. The Muslim rebellion and state in Chinese Central Asia,
1864–1877, Stanford, CA 2004.
Knysh, Alexander (trans.), al-Qushayrī’s epistle on Sufism, Reading 2007.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism as an explanatory paradigm. The issue of the motivations
of Sufi movements in Russian and western historiography, WI 42/2 (2002): 139–73.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism. A new history of Islamic mysticism, Princeton 2017.
Köstüklü, Nuri, Vatan savunmasında gönül erleri: mücâhidîn-i Mevlevîyye Alayı, in
X. Milli Mevlânâ kongresi (tebliğler), 2–3 mayıs 2002 (Konya 2002), 213–26.
Martin, Bradford G., Muslim brotherhoods in 19th-century Africa, Cambridge 1978.
Neale, Harry, Jihad in premodern Sufi writings, New York 2017.
Papas, Alexandre, When the Dervish starts publishing. A note on renunciation and
literary production in the Indian Qalandariyya, in R. Chih, D. Gril, C. Mayeur-Jaouen
and R. Seesemann (eds.), Sufism, literary production and printing in the nineteenth
century (Würzburg 2015), 121–38.
Raei, Shahrokh, Some notes on the Khâksâr coat of arms, Journal of the History of
Sufism 6 (2015): 129–38.
Willis, John, In the path of Allah. The passion of al-Hajj ‘Umar, London 1989.
Zakeri, Mohsen, Javānmardī, EIr.
Zarcone, Thierry, The sword of ‘Alî (zülfikar) in Alevism and Bektashism, Journal of
the History of Sufism 6 (2015): 113–28.
Zelkina, Anna, In quest for God and freedom. Sufi responses to the Russian advance in the
North Caucasus, London 2000.
 Chapter 17

Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates

Knut S. Vikør

The concept of a “Ṣūfī sultanate” seems like an oxymoron. A Ṣūfī master

(shaykh) is a spiritual guide for disciples (murīds), not a general commanding
his subjects. And while we have seen in this volume that Ṣūfī brotherhoods
indeed often played social, economic, and political roles of various kinds,
including being involved in revolts or jihād (Sabra, Chih, Papas, and Cook in
this volume), the establishment of something we could call a state requires a
higher degree of institutionalisation. Nevertheless, there are some instances in
which Ṣūfī revolts have led to the creation of a state. An examination of such
cases seems to indicate that some contexts enabled Ṣūfī leaders to transform
themselves into heads of states or statelets. Common factors seem to be the
absence of alternative political structures during transitions from nomadic to
urban political orders, when new states based on Islamic reformist agendas are
created, or when existing states have been crushed by colonial intervention.
Below we provide a number of examples to illustrate this thesis.

1 Transition to Statehood

Such cases can probably be grouped into certain types of Ṣūfī state-building.
One type consists of states that arose in mediaeval or late mediaeval times on
the fringes of the Muslim world, as nomadic or tribal forces began to morph
into early statehood. Here we can identify two cases from Central Asia.

1.1 The Khwājas of Central Asia

The dominant Ṣūfī order, or ṭarīqa, in Central Asia is the Naqshbandiyya,
or Khwājagān as it was called in the time of Khwāja ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār
(d. 895/1490). He gained political prominence in his region, not least by amass-
ing great wealth in land holdings (Algar; Paul, Politische und soziale Bedeutung;
Paul, Forming a faction). He did not, however, proclaim himself sultan or ruler
of his region.
One of Khwāja Aḥrār’s most famous spiritual descendants, Hidāyatallāh b.
Muḥammad Yūsuf, known as Khwāja Āfāq (d. 1105/1694), took that step. A re-
gional leader both through his religious status as khwāja and his wealth, he

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_019

Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 323

was exiled by the Chaghatayid ruler who patronised a rival khwāja clan. With
the support of Buddhist Mongols, Āfāq took control of the oasis of Kashgar
in the Tarim Basin in 1090/1679. There, he established himself as khān, ruler of
the city and region, although formally still under his Mongol patron. He legiti-
mised his position by marrying into a local noble line, claiming to be a descen-
dant of the Prophet, and presenting himself as a shaykh of the Naqshbandiyya.
At that time, mutual relationships between Naqshbandī Khwājas and the
ruling khāns, the holders of spiritual and political power, had been the norm
in Central Asia. Khwāja Āfāq broke this mould by combining his religious posi-
tion with temporal leadership (Papas, part 3). Here, too, money and material
resources were a crucial element in the growth of his power. By controlling
the income generated by pious endowments (waqfs), he could amass great
wealth. Some historians note that Khwāja Āfāq’s economic policies also broke
with those of his predecessors who based their rule on the redistribution of
resources to the tribes (Togan, Differences in ideology and practice, 28–30).
Āfāq’s policy, by contrast, was based on the accumulation of wealth and ignor-
ing the redistributive model.
This led to the development of a state structure that could become stron-
ger than one reliant on patron-client relationships. It is reasonable to link this
development to the support he could draw on due to his religious legitimacy
both as defender of the sharīʿa and as the chief shaykh of the Naqshbandiyya
ṭarīqa in the region. His successors ruled Kashgar, using the titles of pādishāh,
khān, and töre (tribal leader; Togan, Islam in a changing society, 140), until the
Chinese conquered it in the 1750s.

1.2 The Ṣafavids

By the time the Kashgar rulers had faded away, another Ṣūfī leader who had
attempted to form a state on the basis of his tribal following, had arisen, flour-
ished, and fallen. But while the Ṣafavid dynasty had disappeared by the mid-
twelfth/eighteenth century, the state it had created persisted after their fall
(Dale; Newman; Savory). Shīʿism was no doubt an important element in mak-
ing Iran a permanent entity, but the dynasty’s background in the Ṣafavī Ṣūfī
order was also important for its success.
The eponymous founder of the order, Ṣafī l-Dīn al-Ardabīlī (d. 735/1334)
and his son Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Ardabīlī (d. 794/1391) began spreading their ṭarīqa
among the Turkish-speaking tribes of Azerbaijan. Their followers wore red tur-
bans and came to be known as Qizilbāsh, “red-caps.” Although their headgear
marked their brotherhood affiliation, the Qizilbāsh functioned largely as a
Turkish-speaking tribe, and their organisation was as much tribal as religious.
The Ṣafavī shaykhs came to nurture close relationships with the dominant
324 Vikør

begs (traditional chiefs) of the region, in particular the Āq Qoyūnlū, and

Shaykh Junayd (d. 864/1460) married the sister of the Āq Qoyūnlū leader, Uzun
Ḥasan (d. 882/1478). It was also around this time that the remarkable change
of Ṣafavid religious affiliation from Sunnism to Shīʿism took place. However,
in 894/1489 they fell out of favour with Uzun Ḥasan’s successor, and most of
the Ṣafavid family were killed. Only Junayd’s grandson Ismāʿīl I (d. 930/1524)
was saved by the loyal Qizilbāsh. In 905/1500 he returned to exact revenge.
With the Qizilbāsh as his core military force, he went on to conquer most of
the territories that today make up Iran, areas that before his conquest had no
shared identity.
Ismāʿīl I thus created a state entity that far surpassed those of his Āq
Qoyūnlū predecessors, and he named himself shāh (pādishāh-i Irān). In an-
other bold move, he demanded that the ordinary subjects of his state, and not
just the ruling elite, embrace Shīʿism. This measure was surprisingly success-
ful, and helped to forge an Iranian identity; adherence to the Ṣafavī Ṣūfī order
remained, at best, an activity of the elite. Yet, the connection between the Ṣūfī
order and the Qizilbāsh was a major factor in the creation of the state, even
though that state was, in Ismāʿīl’s time, still basically tribal. After his death,
the Qizilbāsh caused havoc by infighting and trying to control the state, and
Shāh ʿAbbās I (d. 1038/1629) only stabilised it by breaking the Qizilbāsh hold
over politics.
Thus, the Ṣafavids’ path can be seen as a continuation of the process we saw
in Central Asia: From Khwāja Aḥrār, who gained authority through economic
and religious means, to Khwāja Āfāq, who combined the positions of khwāja
and khān (i.e., religious and political leader), to the Ṣafavids, who used their
Ṣūfī legitimacy and tribesmen loyal to Ṣūfī leaders to create a state that out-
lived both the dynasty they established and the Ṣūfī legitimacy upon which
they originally based their claims to leadership.

2 Movements for Islamic Reform

In West Africa in the early nineteenth century, a series of movements for

Islamic reform of the existing Muslim kingdoms broke out. These jihād
movements were based on Fulānī ethnicity and sharīʿa piety, but also had a
Ṣūfī element.
The first paradigmatic revolt, by ʿUthmān b. Fodiye (Usuman Dan Fodio,
1168–1232/1754–1817), led to the foundation of a unified empire centred in
Sokoto, Northern Nigeria (Last; Adelẹyẹ). After his victory, Ibn Fodiye with-
drew from politics and left the business of running the state to his brother
Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 325

ʿAbdullāhī (c. 1180–1245/1766–1829) and son Muḥammad Bello (1195–1253/

1781–1837), who took the title of amīr al-muʾminīn (sarkin musulmi), “command-
er of the faithful” on his father’s death. Thus, their new state is often called the
“Sokoto caliphate.” However, they themselves used the name “Kadirawa” for
their movement (Paden, 68). Thus, the Qādiriyya ṭarīqa was the unifying iden-
tity for the jihād and the empire, although the ṭarīqa had no official status as
such. When Ibn Fodiye first spread his teachings, before the jihād, he utilised
Ṣūfī elements in his vernacular poetry. But the attacks on the impious Hausa
kings were couched in straightforward exoteric legal and political terms. It is
also difficult to see any strong Ṣūfī influence in the political structure of the
jihād, or in the structure of the ensuing Sokoto state (which was fairly decen-
tralised, with many of the earlier kingdoms continuing as emirates under the
amīr al-muʾminīn).

2.1 al-Ḥājj ʿUmar b. Saʿīd Tall

Other jihadist movements, such as those of Masina in central Mali are similar
to that of the Sokoto caliphate. However, when we reach the third large jihad-
ist force, arising in the regions between Guinea, Senegal, and Mali, we see a
different picture.
Like the Sokoto leaders, ʿUmar b. Saʿīd Tall (c. 1208 or 09–1280/1794–1864)
was of Fulānī origin (Ọlọruntimehin; Robinson). For several years, he stayed
in Sokoto with Muḥammad Bello, whose daughter he married. However, he
had encountered a new and different Ṣūfī ṭarīqa, the Tijāniyya. During a hajj to
Mecca in 1828–30, he was appointed khalīfa of the order in West Africa. Upon
his return to his native Futa Toro region, he established a religious centre at
Dingiray (in Mali today), where he disseminated the Tijāniyya ṭarīqa, and also
produced some of the most influential works on Tijānī doctrine. Politically
quietist, he gathered a large following of Tijānī adherents, called talibés. Thus,
this was clearly a Ṣūfī religious centre, with a much stronger ṭarīqa identity
than the Sokoto Qādirīs. It would appear, however, that al-Ḥājj ʿUmar also used
this time to develop his military strength. In 1852 he began preaching a jihād
against the local kings, who were in fact the successors of a previous Islamic
revolt of the twelfth/seventeenth century, but also against the pagan peoples
south of his domain. He quickly gained ascendance over the Upper Niger re-
gion, and young people flocked to him to become talibés; they became, like
the Ṣafavid Qizilbāsh, the core military strength of his state, though without
any tribal cohesion. Al-Ḥājj ʿUmar made a point of bypassing the established
notables in favour of the talibés, who were recruited only on the basis of their
loyalty to the Tijāniyya order and, of course, their desire to be on the winning
side. ʿUmar also emphasised his own status as khalīfa (deputy) of the Tijāniyya,
326 Vikør

while his son and successor, Aḥmad (d. 1315/1897), adopted the title of amīr
al-muʾminīn (Ọlọruntimehin, 178).
Therefore, to a certain extent, ʿUmar Tall’s state can be called a “Ṣūfī sultan-
ate.” But it was also marked by political ambition: while he maintained close
relations with Sokoto far to the east, when he wanted to expand his area north-
wards he fought the neighbouring Masina state, which was itself a Fulānī state
influenced by the same Sokoto jihād.

3 Anti-Colonial Resistance

Al-Ḥājj ʿUmar’s state is often represented as an anti-colonial movement, since

it came into conflict with the French forces that were moving inland from the
Senegal coast, and his state was ultimately destroyed by the French after his
death. However, ʿUmar’s agenda was clearly based on, at least in part, expand-
ing the lands of Islam by fighting the pagans and, in part, on reforming the ex-
isting Muslim states in his regions. The French were a distraction, and he tried
to stave them off with negotiations when they came too close to his domain. It
was the French who made him their enemy.
However, anti-colonialism was a strong motive for militancy. As colonial
incursions often swept away the established state structures, resistance move-
ments sought alternative frameworks for their actions. Non-political, but
structured movements like Ṣūfī orders often provided such frameworks for
anti-colonial resistance. In most cases, these did not lead to state-like institu-
tions, but three cases come close to fitting the bill.

3.1 ʿAbd al-Qādir of Algeria

The earliest of the three cases of anti-colonial resistance is that of the North
African resistance leader ʿAbd al-Qādir, known as “al-Jazāʾirī” (Danziger;
Étienne). His Ṣūfī background is evident from his name: his father Muḥyī
l-Dīn was recognised as head of the Qādiriyya in the western Maghrib. He had
some temporal influence with the tribes in the region, and when the French
forces landed on the Maghribi coast in 1830 some local tribes approached him
to head a resistance against the invaders. He accepted, but as he was by then
an elderly man, he asked the tribes instead to accept his son ʿAbd al-Qādir
(1222–1300/1808–83) as leader. In spite of his son’s youth, the tribes acqui-
esced and pledged allegiance (bayʿa) to ʿAbd al-Qādir as amīr al-muʾminīn. His
was not a claim to a global caliphate, because he recognised the status of the
Moroccan sultan across the border and he did not challenge the authority of
the Ottoman governor who remained in control of eastern Algeria until 1839.
Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 327

It was thus clear that it was his family’s Ṣūfī status among the tribes that
prompted ʿAbd al-Qādir to lead the struggle. He began establishing political
structures, while the French took several years to muster sufficient forces to
move inland and instead negotiated treaties with ʿAbd al-Qādir that de facto
recognised his authority over the interior. ʿAbd al-Qādir settled in the town of
Mostaganem, which was his capital. He was partly influenced by the reformist
endeavours of Muḥammad ʿAlī in Egypt and attempted to create, for example,
a modernised army. For the most part, we must consider his state as a tradi-
tional one. When the French finally moved against him, he quickly abandoned
the towns he controlled and resorted to guerrilla warfare.
We can see little or no influence of Sufism in his state or in his ideology. ʿAbd
al-Qādir remained a devout Ṣūfī, and returned to this existence when he was fi-
nally defeated in 1847 and exiled to Syria. He seems to have kept his Sufism and
state-building activities quite separate. The most noteworthy case in which the
two activities overlapped may have been when he took time off from fighting
the French to attack the rival Tijānī centre at ʿAyn Māḍī. Unlike their Tijānī
brother al-Ḥājj ʿUmar in West Africa, the Tijānīs of Algeria were completely
apolitical and did not take a position for or against the resistance movement.
Thus, ʿAbd al-Qādir’s quarrel with them was, primarily, because they might un-
dercut his Qādirī Ṣūfī position, rather than because of political and military
aspirations. Yet, while ʿAbd al-Qādir was both a Ṣūfī and a head of state, it is
probably not correct to call his political structure a “Ṣūfī sultanate.”

3.2 Imām Shāmil and the Caucasian Naqshbandiyya

Many aspects of ʿAbd al-Qādir’s struggle against the French echoed the
Caucasian struggle against Russian expansion into the Causasus that was tak-
ing place at the same time. The Caucasian struggle was led by the Naqshbandī
shaykh Shāmil (1212–87/1796–1871, originally Shamwil, also rendered Shamīl).
It is unclear what status he had in the order, but some sources say he was ap-
pointed the local khalīfa (Gammer, 67). However, he was known by the title
“imām,” by which was meant amīr al-muʾminīm, and this was the title he him-
self used. Like ʿAbd al-Qādir, this only referred to his local region, as he also
accepted the Ottoman sultan as “the only padishāh,” according to his writings.
Shāmil also followed ʿAbd al-Qādir in seeking negotiations and treaties with
his enemies when that served his purpose. In the Caucasus too, both sides
wanted time to build up their strength, and it was only in 1836 that the war
started in earnest. Shāmil was defeated in 1839, but returned and continued as
a local ruler until his final surrender in 1859.
Shāmil’s state followed a Muslim pattern rather than a specific Ṣūfī one, but
was based on religious reform rather than traditionalism. Thus, like Ibn Fodiye,
328 Vikør

he insisted on the application of the sharīʿa and combatting semi- or non-

Islamic customs (ʿādāt). He appointed governors, nāʾibs as well as qāḍīs and
muftīs, although with some local adaptations (e.g., the muftī was appointed by
the nāʾib, and in turn nominated the qāḍīs; Gammer, 225–7). The Ṣūfī element
of his struggle seems, primarily, to have been one of legitimacy and mobilisa-
tion; we can find little or no trace of Ṣūfī thought in the writings we have from
him (in sharp contrast to al-Ḥājj ʿUmar). Nevertheless, he clearly drew on Ṣūfī
elements to bolster support. When queried about a difficult topic, he would go
into khalwa (seclusion) for days and emerge with an answer given to him by
the Prophet in a vision. He could read people’s thoughts and be physically pres-
ent at several places at the same time. These abilities belong to the repertoire
of a Ṣūfī shaykh. Like the talibés of al-Ḥājj ʿUmar, Shāmil’s soldiers were also
called “students,” murīds, but here a clear distinction was made between mem-
bers of the order, ṭarīqa murīds, and fighting adepts, nāʾibi murīds—although
there was considerable overlap between the two.

3.3 The Sanūsī Kingdom of Libya

The Qādiriyya of Ibn Fodiye and ʿAbd al-Qādir is considered to be among the
“old” decentralised Ṣūfī orders, supposedly less useful as the basis for jihāds
and state building than the newer Tijāniyya of al-Ḥājj ʿUmar (although this was
not the case in Algeria during ʿAbd al-Qādir’s time).
Another new ṭarīqa was the Sanūsiyya. This was a non-political order aimed
at spreading learning among the Bedouin of Cyrenaica (eastern Libya) from
the 1840s (Evans-Pritchard; Vikør). But when Italy invaded Libya in 1911 and the
Ottomans pulled out, the Bedouin leaders approached the third leader of the
brotherhood, Aḥmad al-Sharīf (1284–1352/1867 or 8–1933) to lead their resis-
tance. Against the misgivings of the council of elders, al-Sharīf accepted, and
the religious brotherhood was soon transformed into the organisational back-
bone of a guerrilla war that was carried out by Bedouin tribes. Al-Sharīf staved
off Italian incursions, but had to resign after a disastrous attack on the British
across the border with Egypt in 1916. The British negotiated an agreement be-
tween the Sanūsī and the Italians (the Acroma agreement, 1917), in which the
new head of the order, al-Sharīf’s cousin Muḥammad Idrīs, an ally of Britain,
became the de facto ruler of Cyrenaica. In a new treaty in 1920 (at al-Rajma),
he was accorded the title emir. After the fascists took power in Rome two years
later, the war resumed and lasted until the defeat of the Sanūsīs in 1931. Just
ten years later, however, Italian rule was brought to an end by the Second
World War. In the aftermath of the war, the Western powers could not agree
on the future of Libya, but a majority in the new United Nations decided that
Libya would become a unified state. The western region, Tripolitania, wanted
Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 329

a republic, but the less populated Cyrenaica only accepted unity if their can-
didate, Idrīs, became head of state. Thus, the head of the Sanūsī Ṣūfī order
became king of Libya, and remained so until deposed by al-Qadhdhāfī in 1969.
In this history, there is no doubt that the Sanūsī order, while originally
non-political and non-militant, played a key organisational role in the jihād
against the Italians. The Acroma emirate was imposed from outside, and in
the later war the Italians effectively crushed the Sanūsiyya as a brotherhood.
When Idrīs returned as king in 1951, the Sanūsiyya was just a tribal aristoc-
racy of Cyrenaican nobility who effectively ran the state with the royal fam-
ily. Although Idrīs himself was keenly interested in his religious roots, perhaps
more so than in running the kingdom, Libya can hardly be considered a
“Ṣūfī kingdom.”

4 Conclusion: Ṣūfī States

In all these cases, Ṣūfī leaders became heads of state. But the Ṣūfī influence
on the actual state structures they built were negligible or completely absent.
The shaykhs-sultans were known by various titles: imām (Shāmil), khān (Āfāq),
shāh, emir, or mālik (Ṣafavids, Sanūsiyya), etc. But formally, most referred to
themselves primarily with the classical title amīr al-muʾminīn, a title generally
associated with, but not synonymous with, the office of the caliph. By the time
these states arose, this title no longer had universal implications, but desig-
nated a ruler who implemented the sharīʿa in his territory. While some of these
leaders also may have used Ṣūfī or religious titles, such as khalīfa of the ṭarīqa
(al-Ḥājj ʿUmar) or khwāja (Āfāq), this likely denoted an authority distinct from
that of political leader.
A similar situation existed in relation to the administrative apparatus com-
posed of traditional offices, such as wazīr, qāḍī, and muftī. However, here we
can distinguish between the cases in which the previous Ṣūfī initiates turned
militants ran the new state, and those in which the traditional notables admin-
istered the state. In the former group, we find al-Ḥājj ʿUmar’s ṭalibés, Shāmil’s
murīds (with the caveat mentioned above) and the Ṣafavid Qizilbāsh. In the
latter cases of Ibn Fodiye and ʿAbd al-Qādir the Ṣūfī initiates seemed to have
little or no influence. The Sanūsīs represent an intermediary position; that is,
the non-initiate Bedouins did the fighting, but they were led by the local Sanūsī
shaykhs, who were generally drawn from outside the tribal unit. In cases where
there was such a link, militancy and political leadership transformed those in-
volved into an established state aristocracy, regardless of whether or not they
maintained a religious identity.
330 Vikør

There seems to be no correlation between the content of the ṭarīqa’s teach-

ings and its capacity for politics and statehood. The Tijānī example is clear
proof of this: After the defeat of al-Ḥājj ʿUmar’s state, the Tijānī ṭarīqa spread
under colonialism to become the dominant Ṣūfī order in West Africa, but
without a hint of political militancy. In fact, the major branches of the order
are those that are most independent from ʿUmar’s lineage and legacy. There
is, however, an evident link between organisational structure and potential
for political action, as in the cases of al-Ḥājj ʿUmar and al-Sanūsī, orders with
much stricter religious hierarchy than most others.
Therefore, the significance of the concept of “Ṣūfī states” is open to debate,
or perhaps this Ṣūfī element has been overemphasised in Western historiogra-
phy, as Knysh argues in the case of Shāmil (Knysh; Patrizi in this volume; Papas
in this volume). In fact, “Ṣūfī sultans” and imams seem to have become, even-
tually, regular sultans and imams. Their Ṣūfī connections and Ṣūfī organisa-
tion may have helped them achieve this position, but the more they immersed
themselves in statehood, the more diluted and indistinct the Ṣūfī aspect
of their rule became. Ṣūfī models, ideas, or identities are better seen as resourc-
es that historical actors or movements can use in specific circumstances than
as part of conventional politics. These resources, however, became dispensable
and were easily set aside when these rebel movements evolved into states.

Bibliography

Abun-Nasr, Jamil M., The Tijaniyya. A Sufi order in the modern world, London 1965.
Adelẹyẹ, R. A., Power and diplomacy in northern Nigeria 1804–1906. The Sokoto caliphate
and its enemies, London 1971.
Algar, Hamid, Political aspects of Naqshbandī history, in Marc Gaborieau, Alexandre
Popovic, and Thierry Zarcone (eds.), Naqshbandis. Cheminements et situation actu-
elle d’un ordre mystique musulman (Paris 1990), 123–52.
Bennigsen, Alexandre and Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, Le Soufi et le commissaire.
Les confréries musulmanes en URSS, Paris 1986.
Dale, Stephen F., The Muslim empires of the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals,
Cambridge 2010.
Danziger, Raphael, Abd al-Qadir and the Algerians. Resistance to the French and internal
consolidation, New York 1977.
Étienne, Bruno, Abdelkader. Isthme des isthmes (Barzakh al-barazikh), Paris 1994.
Evans-Pritchard, E. E., The Sanusi of Cyrenaica, Oxford 1949.
Gammer, Moshe, Muslim resistance to the Tsar. Shamil and the conquest of Chechnia
and Daghestan, London 2003.
Ṣūfī Sultanates and Imamates 331

Kemper, Michael, The Daghestani legal discourse on the imamate, Central Asian Survey
21 (2010): 265–78.
Knysh, Alexander, Sufism as an explanatory paradigm. The issue of the motivations
of Sufi resistance movements in western and Russian scholarship, WI 42 (2002):
139–73.
Last, Murray, The Sokoto caliphate, London 1967.
Newman, Andrew J., Safavid Iran. Rebirth of a Persian empire, London 2012.
Ọlọruntimehin, B. O., The Segu Tukolor empire, London 1972.
Paden, John N., Religion and political culture in Kano, Berkeley 1973.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Étude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan Oriental, Paris 2005.
Paul, Jürgen, Die politische und soziale Bedeutung der Naqšbandiyya in Mittelasien im 15.
Jahrhundert, Berlin 1991.
Paul, Jürgen, Forming a Faction. The ḥimāyat system of Khwaja Ahrar, IJMES 23 (1991):
533–48.
Reynolds, Michael A., Mobilisation of Muslims in the Caucasus, in David Motadel
(ed.), Islam and the European empires (Oxford 2014), 187–212.
Robinson, David, The holy war of Umar Tal. The western Sudan in the mid-nineteenth
century, Oxford 1985.
Savory, R. S., Iran under the Safawids, Cambridge 1980.
Shinar, Pessah, ʿAbd al-Qādir and ʿAbd al-Krīm. Religious influences on their thought
and action, Studies in Islam 1/3 (1964): 135–64.
Togan, Isenbike, Islam in a Changing Society. The Khojas of eastern Turkistan, in
Jo-Ann Gross (ed.), Muslims in Central Asia. Expressions of identity and change
(Durham, NC 1992), 134–48.
Togan, Isenbike, Differences in ideology and practice. The case of the Black and White
Mountain faction, Journal of the History of Sufism 3 (2001): 25–38.
Vikør, Knut S., Jihād, ʿilm and taṣawwuf—two justifications of action from the Idrīsī
tradition, SI 90 (2000): 153–76.
Weismann, Itzchak, The Naqshbandiyya. Orthodoxy and activism in a worldwide Sufi
tradition, London 2007.
Zarcone, Thierry, La Naqchbandiyya, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.),
Les Voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris
1996), 451–67.
Zelkina, Anna, Jihād in the name of God. Shaykh Shamil as the religious leader of the
Caucasus, Central Asian Survey 21 (2010): 249–64.
 Part 5
The Organisation of Mysticism

⸪
 Chapter 18

The Organisation of Mysticism

Mark Sedgwick

Mysticism in Islam is organised through the relationship between murshid

(guide) and murīd (seeker), and through collective institutions such as the
ṭarīqa (lit. path; order), which has been the dominant organisational form
since the eighth/fourteenth century. In addition, the ribāṭ or khānqāh (lodge)
and the brotherhood come in different urban and rural forms. The ṭarīqa, the
lodge, and the brotherhood are all defined below.
We can understand mysticism in various ways, but arguably the idea of the
encounter of the soul (Gr. psychē, Ar. rūḥ) with God or the Godhead is central.
This encounter does not, in principle, require any form of organisation what-
soever. To the extent that it requires anything other than what is understood
to come from God, it requires piety and practice. Despite this, in Islam as in
other religions and traditions, mysticism has tended to be organised. And, in
the Muslim world as elsewhere, rulers and states have also sought to regulate
mystics and their institutions, giving rise to a further level of organisation.
The organisation of mysticism has been relatively little studied. Ṣūfīs have
written mostly about persons (great saints: walī, pl. awliyāʾ), theology, philoso-
phy, and practice. Western scholars have generally followed these emphases.
The first Ṣūfī texts that became available in the West dealt with theology and
philosophy (Sedgwick, Western Sufism), and this was the original focus of
Western scholarship on Islamic mysticism. The study of persons and practices
followed. The study of organisation came last, as the sources for it are more
difficult to obtain. J. Spencer Trimingham included one chapter on organisa-
tion in his work, The Sufi orders in Islam (in 1971), and since that time there
has been no new comprehensive treatment of Ṣūfī organisation. Organisation
matters, however, as it provides the context within which practices take place,
persons operate, and theology and philosophy are developed, transmitted,
and received. ​
For those who understand mysticism as primarily individual, the organ-
isation of mysticism necessarily represents a decline from a pure ideal. This
understanding is found in much of the early twentieth-century Western
scholarship, which implicitly regarded organised mysticism as somehow de-
based. This view has now been mostly abandoned, however (Le Gall), and the

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_020

336 Sedgwick

organised mysticism of ṭarīqa Sufism is now often regarded as the norm for
Islamic mysticism. This, too, is incorrect, as the ṭarīqa is only one of the organ-
isational forms that Sufism has taken. There was Sufism before the ṭarīqa, and
there is Sufism beyond the ṭarīqa today.
This chapter is structured historically, following the organisation of Sufism
from its beginnings through the ribāṭ and the brotherhood to the ṭarīqa, and
then on to modern developments. The organisation of Ṣūfīs by rulers and
states is considered after the ṭarīqa, but before modern developments.

1 The Beginnings of Sufism

At its beginnings, Sufism was individual rather than organised, though there
was still a transfer of ideas and practices from individual to individual, which
is in some ways a form of organisation. The very first Muslims who were later
identified as Ṣūfīs did not use the term “Ṣūfī” themselves; the earliest use of this
term was in and around Baghdad, at the heart of the great ʿAbbāsid caliphate,
in the third/ninth century (Karamustafa, Sufism, 6). These third-/ninth-century
Ṣūfīs did not understand Sufism as something they had invented, however, but
as something that had been practiced by earlier ascetics and mystics.
Though little is known of these earliest Muslim ascetics and mystics, they
and their activities do not seem to have been organised in any particular fash-
ion. Nothing is said about the institutional or even personal relations of the
earliest (often semi-mythical) proto-Ṣūfīs whose lives are reported in the clas-
sic Risāla of Abū l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072). These proto-Ṣūfīs appear
as saintly ascetics whose practice was supported only by God and their own
piety (Qushayrī, 18–43).
Starting with Abū l-Qāsim al-Junayd (d. 298/910), one of the first Muslim
mystics to identify himself as a Ṣūfī, it became standard to mention who a
great Ṣūfī studied with. At first, the Ṣūfī who was most often mentioned in
this way was al-Junayd himself (Qushayrī, 43–65). The central organisational
mechanism of Sufism—the relationship between teacher and student—dates
to the beginnings of Sufism, then.
A teacher-student relationship is found in many human activities that in-
volve the transmission of knowledge or techniques, and is also characteris-
tic of the early ʿulamāʾ (religious scholars). However, one aspect of the Ṣūfī
teacher-student relationship that differs from the organisation of the exoteric
sciences of the ʿulamāʾ was the institution of the ʿaqd (contract). According to
al-Qushayrī’s Risāla, at the beginning of the training of a Ṣūfī murīd, an ʿaqd
was formed between the murīd and God, and as a result of this contract, the
The Organisation of Mysticism 337

murīd owed total obedience to his murshid, known generally as a shaykh (Ar.,
elder or teacher) or pīr (P., also elder or teacher). “One condition for success
is that there should be no opposition to the master [shaykh] in his student’s
[murīd’s] heart” (Qushayrī, 406). Later, a contract between the murīd and the
shaykh replaced that between the murīd and God; this contract was known as
an ʿahd (covenant) or bayʿa (allegiance). Organisationally, then, the teacher-
student relationship in Sufism is distinguished from the teacher-student rela-
tionship in other Islamic contexts by the bayʿa from murīd to shaykh (Thibon
in this volume).
By the third/ninth century, the giving of bayʿa had become ritualised, often
taking the form of the shaykh bestowing an article of clothing, normally a kh-
irqa (cloak), on the murīd (Michon). “Taking the khirqa” thus became a syn-
onym for giving bayʿa. This practice was sometimes justified by reference to a
ḥadīth (report) of the Prophet giving a khamīṣa (shirt) to one of his followers,
though many Ṣūfīs accepted that this was in fact a weak justification (Ohlander,
210). The actual purpose of the khirqa is unknown, though it has a parallel in
the custom of a ruler bestowing a khilaʿ (robe of honour) as a mark of favour, a
custom said to have been followed by Pharaoh, who bestowed a robe on Joseph
(Genesis 41: 42). This custom survived in the Middle East and Central Asia until
the Ottomans replaced it with the modern practice of bestowing stars, ribbons,
and medals. The khirqa served as a visible mark of identity, like a Christian
monastic habit, and likewise it varied in colour and design. Some Ṣūfīs wore
muraqqaʿa (patched) khirqas as a mark of their asceticism.
Since the adoption of global models of Western men’s clothing in the Muslim
world from the late nineteenth century onwards, the khirqa has largely disap-
peared, although it is still worn by Mevlevi Ṣūfīs during their samāʿ (whirling
ceremony) and by some shaykhs in Iran and Central Asia. The practice of bayʿa,
in contrast, continues. It is now generally marked by the murshid assigning a
wird (litany) to the murīd.

2 Early Ṣūfī Organisation

The very earliest Ṣūfīs were organised informally into groups as well as into
teacher-student pairs. The Ṣūfīs who associated with al-Junayd, for example,
met regularly in the Shūnīziyya Mosque in Baghdad (Karamustafa, Sufism, 20).
Again, this form of organisation resembles that of the early ʿulamāʾ, and the
term ḥalqa (circle) was used to refer to their gatherings/lessons. Two formal
institutions, the lodge and the brotherhood, then replaced the informal groups
of Ṣūfīs.
338 Sedgwick

2.1 The Lodge

The first Ṣūfī lodges, called ribāṭ (fort) or khānqāh (lit., “a place of residence”),
were established in eastern Iran in the fourth/tenth century (Chabbi; Firouzeh
in this volume). They became widespread there during the fifth/eleventh cen-
tury (Karamustafa, Sufism, 121), and then in Damascus in the sixth/twelfth
century (Ephrat and Mahamid, 198). Similar institutions were then established
elsewhere (Ephrat and Pinto in this volume). The term zāwiya (lit., “corner”)
was later widely used, when other terms were also applied, including tekke in
the Turkish context. Over the millennium during which the Ṣūfī lodge has ex-
isted, these and other terms have sometimes been used with particular shades
of meaning, but often they have been used interchangeably. No clear or gener-
ally recognised typology corresponds to the different terms. This article will
therefore refer to the ribāṭ to encompass all other terms. The original mili-
tary significance of the term reflects an early association between Ṣūfīs and
mutaṭawwiʿa (volunteer fighters) (Tor, 230). One of the most celebrated ascet-
ics and mystics before al-Junayd and those who identified as Ṣūfīs was Ibrāhīm
b. Adham (d. 161/778), a volunteer on the Arab-Byzantine frontier who is said
to have excelled as a scholar, eaten almost nothing, and attained knowledge of
God (maʿrifa). Ibrāhīm b. Adham was followed by a number of companions,
and helped inspire many other scholar-ascetics who also moved to the frontier
(Bonner; Hofer [Ṣūfī Outposts] in this volume). Most of the mutaṭawwiʿa who
occupied military ribāṭs were not, however, Ṣūfīs (Chabbi and Rabbat), despite
the later myth that conflated Ṣūfīs and mujāhidīn (fighters of jihād). The mili-
tary ribāṭ and the khānqāh ribāṭ were not the same thing.
The classic khānqāh ribāṭ housed a number of Ṣūfīs who lived, ate, prayed,
performed dhikr (repetitions of invocations or the names of God), and stud-
ied together under the direction of a shaykh. Many urban khānqāh ribāṭs were
endowed by local rulers, and these were often quite grand; for example, the
ribāṭ that was attached to the tomb of the Mamlūk sultan Baybars II of Egypt
(d. 710/1310) accommodated four hundred residents (Trimingham, 171). The
waqf (endowments) for many such ribāṭs provided free food and housing for
their inhabitants, who were thus relieved from the need to earn a living. Some
of those who lived in a ribāṭ were long-term residents, some short-term. Some
were travelling students, some were the staff of the ribāṭ (cooks, musicians),
and some were retired ʿulamāʾ who wanted to dedicate their final years to their
devotions (Hofer, Popularisation). At least in theory, Ṣūfīs in a ribāṭ lived lives
cut off from material concerns, focusing on the divine through prayer and dhikr
and the recitation of the Qurʾān, sleeping and eating little. Marriage was often
discouraged (Ohlander, 194–5, 229–30), despite the general encouragement
The Organisation of Mysticism 339

of marriage found in Islam. Ribāṭ Ṣūfīs wore a distinctive khirqa, sometimes

granted on entering the ribāṭ and sometimes granted at the completion of an
initial training period (Ohlander, 210). Some critics, however, thought the in-
habitants of the ribāṭs lived in a degree of comfort that brought into question
whether or not they were true Ṣūfīs. Even so, local populations generally ac-
cepted them as teachers, and sometimes attended their rituals as spectators
(Hofer, Popularisation). In at least some ribāṭs, the shaykh was assisted by a
khādim (servant), who looked after the financing and day-to-day running of
the ribāṭ (Ohlander, 207–8).
In addition to ribāṭs, Ṣūfī communities also formed around certain tombs,
often called qubba (dome) or maqām (site) in Arabic, or dargāh in Persian and
Urdu. Often a great Ṣūfī shaykh was regarded as a walī (saint), and thus, their
tombs became places of ziyāra (visitation, pilgrimage); this practice had be-
come well established by the sixth/twelfth century, when several ziyāra manu-
als were written (Karamustafa, Sufism, 132). It is important to note that the
practice of ziyāra to tombs is not exclusive to Ṣūfīs. It is also a standard Shīʿī
practice, and is even practiced by many Sunnī Muslims who do not consider
themselves Ṣūfīs. Further, the occupants of many tombs that are the object
of ziyāra have no connection with Sufism. Ziyāras may be made to the tombs
of members of the ʿulamāʾ, or even military commanders like Abū Ayyūb
al-Anṣārī (d. 52/672), a Companion of the Prophet whose tomb outside Con-
stantinople (known as Eyüp Sultan) is now one of the most important religious
sites in Istanbul.
Many or even most of the famous tombs are, however, those of Ṣūfīs; thus,
there is a large overlap between ziyāras and Sufism (Mayeur-Jaouen in this vol-
ume). As an institution, whether Ṣūfī or not, tombs are especially important
for women since, unlike mosques, tombs are not gendered spaces. Women
visit tombs as often as, or more than, men do. Tombs are visited on a daily
basis for baraka (blessings), or as necessary for relief from illness or other
problems. Particular tombs acquired reputations for particular functions. In
the nineteenth-century Punjab, for example, one tomb was known for its ef-
fectiveness against leprosy, and another for its use against possession by jinn
(demons) (Gilmartin, 42). On a seasonal basis, tombs are the sites of festivals
known as mawlids (Arabic) or ʿurs (in the Indian subcontinent); some of these
festivals attract great numbers of people (McGregor).
Many major Ṣūfī tombs are not only sites of ziyāra and mawlids but also
of institutions resembling the ribāṭ. For example, one early Ṣūfī community
of about one hundred persons formed around the shrine of one Abū Saʿīd
(d. 440/1049) in Mīhana, Khurāsān (eastern Iran) (Karamustafa, Sufism 143).
340 Sedgwick

Another Ṣūfī community developed around the tomb of Aḥmad al-Badawī

(d. 675/1276) in Ṭanṭā, Egypt, where the waqf provided for seven hundred stu-
dents (Mayeur-Jaouen).
Ṣūfī tombs and the communities attached to them, often descendants of
the original walī and his followers, were of great importance in rural areas of
the Muslim world, from Morocco to India and beyond. Until modern times, the
authority of the state in the Muslim world was most prominent in cities and
large towns, which were also where the ʿulamāʾ were normally located. The
rural tombs, the guardians of which were known in the western Arab world as
a murābiṭ (ribāṭ-keeper, rendered into French as marabout) and in South Asia
as a khādim (servant), not only provided religious services but also educational
(teaching the Qurʾān and basic literacy), judicial (conducting trials), and even
political services (arbitrating in tribal disputes) (Gellner 315–6; Gilmartin 57–8;
Rinn 18). In recent decades, these functions have declined as governments have
increased their presence in rural areas and provided state-run educational and
judicial services, but they have not disappeared entirely. In Upper Egypt, for
example, Ṣūfī shaykhs are still thought to be better and faster at resolving land
disputes than state courts are (Chih, 16–63). In South Asia, a khādim may en-
sure proper behaviour, but may also act as a shaykh.
When central political authority was weak, the guardians of major Ṣūfī
tombs often became local rulers, and sometimes even commanded military
forces. During the eleventh/seventeenth century, for example, as the power
of the Saʿdī dynasty in Morocco waned, a local shaykh, Muḥammad al-Ḥājjī
(d. 1082/1612), established himself as a regional ruler (with the aid of military
force) and ultimately claimed the title of sultan of Morocco. He was eventually
defeated in battle by the ʿAlawī dynasty that still rules Morocco (Knysh, 247).
Likewise, as the power of the Mughal dynasty collapsed in India, the guard-
ians of the tomb of Bābā Farīd (d. c. 670/1271) at Pakpattan (in the Punjab)
established themselves as local rulers, until, in 1810, they were defeated mili-
tarily by the Sikh Empire (Gilmartin, 46–7). During the nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, several insurrections against European colonial regimes
and unpopular Muslim governments were led by rural Ṣūfīs (Keddie; Knysh,
257–60 and 289–300).
Although the political, legal, and educational functions of rural tombs and
their murābiṭ, khādims, or shaykhs have been extremely important for the
functioning of rural communities, these figures all ultimately depended on the
religious significance of the walī and the tomb. Ṣūfī tombs, then, are Ṣūfī insti-
tutions, not just social or political communities.
The Organisation of Mysticism 341

2.2 The Itinerant Brotherhood

The itinerant brotherhood was a Ṣūfī organisational form that developed in
parallel with the ribāṭ, and has been identified by some scholars as a reaction
against the comforts of ribāṭ Sufism. The members of itinerant brotherhoods
were mendicant ascetics. Outsiders first referred to the itinerant brother-
hoods by a variety of names that indicated their specific doctrinal positions.
In the fourth/tenth century there are references to a Ḥusniyya (those [who]
beautify [God]), a Malāmatiyya (those [who are] blameworthy), a Shawqiyya
(those [who] yearn [for God]), a Maʿdhūriyya (those [who seek] excuses), and
a Wāṣiliyya (those [who seek to] attain [i.e., union with God]) (Karamustafa,
Antinomian Sufis). The Wāṣiliyya were given this name because they allegedly
believed that once they attained union with God, they were exempt from the
sharīʿa, and the Malāmatiyya were referred to thus because they practiced self-
blame or, perhaps, were indifferent to public blame. Commentators debated
about what acts did or might produce blame (Karamustafa, Antinomian Sufis).
It seems clear, however, that these itinerant brotherhoods were often antino-
mian, defying religious and social norms.
While we do not have information about the internal organisation of the
earliest itinerant brotherhoods, they were evidently sufficiently organised to
be seen as groups by outsiders. Their theology varied. Some were close to main-
stream Sunnī Islam, while others held very different views, including those as-
sociated with the ghulāt (extremist Shīʿīs) of early Islam, and most strikingly,
those who believed in divine incarnation.
By the fifth/eleventh century, the itinerant, mendicant ascetics had become
known as the darvīsh (P., beggar) or qalandar (P., uncouth). Darvīsh later be-
came a synonym for Ṣūfī, and indeed early European literature refers to “der-
vishes,” not to Ṣūfīs; the term “Ṣūfī” became standard only during the twentieth
century (Sedgwick, Western Sufism, 125). Qalandar came to denote itinerant,
mendicant Ṣūfīs. Also by the fifth/eleventh century, the mode of life of the
darvīsh or qalandar had been sufficiently formalised for particular clothing
and accessories to become standard. The darvīsh or qalandar dressed in an-
imal skins and a tāj (a felt hat, usually conical), and carried a staff, a small
hatchet, a kashkūl (begging bowl), and a tasbīh (rosary). Sometimes qalandars
lived alone, and sometimes in groups. Like the earliest itinerant brotherhoods,
they were often antinomian. Though the details are disputed, there are nu-
merous accounts of consumption of alcohol and narcotics, and of irregular
sexual practices. By the seventh/thirteenth century, the itinerant brotherhood
model and the ribāṭ form of organisation began to merge, as qalandars opened
342 Sedgwick

ribāṭs in such major cities as Damascus, Damietta, Cairo, and Jerusalem. Some
qalandars became part-time itinerants, and lived part of the year in ribāṭs
(Karamustafa, Antinomian Sufis).
Although other forms of organisation eventually superseded the itiner-
ant brotherhood, the qalandars remained popular in Central Asia during the
eleventh/seventeenth and twelfth/eighteenth centuries, and survived there
until the early twentieth century (Papas, Mystiques et vagabonds). E. W. Lane
wrote about Persian dervishes in Cairo in the 1830s, and noted that they were
still distinguished by their kashkūl and tāj (Lane, 248–9). The qalandar model
also survives until today in the form of the Bektāşīs. During the tenth/sixteenth
century the Ottoman government was threatened by Kızılbāş (lit., “red heads”),
Turkic tribesmen who were inclined towards Shīʿism, and the Ottomans’ rivals,
the Ṣafavids. The Bektāşīs were already linked with the elite Ottoman military
forces (the Janissaries, many of whom were Bektāşīs), and were therefore pro-
moted by Ottoman rulers as an alternative to the Kızılbāş. The Kızılbāş survived
until today, as the Alevīs (Dressler), while the Bektāşīs absorbed the remains
of the qalandars, including some of their unusual theological positions and
ceremonies. These positions distinguish them from mainstream Sunnī Sufism.
The Bektāşīs developed a unique organisational structure, on the one hand
linked to the Janissaries and on the other hand divided into celibate and non-
celibate branches. The celibate branch was led by a dede (grandfather) as
shaykh, who presided over a hierarchy of ranks and a large number of tekkes.
The non-celibate branch was led by a çelebi (gentleman) (Zarcone).
When the early nineteenth-century Ottoman government was challenged
by the Janissaries and suppressed them (in 1826) it also suppressed the Bektāşīs,
and confiscated their property. Despite this, the Bektāşīs survived until the end
of the Ottoman Empire (Zarcone), and they are still found in Albania, where
the 1826 suppression was never very effective. During the 1920s and 1930s,
Albanian Bektāşīs became an officially recognised religious community along-
side Sunnī Islam and Christianity; they retain this status until today (Clayer).

2.3 Futuwwa Brotherhoods

Young male Ṣūfīs also organised themselves into urban brotherhoods that
overlapped with other non-Ṣūfī brotherhoods, known in the eastern Arab
world as futuwwa (Ar., fatā, pl. fityān, youths) and in Anatolia as akhīs (broth-
ers). Scholars continue to debate the precise nature of these brotherhoods,
but it seems that they took multiple forms, some resembling military forces,
some resembling trade guilds, and some resembling vagrant bands or youth
gangs—and indeed the term ʿayyār (vagrant) was often used. In some ways the
futuwwa brotherhoods were the counterpart of Europe’s youth confraternities,
The Organisation of Mysticism 343

one variety of which played a major role in the life of mediaeval Europe by
combining religious devotions, charitable activities, mutual self-help, and
what Christopher Black has called “general desires for corporative identity and
solidarity outside the kin group” (Black, 8).
The futuwwa differed from the itinerant brotherhoods in that they were
urban and settled, and they differed from both the itinerant brotherhoods and
ribāṭ Ṣūfīs in that they did not live together, though they often ate together.
Entry into the futuwwa brotherhood was marked not by receiving a khirqa but
by receiving a shadd (girdle belt), a symbol that was also used by trade guilds
(and by Christian monks). Membership in the futuwwa was further indicated
by wearing sirwāl (trousers) (Algar and Raymond). The shadd was generally
granted when a ṭālib (postulant) had completed a trial period and could be-
come a murīd, then a rafīq (companion) (Taeschner, 140).
The objectives of the futuwwa were periodically described in what was
known as a futuwwat-nāme (a treatise on futuwwa). These included advice on
the religious and spiritual training and development of young men, and have
been compared to European manuals of chivalry. These manuals link the futu-
wwa brotherhoods to Sufism. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), an important
Ṣūfī (on whom see below) who wrote two futuwwat-nāmes, argued that the
futuwwa was a subsidiary form of Sufism (Ohlander, 284–5, 289–90). He seems
to have had some success in incorporating the futuwwa into Sufism, although
futuwwa brotherhoods still maintained a distinct, separate identity. In gener-
al, little is known of their internal organisation or functioning, but we have
some information about the akhīs in eighth-/fourteenth-century Anatolia. By
then, the akhīs were an association of urban craftsmen who pooled the profits
of their trades, ate together every evening, and then performed dhikr or read
Qurʾān, rather as ribāṭ Ṣūfīs did. They welcomed and handsomely entertained
travellers, including Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (d. 770/1368–9 or 779/1377), and even acted as
governors in towns where the rising Ottoman power had not yet established
itself (Arnakis). Thus, they combined religious, economic, and political func-
tions, rather as rural murābiṭs and shaykhs at tombs did.
The futuwwa were repressed in Iran by the Ṣafavids after the tenth/sixteenth
century (Ridgeon), as the akhīs were repressed by the Ottomans around the
same time, after an initial policy of patronising them was abandoned (Ocak).
The term futuwwat-nāme persisted, however, to describe the literature of some
trade guilds, which survived (often with Ṣūfī connections) until the economic
restructuring of the nineteenth century (Ridgeon; Afshari in this volume). A
form of futuwwat-nāme known as the risāla was in use in Central Asia until the
early twentieth century (Dagyeli). The term futuwwa likewise survives, and is
now used to describe local gangsters (Irwin, 162–3).
344 Sedgwick

3 Ṭarīqa Sufism

During the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries, the ṭarīqa

(order) became the central Ṣūfī organisation, gradually replacing and incor-
porating the urban ribāṭ and the brotherhood. A ṭarīq is a path or road, and
thus, a ṭarīqa is literally a path, though the word came to denote a more loosely
organised group of Ṣūfīs. As in the futuwwa brotherhood, and unlike partici-
pation in the urban ribāṭ or the itinerant brotherhood, participation in the
ṭarīqa is part-time. Life in a ribāṭ left some time for individual activities such
as teaching, but most of those who lived in ribāṭs were ʿulamāʾ, not ordinary
Muslims. Ordinary Muslims sometimes attended their ceremonies, but as
spectators, not participants. Similarly, belonging to an itinerant brotherhood
was a full-time affair, and the qalandars were clearly distinguished from the
general population by their dress and behaviour. The fact that participation in
the ṭarīqa was part-time made possible a far larger membership. Also, unlike
the futuwwa brotherhood or any earlier form of Ṣūfī organisation, the ṭarīqas
extended beyond a single town or city. The organisational form of the ṭarīqa,
then, is what allowed Sufism to spread as widely in the Muslim world as it did
(Ceyhan in this volume).
The ṭarīqa also differed from the ribāṭ and the brotherhood in that, like
tombs, they were identified with the memory of a particular walī. The great-
est and most widespread ṭarīqas are all named after the saints (awliyāʾ) who
lived between the sixth/twelfth and ninth/fifteenth centuries, including the
Qādiriyya (named after ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī, d. 561/1166), the Suhrawardiyya
(named after Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī, d. 563/1168, the uncle of the
ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī already mentioned and no relation of Shihāb al-Dīn
al-Suhrawardī, the philosopher who was executed in Aleppo in 587/1191),
the Shādhiliyya (named after Abū l-Ḥasan al-Shādhilī, d. 656/1258), and the
Mevleviyye (named after Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī, known as Mevlānā, d. 672/1273).
These awliyāʾ all came from the ribāṭ system. For example, Abū l-Najīb
al-Suhrawardī led a ribāṭ in Baghdad, and al-Shādhilī led a ribāṭ located outside
Alexandria (Hofer, Popularisation). One of Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī’s major
contributions to the later development of the ṭarīqa system was the partial
opening of his ribāṭ to mutashābihūn (imitators), part-time participants who
were not required to follow the same rules as full-time members of the ribāṭ,
to whom he gave the khirqat al-tabarruk (khirqa of blessing) (Ohlander, 194,
212–3). Thus, in a sense, Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī’s mutashābihūn were the
first ṭarīqa Ṣūfīs.
Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī was retrospectively identified as the leader of
a ṭarīqa as a result of the efforts of his nephew ʿUmar (the author of the
The Organisation of Mysticism 345

futuwwat-nāme already mentioned), who enjoyed the patronage of the

ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir (r. 575–622/1180–1225), for whom he performed a num-
ber of diplomatic missions, and who directed five ribāṭs in Baghdad (Ohlander,
112). The Suhrawardiyya also became established as a ṭarīqa through the ef-
forts of other followers of ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī who spread the Suhrawardiyya
ṭarīqa widely, especially in India (Knysh, 200).
Similarly, al-Shādhilī was retrospectively identified as the leader of a ṭarīqa,
largely as a result of the writings and efforts of a later follower, Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Allāh
al-Iskandarī (d. 709/1309) (Hofer, Popularisation). Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Allāh prescribed a
wird and other exercises that almost anyone could perform, and encouraged
people to perform them while continuing to practice their occupations and
dress like everyone else. This, combined with successful preaching and an
emphasis on the sanctity of al-Shādhilī, allowed the Shādhiliyya to become a
far larger organisation than any ribāṭ (Hofer, Popularisation). Although some
ṭarīqas maintained ribāṭs, usually known as zāwiyas, a ṭarīqa did not need a
zāwiya; rituals could be held in ordinary mosques (Chih and Mayeur-Jaouen,
32–3).
Many existing ribāṭs were incorporated into ṭarīqas (Chabbi), as were many
brotherhoods (Karamustafa, Antinomian Sufis). After the eighth/fourteenth
century, the number of new ribāṭs founded in Damascus declined (Ephrat and
Mahamid, 198), as they did a little later in Egypt, partly because of the decline
of the Mamlūk elites that had supported them (Chih and Mayeur-Jaouen, 32),
and partly because of the growth of the ṭarīqa. By contrast, the rural ribāṭ
survived, sometimes affiliated to a ṭarīqa, as was often the case in the Punjab
(Gilmartin), and sometimes quite separate from the ṭarīqas, as in Algeria
(Rinn, 20). In Upper Egypt the arbitration functions of the rural ribāṭ are now
carried out by respected ṭarīqa shaykhs who are not normally associated with
tombs (Chih, 16–63).
It is not clear exactly why the ṭarīqa emerged when it did. There are a num-
ber of theories. A. J. Arberry, writing in 1950 and adhering to a model of the rise
and fall of Islamic civilisation that was popular at the time, believed that the
rise of the ṭarīqa reflected the general decay of Muslim society and culture, and
the triumph of “the credulous masses” (Arberry, 119–21). Annemarie Schimmel
followed the opposite paradigm; she saw the ṭarīqa as popular because ordi-
nary Muslims tired of “the scholasticism of orthodox theologians” and want-
ed something more intimate and personal (Schimmel, 231). As Nathan Hofer
states, there really is no evidence for either of these explanations. Marshall
Hodgson is careful not to propose a single explanation for the growth of what
he calls “Sufism as institutionalized mass religion” (Hodgson, 210), and in this
he was probably right. It is clear that there was a widespread demand for what
346 Sedgwick

the ṭarīqas provided, that the organisational form of the ṭarīqa met this de-
mand, and that this process encountered no significant or effective opposi-
tion. Erik Ohlander sees two complementary developments: the “routinization
of Sufism as a distinct mode of religiosity, identity, and social affiliation” and
“an institutionalizing vision of organization, accoutrement, and praxis which
was self-regulating, self-propagating, and most importantly, reproducible”
(Ohlander, 187).
The ṭarīqa differed not only from the ribāṭ and the brotherhood but also
from the Catholic monastic order. Firstly, membership of a monastic order is
full-time, with vows of chastity and poverty preventing participation in ordi-
nary life. Secondly, a monastic order is integrated into the authority structures
of the Catholic Church, structures that have no real equivalent in Islam. The
Catholic “third order” is somewhat closer to the ṭarīqa, as its members (called
“tertiaries”) live “in the world,” but a third order is attached to a “first order”
(a male monastic order) or a “second order” (a female monastic order). The
closest the Catholic Church comes to the ṭarīqa is, perhaps, Opus Dei, a largely
autonomous movement established in Spain in 1928, most of whose members
live in the world. Opus Dei is so unusual that the papacy has repeatedly had to
invent new organisational categories to accommodate it (Walsh).

3.1 Orders and Sub-Orders

As the most successful ṭarīqas spread across the Muslim world, they frag-
mented, as was inevitable in the absence of a strong centralised organisation
and discipline of the variety that kept the Catholic monastic orders together,
and which the Catholic orders derived from the organisation and discipline of
the Catholic Church itself. Once major ṭarīqas such as the Shādhiliyya were
found everywhere from Morocco to China, day-to-day leadership passed to
the local level, and sub-orders came into being, for example, the Jazūliyya
Shādhiliyya, named after the Moroccan walī Muḥammad al-Jazūlī (d. 869/1465)
(Bencheneb). Sub-orders, too, fragmented over time; for example, there has
been no single, united Jazūliyya Shādhiliyya for many centuries. The Jazūliyya
itself has given rise to sub-sub-orders, such as the ʿĪsāwiyya, and although the
ʿĪsāwiyya is in theory one single ṭarīqa, in practice its various branches operate
independently (for example, the ʿĪsāwiyya of Taroudant, Morocco). An indi-
vidual Ṣūfī, then, commonly belongs to a sub-order or a sub-sub-order that is
loosely affiliated to one of the great orders or to another sub-order, and it is the
individual Ṣūfī’s sub-order or sub-sub-order that is of organisational signifi-
cance. The larger order to which a sub-order or sub-sub-order belongs normal-
ly determines its identity and its basic approach and liturgy, but generally has
little or no control over its activities. Sometimes a sub-order or a sub-sub-order
The Organisation of Mysticism 347

“belongs” to more than one great order; this, of course, is only possible when
the larger order exercises no actual control.
All are equally called ṭarīqas: the larger order (Shādhiliyya), the sub-
order (Jazūliyya Shādhiliyya), the sub-sub-order (ʿĪsāwiyya), and the quasi-
independent local branch of the sub-sub-order (ʿĪsāwiyya of Taroudant). The
name of a sub-order often indicates the larger order from which it derives, as
in the case of the Jazūliyya Shādhiliyya or the Khālidiyya Naqshbandiyya. It
should be noted that since adjectives follow the noun in Arabic, these two
ṭarīqas are known in Arabic as the Shādhiliyya Jazūliyya and the Naqshbandi-
yya Khālidiyya. Abbreviated nomenclature (“Jazūliyya” and “Khālidiyya”) is
also used.
Most of the larger orders no longer have a living leader, though the guard-
ians of the tomb of ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī in Baghdad are still treated with great
respect by Qādirīs everywhere. The leaders of some ṭarīqas in cities such as
Cairo retain limited authority over the shaykhs of local sub-orders, notably
when the successor to a shaykh needs to be appointed. From the Mamlūk pe-
riod to the nineteenth century, for example, some Qādirī sub-orders in Egypt
recognised a central mashyakha (skaykhdom) in Cairo, though some other
Qādirī sub-orders did not. In contrast, another Egyptian ṭarīqa, the Rifāʿiyya,
had no central authority (De Jong, 16–8). The most centralised of all the ṭarīqas
was the Mevleviyye, all branches of which, across the Middle East, accepted
the authority of the çelebi in Konya (Trimingham, 179).

3.2 Ṭarīqa Officials

Sometimes a ṭarīqa is small, consisting only of a shaykh and between twen-
ty and one hundred followers meeting at one location. Sometimes, however,
there are more followers, who meet at more than one location. In this case,
the shaykh normally appoints a muqaddam (deputy), also called a khalīfa (suc-
cessor, representative), and occasionally called a khādim (the term used for
the guardian of a tomb in South Asia). Sometimes a muqaddam works at the
ṭarīqa’s central location under the eye of the shaykh, but more often a muqad-
dam lives and works in a different location, even in a different country. Given
the difficulties involved in travelling long distances before the nineteenth cen-
tury, such muqaddams often enjoyed a high degree of independence. Many
muqaddams still enjoy great independence even today, as Ṣūfī shaykhs are pri-
marily teachers, not administrators.
Sometimes the appointment of a muqaddam is purely verbal, but sometimes
a muqaddam is given a formal ijāza (licence), often in writing. An ijāza licenses
its holder to admit new followers into the ṭarīqa. The term ijāza is also used
among the ʿulamāʾ to describe the permission a senior scholar gives a junior
348 Sedgwick

scholar to teach a particular text (Vajda). An ijāza, then, is also a sort of certificate.
Sometimes, honorary ijāzas are given, in Sufism as in classic Islamic scholar-
ship. Not all who receive an ijāza from a shaykh, then, function as actual muqa-
ddams. The celebrated Egyptian Ṣūfī ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Shāʿrānī (d. 973/1565)
was known for having twenty-six ijāzas (Chih and Mayeur-Jaouen, 39).
In addition to muqaddams, a ṭarīqa may have a number of other officials
who perform various duties, especially during a ḥaḍra (dhikr ceremony).
The most important of these is the reciter, for whom various terms are used
depending on the place, including munshid and maddāḥ. In nineteenth-
century Algeria, most ṭarīqas also appointed standard-bearers and a saqqāʾ
(water-carrier) who was responsible not only for water but also for refresh-
ments and cooking (Rinn, 87). The muqaddam, though, is the most important
ṭarīqa official.

3.3 The Silsila

Sub-orders are linked to the larger orders by a silsila (chain), a list of shaykhs
and their predecessors (Alatas in this volume). Most silsilas trace their lineag-
es beyond the source of the larger order to the Prophet Muḥammad himself,
normally after first passing through one of al-khulafāʾ al-rāshidūn (the rightly-
guided caliphs), generally ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib (d. 40/661). This indicates an early
connection with Shīʿism, though it is no longer of much importance. Modern
historians, though not Ṣūfīs, regard the earlier parts of these silsilas as fictional.
The silsila is the Ṣūfī counterpart of the isnād (support), the list of authorities
that authenticates a ḥadīth. Likewise, it serves an important legitimising func-
tion. Just as there are honorary ijāzas, there is also an honorary bayʿa, and one
individual may be attached to more than one silsila. Therefore, some shaykhs
combine multiple ṭarīqas in their own silsila.
Some silsilas link a shaykh directly to the Prophet, sometimes through
the intermediary of Uways al-Qaranī (d. c. 37/657) (a semi-legendary early
saintly figure who is thought to have direct communication with the Prophet
Muḥammad) or Khiḍr (a Qurʾānic figure said to have flourished at the time
of the Prophet Mūsā/Moses, who is the subject of myths and stories). These
are often known as Uwaysī silsilas, and may be found when a new ṭarīqa has
been founded. Both Aḥmad b. Idrīs (d. 1837) and Muḥammad b. ʿAlī l-Sanūsī
(d. 1253/1859) had Uwaysī silsilas (O’Fahey and Radtke, 69–70).

3.4 Ṭarīqa Membership

In theory, a follower of a shaykh (and thus a member of a ṭarīqa) is one who
has given bayʿa to that shaykh. Some ṭarīqas then distinguish between a murīd,
The Organisation of Mysticism 349

who has given bayʿa, and a more loosely attached follower, often called a
muḥibb (admirer); one sub-order of the Shādhiliyya distinguishes four such
grades (Trimingham, 188–9). In practice, however, some who attend the cer-
emonies and rituals of a ṭarīqa may not have given bayʿa or received any alter-
native rank, and not all those who have given bayʿa attend events regularly, and
some may move to another town or country where there is no local branch,
or may simply drift away from a ṭarīqa. In addition, because of the practice of
honorary bayʿa, one person may have given bayʿa to several shaykhs, only one
of whom serves as his murshid. Given this, ṭarīqa membership is fluid, and it is
difficult to say exactly how many “followers” a particular shaykh actually has.
Shaykhs have almost invariably been male, as have their followers in the
ṭarīqa. Although there are reports of ribāṭs for women in the sixth/twelfth cen-
tury, these may have been refuges for the destitute rather than communities
of Ṣūfīs (Karamustafa, Sufism, 126). Some nineteenth-century Algerian ṭarīqas
admitted women and even had female muqaddams (Rinn, 88–9), but this was
unusual in other parts of the Muslim world. There is no theological reason for
the gendering of Sufism, but gender practices in Sufism generally follow local
norms. This means that as gender practices have changed during the twentieth
century in some parts of the Muslim world, such that women play a greater
part in public life, women have also begun to play greater roles in some ṭarīqas,
both as followers and in some cases also in leadership positions (Sedgwick,
Saints, 209).
While nearly all shaykhs have been male, there has been variety in their oc-
cupations and backgrounds. Some have been members of the ʿulamāʾ, some
have been merchants, and some have been poor and illiterate. This has or-
ganisational consequences. When a shaykh is a merchant, the organisation
of Sufism and the organisation of trade may be entwined, so that a shaykh’s
business trips facilitate the spread of his ṭarīqa, and the ṭarīqa may also assist
the business. When a shaykh is a member of the ʿulamāʾ, activities may also be-
come entwined. Such a shaykh has the exoteric knowledge of the ʿulamāʾ and
the esoteric knowledge of the Ṣūfīs, and may combine these in his teaching.
Ṣūfī organisational structures may also become entwined with other struc-
tures. In some parts of Upper Egypt, for example, roles in ṭarīqas mirror roles
in agriculture. Major landowners do not themselves participate in ṭarīqas,
but often contribute to them financially. Prosperous farmers are the local
shaykhs (or technically muqaddams, as they publicly honour national leaders
in Cairo). Murīds are mostly agricultural labourers. It has been suggested that
this both mirrors and reinforces existing economically-based power structures
(Hopkins, 145, 150).
350 Sedgwick

4 Succession

When a shaykh or the guardian of a tomb dies, a successor must be found.

Sometimes a shaykh publicly appoints a successor before his death, but this
is unusual. It is sometimes noted that the Prophet Muḥammad did not (ac-
cording to Sunnīs) appoint a successor himself. When no successor has been
appointed, sometimes a follower of the former shaykh, often one of his muqad-
dams, is so clearly suited to be the new shaykh that succession passes smoothly
and uneventfully. Sometimes, however, there is more than one plausible can-
didate, in which case the followers of the former shaykh may split into more
than one group, and one ṭarīqa may divide into two ṭarīqas. The same may
happen when a muqaddam of the former shaykh who lives and teaches in a
distant town does not follow the shaykh’s successor, or only follows him in a
formal or nominal sense. The shaykh’s successor then leads one ṭarīqa, and the
former muqaddam leads another, thus becoming a shaykh himself. This is not
generally considered problematic in the case of a ṭarīqa without property, but
if a ṭarīqa has property, whether a tomb or waqf, a succession dispute leads to
difficult consequences, and may not be easily resolved by the division of one
ṭarīqa into two.
Sometimes the successor to a shaykh is one of the shaykh’s sons. This tends
to happen more in long-established ṭarīqas or when a tomb is involved, and is
especially common if hereditary succession is already established. There is no
theological justification for this hereditary succession, though a parallel can
be found in the hereditary transmission of the rank and title of sayyid (mas-
ter) among the descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad. However, the son of
a shaykh is often well suited to succeed his father, who has often trained him
by word and example from an early age. A similar phenomenon is sometimes
found among the ʿulamāʾ, when the son of a scholar also becomes a scholar
himself, having benefitted from his father’s training, and also from his father’s
contacts. Scholarly families are also found in Judaism, and sometimes even in
Western universities. By the nineteenth century, the leadership of most of the
larger Egyptian ṭarīqas had become hereditary (De Jong, 37), and this was also
the case elsewhere.
Hereditary succession gives rise to Ṣūfī families, which have, in some pe-
riods and places, developed into a separate caste, closely identified with the
ashrāf (sayyids, noble descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad) (Alatas in this
volume). The ashrāf are distinguished from other Muslims by special rules
concerning marriage, as the daughter of an ashrāf family may not normally
marry someone from a non-ashrāf family (Arendonk and Graham). In tribal
areas of Morocco, Ṣūfī families often developed into what were, in effect, Ṣūfī
The Organisation of Mysticism 351

clans, with up to three hundred descendants of a walī living together around

the walī’s tomb (Gellner, 314). In Kashgar and the Tarim Basin (now in Xinjiang,
China), the descendants of the Naqshbandī shaykh Khwāja Hidāyatallāh Āfāq
(d. 1105/1694), known collectively as the Khwājas or the Āfāqiyya, became re-
gional rulers comparable to the Moroccan and Indian tomb guardians already
mentioned, until they were defeated by Chinese forces in 1759 (Papas, Soufisme
et politique).

4.1 The Ṭarīqa Cycle

Not all successors to shaykhs have the abilities necessary to maintain a ṭarīqa;
therefore, ṭarīqas sometimes decline and finally vanish, especially if they have
no tomb or waqf to sustain them. The Shādhiliyya has now existed for eight
centuries, and may continue for many more centuries, though no individual
branch of the Shādhiliyya has lasted that long. Although every Shādhilī branch
traces its history through Abū l-Ḥasan al-Shādhilī to the Prophet, in practice a
single branch has probably not existed for more than a century, and possibly
less. Branches based around tombs last longer, however, and are often as old as
the tomb itself.
At any point in time, some ṭarīqas will decline under less remarkable
shaykhs, some will be well-established and stable, and some will grow under
more remarkable shaykhs. The biographies of notable Ṣūfīs often report a Ṣūfī
joining a well-established ṭarīqa, moving on to a more remarkable shaykh, and
then perhaps succeeding that shaykh on his death. Such notable Ṣūfīs are often
described as “reformers” intent on the “purification” of Sufism. In fact, what is
happening may be less about reform or purification than the natural life cycle
of the ṭarīqa, in which new ṭarīqas are constantly being born, maturing, declin-
ing, dying, and being replaced (Sedgwick, Establishments).
Growing ṭarīqas under remarkable shaykhs may be closer to the Ṣūfī ideal,
but well-established ṭarīqas and tombs also perform important functions. A
remarkable shaykh may call for a higher degree of commitment than many
people are prepared to give (Sedgwick, Establishments). For those who are
looking for a more limited involvement with Sufism and who are content to
repeat the wird and attend the ḥaḍra and the mawlid, a well-established ṭarīqa
under a hereditary shaykh is often more appropriate.

5 Finances

The activities of Ṣūfī ribāṭs, tombs and ṭarīqas are generally financed by contri-
butions from shaykhs’ followers and admirers, or by a waqf, with the important
352 Sedgwick

proviso that while in the past ṭarīqas controlled their own waqf, in the modern
period waqf properties are often controlled by the state, considerably reducing
the independence of the ṭarīqas affected (Sabra in this volume).
Contributions from followers and admirers may be in kind, in cash, or in
labour. Those made in kind or labour take a variety of forms, from making tea
before a ḥaḍra and cleaning up after it to working in shaykh’s fields, a practice
which was common in northern Sudan (Karrar, 148). Contributions may also
be irregular and entirely voluntary, regular and customary, or take the form of
fees for particular services.
Waqf, customary contributions, and fees are more important for well-
established ṭarīqas and tombs. Waqf funds derive from gifts and legacies,
sometimes from rulers and sometimes from wealthy followers. Customary
contributions are often made on an annual basis, for example at a mawlid or
at an ʿīd (festival) (De Jong, 160). These customary contributions are, in effect,
membership fees. Sometimes, however, in the view of colonial officials, the
contributions collected by rural shaykhs and murābiṭs were considered exces-
sive in relation to the resources of the rural farmers who made them (Rinn,
95–6). It is difficult to determine whether such views reflected reality or the
antipathy the colonial officials held towards Sufism.
Fees were and are given in return for a variety of religious services, ranging
from the provision of names for the newborn (Crapanzano, 338) to burial plots
for the dead. Fees were also given for the performance of ḥaḍras at marriage
celebrations (De Jong, 101) or, in rural Morocco, to cure the ill or someone pos-
sessed by jinn (Crapanzano, 338–43). Fees were never a significant source of
income for new and growing ṭarīqas.
Waqf income and various kinds of contributions are applied to the activities
of the ṭarīqa, including the purchase and maintenance of premises, to charita-
ble ends (sometimes in the form of free food or cash), and to the maintenance
of shaykhs and their families. Some shaykhs refuse any income from ṭarīqa
sources, especially if they have some other source of income, for example, if
they are members of the ʿulamāʾ, and can live from teaching salaries. By con-
trast, some shaykhs live comfortably or even become rich. This is not normally
seen as problematic.

6 The Organisation of Ṣūfīs

Given their size and potential for action, Ṣūfī organisations have long been a
concern for rulers and states. It is therefore not surprising that there have been
repeated attempts to organise and control Sufism.
The Organisation of Mysticism 353

One way in which rulers and states commonly exercise influence over reli-
gious institutions is through patronage, since the recipients of patronage are
more likely to respect the interests and wishes of their patrons. Patronage of
celebrated religious institutions also helps legitimise rulers and states in the
eyes of the general population (Papas in this volume). Throughout the history
of Islam, rulers have shown public respect to leading Ṣūfī shaykhs, and often
also given them money and property. Sometimes gifts from rulers serve other
purposes. The Ottoman practice of granting waqfs in newly conquered areas
to favoured Ṣūfīs, for example, helped consolidate their control of such areas
(Green, 133).
In Baghdad in the fifth/eleventh century, during a turbulent period when
dynastic rivalries aligned with confessional disputes, a formal office of shaykh
al-shuyūkh (shaykh of the shaykhs or chief shaykh) was introduced. A ribāṭ was
endowed for the shaykh al-shuyūkh, whose task it was to promote Sunnī the-
ology and loyalty to the Sunnī regime. The Sunnī ruler in Damascus followed
suit, and as did the ruler in Cairo, where a ribāṭ was endowed for a shaykh
al-shuyūkh in the sixth/twelfth century. The Baghdad and Cairo offices were
sometimes hereditary, and as their holders became increasingly engaged
in politics, it seems likely that several appointed deputies to carry out their
Ṣūfī duties, at least in Cairo. Despite their titles, they seem to have exercised
little real control over other Ṣūfīs, who often complained about their moral
and scholarly shortcomings. After the seventh/thirteenth century, the of-
fice seems to have been abandoned (Hofer, Origins and development). The
last shaykh al-shuyūkh of Baghdad was executed by the Mongols in 656/1258
(Ohlander, 111).
The ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Nāṣir, ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī’s patron, also attempted to
control the fityān of Baghdad, first by joining them and then by declaring him-
self their head (Ohlander, 271). This established a connection between futuw-
wa and royal authority that continued in Cairo after the Mongol destruction of
Baghdad, when the refugee ʿAbbāsid prince who became caliph al-Mustanṣir II
(r. 659–60/1261) dressed sultan Baybars I (d. 676/1277) in the sirwāl of futuwwa
(Taeschner, 143). A similar practice developed in the Ottoman Empire, where,
from 824/1421, new sultans were dressed in a sword belt, as a form of shadd, by
a Ṣūfī shaykh (Algar and Raymond).
Rather than appointing a single shaykh al-shuyūkh to supervise all the
ṭarīqas, the Mamlūk sultans in Cairo attempted to exercise control over in-
dividual ṭarīqas. For example, they appointed a member of a leading ʿulamāʾ
family, one Muḥammad ʿAshūr, to lead the Burhāmiyya, and then made this
office hereditary. Throughout the Mamlūk and Ottoman periods, the ʿAshūr
family seems to have maintained its authority over Burhāmīs in Cairo, and so
354 Sedgwick

presumably also (indirectly) the authority over them of the state from which
its own authority derived, though it probably never exercised much control
outside Cairo (De Jong, 17–8).
In the early modern era, the construction of stronger and more centralised
states on models inspired by nineteenth-century European practices included
the expansion of state power over all religious institutions, including Sufism.
In Egypt, the reforming military ruler Muḥammad ʿAlī Pasha (r. 1805–48) ap-
pointed a supervisor over all the Ṣūfī ṭarīqas, giving him the power to resolve
succession disputes, to approve the payment of government stipends out of
the waqf that the state had taken control of, and to allocate individual ṭarīqas
particular areas in which they had exclusive right to operate by virtue of qadam
(seniority). The Egyptian state thus established some control over older, more
institutionalised ṭarīqas, especially those with tombs, or with a claim on sti-
pends in lieu of waqf. This system seems to have little impact on the less insti-
tutionalised, growing ṭarīqas, however, and perhaps for this reason, Khedive
Ismāʿīl (r. 1863–79) attempted to ban private ḥaḍras, so that only recognised
ṭarīqas could operate (De Jong, 20–44).
Again, these provisions did not have their desired effect, and in 1895 a khe-
dival decree established a Majlis al-Ṣūfī (Sufi Council) with jurisdiction over
Sufism and the same powers in this area as a court of law (De Jong, 132). The
Majlis passed regulations that specified, in remarkable detail, how a ṭarīqa was
to operate and even what might and might not be done during a ḥaḍra, try-
ing especially to eliminate doctrines and practices that the reformist religious
establishment of the time found objectionable. Its regulations, however, were
controversial, and never enforced (De Jong, 167, 172). It is not clear what in-
fluence these attempts had in terms of establishing bureaucratic control. The
Majlis al-Ṣūfī is now al-Majlis al-Aʿlā lil-Ṭuruq al-Ṣūfīya (the Supreme Council
for Sufi Ṭarīqas), and in theory, all Egyptian ṭarīqas must be registered and su-
pervised by it. In practice, many of Egypt’s ṭarīqas are not registered, and many
Ṣūfīs simply ignore the Majlis (Hoffman, 15). However, only registered ṭarīqas
can conduct large-scale rituals and processions in public.
Similar models were adopted elsewhere. In 1866, the Ottomans established
a Meclis-i Meşāyiḥ (Council of Shaykhs), linked to the Şeyhülislām, the office
at the pinnacle of the Ottoman religious hierarchy (Zarcone).
Colonial states also attempted to control Ṣūfī organisations, but ironically,
these attempts often had more in common with premodern models than with
the centralised state models followed by Muḥammad ʿAlī and his successors.
The British in India and the French in Algeria were both, in principle, op-
posed to Sufism, which they saw as a threat to their power and as inherently
The Organisation of Mysticism 355

undesirable, as a mixture of superstition and exploitation of the credulous.

In principle, the British government in India rejected any involvement with
Sufism (Gilmartin), and the French in Algeria took steps to discourage it, for
example by attempting (without success) to eliminate the payment of custom-
ary dues (Rinn, 95). Both colonial governments, however, found that govern-
ing rural areas, where shaykhs and murābiṭs were so important, required them
to engage with influential Ṣūfīs. The French in Algeria recognised the impor-
tance of winning the favour of murābiṭs and watched them carefully (Rinn, 19),
and the British in India went so far as to attempt to sway influential shaykhs
with land grants (Gilmartin, 51). The British also increased their influence
over local shaykhs by arbitrating in succession disputes (Robinson, 16), just as
Muḥammad ʿAlī’s appointee in Cairo did. In the 1930s, a succession dispute
over the guardianship of the tomb of Bābā Farīd at Pakpattan, the base of the
Ṣūfīs who had fought off the Sikhs until 1810, led the Court of Wards to take
control of the tomb and its waqf, and then to British supervision of the annual
ʿurs there (Gilmartin, 49).
Some states, instead of regulating Sufism, banned it entirely. In Saudi Arabia,
the ʿulamāʾ follow the example of the reformist scholar Muḥammad b. ʿAbd
al-Wahhāb (d. 1206/1792) and see Sufism as shirk (idolatry). The ban is only par-
tially effective, and Ṣūfīs in Saudi Arabia continue to meet in private. In 1967,
communist Albania banned Sufism, along with all other forms of religion; this
lapsed after the fall of the communist regime (Clayer). Turkey, where the ideol-
ogy promoted by Muṣṭafā Kemāl Atatürk (1881–1938) emphasised secularism,
also banned Sufism. In 1925, the Atatürk regime took a number of steps to re-
duce the presence of Islam in Turkish public life, including banning the ṭarīqas
and confiscating their property. Since the liberalisation of the Kemalist system
during the 1950s and 1960s, the Ṣūfī ṭarīqas have been operating again, and
are tolerated by the Turkish state, though not officially recognised. The ṭarīqas
were also banned and repressed by the officially atheist regimes established in
the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China.
Many of the nationalist regimes that took power in Arab countries after
the Second World War also implemented policies that were hostile to Sufism,
though none went so far as Atatürk. As al-Ikhwān al-Muslimūn (the Muslim
Brotherhood) and then groups inspired by al-Qaeda and al-Dawla al-Islāmiyya
(the Islamic State) became more a problem for Arab regimes, there was an
increasing tendency for Arab states to promote Sufism as an alternative
form of Islam. This tendency is most developed in Morocco, where in 2002 a
Ṣūfī, Ahmed Toufiq (b. 1943), was appointed minister of endowments and
Islamic affairs.
356 Sedgwick

7 New Organisational Techniques

In recent decades, novel organisational techniques have been adopted by Ṣūfīs

as well as by states. The ṭarīqa remains the standard organisational form of
Sufism everywhere, and some ṭarīqas today are indistinguishable from those
of the eighteenth century, but some have also adopted new organisational
techniques, either incorporating modern practices into the ṭarīqa or grafting
modern organisational forms onto it.
Thus, in the 1960s, the Egyptian Ḥāmidiyya Shādhiliyya incorporated mod-
ern practices into the ṭarīqa, by adopting a carefully structured central organ-
isation and written rules (Gilsenan). In Turkey, the Nurcus, a large organisation
that follows the teachings and practices of Said Nursi (1877–1960), denies being
a ṭarīqa, but behaves very much like one; at the local level its groups are called
dershanes (classrooms) (Puler, 428–31), though the dershane is administered
by a şura (consultation) that operates by majority vote. Each dershane selects
two delegates to a local şura that meets once a month, and the şura selects
delegates to a national (Turkish) şura that meets twice a year. At least in theory,
the national şura does not exercise authority over şuras at the dershane level,
which operate autonomously and manage their own finances (Şahinöz, 184–7).
This organisational superstructure is unrelated to the organisation of the clas-
sic ṭarīqa. In America, the Threshold Society, an American Mevlevi ṭarīqa, has
a formal “Ethics Agreement” that specifies, among other things, a dispute-
resolution process that if necessary, involves reference to an Ethics Committee.
Other ṭarīqas have set up ancillary organisations following modern forms.
In the 1970s in Egypt, the Muḥammadiyya Shādhiliyya set up as its public face a
quasi-NGO, the ʿAshīra Muḥammadiyya (Muḥammadan Clan), which also en-
gaged in the provision of social services (Johansen). The Threshold Society is
legally organised under US law as a tax-exempt non-profit organisation, which
brings certain financial advantages, and means that, in theory, it is run not by
its shaykh but by a board. In practice, it is mostly run by its shaykh, not alone
but in conjunction with his wife; the shaykh and his wife are described as “di-
rectors.” The Threshold Society has thus adjusted to American gender prac-
tices as well as American tax law. Despite this, it is still recognisably a ṭarīqa.
In the Sudan, the Khatmiyya ṭarīqa set up a political party, al-Ḥizb al-Ittiḥādi
al-Dīmūqrāṭī (Democratic Unionist Party) in the run-up to independence from
Britain, and this party remains one of Sudan’s major political forces to this day.
It is more a political party than a ṭarīqa, however, and although it depends on
the support of Khatmīs, its program or tactics are not Ṣūfī in nature (Warburg).
Much the same is true of other ṭarīqa-based political parties in other countries.
The Organisation of Mysticism 357

It has sometimes been suggested that the Muslim Brotherhood draws

on Sufism for its organisational model, but other models (including paramili-
tary ones) were more influential; the Muslim Brotherhood’s greatest debt to
Sufism is in its ritual, which includes a waẓīfa (an alternative term for wird),
which is clearly of Ṣūfī origin. The only way in which the Muslim Brotherhood
may be said to draw on Ṣūfī organisational practice is in its use of a modi-
fied version of the rābiṭa (bonding) ritual, which was borrowed from the
Naqshbandiyya. This is used to strengthen the bond between the individual
Muslim Brother and other Muslim Brothers (Elsässer); thus, it is, in effect, an
organisational technique.

8 Conclusion

Although mysticism does not, in principle, require any form of organisation,

mysticism in Islam has in practice taken a variety of organisational forms. The
murshid-murīd relationship is common to all of them. This relationship has
been extended by various means. Just as the teacher-student relationship has
spread through the institution of the school, the murshid-murīd was extended
early on by the ribāṭ system, which allowed one shaykh to direct many murīds,
and also provided an institutional framework for the receipt and administra-
tion of funds, often in the form of waqf, that freed the shaykh and murīds from
the need to earn a living, allowing them to focus on religious and mystical ac-
tivities. In many ways, the ribāṭ resembles the Christian monastery, but as an
Islamic institution it was administratively autonomous, not tied to any larger
ecclesiastic structures. Rulers attempted to enlist the ribāṭs in support of their
own interests, mostly by means of patronage, but also through the office of the
shaykh al-shuyūkh.
The urban ribāṭ was later absorbed into the ṭarīqa system, but its rural tomb-
based counterpart, sometimes also called a ribāṭ, survived, growing in social
importance as it provided educational, judicial, and even political services
in areas of the Muslim world where the ʿulamāʾ were rarely present and the
authority of the state was weak or absent. Muslim rulers and colonial states
recognised the importance of the rural ribāṭ and its counterparts; when pos-
sible they incorporated ribāṭs into a patronage system which resembled that
used with tribes, and occasionally subdued them by military force when other
means failed. Modern states now provide the services that the rural ribāṭ and
its counterparts once provided, but even so, rural Sufism based around tombs
is still important in some areas.
358 Sedgwick

The brotherhood, of which there were two forms, was the other early organ-
isational form Sufism used. Itinerant mendicant brotherhoods of the qalandar
type became widespread. Shams-i Tabrīz (d. c. 645/1247) was evidently a Ṣūfī
of this type, while Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī directed a lodge. Little is known of the
internal organisation of the itinerant brotherhood, or of how rulers attempted
to control them. Many were later absorbed into the ṭarīqa system, just as the
urban ribāṭ was, but even in the nineteenth century, there were still itinerant
mendicant Ṣūfīs; the Bektāşīs, now found especially in Albania, originated
from this form of organisation.
Brotherhoods were also associated with futuwwa, which were neither
mendicant nor itinerant. They took a number of forms, sometimes military,
sometimes as associations of craftsmen. These resembled the confraternities
of mediaeval Europe except that, once again, they were free from ecclesiasti-
cal supervision and control. Muslim rulers often tried to control them or ally
with them. In some ways, these brotherhoods were the forerunners of ṭarīqa
Sufism, as they allowed ordinary Muslims to combine aspects of Sufism with
their normal lives. Engagement in the ribāṭ of the qalandar-type brotherhood,
by contrast, was a full-time affair. The futuwwa brotherhoods were repressed,
but some of their rituals survived in imperial ceremonial.
As an organisational form, the ṭarīqa was immensely successful; it spread
throughout the Muslim world, incorporating and often replacing earlier forms
of Ṣūfī organisations, and bringing Sufism to ordinary Muslims everywhere. If
the ribāṭ resembles the Christian monastery and the futuwwa brotherhood re-
sembles the mediaeval Catholic confraternity, the ṭarīqa has no obvious coun-
terpart in European history. If any parallel other than Opus Dei is appropriate,
it is the anachronistic one of the franchise.
The extent to which ṭarīqa Sufism was the same as the mysticism of the
ribāṭ varied from ṭarīqa to ṭarīqa. Most followers of well-established, mature
ṭarīqas focused on the wird and the dhikr, not on aḥwāl (mystical states) and
maqāmāt (mystical stations). Ṭarīqas led by notable shaykhs, however, focused
on the mystical or esoteric development of its followers.
Rulers attempted to control urban ṭarīqas, sometimes by appointing their
shaykhs. In the modern period, rulers tried to institutionalise control over
them, notably through the Egyptian Ṣūfī Majlis. In other countries, notably
Turkey, modern states tried to eliminate the ṭarīqas altogether. These attempts
have met with only limited success, as the ṭarīqa is a robust organisational
form, especially when it is not dependent on state-controlled waqf. Even so,
the ṭarīqas no longer occupy the prominent place they once did in Muslim so-
cieties, if only because many new organisations, from universities to newspa-
pers, have ended the joint monopoly that Ṣūfīs and ʿulamāʾ held over public life
The Organisation of Mysticism 359

for many centuries. Some ṭarīqas have modified their organisations somewhat,
either by incorporating modern practices or by grafting modern organisations
onto the ṭarīqa. Despite this, the organisational form of the ṭarīqa continues
to reign supreme.

Bibliography

Algar, Hamid and André Raymond, Shadd, EI2.

Arberry, A. J., Sufism. An account of the mystics of Islam, London 1950.
Arendonk, C. van and W. A. Graham, Sharīf, EI2.
Arnakis, G. G., Futuwwa traditions in the Ottoman Empire—Akhis, Bektashi dervishes,
and craftsmen, JNES 12 (1953): 232–47.
Bencheneb, M., al-Djazūlī, EI2.
Black, Christopher F., The confraternity context, in Christopher F. Black and Pamela
Gravestock (eds.), Early modern confraternities in Europe and the Americas.
International and interdisciplinary perspectives (Aldershot 2006), 1–34.
Bonner, Michael, Aristocratic violence and holy war. Studies in the jihad and the Arab-
Byzantine frontier, New Haven 1996.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, Khānḳāh, EI2.
Chabbi, Jacqueline and Nasser Rabbat, Ribāṭ, EI2.
Chih, Rachida and Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen, Le soufisme ottoman vu d’Égypte
(XVIe–XVIIIe siècle), in Rachida Chih and Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen (eds.), Le
soufisme à l’époque ottomane (Cairo 2010), 1–56.
Chih, Rachida, The Khalwatiyya brotherhood in rural Upper Egypt and in Cairo, in
Nicholas S. Hopkins (ed.), Upper Egypt. Identity and change (Cairo 2004), 157–68.
Clayer, Nathalie, Saints and Sufis in post-communist Albania, in Masatoshi Kisaichi
(ed.), Popular movements and democratization in the Islamic world (Abingdon
2006), 33–42.
Crapanzano, Vincent, The Hamadsha, in Nikki R. Keddie (ed.), Scholars, saints, and
Sufis. Muslim religious institutions in the Middle East since 1500 (Berkeley 1972),
327–48.
Dağyeli, Jeanine Elif, “Gott Liebt das Handwerk.” Moral, Identität und religiöse Legitimie-
rung in der mittelasiatischen Handwerks-risala, Wiesbaden 2011.
De Jong, Fred, Ṭuruq and ṭuruq-linked institutions in 19th century Egypt, Leiden 1978.
Dressler, Markus, Alevīs, EI3.
Elsässer, Sebastian, Sufism and the Muslim Brotherhood. Ḥasan al-Bannā’s wird and
the transformation of Sufi traditions in modern Islamic activism, OM 99 (2019):
280–305. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/22138617-12340221.
360 Sedgwick

Ephrat, Daphna and Hatim Mahamid, The creation of Sufi spheres in medieval Damas-
cus (mid-6th/12th to mid–8th/14th centuries), JRAS 25 (2015): 189–208.
Gellner, Ernest, Doctor and saint, in Nikki R. Keddie (ed.), Scholars, saints, and Sufis.
Muslim religious institutions in the Middle East since 1500 (Berkeley 1972), 307–26.
Gilmartin, David, Empire and Islam. Punjab and the making of Pakistan, London 1988.
Gilsenan, Michael, Saint and Sufi in modern Egypt. An essay in the sociology of religion,
Oxford 1973.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Chichester 2012.
Hodgson, Marshall, The venture of Islam, Chicago 1977.
Hofer, Nathan, The origins and development of the office of the “Chief Sufi” in Egypt,
1173–1325, JSS 3 (2014): 1–37.
Hofer, Nathan, The popularisation of Sufism in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt, 1173–1325,
Edinburgh 2015.
Hoffman, Valerie J., Sufism, mystics, and saints in modern Egypt, Columbia, SC 1995.
Hopkins, Nicholas S., Sufi organization in Rural Asyur. The Rifa’iyya in Musha, in
Nicholas S. Hopkins (ed.), Upper Egypt. Identity and change (Cairo 2004), 141–55.
Irwin, Robert, Futuwwa. Chivalry and gangsterism in medieval Cairo, Muqarnas 21
(2004): 161–70.
Johansen, Julian, Sufism and Islamic reform in Egypt. The battle for Islamic tradition,
Oxford 1996.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Antinomian Sufis, in Lloyd Ridgeon (ed.), The Cambridge com-
panion to Sufism (New York 2015), 101–24.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Karrar, Ali Salih, The Sufi brotherhoods in the Sudan, London 1992.
Keddie, Nikki, The revolt of Islam, 1700 to 1993. Comparative considerations and rela-
tions to imperialism, Comparative Studies in Society and History 36 (1994): 463–87.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2010.
Lane, E. W., An account of the manners and customs of the modern Egyptians, London
1978.
Le Gall, Dina, Recent thinking on Sufis and saints in the lives of Muslim societies, past
and present, IJMES 42 (2010): 673–87.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine, Ṭanṭā, EI2.
McGregor, Richard J., Grave visitation/worship, EI3.
Michon, Jean-Louis, Khirḳa, EI2.
O’Fahey, Rex Sean and Bernd Radtke, Neo-Sufism reconsidered, Der Islam 70 (1993):
52–87.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Ahi, EI3.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. Umar al-Suhrawardī and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
The Organisation of Mysticism 361

Papas, Alexandre, Mystiques et vagabonds en islam. Portraits de trois soufis qalandar,

Paris 2010.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Etude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan oriental, Paris 2005.
al-Qushayri, Abu ʾl-Qasim, Al-Risala al-qushayriyya fī ʿilm al-tasawwuf, trans.
Alexander D. Knysh, Reading 2007.
Ridgeon, Lloyd, Futuwwa (in Ṣūfism), EI3.
Rinn, Louis, Marabouts et Khouan. Étude sur l’Islam en Algérie, Algiers 1884.
Robinson, Francis, Ulama, Sufis and Colonial Rule in North India and Indonesia, in
C. A. Bayly and D. H. A. Kolff (eds.), Two colonial empires. Comparative essays on the
history of India and Indonesia (Dordrecht 1986), 9–34.
Şahinöz, Cemil, Die Nurculuk Bewegung. Entstehung, Organisation und Vernetzung,
Istanbul 2009.
Schimmel, Annemarie, Mystical dimensions of Islam, Chapel Hill, NC 1975.
Sedgwick, Mark, Establishments and sects in the Islamic world, in Phillip Lucas and
Thomas Robbins (eds.), New Religious Movements in the 21st Century. Legal, political,
and social challenges in global perspective (New York 2004), 283–312.
Sedgwick, Mark, Saints and sons. The making and remaking of the Rashidi Ahmadi Sufi
order, 1799–2000, Leiden 2005.
Sedgwick, Mark, Western Sufism. From the Abbasids to the new age, New York 2016.
Taeschner, Franz, Futuwwa, eine gemeinschaftbildende Idee im mittelalterlichen
Orient und ihre verschiedenen Erscheinungsformen, Schweizerisches Archiv für
Volkskunde 52 (1956): 122–58.
Tor, Deborah G., Violent order. Religious warfare, chivalry, and the “Ayyār” phenomenon
in the medieval Islamic world, Würzburg 2007.
Trimingham, J. Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1971.
Vajda, Georges, Idjāza, EI2.
Walsh, Michael, Opus Dei. An investigation into the powerful secretive society within the
Catholic Church, New York 1992.
Warburg, Gabriel, Mahdism and Islamism in Sudan, IJMES 27 (1995): 219–36.
Zarcone, Thierry, Bektaşiyye, EI3.
 Chapter 19

The First Communities

Jean-Jacques Thibon

The first Ṣūfīs adopted a particular way of life characterised by certain ele-
ments that distinguished them from other Muslims: wearing garments such
as a patched frock (muraqqaʿa), rituals in which disciples wear the Ṣūfī cloak
(lubs al-khirqa); seeking to access the divine by a path (ṭarīqa); utilising chains
of initiation (silsila); and living in specific places (khānaqāh, ribāṭ, zāwiya).
The first Ṣūfīs were divided over these various elements, a fact that is reflected
in the Ṣūfī literature of the early centuries.

1 Origins

There is a dearth of information on the beginnings of spiritual vocations in

the first two centuries of Islam. It is especially difficult to ascertain whether
the movement of asceticism and renunciation of the world (zuhd), which pre-
ceded the emergence of Sufism (Melchert, The transition, 51–70) led to the
first groups that formed around emblematic figures such as al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī
(d. 110/728). The relations between those who taught and those who received
instruction are still poorly known, as they depend on later sources. These rela-
tions are most commonly expressed in various terms based on the root ṣ-ḥ-b
(ṣaḥiba, ṣuḥba), which denotes companionship and thus, the relations of mas-
ters to disciples; the content and governing rules of these relations, however,
evolved over time (Gril, Compagnons, 35–41). In Iraq at the turn of the second/
eighth century there appeared around Basra and Kufa the first types of organ-
isations that coalesced around figures that later Ṣūfīs claimed as their own,
such as Mālik b. Dīnār (d. between 127/744–5 and 130/747–8) and ʿAbd al-Wāḥid
b. Zayd (d. c. 133/750), who may have founded the first centre of instruction for
ascetics (duwayra) on the island of ʿAbbādān (Knysh, ʿAbd al-Wāḥid b. Zayd),
and who therefore played a leading role in the subsequent history of Sufism.
It seems that the activities of these early core groups were essentially related
to education, to preaching activities, and sometimes to serving the poor and
pious figures, women as well as men (Melchert, Before ṣūfiyyāt, 115–39).
It is difficult to ascertain the origins of wearing particular garments as a dis-
tinguishing trait to indicate one’s belonging to a clearly defined social group.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_021

The First Communities 363

The ascetics of the second/eighth century wore simple clothing, often made of
wool; on this issue, it is difficult not to recognise the influence of the Christian
monks. Thus, the Damascene Abū Sulaymān al-Dārānī (d. c. 215/830), who is
said to have worn a coarse white tunic, regarded the wearing of wool as a sign
of renunciation (al-Sīrjānī, § 232–3). The white woollen garment was arguably
the most common one, and is often presented as the origin of the term ṣūfī,
namely, those who wear a garment made of wool (ṣūf ), although this deri-
vation is debated by Ṣūfīs themselves (for example, al-Kalābādhī, 21–6; and
Anon., Adab al-muluk, 24–6).

2 Muraqqaʿa and Khirqa: Sources and Discussions

At a later stage, toward the middle of the second/eighth century, there appeared
garments onto which pieces of fabric or used clothing were sewn. The terms
muraqqaʿa (a garment made of pieces of fabric sewn together), mulawwanāt
(multicoloured or variegated garments) (al-Sulamī, Bayān, 366) and khirqa
(Meier, Abū Saʿīd, 356–60) (a piece of fabric, mystical cloak, patched frock) are
synonymous, although the technical meaning of the khirqa appeared after the
fourth/tenth century. Despite some nuances, these terms all refer to this piece
of clothing, which was worn because of the material conditions of the earliest
Ṣūfīs; eventually it became a distinctive garment of the Ṣūfīs, “[the] symbol
of material and spiritual poverty of someone [travelling on] the path to God”
(Gril, De la khirqa, 58). The scriptural justification for wearing a muraqqaʿa was
related to the caliph ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb, who wore a loincloth patched with
twelve pieces of fabric (and possibly another garment, a jubba, comprising
thirteen pieces), according to al-Kharkūshī (Tahdhīb al-asrār, 228–9) when he
stood on the pulpit in the mosque of Medina. There is also a story that por-
trays ʿĀʾisha mending a garment (raqqaʿa) with pieces of fabric (riqāʿa), and
the Prophet encouraging her to continue to do so. Although it is difficult to
verify historically, these reports at least show that these two figures represent-
ed models of frugality for the first generations of Muslims (al-Sīrjānī, § 231–2).
According to certain traditions, the Prophet himself mended his clothing (or
commended the use of clothing patched with pieces of fabric (riqāʿ), accord-
ing to Ibn Ḥanbal, 6:106, 6:242 and 3:244) and encouraged his companions to
wear woollen garments (al-Kharkūshī, 228; al-Maqdisī, 222–6). However, as
ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234) acknowledged in his ʿAwārif al-maʿārif (The
benefits of spiritual knowledge), the ritual of transmitting the khirqa was not
practised in that way by the Prophet (Gril, De la khirqa, 59). Later, the follow-
ing verse of the Qurʾān was invoked as a scriptural foundation: “However, the
364 Thibon

garment of piety is worth even more” (7:26) (see, for example, al-Kharkūshī,
229 and Ibn al-ʿArabī cited in Addas, 19).
For Ibrāhīm b. Adham (d. 161/777–8), a prominent Ṣūfī figure originally from
Khurāsān, wearing a patched garment was ostentatious if done by choice, and,
if done out of necessity, it amounted to a complaint about one’s material situ-
ation (al-Sīrjānī, § 235). The Damascene Aḥmad b. Abī l-Ḥawārī (d. 230/845 or
244/860) claimed to have worn it in his youth and to have earned his father’s
disapproval, because the latter thought him incapable of living up to the strin-
gent demands that wearing such a garment implied (al-Sīrjānī, § 233). Ḥātim
al-Aṣamm (d. 237/851–2) was originally from Balkh; he and his disciples wore
used garments, perhaps even rags, and he maintained that wearing the cloak
(ʿabāʾ) was one of the signs of renunciation. His spiritual method was based on
four types of death, the fourth one being the so-called “green death” that con-
sisted of donning a garment made of rags (riqāʿ) sewn one on top of the other
(Thibon, Les générations, 94, n. 2 and 97, n. 20; on this matter: Chodkiewicz, Les
quatre morts, 35–57). This garment, known from the prophetic era, was a sort
of coat of white or striped wool, sometimes made of camel hair and without
sleeves; it became a distinguishing symbol for Iraqi Ṣūfīs. Another Khurāsānī,
Abū Turāb al-Nakhshabī (d. 245/859), saw it as a form of disguised mendican-
cy, a warning to those who came to khānaqāhs as mendicants, not as genuine
ascetics (al-Sīrjānī, § 237). In Basra, during the first half of the third/ninth cen-
tury, the muraqqaʿa was criticised by al-Muḥāsibī (d. 243/857 in Baghdad) as
a subterfuge, used in order to be recognised as a renunciant and solicit alms
(al-Sarrāj, 248). Abū Ḥātim al-ʿAṭṭār (d. 260s/874–84), a transition figure be-
tween early Sufism and classical Baghdadi Sufism (Melchert, Basran origins,
234–40), cautioned the Ṣūfīs who wore it (al-Sīrjānī, § 235). Thus, adopting a
specific garment became the subject of debates and disputes for a good part
of the third/ninth century, although al-Junayd accepted it under certain condi-
tions (i.e., the master had to order the disciple to don it: al-Sīrjānī, § 228). In
addressing his entourage, al-Shiblī (d. 334/946) turned to poetry to convey the
message that clothing does not make one a Ṣūfī (Böwering and Orfali (eds.),
Sufi treatises, 105, § 514). Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Nūrī (d. 295/907), another Baghdadi,
was the most severely critical of the deviations that had occurred in the past
decades; he proclaimed: “The pieces of fabric were a veil covering pearls; they
have now become piles of rubbish over corpses” (al-Sīrjānī, § 237).
The wearing of the murāqqaʿa does not have a single, uniform meaning
throughout the Middle Eastern area. In Khurāsān, it was associated with those
who practise the code of chivalrous virtue ( futuwwa) and thus belonged to
a trade guild or an urban movement seeking social justice, then it became
a form of spirituality integrated by the Ṣūfīs (al-Qushayrī, “bāb al-futuwwa,”
The First Communities 365

472–9; al-Sulamī, Kitāb al-futuwwa; on futuwwa and its links with Sufism, see Tor,
229–49). Yet not all of those who practised the futuwwa code wore this gar-
ment, at least in public; for example, Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād, one of its most fa-
mous representatives (Deladrière, 77; al-Sulamī, Risālat, 108; al-Sarrāj, 194), did
not wear the garment in public. Likewise, in Nīshāpūr, those in the Malāma
movement, which was characterised by the blaming of the soul/self and the
search for anonymity, rejected the slightest mark of distinction, including in
their clothing. They believed that any kind of public exposure of one’s spiri-
tual state was tantamount to ostentation (Deladrière, 66, 85; al-Sulamī, Risālat,
103, 113). By contrast, in the same geographical area, the Karrāmiyya, who were
somewhat eccentric preachers in search of social visibility, wore barely tanned
animal skins (Massignon, 260).
During the fourth/tenth century, treatises were devoted to the wearing of
specific garments, one treatise of which is the Kitāb lubs al-muraqqaʿāt by Ibn
Khafīf (d. 371/982) (Sobieroj, Ibn Ḫafīf, 311, n. 26, cited by Karamustafa, 86),
but these are no longer extant. More often than not, this subject and its ac-
companying discussions are found dispersed throughout the first manuals of
Sufism. One of the first is the work of al-Kalābādhī (d. 380/990), who primarily
mentions wearing a woollen garment (al-Kalābādhī, 22–5: where he discusses
the origin of the term ṣūfī; on Abū Ḥātim accompanied by 320 disciples, all
wearing woollen clothes on their way to the pilgrimage, see Abū Nuʿaym, 8:80).
Al-Sarrāj (d. 378/988) does not discuss this matter at length; in his Lumaʿ, he
says that clothing matters little as long as it corresponds to the spiritual mo-
ment (waqt) and is not based on a calculated choice or meant to be a sign of
affectation (al-Sarrāj, 188). Al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072) does not devote any space
to this matter in his Risāla, but he does address it in another text. There, he
says that it is preferable for the disciple to have the khirqa handed to him by
the master, so that it is not a result of his personal choice (see ʿUyūn al-ajwiba
fī funūn al-asʾila, in Sobieroj, Die Responsensammlung, 37, question 57). In the
same place, he explains the reasons for wearing a specific blue garment—
he says it is the colour of mourning, and white is preferable (Sobieroj, Die
Responsensammlung, 36, question 56). Al-Kharkūshī (d. 407/1016) devotes a
section to clothing in general and shows an interest in references to the pro-
phetic era; however, he does not speak of any specific garment, and the term
muraqqaʿāt appears only once (al-Kharkūshī, 228–35; 234 for the muraqqaʿāt).
Throughout his works, al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) has interspersed several refer-
ences or reflections on this matter, but he does not address it in a specific chap-
ter or treatise. He states that wearing the khirqa is part of the adab of the Ṣūfīs
(al-Sulamī, Jawāmiʿ, 40, § 100), but in his eyes, it is only justified by complete
indigence. Influenced by the malāmatī orientation, al-Sulamī did not favour
366 Thibon

external manifestations of spirituality, although he did not condemn them ei-

ther (Thibon, L’œuvre, 178). In another text, he gave a legal concession (rukhṣa)
that it was acceptable to tear up the khirqa of those wearing it incorrectly
(al-Sulamī, Dhikr ādāb al-ṣūfiyya, 36).
It is not until the middle of the fifth/eleventh century that a treatise appeared
granting this matter significant attention. We can draw a good deal of factual
information on the subject from the Kitāb al-bayāḍ wa-l-sawād (The black and
white) of Abū l-Ḥasan al-Sīrjānī (d. c. 470/1077), (al-Sīrjānī, ch. 16, 107–12) and
Kashf al-maḥjūb (Uncovering the veiled) by al-Hujwīrī (d. between 465/1072
and 469/1077) (al-Hujwīrī, ch. 4, 45–57). According to Karamustafa, al-Hujwīrī
purportedly wrote a treatise (now lost) titled Asrār al-khirqa wa-l-mulawannāt
(Mysteries of patched and coloured cloaks) (Karamustafa, 86). In chapter 4 of
the Kashf al-maḥjūb, titled “On the wearing of patched habits (muraqqaʿāt),” he
denounces various acts of abuse committed by those wearing the muraqqaʿa,
and those who are ‘fake’ Ṣūfīs, and he defines the various conditions that
must be met before one can wear them, namely, a trial period of three years
under the tutelage of a master, during which time the aspirant acquires the
qualifications required for investiture (al-Hujwīrī, 54–5; he also mentions a
blue-coloured garment worn especially by those who travel, 53). Abū l-Faḍl
al-Maqdisī, a muḥaddith known by the name of Ibn al-Qaysarānī (d. 507/1113
in Baghdad), wrote Ṣafwat al-taṣawwuf (The finest of mystical knowledge); one
of its sections is entitled “On the Sunna of wearing the khirqa handed over by
the master,” thus indicating a rite of initiatory investiture. However, the few
pages that deal with this issue are a compilation of disparate scriptural indices,
without comments (al-Maqdisī, 222–6).
It is difficult to determine at what point the khirqa or the muraqqaʿa took
on a more elaborate meaning and became an essential element of a ritual;
however, it was probably not before the fourth/tenth century (Michon refers
to Massignon, and indicates the third/ninth century and al-Muḥāsibī and Ibn
Ḥarb; however, we do not find any precise references in Massignon, 71). The
original reference to the shroud and to renunciation of the world was subse-
quently enriched by an elaborate and detailed symbolism involving various as-
pects of the garment, especially, its colour (for colours and their meanings, see
Anon., Adab al-muluk, 26–8), its texture, the size of the stitches, the length of the
sleeves, the existence of a hem, a double collar, or embroidery, etc. (Böwering,
Règles, 143–5 and n. 3 and 4). The khirqa—a patched cloak or a simple fabric
or a cotton hat—gave rise to an elaborate initiation ritual, introducing the dis-
ciple to the path under the guidance of a master. It marks the beginnings of a
companionship (ṣuḥba) meant to lead the student to spiritual realisation (Gril,
De la khirqa, 58–9). However, this term is not limited to a univocal function: for
The First Communities 367

example, al-Hujwīrī indicated that a trial period of three years should precede
wearing a cloak; in this case it was an initiatory rite and not a rite of reception
for a disciple who had already confirmed his initial commitment (Addas, 9–17).
According to Chodkiewicz’s description, Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) considered
it “an additional function,” in which the master transferred his spiritual states
to this disciple to lead him to perfection (Chodkiewicz, Note, 50). It somehow
complements other modalities such as the bayʿa (the pledge) of the initiato-
ry pact and the talqīn al-dhikr (the transmission of an invocation formula),
two modalities of initiatory incorporation whose scriptural foundations are
more solid than those of the lubs al-khirqa and yet seldom highlighted in the
sources of the first four centuries (Chodkiewicz, Note, 42–9; see al-Qushayrī,
737 [“bāb al-waṣiyya li-l-murīdīn”], where talqīn al-dhikr is mentioned; on the
subsequent ritual, see Papas). It should be noted that Ibn al-ʿArabī was initially
hostile to the lubs al-khirqa, as the western Muslims did not know this practice
during his time. He changed his mind once he arrived in the East (Addas, 13–5).
Finally, Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), in his ʿAwārif
al-maʿārif, distinguished two types of khirqa, the first representing a complete
commitment to the master and a connection of spiritual aspiration (khirqat
al-irāda); the other connection of blessing (khirqat al-tabarruk) refers to one
who seeks to benefit from the master’s baraka, without undertaking commit-
ments assigned by the master (al-Suhrawardī, ch. 12, 99; on the khirqa in the
Persian sources, see Ohlander).

3 From Isnād to Silsila

Wearing a khirqa handed down by a master enables the disciple to benefit from
the transfer of baraka the khirqa symbolises; in return, the disciple places him-
self under the master’s authority in order to make progress on the path. Yet
what is this authority based on? The first manuals of Sufism or the works of
Ṣūfī ṭabaqāt (successive generations) documented the relations of masters to
disciples in order to establish the transmission of their teachings. Their au-
thors, such as al-Sulamī or al-Qushayrī, were also traditionists (muḥaddithūn)
(on the links between Sufism and the ḥadīth sciences, see Karamustafa, 87–91;
Knysh Islamic mysticism, 125–30). The process of collecting the words of the
masters and the teachings they documented involved employing methods
that were similar, in every respect, to those of the traditionists; most notably,
they mention the chain of transmitters. In fact, these isnāds had an additional
value: they not only guaranteed the authenticity of the words transmitted, as
with ḥadīth, but they also embodied a presence and conveyed the baraka of
368 Thibon

the initial speakers and the various successive transmitters. Al-Sulamī was one
of the first Ṣūfī authors to formulate the characteristics of this spiritual isnād
(Thibon, L’œuvre, 432–5). This new use of the isnād modified the perception of
the chain of transmission of the muḥaddith, at least for Ṣūfīs. What was just an
instrument of validation of the authenticity of the prophetic words became,
for Ṣūfīs, the vehicle of the Prophet’s presence through successive generations,
almost a sort of relic (Thibon, Transmission, 75–6). The isnād guaranteed the
reliability and authenticity of the words of the Ṣūfīs of the first generations,
but with the establishment of another kind of transmission, the isnād lost its
importance. The new chain of transmission that was established validated the
baraka of a Ṣūfī master and the totality of his teachings and was called the
“path” (ṭarīq, ṭarīqa).
Among the books of Ṭabaqāt al-ṣūfiyya (Generations of the Ṣūfīs), al-Sulamī
was likely one of the first to note the different types of relationships that ex-
isted among the teachers he identified (Thibon Les générations, 18–27). At the
time, the relationships between masters and disciples were often manifold
and seemingly unlimited by constraints connected with conventional norms
(ādāb) or particular behaviour between masters and disciples. In this work, as
in others, the term ṣaḥiba plays an essential role in describing such relation-
ships. In addition, during the two centuries in which the figures identified in
the Ṭabaqāt lived, the content of this term evolved. For example, was there a
transition from simple companionship that might be qualified as scholarly, to
a master-disciple relationship? (Ibn ʿAbbād dated the transition from shaykh
al-taʿlīm to shaykh al-tarbiya as being from the fifth/eleventh century; on this,
see Meier, Khurāsān, 189–219 and Meier, Qušayrī’s Tartib, 93–8). Sometimes a
lineage is sketched out, as when al-Sulamī said of Shaqīq al-Balkhī: “He was
the master of Ḥātim al-Aṣamm, a disciple of Ibrāhīm b. Adham, and from him
he took the spiritual path (akhadha ʿan-hu al-ṭarīqa)” (Thibon, Les générations,
74). The expression akhadha ʿan-hu al-ṭarīqa, which became normative in later
Sufism, only appears twice in the text and in each case links only two figures.
Furthermore, the term ṭarīqa or ṭarīq is ambiguous. At that point, in the fourth/
tenth century, the term did not yet designate a specific lineage, but a method of
inner transformation experienced by a specific master in order to reach God.
Al-Sulamī thus explains that Ibrāhīm al-Khawwāṣ followed the path of trusting
in God (salaka ṭarīq al-tawakkul).
Jaʿfar al-Khuldī (d. 348/959) was one of the first to identify an initiatory chain
(silsila) that is cited by Ibn Nadīm, and proceeds from Junayd to Anas b. Mālik,
and includes Sarī l-Saqaṭī < Maʿrūf al-Karkhī < Farqad al-Sabakhī < al-Ḥasan
al-Baṣrī (Thibon, al-Khuldī, Jaʿfar; see also Trimingham, appendix A, 261–3
for the first silsilas). Al-Qushayrī cites his own master, Abū ʿAlī l-Daqqāq, who
stated: “I took this path (ṭarīq) from al-Naṣrābādhī, who took it from al-Shiblī,
The First Communities 369

who took it from Junayd, who took it from Sarī (l-Saqaṭī), who took it from
Maʿrūf al-Karkhī, who took it from Dāwūd al-Ṭāʾī, who had met the succes-
sors (tābiʿūn)” (al-Qushayrī, “bāb al-ṣuḥba,” 578–9; a path passing via al-Sulamī
and al-Naṣrābādhī and going back to the first six imāms is given for Abū Saʿid
b. Abī l-Khayr according to Monawwar, 49; Ibn Salāḥ al-Shahrazūrī, who was
connected to the path of Qushayrī [khirqa qushayriyya] presents a chain that
mentions Ḥabīb al-ʿAjamī, al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, and ʿAlī after al-Ṭāʾī; see Chiabotti,
44–5). It should be noted that these first chains do not reach beyond the suc-
cessors. It is only later that a link connects al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī to ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib;
this link is common in the majority of brotherhoods, but is the subject of con-
troversy and debate (see the critique formulated by Massignon, 128–34, whose
views, because he addressed this question as a pioneer, lack nuance, as pointed
out by Gril, De la khirqa, 60). For pedagogical reasons, al-Hujwīrī identified
twelve branches into which Sufism is divided, two of which were excluded
for their heterodoxy. Each branch was designated by the name of the figure
considered to be their founder. The branches he highlighted are not the Ṣūfī
lineages that appeared later, rather they are methods of education specific to
each of the masters and the associated practices that their disciples transmit-
ted (al-Ḥujwīrī, 176–260; trans. Mortazavi, 214–301). Ibn al-ʿArabī was one of
the first Ṣūfīs to have dedicated a treatise to the initiatory affiliation that he
acquired when he received a khirqa (Gril, De la khirqa, 60). With the develop-
ment of the ṭuruq (pl. of ṭarīqa, initiatory paths or brotherhoods) this isnād
was then transformed and took on the name of silsila, a kind of genealogical
tree showing the filiation from the current master, more often than not going
back to the Prophet, through all the spiritual figures that transmitted a particu-
lar path (see Alatas in this volume). It was not until the sixth/twelfth century
that the first brotherhoods appeared; these continued to develop and have
branched out until the present day. ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (d. 561/1166), founder
of the Qādiriyya brotherhood, marked that turning point (Knysh, Islamic mys-
ticism, 179–95). Yet he was not the only one. Al-Ṣuhrawārdī benefited from the
subsidies of caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–622/1180–1225) who held him in
high esteem and built for him a ribāṭ called al-Marzūbaniyya. In this way the
caliph enhanced his social and spiritual standing in the eyes of his subjects
(Knysh, Islamic mysticism, 195–207; Hartmann) and Sufism became a powerful
social and political force (Ceyhan in this volume).

4 The Ṣūfī Centres: Khānaqāh, Ribāṭ, and Zāwiya

In order to deliver their teachings to their disciples, Ṣūfī masters needed places
in which to meet (Ephrat and Pinto, Firouzeh, Hofer [Ṣūfī Outposts], all in this
370 Thibon

volume). As with other Islamic sciences, mosques served as meeting places

for these first circles, for example, the mosque of Shūnīziyya in Baghdad was
a centre for Junayd (Karamustafa, 20). Private homes occasionally served for
small groups of disciples, including women. But, in the early centuries of
Sufism, there was no specific place devoted solely to the teaching of Sufism.
Al-Sulamī’s duwayra, inherited from his grandfather (Thibon, L’œuvre, 96, 102),
was noteworthy; it was a sort of convent, a private place that housed a library
and hosted disciples or/and passing visitors. Under his successor it was desig-
nated as a khānaqāh (or khānegāh) (Monawwar, 213; Malamud). Among the
terms used to refer to these institutions that brought together masters and
disciples, it is among the oldest. The terms ribāṭ or zāwiya complete this glos-
sary of Ṣūfī institutions that arose during the Saljūq period alongside madra-
sas (Chabbi). It is not always easy to distinguish their respective attributions.
In sixth-/twelfth-century Baghdad, the term ribāṭ referred to establishments
funded by worldly powers or pious donations (awqāf ); these were clearly part
of the urban landscape (Van Renterghem, 1:115–22 mentions about thirty ribāṭs
of varying size in Baghdad at the end of the sixth/twelfth century). In Nīshāpūr,
the Persian Ṣūfī Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr (d. 440/1049) is said to have been the
first to establish a ten-point code to regulate communal life in the khānqāh
(Monawwar, 324–5). The titles of specific works that indicate that they address
the rules of communal life appeared as early as the middle of the fourth/tenth
century. These take up earlier directives that had not yet been formalised or
codified. Indeed, several works by al-Sulamī deal with this matter (e.g., Ādāb
al-ṣuḥba wa-ḥusn al-ʿishra, see J.-J. Thibon, L’œuvre, 259–83).

5 Conclusion

The emergence of Sufism around the second half of the third/ninth century
was followed in the next century by a phase of exploration of the various forms
of spirituality, and its doctrines and practices were documented in written
form. The fifth/eleventh to sixth/twelfth century constitute a pivotal phase,
when the first institutionalisation took place, preceding the emergence of the
brotherhoods. Around the figure of the spiritual master (shaykh), who acquired
an indisputable authority and became indispensable for those in search of a
spiritual ideal, practices, and codes that went beyond spiritual exercises and
devotion were instituted (Van Renterghem, 1:108). A Ṣūfī identity was formed
based on markers such as clothing, rituals, and places that made it possible to
quickly recognise an individual as being a Ṣūfī. From then on, Sufism became
The First Communities 371

a social component in cities, one that potentially represented the political and
social aspirations of the populace or, alternatively, was used as an instrument
in the hands of power.

Bibliography

Primary Sources
Anonymous, Adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq al-taṣawwuf, ed. Bernd Radtke, Beirut and
Stuttgart 1991.
Ātes, Süleyman, Tisʿat kutub fī aḥwāl al-taṣawwuf wa-l-zuhd, Beirut 1993.
Aḥmad b. Ḥanbal, Musnad, 6 vols., Beirut 1389/1969.
al-Hujwīrī, ʿAlī, The Kashf al-maḥjūb, Eng. trans. Reynold A. Nicholson, Leiden and
London 1911, French trans. Djamshid Mortazavi, as Somme spirituelle, Paris 1988.
al-Iṣfahānī, Abū Nuʿaym, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ wa-ṭabaqāt al-aṣfiyāʾ, 10 vols., Cairo 1352–7/
1932–8, repr. Beirut 1996.
al-Kalābādhī, Abū Bakr, al-Taʿarruf li-madhhab ahl al-taṣawwuf, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm
Maḥmūd and ʿAbd al-Bāqī Surūr, Cairo 1380/1960.
al-Kharkūshī, Abū Saʿd, Tahdhīb al-asrār fī uṣūl al-taṣawwuf, ed. Imām Sayyid
Muḥammad ʿAlī, Beirut 2006.
al-Maqdisī, Abū l-Faḍl, Ṣafwat al-taṣawwuf, ed. Ghāda al-Muqaddam, Beirut 1416/1995.
al-Qushayrī, Abū l-Qāsim, al-Risāla al-qushayriyya, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Maḥmūd and
Maḥmūd Ibn al-Sharīf, 2 vols., Cairo 1966, repr. 1972.
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr, al-Lumaʿ fī-l-taṣawwuf, ed. Reynold Alleyne Nicholson, London and
Leiden 1914.
al-Sīrjānī, Abū l-Ḥasan, Kitāb al-bayāḍ wa-l-sawād, ed. Bilal Orfali and Nadia Saab,
as Sufism, black and white. A critical edition of Kitāb al-bayāḍ wa-l-sawād by Abū
l-Ḥasan al-Sīrjānī (d. ca. 470/1077), Leiden and Boston 2012.
al-Suhrawardī, Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar, ʿAwārif al-maʿārif, ed. ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm Maḥmūd and
Maḥmūd b. al-Sharīf, Cairo, repr. 2000.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Bayān aḥwāl al-ṣūfiyya, in Süleyman Ateş (ed.),
Sülemî’nin risaleleri (Ankara 1981), 131–40.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Dhikr ādāb al-ṣūfiyya fī ityāni-him al-rukhaṣ, ed.
N. Zeidan as Six opuscules mystiques inédits, 30–48, PhD dissertation, Paris 1974.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Jawāmiʿ ādāb al-ṣūfiyya, ed. E. Kohlberg, Jerusalem
1976.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Kitāb al-futuwwa, ed. Süleyman Ateş, as Tasavvufta
fütüvvet, Ankara 1397/1977.
372 Thibon

al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Risālat al-Malāmatiyya, ed. Abū ʿAlāʾ al-ʿAfīfī, in
al-Malāmatiyya wa-l-ṣūfiyya wa-ahl al-futuwwa, Cairo 1945.
al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, Ṭabaqāt al-ṣūfiyya, ed. Johannes Pedersen, Leiden
1960; ed. Nūr al-Dīn Shurayba, Cairo 1389/19692, 19531.

Studies
Addas, Claude, Ibn ʿArabī. Le livre de la filiation spirituelle. Présentation et traduction
de l’arabe par C. Addas, ʿAyn al-ḥayât, Quadernodi Studi delle Tarîqa Naqshbandiyya
5 (1999): 5–44; repr. Marrakech 2000.
Böwering, Gerhard, Règles et rituels soufis, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein
(eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à
aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 139–56.
Böwering, Gerhard and Bilal Orfali, eds., Sufi treatises of Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī
(d. 412/1021), Beirut 2009.
Chabbi, Jacqueline, Ribāṭ, EI2.
Chiabotti, Francesco, Entre soufisme et savoir islamique. L’œuvre de ʿAbd al-Karīm
al-Qušayrī (376–465/986–1072), PhD dissertation, Aix-en-Provence 2014.
Chodkiewicz, Michel, Les quatre morts du soufi, Revue de l’Histoire des Religions 215/1
(1998): 35–57.
Chodkiewicz, Michel, Note complémentaire sur les rites d’initiation dans les turuq,
ʿAyn al-ḥayât, Quadernodi Studi delle Tarîqa Naqshbandiyya 5 (1999): 45–64.
Deladrière, Roger, La Lucidité implacable, Paris 1991.
Gril, Denis, Compagnons ou disciples? La ṣuḥba et ses exigences. L’exemple d’Ibrāhīm
b. Adham d’après la Ḥilyat al-awliyā’, in Geneviève Gobillot and Jean-Jacques
Thibon (eds.), Les Maîtres soufis et leurs disciples (Beirut 2012), 35–53.
Gril, Denis, De la khirqa à la ṭarīqa. Continuité et évolution dans l’identification et la
classification des voies, in Rachida Chih and Catherine Mayeur–Jaouen (eds.), Le
soufisme à l’époque ottomane, XVIe–XVIIIe siècle/Sufism in the Ottoman era, 16th–
18th century (Cairo 2010), 57–81.
Gril, Denis, Les débuts du soufisme, 27–43; La Voie, 87–103; Doctrine et pratiques,
121–38, in Alexandre Popovic and Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les voies d’Allah. Les ordres
mystiques dans le monde musulman des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996).
Gramlich, Richard, Das Sendschreiben al-Qušayrīs über das Sufitum, Stuttgart 1989.
Gramlich, Richard, Schlaglichter über das Sufitum. Abū Naṣr as-Sarrāǧs kitāb al-lumaʿ,
Stuttgart 1990.
Hartmann, Angelika, al-Suhrawardī, EI2.
Karamustafa, Ahmet T., Sufism. The formative period, Edinburgh 2007.
Knysh, Alexander D., Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Knysh, Alexander D. (trans.), al-Qushayri’s epistle on Sufism, Reading 2007.
Knysh, Alexander D., ʿAbd al-Wāḥid b. Zayd, EI3.
Malamud, Margaret, Sufi organizations and structures of authority in medieval
Nishapur, IJMES 26/03 (1994): 427­­–42.
The First Communities 373

Massignon, Louis, Essai sur les origines du lexique technique de la mystique musulmane,
Paris 19542, 19221.
Meier, Fritz, Abū Saʿīd-i Abū l-Hayr (357–440/967–1049). Wirklichkeit und Legende,
Tehran and Liège 1976.
Meier, Fritz, Khurāsān and the end of classical Sufism, in Fritz Meier, Essays on Islamic
piety and mysticism, trans. John O’Kane with Bernd Radtke (Boston and Leiden
1999), 189–219.
Meier, Fritz, Qušayrī’s Tartīb al-sulūk, in Fritz Meier, Essays on Islamic piety and mysti-
cism, trans. John O’Kane with Bernd Radke (Boston and Leiden 1999), 93–133.
Melchert, Christopher, The transition from asceticism to mysticism at the middle of
the 9th century C.E., SI 83 (1996): 51–70.
Melchert, Christopher, Basran origins of classical Sufism, Der Islam 82 (2005): 221–40.
Melchert, Christopher, Before ṣūfiyyāt. Female Muslim renunciants in the 8th and
9th centuries CE, JSS 5/2 (2016): 115–39.
Melchert, Christopher, Asceticism, EI3.
Michon, Jean-Louis, Khirqa, EI2.
Monawwar, Mohammad Ebn E., Les Étapes mystiques du shaykh Abū Saʿīd, French
trans. M. Achena, Paris 1974.
Ohlander, Erik S., Ḵerqa, EIr.
Papas, Alexandre, Initiation in Ṣūfism, EI3.
Salinger, Gerard, Was the futūwa an oriental form of chivalry?, Proceedings of the
American Philosophical Society 94 (1950): 481–93.
Sobieroj, Florian, Die Responsensammlung über das Sufitum. Al-Qušairī’s ʿUyūn al-
aǧwiba fī funūn al-asʾila, Wiesbaden 2012.
Sobieroj, Florian, Ibn Ḫafīf aš-Šīrāzī und seine Schrift zur Novizenerziehung (Kitāb
al-Iqtiṣād). Biographische Studien, Edition und Übersetzung, Beirut 1998.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, Les générations des soufis, Leiden and Boston 2019.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, Transmission du hadith et modèle prophétique chez les pre-
miers soufis, Archives de sciences sociales des religions 178/3 (2017): 71–87.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, al-Khuldī, Jaʿfar, EI3.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, L’œuvre d’Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (325/937–412/1021) et la
formation du soufisme, Damascus 2009.
Thibon, Jean-Jacques, Les voies des Hommes sincères parmi les soufis, introduction
et traduction du texte de Sulamī Manāhij al-ṣādiqīn, La règle d’Abraham 34 (2012):
27–64.
Tor, Deborah G., Violent order. Religious warfare, chivalry, and the ʿayyār phenomenon in
the medieval Islamic world, Würzburg 2007.
Trimingham, J. Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, London 1971.
van Renterghem, Vanessa, Les élites bagdadiennes au temps des Seldjoukides. Étude
d’histoire sociale, 2 vols., Beirut and Damascus 2015.
 Chapter 20

Ṣūfī Lineages and Families

Ismail Fajrie Alatas

Nasab and silsila are terms that denote kinds of genealogical relations, both
of which are regarded by Ṣūfīs as authoritative channels for the transmission
of spiritual knowledge across generations; thus, they serve as a foundation of
Ṣūfī institutions and organisations. Nasab (Ar. pl. ansāb) refers to pedigree or
bloodline and designates the lineal descent of a particular individual or tribe
from an eponymous ancestor. Silsila (Ar. pl. salāsil), literally means “chain,” and
is commonly used in Sufism and Ṣūfī orders, or ṭarīqa (Ar. pl. ṭuruq), to denote
a continuous string of Ṣūfī initiation and transmission of spiritual knowledge.
Silsila connects a Ṣūfī disciple to his/her master (shaykh or pīr), all the way
to the founder of the ṭarīqa, and ultimately back to the Prophet Muḥammad.
Both nasab and silsila are often presented graphically, in the form of a
shajara, or genealogical tree, that maps an individual lineally to his predeces-
sors, and—in certain cases—also laterally in relation to other individuals who
share the same line of descent.
In charting a genealogical connection to the Prophet or a Ṣūfī master, a sil-
sila works like a nasab, although theoretically speaking, the silsila is accessible
and attainable to any Muslim, while the nasab is exclusive. That is, one must be
born into a nasab, but one can attach oneself to a Ṣūfī master over a protracted
period and be initiated into the ṭarīqa and thereby enter into a silsila. This
functional similarity may make a silsila a kind of rival of a nasab, particularly
when both are understood as channels of spiritual blessings (baraka) and mys-
tical powers constitutive of spiritual leadership, and thus define the logic of
leadership succession in a Ṣūfī ṭarīqa. Nevertheless, nasab and silsila may also
work together in augmenting the spiritual authority of Ṣūfī masters, forming
family ṭarīqas, and establishing a hereditary succession of ṭarīqa leadership.

1 Nasab

Nasab is the fundamental organising principle of traditional Arab societies. It

provides the historical validation of kinship and all the privileges and ethical
responsibilities that this entails, including the determination of nobility. An
individual’s relationship to a patrilineal ancestor is introduced either by the

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_022

Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 375

term ibn (son of) or, in the case of a woman, bint (daughter of). For example,
D1 ibn C ibn B ibn A, or D2 bint C ibn B ibn A. While interest in kinship and
genealogies among the Arabs predated Islam, nasab narratives were put into
writing around the first/seventh century (Rosenthal). During the reign of the
caliph ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb (r. 13–23/634–44), nasab was inscribed to register
tribal affiliations for military and tax purposes. By the third/ninth century, ge-
nealogical writings had become an integral part of Arab literary and historio-
graphical traditions (Duri). During the same period, if not earlier, nasab was
drawn in an arboreal form (mushajjar), thereby projecting a shajara (family
tree), that graphically shows not only lineal descent from an ancestor but also
lateral relations between descendants.
The importance of nasab for the Arabs is due, among other reasons, to the
prevalent ideology of aṣl (root) that posits nobility of origin as conferring moral
qualities and distinction, such as excellence ( faḍīla), honor (sharaf), sincerity
and honesty (ṣidq), and generosity (karam), all of which can be encapsulated
by the term ḥasab (inherited merit) (Abu Lughod, 45; Marlow). The Qurʾān ex-
pounds egalitarian values and decouples ḥasab from nasab, and even stresses
the primacy of ḥasab over nasab to highlight the attainability of moral excel-
lence notwithstanding one’s pedigree. In practice, however, nasab remained a
foundational evaluative category among Muslims who employed it to explain
the noble qualities of an individual.
Moreover, nasab has continued to play a central role in Islamic social or-
ganisations. The Quraysh, those who came from the same tribe as the Prophet
Muḥammad, were given certain privileges—ranging from tax exemptions to
entitlement to certain allowances—in the Medinan era, the ʿUmayyad, and
the ʿAbbāsid empires, as well as in subsequent Islamic polities. The sayyids
(Ar. pl. sāda), meaning those whose nasab can be traced back to the Prophet
Muḥammad through his daughter, Fāṭima, in particular, have persisted in em-
phasising the centrality of prophetic genealogy as a prerequisite to the leader-
ship of the Muslim community. This very issue, of course, lies at the centre
of the Sunnī-Shīʿī division. Later, as I discuss below, some Ṣūfī ṭarīqas stress
prophetic descent as a prerequisite for spiritual leadership of the order with
the assumption that prophetic nasab facilitates the inheritance of prophetic
ḥasab and blessings (baraka).

2 Silsila

If nasab denotes a blood relationship, silsila designates a spiritual genealogy,

that is, a chain of transmission of spiritual knowledge and initiation that links
376 Alatas

a Ṣūfī master to the Prophet Muḥammad. Ṣūfī ideas and practices were initial-
ly developed in informal communities that revolved around particular “moral
athletes” and spiritual mentors in first-/seventh- and second-/eighth-century
Mesopotamia, Syria, and Khurāsān (Knysh, 1). Recent scholarship notes that
early Ṣūfīs in Baghdad were part of the Qurʾānic, ḥadīth, and even legal schol-
arly circles. From such learned circles, these Ṣūfī masters borrowed discursive
tools and symbolic forms, including the ijāza (diploma, certificate of autho-
rization) and silsila (Green, 50) to structure their own knowledge practice.
A silsila is modelled on the isnād, that is, a chain of the transmission of the
Prophet’s words and deeds, used by ḥadīth scholars to verify the soundness
and authenticity of a ḥadīth text (matn). Replicating the isnād, Ṣūfī masters
introduced silsila to authenticate transmission of spiritual teachings and trace
the line of initiatic descent, anchoring both to the prophetic past.
Gradually, Ṣūfīs adopted available institutional frameworks such as ribāṭs
(residences for Muslim warriors along the frontiers) (Fisher; Hofer [Ṣūfī
Outposts] in this volume) and futuwwa (fraternities based on chivalry), that
is, exclusive and esoteric societies of craftsmen and professionals in mediaeval
Persian towns (Meier, 217; Afshari in this volume); they developed their own
Ṣūfī institutions, like lodges and monasteries (khānaqāh). Initiates of these
organisations wore the distinctive robe of their spiritual mentor as a form of
identification, signaling their belonging to a silsila of knowledge and practice
inherited from a Ṣūfī master (Geoffroy, 44–67). These organisations marked the
emergence of Ṣūfī orders or ṭarīqas. Each ṭarīqa is known for its own silsila that
traces the spiritual genealogy of a current head of the order to its eponymous
founder and ultimately back to the Prophet. As a graphic form that asserts the
ṭarīqa’s connection to the Prophet, a silsila works to legitimise the order as a
proper mechanism for the transmission of prophetic teachings. In the context
of a fully-organised ṭarīqa, a silsila took on another function beyond simply au-
thenticating knowledge transmission, that of charting and defining the order’s
leadership succession.
The silsila has been a potent discursive tool and symbolic concept that held
together adherents of a Ṣūfī ṭarīqa over the generations and geographical gaps
that divided them from the eponymous founder of the order. While the silsila
did not necessarily point to concrete bonds of connectivity, it nevertheless pro-
vided adherents of a ṭarīqa with a conceptual connection that allowed them
to imagine themselves as belonging to an inherited religious tradition that ul-
timately goes back to the Prophet. As such, a silsila “offered a way for initiates
to conceive themselves as being meaningfully connected to the teachings and
power of a Prophet who had lived centuries ago” (Green, 87). Equally important
Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 377

figure 20.1 The silsila of the Ṭarīqa ʿAlawiyya belonging to the Ḥaḍramī scholar Aḥmad b.
ʿAbdallāh al-ʿAṭṭās (d. 1929) of Pekalongan (Central Java, Indonesia)
Photo by Ismail Fajrie Alatas
378 Alatas

is the way in which the silsila works to declare an eponymous founder of a

ṭarīqa a deputy (khalīfa) of the Prophet who can impart prophetic teachings
and guidance to the community. Such a form of authority became increasingly
important for Muslims, particularly after the decline of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate
and its collapse in the seventh/thirteenth century (Abun-Nasr, 82).

3 Tensions and Convergences

A silsila endows the disciples of a Ṣūfī master with a spiritual genealogy in

addition to their own nasab. In doing so, it provides a tangible link to the
Prophet, even when its possessor is not his descendant. Key to this is what can
be termed as genealogical adoption. Being a disciple of a Ṣūfī master involves
renouncing former ties and surrendering oneself to the master. In exchange
for the disciple’s loyalty and attachment, the master adopts him as his spiritual
child, providing him with support, protection, and a new spiritual genealogy
(Hammoudi, 96–7). The silsila and nasab, however, often intersect, as tension
emerges from the different ethical imperatives entailed by these genealogical
relations. Having two parallel genealogies may invoke questions regarding the
primary locus of the disciple’s ethical responsibility. What should the disciple
do when the demands of the master conflict with those of the parents? Indeed,
candid competition between a disciple’s parents and his Ṣūfī master is a trope
that is discussed in many hagiographical texts (Bashir, 153).
Nasab and silsila, however, are not always at odds, and the two kinds of gene-
alogies may combine to strengthen one another. For instance, in the Maghrib
from at least the late ninth/fifteenth century, the authority of an ideal Ṣūfī
master was built not only on the basis of his knowledge and spiritual achieve-
ments but more importantly on the notion of his inherited spiritual powers
and ḥasab that are transmitted through prophetic nasab. Such a trend has been
described as Sharifian Sufism, a combination of the Sharifian Ḥasanid Shīʿism
initially propagated in the Maghrib by the Idrīsid dynasty (r. 172–375/789–985)
and Sufism (Cornell, 221–4). The combination of spiritual and genealogical
descent from the Prophet projects an ideal religious leader as being a sayyid
who imitates and actively propagates the Sunna, and is committed to societal
reform. This form of religious authority, in turn, served as the philosophical
basis of the notion of political sovereignty in Morocco.
The combination of nasab and silsila also served as the basis for the emer-
gence of hereditary sanctity, a textual and sociological phenomenon that pro-
liferated across the Muslim world from the eighth/fourteenth century on, as
piety was increasingly identified with the Prophet and his family. While not all
Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 379

of the Prophet’s descendants were considered saints, “it was from among them
that most Muslim saints emerged” (Mayeur-Jaouen and Papas, 8). Indeed, as
early as the fifth/eleventh century, hagiographical sources presented sayyid
families as the privileged sites for the transmission of sanctity. Scholarly and
saintly sayyid families, like the ʿAydarūs family of the Ḥaḍramawt and India,
and the Wafāʾ family of Egypt, were perceived as the institutional loci and
training grounds in and through which sanctity is passed on from father or
uncles to sons or nephews (Peskes; McGregor). As late as the twentieth cen-
tury, scions of saintly sayyid families in Java were still actively disseminating
teachings that sayyids were born with congenital knowledge and spiritual po-
tentialities that could be developed into sanctity through proper familial train-
ing and supervision from childhood (Alatas, They are the heirs, 146–7).
We can also observe the merging of nasab and silsila in so-called family
ṭarīqas, orders in which the nasab of the spiritual leader also functions as a
silsila, and the transmission of spiritual knowledge and leadership is passed
down within the family. In such a ṭarīqa, spiritual leadership is passed down
hereditarily. Scholars have suggested that most large Ṣūfī communities ini-
tially began as lineage-based institutions (Trimingham, 14–6). Some have suc-
ceeded in becoming more open, while others have remained as family orders.
A notable example of the first trend is the Qādiriyya ṭarīqa, attributed to the
Baghdad-based scholar and public moralist ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (d. 561/1166).
In the eighth/fourteenth century, ʿAbd al-Qādir’s sons played active roles in
propagating the ṭarīqa. Gradually, the ṭarīqa spread through “the personal ini-
tiative of Ṣūfī shaykhs in different lands who enhanced their religious standing
by acting as representatives of the prestigious Qādiriyya without renouncing
their independence as spiritual guides of their local communities” (Abun-Nasr,
96). While ʿAbd al-Qādir’s family remained one of the leading scholarly Sunnī
families of Baghdad, the ṭarīqa itself gradually devolved and became decentral-
ised. The Ṣūfī shaykhs in various Muslim lands who belonged to the Qādiriyya
silsila had much latitude in determining the mystical teachings and practices,
all of which were validated through the spiritual authority of ʿAbd al-Qādir.
This dynamic, in turn, allowed the Qādiriyya to spread more widely than any
other ṭarīqa. By the ninth/fifteenth century, the Qādiriyya had branches in the
Middle East, the Maghrib, Iberia, the Indian subcontinent, the horn of Africa,
and Mali, and by the tenth/sixteenth, it had reached China and present-day
Indonesia. The landscape of the Qādiriyya can thus be characterised as a loose
network made up by individual silsilas, some more visible than others, which
operated independently, even as they claimed a common background and ep-
onym. The case of the Qādiriyya shows that the decoupling of silsila and nasab
may lead to the dramatic expansion of the ṭarīqa.
380 Alatas

An example of the second trend is the Ṭarīqat Sādat Banī ʿAlawī, commonly
known as the ʿAlawiyya ṭarīqa (Alatas, ʿAlāwiyya). This order emerged in the
seventh/thirteenth century among the Bā ʿAlawī sayyids of the Ḥaḍramawt, in
southern Yemen and is attributed to Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Bā ʿAlawī (d. 653/1255),
also known as al-faqīḥ al-muqaddam (the paramount jurist). This ṭarīqa com-
bined two silsilas: that of the Prophet’s family (ahl al-bayt) handed down
through the nasab, and that of the renowned Ṣūfī master of the Maghrib, Abū
Madyan Shuʿayb (d. 589/1193 or 594/1198). Like other South Arabian Ṣūfī or-
ders, the ʿAlawiyya ṭarīqa never became a fully institutionalized order. In the
absence of developed infrastructures, nasab played a crucial role in securing
transmission of knowledge and succession of leadership. As a result, most
Bā ʿAlawī scholars did not formally initiate their Bā ʿAlawī children into the
ʿAlawiyya ṭarīqa, as it was assumed that they are born into the ṭarīqa, just as
they are born into the lineage. Thus, if a Bā ʿAlawī sayyid adopts another silsila,
it may be seen as a betrayal of his nasab. While the ʿAlawiyya ṭarīqa never man-
aged to become widespread like the Qādiriyya, it has, nevertheless, taken root
in regions across the Indian Ocean, largely through the diasporic mobility of
the Bā ʿAlawī sayyids (Ho).

4 Hereditary Succession and Ṣūfī Dynasties

Other ṭarīqas, most notably the Naqshbandiyya, have emphasised a non-

hereditary mode of leadership succession. Descent from the Prophet or the
founder of a ṭarīqa alone does not, in the view of the early Naqshbandī mas-
ters, constitute an adequate prerequisite for ṭarīqa leadership. A future leader
ought to have reached a certain spiritual station (maqām) through the practice
of spiritual wayfaring (sulūk). Only those who have achieved such stations are
deemed to be credible Ṣūfī masters who can guide others. While this stance
may be the founding principle of the Naqshbandiyya, as early as the eighth/
fourteenth century, Ṣūfī masters affiliated to this silsila had “split into numer-
ous hereditary branches and formed several rival dynasties” (Papas, 38), gener-
ating internal debates over the appropriate logic of succession.
The Juybārī family of Bukhara, for example, was a family of Naqshbandī
masters that became an influential and well-endowed spiritual dynasty. The
eldest son of the previous master became the head of the dynasty, while the
younger brothers moved elsewhere (like India, where the Mughal rulers re-
mained devoted to the Naqshbandiyya ṭarīqa) and established their own influ-
ence (Foltz). Not all masters accepted the principle of primogeniture in the
logic of succession. In fact, primogeniture was a point of contention among
Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 381

Naqshbandī masters even when they accepted hereditary succession. Other

Naqshbandī masters, like Khwāja ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār (d. 895/1490), mixed
the two methods of succession (hereditary and spiritual), by naming their sons
and disciples as their successors. Thus, in reality, nasab played a vital, albeit
contested, role in the logic of succession among early Naqshbandīs, notwith-
standing the ṭarīqa’s original emphasis on the primacy of spiritual state over
descent.
Subsequent Naqshbandī circles produced not only silsila texts but also nasab
texts that present various lineages established by the Ṣūfī masters. Significantly,
prophetic descent became increasingly central to the Naqshbandī logic of
succession. Alexandre Papas notes how such an evolution in the Naqshbandī
circles was driven by the prospect of “probable loss of spirituality in their own
ranks.” That is, “they were conscious of the usual danger of time, so they found
a solution in the identification of initiation and heredity” (Papas, 46). At the
same time, hereditary succession was perceived as a way to avoid interruption
in the silsila, prevent the possibility of conflict between possible successors,
and ensure the smooth transfer of spiritual and material possessions, from
esoteric knowledge and secret formulas to lands and private libraries (Papas,
46–7). In this case, nasab worked to safeguard the durability and smooth ex-
pansion of the silsila.
Some ṭarīqas have even transformed into political dynasties, the most fa-
mous case being the Ṣafavid order attributed to and named after Ṣafī l-Dīn
al-Ardabīlī (735/1334). Ṣafī himself assumed the leadership of an already es-
tablished Ṣūfī order from his father-in-law, and then eclipsed the latter, and
the leadership of the order was passed on, hereditarily, to Ṣafī’s descendants.
Gradually, the family order was transformed into a militant, politically active,
and propertied religious organisation that was particularly popular among the
nomadic Oghuz Turkic-speaking people in Asia Minor and Azerbaijan who
pledged loyalty to the Ṣafavid house. Finally, under the leadership of Ṣafī’s de-
scendant, Shāh Ismāʿīl (d. 930/1524), the Ṣafavid family combined the forces
of religious devotees and the tribes to establish a powerful political dynasty.
It then succeeded in becoming an empire, and ruled over Iran/Persia for more
than two hundred years (Newman; Vikør in this volume).
A more recent example of this dynamic is the Sanūsiyya ṭarīqa estab-
lished by the Algerian-born Muḥammad b. ʿAlī l-Sanūsī (d. 1276/1859) in
Libya. Al-Sanūsī was a disciple and successor of the Moroccan Ṣūfī master
Aḥmad b. Idrīs al-Fāsī (d. 1253/1837), the founder of the Idrīsiyya ṭarīqa (Vikør;
Evans-Pritchard). Actively preaching among the Bedouins of Cyrenaica,
al-Sanūsī modified the teachings and organisational form of the ṭarīqa to suit
the proclivities of the locals. Upon his death, the leadership of the order was
382 Alatas

passed down to his son Muḥammad al-Mahdī (d. 1320/1902), and subsequently
to al-Mahdī’s brother’s son, Aḥmad al-Sharīf (d. 1352/1933). Al-Sharīf led sev-
eral armed struggles against the French, the Italians, and the British before
he was finally exiled from Libya in 1918. Upon his departure, al-Mahdī’s son,
Muḥammad Idrīs (d. 1403/1983) became the leader of the order. In 1951, after
the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution on Libyan inde-
pendence, Idrīs ascended the throne of the newly founded United Kingdom
of Libya and remained as both a monarch and the supreme leader of the
Sanūsiyya ṭarīqa until 1969, when he was deposed in the coup d’état led by
Colonel Muʿammar al-Qadhdhāfī.
Scholars have suggested that Ṣūfī ṭarīqas that developed “centralized sys-
tems of spiritual leadership were the ones that exercised a regulatory religious
influence in rural tribal communities” (Abun-Nasr, 186). Both the Ṣafavid and
the Sanūsī cases certainly attest to this observation. In both cases, the con-
vergence of nasab and silsila worked to form spiritual dynasties. The supreme
leadership of the order was passed down hereditarily, even though others,
outside the hereditary line, may become disciples and deputies. Loyalty to the
spiritual teachings passed down through a silsila become coterminous with
loyalty to the house of the leader. This very dynamic equipped the ṭarīqa with
the potential to become a political dynasty.

5 Conclusion

Central to the teachings of most, if not all, Ṣūfī ṭarīqas is the belief that true
spiritual knowledge ought to be communicated and imparted directly from
the Ṣūfī masters, going back to the Prophet himself in an unbroken chain of
authoritative and trustworthy transmitters. The importance of an unbroken
chain of knowledge transmission means that there must be some discursive
mechanism and attestation that would allow for its authentication, delinea-
tion, and presentation. Traditionally, genealogical forms, whether nasab or
silsila, have performed this role. Theoretically, nasab and silsila point to two
different genealogical relations that may indeed compete with each other.
Nevertheless, it is more often the case that they are combined and used to-
gether to configure novel forms of spiritual authority; establish saintly families,
family ṭarīqas, and spiritual/political dynasties; ensure a steady transmission
of spiritual knowledge; and help smooth the transfer of the material resources
of a Ṣūfī institution. These intersections of nasab and silsila, of which the vari-
ety and complexity are too immense adequately deal with in this short article,
attest to the impact of the family institution upon Ṣūfī organisations.
Ṣūfī Lineages and Families 383

Bibliography

Abu-Lughod, Lila, Veiled sentiments. Honor and poetry in a Bedouin society, Berkeley,
CA 1986, repr. 2016.
Abun-Nasr, Jamil M., Muslim communities of grace. The Sufi brotherhoods in Islamic re-
ligious life, New York 2007.
Alatas, Ismail Fajrie, ʿAlāwiyya (in Ḥaḍramawt), EI3.
Alatas, Ismail Fajrie, They are the heirs of the Prophet. Discourses on the ahl al-bayt and
religious authority among the Bā ʿAlawī in modern Indonesia, in Chiara Formichi
and R. Michael Feener (eds.), Shiʿism in Southeast Asia. ʿAlid piety and sectarian con-
structions (Oxford 2015), 139–64.
Bashir, Shahzad, Sufi bodies. Religion and society in medieval Islam, New York 2011.
Cornell, Vincent J., Realm of the saint. Power and authority in Moroccan Sufism, Austin
1998.
Duri, A. A., The rise of historical writing among the Arabs, trans. Lawrence I. Conrad,
Princeton 1983.
Evans-Pritchard, E. E., The Sanusi of Cyrenaica, Oxford 1949.
Fisher, H. J., What’s in a Name? The Almoravids of the eleventh century in the western
Sahara, Journal of Religion in Africa 22/4 (1992): 290–317.
Foltz, Richard, The Central Asian Naqshbandi connections of the Mughal emperors,
JIS 7/2 (1996): 229–39.
Geoffroy, Eric, L’apparition des voies. Les khirqa primitives, in Alexandre Popovic and
Gilles Veinstein (eds.), Les Voies d’Allah. Les ordres mystiques dans le monde musul-
man des origines à aujourd’hui (Paris 1996), 44–54.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Malden 2012.
Hammoudi, Abdellah, Master and disciple. The cultural foundations of Moroccan au-
thoritarianism, Chicago 1997.
Ho, Engseng, The graves of Tarim. Genealogy and mobility across the Indian Ocean,
Berkeley, CA 2006.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Marlow, Louise, Ḥasab o Nasab, EIr, XII/1, 23–24.
Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine and Alexandre Papas, Introduction, in Catherine Mayeur-
Jaouen and Alexandre Papas (eds.), Family portraits with saints. Hagiography, sanc-
tity, and family in the Muslim world (Berlin 2014), 7–25.
McGregor, Richard J. A., Sanctity and mysticism in medieval Egypt. The Wafāʾ Sufi order
and the legacy of Ibn ʿArabī, Albany, NY 2004.
Meier, Fritz, Khurāsān and the end of classical Sufism, in Essays on Islamic piety and
mysticism, trans. John O’Kane, Leiden 1999.
Newman, Andrew J., Safavid Iran. Rebirth of a Persian empire, London 2009.
384 Alatas

Papas, Alexandre, Shaykh succession in the classical Naqshbandiyya. Spirituality, he-

redity and the question of body, Asian and African Area Studies 7/1 (2007): 36–49.
Peskes, Esther, Sainthood as patrimony. ʿAbd Allāh al-ʿAydarūs (d. 1461) and his descen-
dants, in Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen and Alexandre Papas (eds.), Family portraits with
saints. Hagiography, sanctity, and family in the Muslim world (Berlin 2014), 125–57.
Rosenthal, Franz, Nasab, EI2.
Trimingham, J. Spencer, The Sufi orders in Islam, Oxford 1971.
Vikør, Knut S., Sufi and scholar on the desert edge. Muḥammad B. ʿAlī Al-Sanūsī and his
brotherhood, Evanston 1995.
 Chapter 21

Established Ṣūfī Orders

Semih Ceyhan

During the Islamic Middle Period (i.e. the sixth/twelfth to the seventh/thir-
teenth centuries) Sufism gained continuity and took on a more disciplined,
systematic institutional form based on the master-disciple relationship. From
this period onwards, the institutionalisation of the Ṣūfī path (ṭarīqa) took
place both internally and externally. Internally, the founding generation of
masters gave the path a systematic identity by incorporating spiritual lineages
(silsila), litanies (awrād), invocations (adhkār), the proper inward and outward
attitudes (ādāb), and doctrinal rules (arkān). Externally, the Ṣūfī path became
a pervasive social phenomenon as a result of endeavours by the founders to
communicate the message not only to their own disciples but also to ordinary
members of society and to those in political power, in an effort to solve indi-
vidual and social problems.

1 Classifications of Ṣūfī Orders

In the late mediaeval period, the founding figure (pīr) of the ṭarīqa, seen as
the embodiment of the theological concept of the “perfect human” (al-insān
al-kāmil), was no longer merely a physical figure that satisfied the spiritual
needs of the disciple. He was also recognised as the “path itself,” which enabled
the connection between God, the universe, and man at a cosmic level. The
idea of an eternal (qadīm) Muḥammadan path (al-ṭarīqa al-Muḥammadiyya)
that reaches back to the Prophet Muḥammad through an uninterrupted chain
of masters was embodied in the founding figures of Ṣūfī orders that remain
in existence today. From the seventh/thirteenth century onwards, being initi-
ated by a shaykh, learning the secret invocation formulas (talqīn al-dhikr), and
embarking on a spiritual journey (al-sayr wa-l-sulūk), came to be understood
as one and the same thing. The institution of the ṭarīqa did not lose its essence
with the passing of the founding master; rather, it gained continuity through
the master’s deputies (khulafāʾ). The diversification of Ṣūfī orders that ramified
into sub-branches became possible through deputies that were dispatched
to various places. Often, it was the families and descendants of the founding

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_023

386 Ceyhan

masters who played pivotal roles in the consolidation of the spiritual educa-
tion (tarbiya) of the path (Alatas in this volume).
Ṣūfī orders, which took shape around the charismatic authority and status
of Ṣūfī shaykhs, assumed an active role in establishing the unity and coher-
ence of the Islamic community by securing the support of Muslim scholars
and Muslim principalities that emerged in the aftermath of the dissolution of
the caliphate (Hodgson, 203–4). The Saljūqs in Iran and Anatolia, the Ayyūbids
in greater Syria and Egypt, and the Mamlūks in Egypt provided political and
economic support for the establishment of lodges and pious endowments
(waqfs) to fund the maintenance of these sites. This support expedited the
institutionalisation of the Ṣūfī orders and helped to expand the geographical
spread of their networks (Knysh, 173; Ephrat and Pinto, Firouzeh, and Hofer
[Endowments] in this volume). Established Ṣūfī orders led to a model of so-
ciety in which people from a very early age learned to act with Muḥammad
manners and courtesy, leading to the internalisation of the Prophet’s way of
life (Sunna), and even those who were not affiliated with any Ṣūfī order even-
tually emulated the highly refined manners observed in every phase of life.
These orders may also have been accepted by society at large because of the
eclectic way in which the shaykhs internalised religious and worldly sciences;
in addition, their intellectual and spiritual competence was not restricted by
the limitations Muslim scholars faced, and this enabled them to more directly
address the existential problems of individuals (Chih in this volume; Sedgwick
in this volume).
The main Ṣūfī orders that have survived over a long period took their names
from the agnomens (kunya) or surnames (laqab) of the founding pīrs. Dozens
of sub-branches stemmed from the main orders. In general, with regard to the
teaching of spiritual discipline and virtues, the founders of sub-branches made
only minor changes in the fundamental methods of the main order. The sub-
branches made some alterations due to historical or geographical contexts, but
were called (in written sources and in oral traditions) by the name of the main
order they originated from or as distinct ṭarīqas, without reference to the main
order. A number of Ṣūfī orders far from the centre sometimes internalised local
elements to such an extent that they came to appear as heterodox movements.
In any case, all Ṣūfī orders of the early modern period represented themselves
as unbroken lineages of spiritual masters that originated from the Prophet.
With the exception of the Naqshbandiyya, whose lineage came from the first
caliph Abū Bakr, the lineages of all institutionalised orders descended from the
fourth caliph ʿAlī. Even though the Ottoman hagiographical compendium by
Ḥulvī (d. 1064/1654), the Lemeẓāt, mentioned certain types of ṭarīqas that de-
scended from the other two caliphs (namely, ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb and ʿUthmān
Established Ṣūfī Orders 387

b. ʿAffān), most orders that have survived to the present day have ʿAlawī lin-
eages (that is, lineages whose main connection to the Prophet Muḥammad
was ʿAlī) (Ḥulvī, 40, 46; Ḥarīrīzāde, I, fol. 8b; Wijdānī, 94).
Ṣūfīs have sometimes classified themselves according to the educational
methods they use and the formulas of invocation they assign to their disciples:
vocal ritual repetition (dhikr/ṭarīq al-jahrī) and silent ritual repetition (dhikr/
ṭarīq al-khafī). Although the silent method was specific to the Naqshbandiyya,
some ṭarīqas practiced both kinds of invocation. Ṣūfī orders that practiced a
vocal type of dhikr differed among themselves as to which method to prac-
tice collectively, i.e. quʿūdī (sitting), qiyāmī (standing), or dawrānī (turning in
concentric circles). Ṣūfī orders that undertake spiritual journeys by chanting
the names of God were called “asmāʾī ” orders, whereas those that chant only
the essential name of God (ism al-dhāt) were called “musammā” orders. The
Naqshbandiyya and the Mawlawiyya/Mevleviyye are examples of musammā
orders, while the Khalwatiyya and the Qādiriyya were asmāʾī orders. According
to another classification, Ṣūfī orders differed on the basis of the main nature of
their spiritual journeying, whether they were nafsānī (journeying within the
self) or rūḥānī (journeying of the spirit). In rūḥānī journeying, all one’s efforts
were concentrated on strengthening the spirit, through litanies and invoca-
tions, with the belief that this neutralised the nafs, which was considered the
source of evil; by contrast, in nafsānī journeying, the traveller tried to pacify
his nafs directly through riyāḍa (ascetic discipline) and mujāhada (spiritual
struggle) (Aydınlı, 123–9, 154–7; Râsim Efendi, 274, 424; Inançer, Rituals). Ṣūfī
authors often note that although Ṣūfī orders used different methods of educa-
tion and discipline, the ultimate goal each aspired to was the same.

2 A Cartography of Ṣūfī Orders

The groups (ṭāʾifas) that congregated and organised around charismatic Ṣūfī
masters in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, North Africa, Central Asia, Iran, Anatolia, and
India (the geographical origins of the main Ṣūfī orders) from the sixth/twelfth
to the nineteenth centuries developed common characteristics in terms of so-
cial and spiritual practices (Ohlander, 1). The main Ṣūfī orders that originated
in the centuries in question encompassed a large part of the world through
networks and sub-branches. We present below a tentative cartography of the
main institutionalised Ṣūfī networks, according to their own terms and de-
scriptions, that is, those of their founders and their saints, their successors and
deputies, their main practical or doctrinal characteristics, and their most com-
monly used writings. This cartography is by no means complete and only aims
388 Ceyhan

to present a synthesis of Ṣūfīs’ own representation of Ṣūfī paths as described,

for instance, in late mediaeval and early modern biographical surveys.

2.1 From Iraq: Qādiriyya, Rifāʿiyya, and Suhrawardiyya

The first widespread, organised Ṣūfī order was the Baghdad-based Qādiriyya,
which was named after ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (d. 561/1166) (Buehler, Işın, and
Zarcone (eds.)). The powerful sermons and lectures of al-Jīlānī, who estab-
lished a madrasa and a ribāṭ (outpost) in Baghdad and who was revered by
Ḥanbalī circles there, attracted a large number of people in a short time. Along
with Aḥmad al-Rifāʿī (d. 578/1182), Aḥmad al-Badawī (d. 675/1276), and Ibrāhīm
al-Dasūqī (d. 676/1278), al-Jīlānī was considered one of the four greatest poles
(al-aqṭāb al-arbaʿa) by Ṣūfīs in the Middle East. The four great poles were
seen as the inheritors of the four great prophets (Moses, Jesus, Abraham, and
Muḥammad) (Sharnūbī, 43–8). Other orders asked for the spiritual assistance
of these poles during their remembrance ceremonies. According to late Ṣūfī
authors, the prediction of Tāj al-ʿĀrifīn Abū l-Wafāʾ al-Baghdādī (d. 501/1107),
the founder of the Baghdad-based Wafāʾiyya order, about the saintly eminence
of al-Jīlānī—an eminence that remained long after his death and in fact be-
came perpetual—, came true. Late Ṣūfī authors argued that the saintly effu-
sion of al-Jīlānī was the main element in the spread of the order over a large
area throughout subsequent centuries (Rifʿat, 701).
The spread of the Qādiriyya over a large geographical area was undoubt-
edly the result of the travels of al-Jīlānī’s biological descendants. Many Qādirī
sub-branches can be traced to the founding master through his sons ʿAbd
al-Wahhāb, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, ʿAbd al-Razzāq, and ʿAbd al-Jabbār (Wijdānī, 116).
Before his death, al-Jīlānī appointed his son ʿAbd al-Wahhāb as the headmaster
of the madrasa and the shaykh of the ribāṭ. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb’s role in the gov-
ernment (as minister of justice) during the time of the caliph al-Nāṣir (r. 575–
622/1180–1225) increased the power of the order. The Dāʾūdiyya branch, which
spread to the greater Syria/Shām region, and the Ghawthiyya branch, which
was widespread in India, can both be traced to ʿAbd al-Wahhāb. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz,
the ancestor of the Qādirī sharīfs in Baghdad, took the order to the Levant. The
Fāriẓiyya branch, which is still widespread in Egypt, is also traced to ʿAbd al-
ʿAzīz. The Qādirī sub-branches in Hama (Syria), India (the Gharībiyya), Central
Asia, northern Iraq (the Khāliṣiyya), and the Balkans can be traced to the third
son ʿAbd al-Razzāq.
The spread of the order to Africa took place through the descendants of
ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. ʿAbd al-Qādir (d. 695/1295), who descended from another son
of al-Jīlānī. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz founded the Qāsimiyya branch with its centre in
Abyssinia. The Qādirī shaykhs Aḥmad al-Bakkāʾī (d. 910/1504) and later, Sīdī
Established Ṣūfī Orders 389

Mukhtār b. Aḥmad al-Kuntī (d. 1226/1811) spread the order in the western
Sahara. Another son of the founding master, Ibrāhīm, was the ancestor of the
Qādirī sharīfs in a number of cities in Morocco. The Qādiriyya reached Bengal
through a Qādirī shaykh named Pīr Shāh Dawla (d. 942/1535 or 980/1573),
and later spread in the region through Qumays al-Qādirī, a descendant of
ʿAbd al-Razzāq. The order reached the Gujarat through Sayyid Jamāl Phatrī
(d. 971/1564), a descendant of al-Jīlānī’s son ʿAbd al-Wahhāb. In Anatolia,
the Qādiryya formed additional sub-branches: the Ashrafiyya in the ninth/
fifteenth century, the Rūmiyya in Istanbul in the eleventh/seventeenth cen-
tury; the Rasmiyya in the twelfth/eighteenth century; and in the nineteenth
century, the Khāliṣiyya, the Mushtāqiyya, and the Anwāriyya.
The Qādiriyya adopted a vocalised remembrance, with its own particular
rite of dawrān (a concentric circle of dervishes turning clockwise or counter-
clockwise). The short litanies (sing. ḥizb) recited by Ṣūfīs after each prayer were
composed and instituted by al-Jīlānī himself. The Qādirīs performed the spiri-
tual retreat (khalwa) like the Khalwatīs and also practiced the rābiṭa (tying the
heart to the master) as in the Naqshbandiyya. In addition, remembrance and
mawlid ceremonies were held every year at the tomb of al-Jīlānī in Baghdad,
under green banners unfurled by groups of Qādirīs who came from around
the world. The most widely read books by Ṣūfīs were those written by al-Jīlānī:
al-Ghunya, al-Fatḥ al-rabbānī, and Futūḥ al-ghayb (Çakır; Azamat).
The fact that Aḥmad al-Rifāʿī took a group of disciples from Manṣūr
al-Baṭāʾiḥī (d. 540/1145) was seen as the reason for the early reorganisation of
the Rifāʿiyya in Iraq (Popovic, part I). Manṣūr gave al-Rifāʿī the title “shaykh
of the shaykhs” and settled him in the lodge at Umm ʿUbayda, declaring him
the head of all the lodges that pledged allegiance to him. The ṭarīqa literature
included a prominent story about the Prophet Muḥammad extending his hand
from his tomb for Aḥmad al-Rifāʿī to kiss during his visit to Medina, all of this
witnessed by a large crowd of visitors (al-Dīrīnī, 6–27).
The first person to sit on the sheepskin of spiritual guidance (irshād) in the
lodge (riwāq) of Umm ʿUbayda after al-Rifāʿī was his nephew and son-in-law ʿAlī
b. ʿUthmān (d. 584/1188), then his other son-in-law ʿAbd al-Raḥīm (d. 604/1207)
took on the duty, then his grandson from his first son-in-law Ibrāhīm al-Aʿzab
(d. 609/1212) became the shaykh; thus the position of shaykh continued in the
family. Through Abū l-Fatḥ al-Wāsiṭī (d. 632/1234), whom Aḥmad al-Rifāʿī had
sent to Alexandria, the Rifāʿiyya became one of the earliest ṭarīqas to form in
Egypt. In the time of ʿIzz al-Dīn Aḥmad al-Ṣayyād (d. 670/1271–2), also a de-
scendant of al-Rifāʿī, the order spread in Iraq, Syria, Ḥijāz, Yemen, and Egypt,
thereby making the Ṣayyādiyya the most widespread branch of the Rifāʿiyya.
The founder of the Ḥarīriyya branch, ʿAlī l-Ḥarīrī (d. 620/1223), was a grandson
390 Ceyhan

of al-Rifāʿī through his daughter and is referred to in the sources as the found-
er of the Rifāʿiyya in Syria. The Rifāʿiyya order had sub-branches such as the
Kayyāliyya (Aleppo), the Jandaliyya (Damascus), the Jamīliyya (Iraq), the
ʿAṭāʾiyya (Jerusalem), and the Jabartiyya (Yemen).
Certain acts are considered fundamental features of Rifāʿī rituals, these in-
clude holding fire with bare hands, walking into fire, cooling a piece of hot iron
called a “rose” (Tk. gül) and licking it repeatedly, piercing various parts of the
body with sharp tools such as swords, daggers, skewers etc., holding poison-
ous animals without being harmed, and chewing pieces of broken glass. It was
maintained that these secrets of the order could be performed by anyone in
the service of al-Rifāʿī, with the permission of the shaykh (Tahralı).
The Baghdad-based Suhrawardiyya spread in the regions of Syria, Iran,
China, Turkestan, Iraq, and especially India (Sobieroj). The order is usually
ascribed to Abū Ḥafṣ Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī (d. 632/1234), but
some Ṣūfī authors suggested that the order began with Abū l-Najīb Suhrawardī
(d. 563/1168) since he played a major role in the upbringing and education of
Shihāb al-Dīn, who was his nephew as well as disciple (Jāmī, 417–8). Shihāb
al-Dīn founded lodges in Damascus and Aleppo and spread the order over
a vast area from Iran to Turkestan and to India through emissaries (depu-
ties) he sent to those regions. The order remained active in Baghdad at the
lodge of Ma‌ʾmūniyya through his son ʿImād al-Dīn Muḥammad Suhrawardī
(d. 655/1257), who succeeded him, and then through ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, his grand-
son. The Suhrawardiyya spread into Iran through the efforts of Najīb al-Dīn ʿAlī
b. Buzghush (d. 678/1280). One of Najīb al-Dīn’s successors, Nūr al-Dīn ʿAbd
al-Ṣamad, founded the Zayniyya in the ninth/fifteenth century. Zayn al-Dīn
al-Khwāfī (d. 838/1435) established the ṭarīqa in Herat, and from there it spread
to Khurāsān, Ḥijāz, Syria, Egypt, Anatolia, and Rumelia (Öngören, Tarihte). The
Suhrawardiyya entered India through the deputies of the master. The teach-
ings of the order were actively propagated in the Delhi region by Ḥamīd al-Dīn
Nāgawrī (d. 673/1274) and Nūr al-Dīn Mubārak Ghaznawī (d. 632/1234), in the
Bengal region by Jalāl al-Dīn Tabrīzī (d. 641–2/1244), and in Multan by Bahāʾ
al-Dīn Zakariyyāʾ Multānī (d. 661/1262 [?]). In Kashmir in the ninth/fifteenth
century, the Suhrawardī Ṣūfīs from the branch of Jalāl al-Dīn Ḥusayn Bukhārī/
Makhdūm-i Jahāniyān (d. 785/1384) were among those who kept Sufism alive.
The lineage of Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī was also called Shihābiyya in ref-
erence to al-Suhrawardī’s nephew Shihāb al-Dīn. When Abū l-Najīb died, his
chief deputy Abū Rashīd Quṭb al-Dīn al-Abharī (d. 572/1177) succeeded him
and the Abharī sub-order emerged. After al-Abharī, Awḥad al-Dīn al-Kirmānī
(Awḥadiyya) continued the order through Rukn al-Dīn al-Sujāsī (d. 635/1238).
After Rukn al-Dīn al-Sujāsī, the Zāhidiyya order emerged from Ibrāhīm Zāhid
Established Ṣūfī Orders 391

al-Jīlānī (d. 700/1301). Ibrāhīm Zāhid al-Jīlānī was known as the shaykh who
established the method of spiritual journeying with the invocation of divine
names, and thus his spiritual guidance became renowned in Iran and eastern
Azerbaijan. From the Zāhidiyya order two other orders emerged: the Ṣafawiyya
and the Khalwatiyya.
In the seventh/thirteenth century during the Saljūq period, the Suhrawar­
diyya spread in Anatolia through Fakhr al-Dīn ʿIrāqī (d. 688/1289)—a deputy
of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Zakariyyā—who had the disposition of a Qalandar (an antino-
mian dervish). In his Ādāb al-muridīn, Abū l-Najīb al-Suhrawardī explained the
general rules that every disciple must comply with, and in the ʿAwārif al-maʿārif,
Shihāb al-Dīn al-Suhrawardī revealed the details of the fundamental principles
of Sufism; these works did not belong exclusively to the Suhrawardī order, but
were works referred to by all Ṣūfī orders teaching the basic manners (Öngören,
Sühreverdiyye, 42–5).

2.2 From Syria: Saʿdiyya

The Saʿdiyya was a major Ṣūfī order founded by Saʿd al-Dīn al-Jibāwī (seventh/
thirteenth to eighth/fourteenth century) (von Schlegell). He continued the
tradition of the Shaybānī branch of the Rifāʿiyya (through his father Yūnus
al-Shaybānī) in Jibā, a village in Syria. In order to better understand the distinc-
tive characteristics that set the Saʿdiyya apart from the so-called Shaybāniyya,
we need to look at a spiritual incident (narrated by biographers such as
al-Muḥibbī, 1:35) that resulted in al-Jibāwī’s meeting with the Prophet and
his “second birth.” During this incident, the Prophet put a date that he had
blown over with his blessed breath into al-Jibāwī’s mouth. As a result of this
prophetic blessing, al-Jibāwī prospered both spiritually and physically. This
incident was institutionalised as a ritual enacted in Saʿdī remembrance gather-
ings. Although a large number of disciples pledged allegiance to al-Jibāwī dur-
ing his travels to Iraq, Jerusalem, and India, the spread of the path mainly took
place in the tenth/sixteenth and eleventh/seventeenth centuries. Within two
centuries, Saʿd al-Dīn al-Jibāwī’s tribe and ṭarīqa became widespread in Syrian
cities such as Hama, Homs, and Aleppo and in towns such as Akka, Jenin, and
Nablus (in modern Palestine). In later periods, the order spread even further to
Egypt, into other areas of Palestine, Syria, Anatolia, and Rumelia.
Turkish Ṣūfī sources (Vassaf, 1:427; Ḥarīrīzāde, II, fols. 129a–138a) indicate
that, over time, the Saʿdiyya ramified into five different branches. The Taghli­
biyya (Shaybiyya) and Wafāʾiyya branches gained popularity in Damascus, the
Sharrābiyya branch spread in and around Hama, the Salāmiyya in Istanbul,
and the ʿĀjiziyya branch in the Balkans. With the exception of the Sharrābiyya
and ʿĀjiziyya, all of the Saʿdī branches were founded by shaykhs who were
392 Ceyhan

descendants of al-Jibāwī. In its practices, the Saʿdiyya resembled the Rifāʿiyya.

The dawsa was a ceremony for sick people who came to the lodge to find cures
for their diseases. During the ceremony, the shaykh walked over the sick lying
prone on the ground, or walked over them while astride a horse. The people
who were healed during the dawsa regarded this as evidence of God’s exis-
tence and also as a miracle (karāma) of the shaykh (Yücer, 272). Some scholars
have asserted that the Saʿdiyya had the features of a military organisation. In
the zāwiyas established against the crusader onslaughts, a certain system of
ranking was used on the battlefield as well as to allocate certain daily chores
(Ghāzī, 1:148). The Saʿdiyya order engaged in a peculiar type of dhikr. When it
started, the shaykh and the dervish stared each other in the eye, whereupon
the dervish became completely immobile, as if he were inanimate. The shaykh
would gaze upon him at the end of the ceremony, and the dervish “would come
back to life” (İnançer, Sa’dilikte, 394).

2.3 From Egypt: Badawiyya and Dasūqiyya

The order ascribed to Aḥmad al-Badawī, whose tomb is in the Egyptian city of
Ṭanṭā, was primarily known as the Badawiyya or Aḥmadiyya (Kara). Its origins
were attributed to the Rifāʿiyya through Shaykh Barrī, to the Shādhiliyya who
were affiliated with Quṭb al-Qarāfī, ʿAbdallāh al-Maghribī, and Abū l-Ḥasan
al-Shādhilī, to the Mashīshiyya and Ibn al-Mashīsh (d. 625/1227–8), and to the
Qādiriyya through the Shādhiliyya. The arguments that the Badawiyya were
related to the Rifāʿiyya continue, despite the fact that the Badawiyya was dis-
tinct in terms of its manners (ādāb) and rules (arkān). Narrations about the
life of Aḥmad al-Badawī in Ṭanṭā relate that he used to sit on the roof (saṭḥ) of
his home, stare at the sun, and cover his face with a double veil. With a single
gaze, he perfected aspirants who came to become his disciples, and without
needing to engage in asceticism and striving, they would become his represen-
tatives and be dispatched to various locations as shaykhs in their own right.
In this respect, it would be more accurate to describe the Badawiyya as an
order not based on spiritual companionship (ṣuḥba) but on the gaze (naẓar)
of the shaykh and his spiritual impregnation of the disciple (talqīḥ). The final
stage of the establishment of the order took place during the time of ʿAbd al-
ʿĀl (d. 733/1332), the chief deputy of the master. After that the order ramified
into four branches (the Kannāsiyya, Manāʾifiyya, Salāmiyya, and Marāziqa or
Imbābiyya) known as the bayt al-kabīr; and at this time the mawlid ceremonies
at Ṭanṭā began (Shaʿrānī, 258–64; ʿAbd al-Ṣamad, 44).
The Dasūqiyya order is attributed to Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī (d. 696/1296–7)
who was born in Egypt (Le Chatelier, 190–4). Books of feats and miracles
(manāqib-nāma) devoted to al-Dasūqī emphasise his mysterious side, such as
Established Ṣūfī Orders 393

his knowledge of Syriac, Hebrew, and ancient Egyptian languages. He was also
credited with understanding the language of animals and birds and the occult
sciences. Al-Jawhara al-muḍīʾah fī sulūk al-ṭālib wa-nuṣḥ al-barīya, attributed
to Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī, was the most commonly known source that introduced
his path (Khalaf Allāh, 112–3). Abū l-Fatḥ al-Wāsiṭī, who spread the Rifāʿiyya in
Egypt, was the grandfather of Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī; in this regard, the Dasūqiyya
had a link with the Rifāʿiyya. Some Ṣūfī scholars (e.g., al-Bakrī, 383) considered
the Dasūqiyya a branch of the Badawiyya or the Shādhiliyya. The Dasūqiyya
ṭarīqa spread more through its disciples than through al-Dasūqī’s family mem-
bers and descendants. The members of the Dasūqiyya, who usually wore green
garments, often chanted the divine name “Yā Dāʾim” during their congrega-
tional recitation (tilāwa) or remembrance ceremonies. The order ramified into
four branches: the Shahāwiyya, named after Sayyid Muḥammad al-Shahāwī
(d. 949/1542); the Sharnūbiyya, named after al-Sharnūbī (d. 994/1586); the
ʿĀshūriyya, named after Ṣaliḥ ʿĀshūr al-Maghribī; and the Tāziyya from al-Tāzī
(De Jong, Ṭuruq; Khalaf Allāh, 289–91).

2.4 From North Africa: Shādhiliyya and Tijāniyya

The Shādhiliyya, founded in Ifrīqiyya, and the Tijāniyya, founded in Algeria,
were the two most widespread orders in the Arab world and Africa. Abū
l-Ḥasan al-Shādhilī (d. 656/1258), who went into retreat on Mount Zaghouan in
the town of Shādhila in Ifrīqiyya on the instruction of his shaykh ʿAbd al-Salām
b. Mashīsh, began serving as a shaykh in his mid-thirties, thereby laying the
foundations of the Shādhiliyya (Geoffroy (ed.)). Al-Shādhilī left for Alexandria
in 642/1244, a move that ultimately led the ṭarīqa to spread to larger segments
of society. Alexandria, which was home to the graves of such famous Shādhilī
saints as Abū l-ʿAbbās al-Mursī, who succeeded al-Shadhilī; Yāqūt al-ʿArshī,
one of al-Mursī’s caliphs; and Makīn al-Dīn al-Asmar, a favourite disciple of
al-Shādhilī, became the centre from where the Shādhiliyya spread throughout
the Muslim world. Over time, the order spread primarily in the Maghrib and
Syria, then in the Arab world, the Indian subcontinent, Malaysia, Indonesia,
Africa, Anatolia, and the Balkans. The most renowned and influential Shādhilī
shaykh in Istanbul was Muḥammad Ẓāfir al-Madanī (d. 1903). Sultan ʿAbd
al-Ḥamīd II had a zāwiya (the Ertuğrul Tekke Mosque) built for the shaykh in
Istanbul (Güven, 405–14).
The two most common branches of the Shādhiliyya are the Darqawiyya,
whose members were well-known for the large-grained prayer beads they
wore around their necks, and the ʿAlāwiyya, founded by Aḥmad al-ʿAlāwī
(d. 1934) (De Jong, Materials; Lings, ch. 3–4). In his time, al-Shādhilī organ-
ised large gatherings on important occasions, especially to celebrate the birth
394 Ceyhan

of the Prophet (al-mawlid al-nabawī), and set up processions with huge ban-
ners and giant timpani-like drums. Masses of people attended these meetings
(al-Munāwī, 127; Maḥmūd, 44–5). To date, members of the Shādhiliyya hold
annual commemoration ceremonies called iḥtifāl. The most frequently recited
texts in the order were al-Shādhilī’s Ḥizb al-baḥr, Ibn Mashīsh’s Ṣalawāt, and
al-Jazūlī’s Dalāʾil al-khayrāt. Al-Ḥikam al-ʿAṭāʾiyya of al-Iskandarī (d. 709/1309)
and Qawāʿid al-taṣawwuf of al-Zarrūq (d. 899/1494) were also commonly read
works. With over a hundred sub-branches, the Shādhiliyya was one of the most
widespread and non-centralised Ṣūfī orders. In the nineteenth century, the
Sanūsiyya in Libya, the Yashruṭiyya in Palestine and the Būzīdiyya in Morocco
were prominent sub-branches of the order.
The Tijāniyya order, founded at the end of the twelfth/eighteenth century
by Aḥmad al-Tijānī (d. 1230/1815), first spread to northwestern African cities,
especially in Morocco and Algeria (Abun-Nasr). With greater influence and
geographical prominence, as a result of its sub-branches, the order has been
popular since its establishment. Al-Tijānī received permission (ijāza) to initiate
people into both the Qādiriyya and Khalwatiyya orders, and according to the
hagiographical tradition, experienced a magnificent spiritual unveiling (kashf),
in which the Prophet directly authorised him to serve as master, whereupon he
named the order Ṭarīqa al-Aḥmadiyya/Muḥammadiyya. For this reason, in the
Tijānī sources, we find lineages connecting the founding master directly to the
Prophet Muḥammad. Sīdī ʿAlī b. ʿĪsāʾ al-Ṭammāsī, Maḥmūd al-Manāʾī, Ibrāhīm
al-Riyāḥī, Aḥmad al-Tijānī’s sons, Muḥammad al-Kabīr and Muḥammad
al-Ṣaghīr, spread the order across North Africa; al-Ḥājj ʿUmar al-Fūtī, al-Ḥājj
Mālik Siy and Ibrāhīm Niyās in Senegal and in a number of neighbouring
countries; Muḥammad al-Ḥāfiẓ al-Mukhtār and Aḥmad b. Amīn al-Shinqīṭī in
Mauritania. The litany of the order is two short ṣalāwats that were (allegedly)
given to al-Tijānī directly by the Prophet. The fact that al-Tijānī was initiated
directly by the Prophet led most Tijānīs to conclude that their ṭarīqa was su-
perior to all others. Thinking that all aspects of law can be received from a
saint who had attained perfect union with the Prophet, Tijānīs emphasised
that such a friend of God does not need the imāms of the four schools of juris-
prudence to derive rulings (al-Tashītī, 50). Yet, in contrast to these arguments,
Tijānī shaykhs have long attached great importance to exoteric Islamic scienc-
es and developed a literature of rebuttals against the criticisms leveled at the
foundations of their ṭarīqa, especially in western Africa (Abun-Nasr, 142–5).

2.5 From Central Asia and Iran: Kubrawiyya, Yasawiyya,

Naqshbandiyya, and Khalwatiyya
Between the sixth/twelfth and eighth/fourteenth centuries, four major or-
ders exercised tremendous influence on the Islamisation of the regions
Established Ṣūfī Orders 395

heavily populated by Turks. These orders are the Kubrawiyya, the Yasawiyya,
the Khwājagān Ṣūfīs and their continuation by the Naqshbandiyya, and the
Khalwatiyya. It is noteworthy that these orders have been accepted by the
common folk of the region as well as their rulers.
Najm al-Dīn Kubrā (d. 617/1220), the founder of Kubrawiyya, served as master
in a land ruled by the Khwārazm Shāhs (Algar, Kobraviya i and ii). Ṣūfī hagiog-
raphers claimed that Kubrā courageously faced the Mongols during their siege
of Khwārazm in 618/1221 and was martyred (Khūrd, 528–9). Numerous impor-
tant figures of the period, such as Majd al-Dīn Baghdādī, ʿAlī Lālā, Saʿd al-Dīn
Ḥammūya, Jamāl al-Dīn al-Jīlī, Najm al-Dīn Dāya al-Rāzī, Sayf al-Dīn Bākharzī,
and Bābā Kamāl Jandī, were all caliphs of Kubrā. Majd al-Dīn Baghdadī fol-
lowed in the footsteps of his master in Khwārazm, whereas al-Jīlī, Ḥammūya,
Dāya, and ʿAlī Lālā joined the group of religious scholars and men of letters who
migrated westward before the Mongol invasion. Bākharzī and Jandī remained
in Central Asia and endeavoured to integrate the new Mongolian rulers and
non-Muslim Turkic tribes into the Islamic tradition. Najm al-Dīn Kubrā’s work,
al-Uṣūl al-ʿashara can be described as the methodology of the Kubrawī order.
In it, he considered his order al-ṭarīq al-shaṭṭār, the way of rapture; this con-
sists of achieving union with God at the inception of the path, on the basis of
volitional death (al-mawt al-irādī). This differs from the way of other paths, in
which disciples achieve union with God at the end (Kübrā, 46–9). Following
the first series of Kubrawī caliphs, the order was represented by ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla
Simnānī, ʿAlī Hamadānī, Muḥammad Nūrbakhsh, and ʿAbdallāh Barzishābādī.
The Kubrawiyya spread to Iran, Central Asia, Khurāsān, Anatolia, India, and
China. Through Muḥammad Nūrbakhsh, a caliph of Isḥāq Khuṭṭalānī (a suc-
cessor of Hamadānī), the Shīʿī Nūrbakhshiyya branch emerged, and through
another caliph, ʿAbdallāh Barzishābādī, the Shīʿī Dhahabiyya branch was
formed. By the tenth/sixteenth century, the lineages of the Sunnī branches of
the Kubrawiyya did not disappear, but weakened, whereas the Dhahabiyya and
the Nūrbakhshiyya branches flourished (Gökbulut, 169–80).
In the sixth/twelfth and seventh/thirteenth centuries, the Yasawiyya
(named after Aḥmad al-Yasawī, d. 562/1166 who was mistakenly considered
by Naqshbandī sources to be a disciple of Yūsuf al-Hamadānī, d. 535/1140, a
leading figure of Sufism in Central Asia) and the Khwājagān order (ascribed
to ʿAbd al-Khāliq al-Ghijduwānī, a caliph of Yūsuf al-Hamadānī), was insti-
tutionalised (Zarcone, Yasawiyya). The path of al-Yasawī, known as the “pīr
[master] of Turkestan,” first spread to Tashkent, the Seyhun region, Khwārazm,
and Transoxiana thanks to the efforts of his deputies Saʿīd Atā and Ḥakīm Atā;
it then spread to the Volga, Anatolia, and India (Nawāʾī). The Dīwān-i ḥikmat,
which contains the aphorisms attributed al-Yasawī, was one of the most widely
read works on Sufism in verse in modern times. The vocalised remembrance
396 Ceyhan

rite peculiar to the Yasawiyya, performed collectively, was called dhikr-i arra
(lit., “the invocation of the saw” in Persian). As the dhikr progresses, the words
were no longer pronounced distinctly, thus becoming a rattle, which sounded
like a saw.
The order known as the Bakriyya was considered by Naqshbandī authors
such as Üsküdārī (d. 1200/1786) to have begun with the first caliph Abū Bakr.
It was traced to the time of Bāyazid al-Bisṭāmī, at which point it was re-
ferred to as Ṭayfūriyya (from Bāyazid’s name, Ṭayfūr), and this lasted to the
time of Yūsuf al-Hamadānī. It was then known as the “Khwājagān path” until
the time of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband (d. 791/1389), after which it became the
Naqshbandiyya (Üsküdārī, 28b). According to this Ṣūfī categorisation, Yūsuf
al-Hamadānī must be considered the first name in the Khwājagan order.
However, the more common view current among Naqshbandīs maintains that
the real founder of the Khwājagān ṭarīqa was ʿAbd al-Khāliq al-Ghijduwānī (a
deputy of al-Hamadānī) who was called the “head of the Khwājagān lineage”
(sar-silsila-yi Khwājagān). The eight principles, known as kalimāt al-qudsiyya
(“the holy words”), which determined the spiritual elements of the Khwājagān
order and later that of the Naqshbandiyya, were established by al-Ghijduwānī;
with three additional principles from Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband, the total rose to
eleven. After al-Ghijduwānī, the Khwājagān ṭarīqa continued around Bukhara
with ʿĀrif Rīwgarī, Maḥmūd Anjīr Faghnawī, ʿAlī Rāmitanī, Muḥammad Bābā
Sammāsī, and Amīr Kulāl (Algar, Hâcegân, 431).
The Naqshbandiyya has replaced almost all other orders, especially the
Kubrawiyya and the Yasawiyya, in its native Central Asia, and has spread to
nearly every region of the Islamic world except the Maghrib and sub-Saharan
Africa. Although Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband left no written works behind, he left
two prominent deputies: Muḥammad Pārsā (d. 822/1419–20) and ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn
ʿAṭṭār (d. 802/1400). Pārsā concentrated his efforts on writing books and train-
ing students in the madrasa tradition, whereas the ṭarīqa was continued by
ʿAṭṭār, who had two important caliphs: Niẓām al-Dīn Khāmūsh (d. 853/1449)
and Yaʿqūb al-Charkhī (d. 851/1447). The founder of the Aḥrāriyya branch,
ʿUbaydallāh Aḥrār (d. 895/1490), a deputy of al-Charkhī, was a key figure in the
history of Sufism. Through Aḥrār’s caliph ʿAbdallāh Ilāhī Simāwī (d. 893/1487),
the Aḥrāriyya reached Anatolia and Rumelia, thereby planting the seeds of
the early Anatolian Naqshbandiyya. A sub-branch of the Aḥrāriyya known as
Kāsāniyya or Dahbidiyya quickly spread to Central Asia and eastern Turkestan.
This branch of the Naqshbandiyya, which adopted the vocalised invocation and
music, was the most effective ṭarīqa in Central Asia from the tenth/sixteenth
to the twelfth/eighteenth century. However, with the arrival in Central Asia of
large numbers of shaykhs from the Mujaddidī branch of the Naqshbandiyya
Established Ṣūfī Orders 397

(in India), the Kāsāniyya lost its former influence. The Āfāqiyya branch, which
emerged from the Kāsāniyya, was nonetheless very active in China and Tibet
(Papas, parts 1–3).
One of the most important phases in Naqshbandī history was the emer-
gence of the Mujaddidiyya branch in the eleventh/seventeenth century.
This sub-order was named after the spiritual title of its founder al-Sirhindī
(d. 1034/1624), who was called “Mujaddid-i alf-i thānī” (The renewer of the sec-
ond millennium). Its spread made the Naqshbandiyya one of the most active
orders in India, with the Indian subcontinent becoming the third major centre
of the ṭarīqa, after Central Asia and Anatolia. Giving a new interpretation to
Sufism in his Maktūbāt (The epistles), al-Sirhindī exerted a long-ranging influ-
ence on modern Naqshbandīs. The Khālidiyya is the third largest branch in the
history of the order; it began with Mawlānā Khālid al-Baghdādī (d. 1242/1827),
whose tomb is in Damascus. In addition to Anatolia, this branch spread across
Iraq, Syria, Ḥijāz, the north Caucasus (Dagestan, Chechnya) and Southeast
Asia (Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia). The majority of Naqshbandīs in Turkey
are from the Khālidī branch (Tosun, Nakşibendiyye). The Naqshbandiyya has
two major invocations: the name of the sacred essence (ism al-dhāt) and the
invocation of negation (nafy) and affirmation (ithbāt). Disciples were taught
to concentrate on the five subtle points (al-laṭāʾif al-khamsa) in the lower and
upper sections of the chest, the final one being between the eyebrows. After
the invocations came a phase of introspective contemplation (murāqaba) on
the meanings of certain Qurʾānic verses. Another element was the practice of
concentrating on the image of one’s shaykh by trying to visualise his counte-
nance. The Naqshbandiyya’s congregational remembrance ceremony is called
khatm al-Khwājagān. Their invocation was often silent (Tosun, Nakşibendiyye
[Âdâb ve Erkân]).
Two post-mediaeval Ṣūfī orders are worth mentioning: the Ṣafawiyya and
the Khalwatiyya. Named after Ṣafī l-Dīn al-Ardabīlī (d. 735/1334), a deputy of
Ibrāhīm Zāhid al-Jīlānī (d. 700/1301), the Ṣafawiyya order spread over a large
area that included Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Ḥijāz, Anatolia, and
Rumelia (Mazzaoui, ch. 4). Reaching its zenith of power and influence during
the time of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn al-Ardabīlī (better known as Khwāja ʿAlī, a grandson
Ṣafī l-Dīn), the ṭarīqa became more politically-motivated under the leadership
of Shaykh Junayd b. Ibrāhīm Ṣafawī (d. 864/1460), a grandson of Khwāja ʿAlī.
The Ṣafawī order began to incline towards Shīʿism, hoping to thereby gain a
large following among Shīʿa-oriented tribes in Anatolia. In the beginning of the
tenth/sixteenth century, the Ṣafawī order became Iran’s Ṣafavid state, which of-
ficially adopted Twelver Shīʿism as its religious denomination. Owing to the red
turban that Shaykh Junayd wore, the heterodox groups in Anatolia affiliated
398 Ceyhan

with the Ṣafawiyya came to be called Qizilbāsh (lit., “red heads”) (Minorsky, 61;
Yıldırım, Turkomans, 223–4).
According to the literature of the order, ʿUmar al-Khalwatī (d. 800/1397) was
the first master of the Khalwatiyya, and their centre was initially Azerbaijan
(De Jong, Khalwatiyya). He came to be called Khalwatī because he frequently
observed a spiritual retreat (khalwat) in a tree hollow. The second master was
Yaḥyā al-Shirwānī (d. 870/1466), whose tomb was inside the Shirvānshāhlar
Palace in Baku. Through al-Shirwānī’s caliphs, the order first spread to Anatolia,
and from there to the Balkans, Syria, Egypt, North Africa, Sudan, Abyssinia,
and Southeast Asia. It was the most common ṭarīqa of Ottoman Anatolia.
The Khalwatiyya ramified into four main branches: the Rūshaniyya (found-
ed by Dede ʿUmar Rūshanī, d. 892/1487), the Jamāliyya (founded by Jamāl
al-Dīn al-Khalwatī, d. 899/1494), the Aḥmadiyya (founded by Aḥmad Shams
al-Dīn al-Marmarawī Yiğitbāshī, d. 910/1504) and the Shamsiyya (founded by
Shams al-Dīn Aḥmad Sīvāsī, d. 1006/1597). From these four branches originated
many sub-branches. The Ramaḍāniyya, a sub-branch of the Aḥmadiyya, was
founded by Ramaḍān al-Dīn al-Makhfī (d. 1025/1616) and spread from Anatolia
to the Balkans; the Shaʿbāniyya, a sub-branch of the Jamāliyya, was founded
by Ḥājjī Shaʿbān Walī (d. 976/1568–9), then spread to Egypt through Muṣṭafā
Kamāl al-Dīn al-Bakrī (d. 1162/1749). Many of the Khalwatī sub-branches in Egypt
were extensions of the Bakriyya. The Khalwatiyya spread to Algeria through the
sub-branch called the Raḥmāniyya. In the early twelfth/eighteenth century, a
sub-branch of the Khalwatiyya called the Jerrāḥiyya was founded. Khalwatīs ob-
served the spiritual retreat for the purification of the soul in accordance with a
specific method and manner. The practice of retreat was based on the Prophet’s
retreat into the cave of Ḥirāʾ before the first revelation. Disciples undertook spiri-
tual travelling with seven divine names. There were seven major attributes of the
self (nafs) that corresponded to the first seven divine names. The wird al-sattār
(beginning with “Yā Sattār”) of Yaḥyā al-Shirwānī was read by all Khalwatīs. On
certain days of the week, the congregation engaged in a remembrance ceremony
called dawrān (a concentric movement turning clockwise or reverse) that was
performed with music, and ḍarb-i asmāʾ (a forceful focus and a rapid movement
of the head to the side of the heart while chanting the divine names). Senior
members of the path have produced a vast body of literature that reflects Ibn
al-ʿArabī’s idea of the “oneness of being” (Ceyhan).

2.6 From Anatolia: Mawlawiyya, Bektāshiyya, Bayrāmiyya, and

Jalwatiyya
In seventh-/thirteenth-century Anatolia, the Mawlawiyya/Mevleviyye and
the Bektāshiyya/Bektāşiyye were founded; in the ninth/fifteenth century the
Established Ṣūfī Orders 399

Bayrāmiyya/Bayrāmiyye emerged; and in the eleventh/seventeenth century

the Jalwatiyya/Celvetiyye appeared as a continuation of the Bayrāmī lin-
eage. The Mawlawiyya, centred in the province of Konya, took its name from
Mawlānā Jalāl al-Dīn al-Rūmī (d. 672/1273) (Yazıcı, Margoliouth, and De Jong).
After his death, the order was represented by “çelebīs” (that is, shaykhs who
were invariably descendants of Rūmī) and based in Konya. The Mawlawiyya
expanded its geographical reach and thus influenced the more than one hun-
dred mawlawī-khānas (lodges) in the important urban centres of the Ottoman
Empire, such as Istanbul, Bursa, Damascus, Aleppo, Cairo, and regional centres
such as Lebanon, the Balkans, and the Crimea (Küçük). According to the in-
formation given by the Ottoman biographer Thāqib Dede, the manners of the
order (ādāb al-ṭarīqa), which was highly ritualised, were definitively instituted
during the time of Pīr ʿĀdil Çelebī (d. 864/1460) (Thāqib Dede, 1:134), and the
choreography of the famous whirling ceremony (samāʿ) took its final form dur-
ing the time of Pīr Ḥusayn Çelebī (d. 1077/1666).
Named after Ḥājjī Bektāsh Walī (d. c. 669/1270), the Bektāshiyya is related
to the Wafāʾiyya that was founded in Baghdad by Abū l-Wafāʾ al-Baghdādī
(d. 501/1107), and also to the Yasawiyya (Zarcone, Bektaşiyye). Owing to its piv-
otal role in the establishment of the Janissary Corps, the Bektāshiyya preserved
its influence throughout Ottoman history. Bālim Sulṭān (d. 925/1519), who or-
ganised the order, may have incorporated certain non-Sunnī elements into the
manners and pillars of the ṭarīqa (Rıfkı, 416–7; Yıldırım, Hacı Bektaş, 261–85).
ʿAlī and the people of the Prophet’s household (ahl al-bayt) held a central posi-
tion in the ṭarīqa, as did the twelve Imāms. All Bektāshī rites and rules were
based on the well-known Ṣūfī formula of “four gateways and forty stations.”
According to this formula, the servant of God (ʿabd) can only reach the truth
(al-ḥaqq) by passing through the gateways of law (sharīʿa), path (ṭarīqa), gnosis
(maʿrifa), and pure truth (ḥaqīqa) and then traversing the ten stations associat-
ed with each. Just as the Mawlawiyya had a central structure, Bektāshī lodges,
particularly those in the Balkans, were strictly supervised by the Ḥājjī Bektāsh
Āsitāne (head lodge) in Nevşehir. The ṭarīqa observed the practice of celibacy
(tajarrud), which it took from the Qalandariyya movement. The Bektāshī re-
membrance was called āyīn-i jamʿ. With the abolition of the Janissary Corps
by Maḥmūd II in the ninteenth century, the Bektāshiyya lost almost all of its
former properties (Ocak).
The Bayrāmiyya was the first Turkish order founded by a Ṣūfī born and
raised in Anatolia, namely, Ḥājjī Bayrām Walī (d. 833/1429) (Clayer, Popovic,
and Zarcone (eds.)). The ṭarīqa stemmed from the lineage of Ḥamīd al-Dīn
al-Aksarāyī, popularly known as Somuncu Bābā (d. 815/1412), who was one of
the caliphs of the Ṣafavid shaykh Khwāja ʿAlī. The ṭarīqa was based in Ankara
400 Ceyhan

and after the death of its master, ramified into two branches: the Shamsiyya/
Şemsiyye, named after Aq Shams al-Dīn (d. 863/1459), and the Malāmiyya/
Melāmiyye, ascribed to Dede ʿUmar Sikkīnī (d. 880/1475), both were deputies
of Ḥājjī Bayrām Walī. Ṣūfī sources state that Aq Shams al-Dīn, who participat-
ed in the conquest of Constantinople, wrote Meḥmed II a series of letters in
which he exhorted the sultan to persistence and patience, thereby he made a
significant contribution to the conquest. A number of Ḥamzavī shaykhs who
followed the Bayrāmī-Malāmī path were closely scrutinised because of their
heterodox beliefs (Şahin). In the first half of the eleventh/seventeenth century,
the Jalwatiyya order was founded by ʿAzīz Maḥmūd Hüdāyī (d. 1038/1628–9)
in Istanbul. In contrast to the Khalwatiyya practice of spiritual retreat, the
Jalwatiyya adopted the principle of jalwa (being with God in society). The
Bayrāmiyya became widespread in the Balkans through the Jalwatī/Celvetī
branch. Ismāʿīl Ḥaqqī Bursavī, the founder of the Ḥaqqiyya branch of the
Jalwatiyya, was a prolific Ottoman Ṣūfī author (Yılmaz).

2.7 From India: Chishtiyya and Shaṭṭāriyya

At the beginning of the seventh/thirteenth century, Muʿīn al-Dīn al-Chishtī
(d. 633/1236; born in Chisht, Afghanistan) founded the Chishtī order in the
city of Ajmer, India (Ernst and Lawrence, ch. 2–4). The order spread across
the whole of the Indian subcontinent, and became one of the four most com-
mon orders in India (along with the Qādiriyya, the Naqshbandiyya, and the
Suhrawardiyya). The Chishtiyya reached its peak during the time of Farīd
al-Dīn Masʿūd ‘Ganj-i Shakar’ (d. 664/1265–6) and Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ
(d. 725/1325); it spread to the rural provinces of India by the disciples of Niẓām
al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. In the first half of the eighth/fourteenth century, under Burhān
al-Dīn al-Gharīb (d. 738/1337), the order reached the Deccan. The Chishtiyya
developed in two branches, that is, the Niẓāmiyya and Ṣābiriyya, which Chishtī
authors (quoted in Subhan, 227) perceived as spiritual variations based on
saintly personalities (roughly, sociability or ṣuḥba for the former and reclusion
or khalwa for the latter) rather than as competing factions. The prescribed set
of manners and pillars of the order involved vocalised dhikr, introspective con-
templation, and, above all, samāʿ (Nizāmī, 343–6).
ʿAbdallāh Shaṭṭār (d. 890/1485), a Central Asian Ṣūfī of the ʿIshqiyya order
who had moved to India and spread its teachings in Jawnpur, Bengal, Rajasthan,
and Mandu established the Shaṭṭāriyya. He built a lodge in Mandu, in which
he was buried. Disciples continued his activities of training and writing from
Gujarat to south India, and as far as Medina and Indonesia (Rizvi, 2:151–73).
The treatises penned by the leaders of the order, such as Shaṭṭār’s Laṭāʾif
al-ghaybiyya (Subtleties of the unseen), Bahāʾ al-Dīn Shaṭṭārī’s (d. 921/1515)
Established Ṣūfī Orders 401

Risāla-yi Shaṭṭāriyya, and Muḥammad Ghawth (of Ghwāliyār) Shaṭṭārī’s

(d. 970/1562–3) Gulzār-i abrār, represented the Shaṭṭāriyya as a path superior
to the others, because its method, influenced by Yogic practices, offered the
disciple a way to quickly harmonise his soul with God’s essence.
To conclude, the establishment of Ṣūfī orders has been an ongoing topic
of discussion among Muslim mystics themselves. Seeking to understand the
development of their own institutions, Ṣūfī authors describe the evolution of
spiritual paths (ṭuruq) according to two main processes. The first is territo-
rial. As we have observed, in addition to the places of origins of the founding
masters, e.g., Iraq, Syria, Egypt, etc., Ṣūfī paths were represented as branches
that reached various regions through deputies and emissaries (khulafāʾ) who
helped to establish the brotherhood in the daily life of their respective locali-
ties. This territorial process was eventually presented as the manifestation of
the master’s saintly power (baraka), in the sense that the saint (walī) ruled
over a province (wilāya). His baraka was active in a particular space both ante-
mortem and post-mortem. The second process, from the Ṣūfī point of view, is
iterative. In addition to a rather repetitive onomastic produced by eponyms
and family names (for example, ʿAbd al-Qādir, Qādiriyya, al-Qādirī), Muslim
mystics described the general dynamic of the ṭuruq in terms of chains of trans-
mission (salāsil), repetitive tasks (litanies [awrād] and invocations [adhkār]),
manners (ādāb) to practice and doctrinal rules (arkān), that is, concepts that
suggested repetition with subtle variations in the formation of Ṣūfī orders.

Bibliography

Primary Sources
ʿAbd al-Ṣamad, al-Jawāhir al-sanīyya wa-al-karāmāt al-Aḥmadīyya, Cairo 2006.
Aydınlı, Ayşenur, Harîrîzâde Kemâleddin Efendi’nin Kenzu’l-feyz isimli eseri (inceleme-
metin), Istanbul 2015.
al-Bakrī, Muḥammad Tawfiq, Bayt al-ṣiddīq, Cairo 1323/1905.
al-Bulqūnī, Muḥammad, Dört kutbun gizemli dünyaları, trans. Naim Erdoğan, Istanbul
2002.
al-Dīrīnī, A., Kitāb Ghāyat al-taḥrīr, Cairo 1315/1898.
Ḥarīrīzāde, Tibyān al-wasāʾil al-ḥaqāʾiq fī bayān salāsil al-ṭarāʾiq, MS 430–431, Süley­
maniye Library, İbrahim Efendi.
Ḥulvī, Lemezât-ı Hulviyye, ed. Mehmet Serhan Tayşi, Istanbul 1993.
Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-uns, ed. Mahdī Tawḥīdīpūr, Tehran 1336/1958.
Khūrd, Amīr, Siyār al-awliyāʾ, Delhi 1302/1885.
402 Ceyhan

Kübrâ, Necmeddin, Tasavvufta on esas. Usûlü’l-aşere şerhleri, ed. Süleyman Gökbulut,

Istanbul 2010.
Lāmiʿī, Tarjuma-yi Nafaḥāt al-uns, Istanbul 1270/1854.
Minorsky, V., Persia in A.D. 1478–1490. An abridged translation of Fazlullah b. Rūzbihān
Khunjī’s Tārīkh-i ʿAlām-ārā-yi Amīnī, London 1957.
al-Muḥibbī, Khulāsat al-āthār, vol. 1, Cairo 1284/1867.
al-Munāwī, ʿAbd al-Ra‌ʾūf, al-Kawākib al-durrīyah, Cairo n.d.
Nawāʾī, ʿAlī Shīr, Nesāyim ül-maḥabbe min shemāyim il-fütüvve, ed. Kemal Eraslan,
Istanbul 1979.
Râsim Efendi, Seyyid Mustafa, Tasavvuf sözlüğü. Istılâhat-ı İnsân-ı Kâmil, ed. İhsan
Kara, Istanbul 2008.
Rıza, Ahmed, Bektaşi sırrı, ed. Dursun Gümüşoğlu, Istanbul 2017.
Shaʿrānī, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, al-Ṭabaqāt al-kubrā. ed. Khalīl al-Manṣūr, Beirut 1997.
al-Suhrawardī, ʿAwārif al-maʿārif, ed. Aḥmad ʿAbd al-Raḥīm al-Sāʾiḥ-Tawfīq ʿAlī Waḥ­
bah, Cairo 1427/2006.
al-Tashītī, M., Kitāb al-jāyish al-kafīl bi-akhdh al-tha‌ʾr mimman salla ʿalāʾ al-shaykh
al-Tījānī sayf al-inkār, Fes 1319/1901.
Thāqib Dede, Safīna-yi nafīsa-i Mawlaviyān, vol. 1, Cairo 1282/1866.
Uzbeq al-Ṣūfī, Nisba Sharīfa, in Zayn al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Samad, Jawāhir al-thaniyya wa
al-karāmāt al-Aḥmadiyya, MS 1196, Süleymaniye Library, İzmirli İsmail Hakkı.
Üsküdārī, Sayyid Ḥasīb, Manāqıb-ı Shaykh Meḥmed Emīn Toqādī, MS 1103 Millet
Library, Ali Emīrī, Şerʿiyye.
Vassaf, Hüseyin, Sefîne-yi evliyâ, ed. Mehmet Akkuş and Ali Yılmaz, Istanbul 2006.
al-Wāsitī, A., Ṭabaqāt khirqa al-ṣūfiyya, Cairo 1305/1888.
Wijdānī, Ṣādiq, Tarikatler ve silsileler (Tomar-ı turûk-ı ʿaliyye), ed. İrfan Gündüz, Istan-
bul 1995.

Secondary Sources
Abun-Nasr, Jamil M., The Tijaniyya. A Sufi order in the modern world, London 1965.
Algar, Hamid, Hâcegân, TDVIA 14 (Istanbul 1996), 431.
Algar, Hamid, Kobraviya i. The eponym, EIr.
Algar, Hamid, Kobraviya ii. The order, EIr.
Azamat, N., Kādiriyye, TDVIA 24 (Istanbul 2001), 131–6.
Baş, Derya Çakır, Bedeviyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 547–608.
Buehler, Arthur, Ekrem Işın, and Thierry Zarcone, eds., Journal of the History of
Sufism 1–2. The Qâdiriyya order (2000).
Çakır, Adalet, Kādiriyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul 2018),
159–220.
Ceyhan, Semih, Halvetiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 695–710.
Established Ṣūfī Orders 403

Clayer, Nathalie, Alexandre Popovic, and Thierry Zarcone, eds., Melâmis-Bayrâmis.

Etudes sur trois mouvements mystiques musulmans, Istanbul 1998.
De Jong, Frederick, Khalwatiyya, EI2.
De Jong, Frederick, Materials relative to the history of the Darqawa order and its
branches, Arabica 26/2 (1979): 126–43.
De Jong, Frederick, Ṭuruq and ṭuruq-linked institutions in nineteenth century Egypt.
A historical study in organizational dimensions of Islamic mysticism, Leiden 1978.
Ernst, Carl and Bruce Lawrence, Sufi martyrs of love. The Chishti order in South Asia and
beyond, New York 2002.
Geoffroy, Eric, ed., Une voie soufie dans le monde. La Shâdhiliyya, Paris 2005.
Ghāzī, Muḥammad, al-Ṭarīqat al-Ṣaʿdiyya fī bilād al-Shām, vol. 1, Damascus 2003.
Gökbulut, Süleyman, Necmeddîn-i Kübrâ. Hayatı, Eserleri, Görüşleri, Istanbul 2010.
Güven, Mustafa Salim, Şazeliyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar
(Istanbul 2018), 373–443.
Hodgson, Marshall, The venture of Islam. Vol. 2: Conscience and history in a world civili-
zation, Chicago 1974.
İnançer, Ö. T., Sa’dilikte zikir usûlü ve musiki, Dünden Bugüne İstanbul Ansiklopedisi vii
(Istanbul 1994), 394.
İnançer, Ö. T., Rituals and main principles of sufism during Ottoman Empire, in Ahmet
Yaşar Ocak (ed.), Sufism and Sufis in Ottoman society (Ankara 2005), 125–70.
Kara, Mustafa, Bedeviyye, TDVIA 5 (Istanbul 1992), 318–29.
Khalaf Allāh, A., al-Sayyid Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī. Min qādat al-fikr al-ṣūfī l-islām, Cairo
2012.
Knysh, Alexander, Islamic mysticism. A short history, Leiden 2000.
Küçük, Sezai, Mevleviyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul 2018),
496–509, 517.
le Chatelier, Alfred, Les Confréries musulmanes du Hedjaz, Paris 1887.
Lings, Martin, A Sufi saint of the twentieth century. Shaykh Ahmad al-ʿAlawi, his spiritual
heritage and legacy, London 1971.
Maḥmūd, ʿAbd al-Ḥalīm, Qadiyya al-taṣawwuf. Al-madrasa al-Shadhiliyya, Cairo n.d.
Mazzaoui, Michel M., The origins of the Ṣafawids. Šīʿism, Ṣūfism, and the ġulāt,
Wiesbaden 1972.
Nizāmī, Khāliq Aḥmad, Çiştiyye, TDVIA 8 (Istanbul 1993), 343–6.
Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar, Bektaşiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 462–4, 468–71.
Ohlander, Erik S., Sufism in an age of transition. ʿUmar al-Suhrawardi and the rise of the
Islamic mystical brotherhoods, Leiden 2008.
Öngören, Reşat, Tarihte bir aydın tarikatı. Zeynîler, Istanbul 2003.
Öngören, Reşat, Sühreverdiyye, TDVIA 38 (Istanbul 2010), 42–5.
Papas, Alexandre, Soufisme et politique entre Chine, Tibet et Turkestan. Etude sur les
Khwajas naqshbandis du Turkestan oriental, Paris 2005.
404 Ceyhan

Popovic, Alexandre, Un ordre de derviches en terre d’Europe. La Rifâ‘iyya, Lausanne 1993.

Rifʿat Efendī, M., Nafḥa al-riyāẓ al-ʿāliye, in Mehmed Rif’at Efendi’nin Nefhatü’r-
Riyâzi’l-Aliye’sinde Abdulkâdir-i Geylânî ve Kâdirîlik, ed. Adalet Çakır, vol. 2, Istanbul
2012.
Rizvi, Saiyid Athar Abbas, A history of Sufism in India, vol. 2, Delhi 2002.
Şahin, Haşim, Bayramiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul 2018),
781–2, 797–822.
Sobieroj, Florian, Suhrawardiyya, EI2.
Subhan, John A., Sufism. Its saints and shrines, Lucknow 1960.
Tahralı, Mustafa, Rifâiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul 2018),
285–312.
Tosun, Necdet, Nakşibendiyye [Âdâb ve Erkân], TDVIA 32 (Istanbul 2006), 342–3.
Tosun, Necdet, Nakşibendiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 611–28.
von Schlegell, Barbara, Saʿdiyya, EI2.
Yazıcı, Tahsin, David S. Margoliouth, and Frederick De Jong, Mawlawiyya, EI2.
Yıldırım, Rıza, Turkomans between two empires. The origin of the Qizilbash identity in
Anatolia (1447–1514), PhD dissertation, Bilkent University, Ankara 2008.
Yıldırım, Rıza, Hacı Bektaş Veli’den Balım Sultan’a Bektaşiliğin doğuşu, Istanbul 2019.
Yılmaz, Hasan Kâmil, Celvetiyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 929–31.
Yücer, Hür Mahmut, Sa’diyye, in Semih Ceyhan (ed.), Türkiye’de Tarikatlar (Istanbul
2018), 223–81.
Zarcone, Thierry, Yasawiyya, EI2.
Zarcone, Thierry, Bektaşiyye, EI3.
 Chapter 22

Cyber Sufism
Stéphane A. Dudoignon

Among the widely circulated misconceptions of Sufism is the idea that this
ensemble of initiatory traditions is a form of social withdrawal that encourages
people to turn their backs on social responsibilities and commitments in order
to retreat into a private world of devotion (e.g., Algar). The expansion of Sufism
in cyberspace from the mid-1990s onwards suggests that Ṣūfīs have been able
to utilise increasingly multidirectional media for the reinvention of gnostic
practices and sociability, while showing themselves intensely active on the so-
ciocultural, educational, and even political levels—in Muslim-minority or ma-
jority societies, and against very diverse socioeconomic backdrops. Conversely,
the internet’s very evolution, especially after the irruption of social media (that
is, “social networks”) since the mid-2000s, has exerted, together with the con-
tinuing demographic changes during this period, a deep impact on the on-
going transformation of Sufism itself (on the significance of this historical
moment for the Middle Eastern internet in general, see Gonzalez-Quijano,
Communautés virtuelles, 196).
Three different types of historical factors have favoured these phenomena.
The first is socio-industrial; it is linked to the combination of labour migra-
tion with the redeployment, through emerging electronic media, of social net-
working in diasporic contexts, as well as the development of diasporic public
spheres. In what follows, we see how several ṭuruq, including the most influ-
ential, have tried to adjust to these new global circumstances. The second type
of factor springs from the very nature of the internet and web 2.0, as well as
from the influence that both have exerted on the evolution of Sufism in two
quite different geopolitical contexts—namely, before and after the Maghrib–
Mashriq revolutions and upheavals of 2011 and thereafter. In retrospect, rapid
changes in attitudes toward authority and in methods of mobilisation were ob-
vious and undeniable. The third type of factor pertains to the unique interac-
tions that developed in cyberspace between Ṣūfīs and the widening ranges of
cultural and religious practice, Muslim or not. Here, emulation between Ṣūfīs
and Salafīs—and, more generally, the proliferation of modern forms of pros-
elytising (e.g., El Naggar)—highlight the need for panoramic approaches that
take into account the sum total of the practitioners’ changing relationships to
the media.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2021 | doi:10.1163/9789004392601_024

406 Dudoignon

Ultimately, the main question is, has the spread of the internet and of
web 2.0 been as revolutionary, for the growth and dissemination of Sufism,
and for the virtualisation of Islamic spirituality, as the diffusion of printed mat-
ter was during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (see Sedgwick in this
volume)? Once again, the medium is, in part at least, the message. It paves the
way, this time, to a new religious public sphere that innovatively juxtaposes
confessional issues with trade, entertainment, and professional life, multi-
plying horizontal relationships and promoting new hierarchies substituting
webmasters for headmasters (cf. Campbell, 312; Hackett, 73; Eickelman and
Anderson, 14–6). Commodification through the spread of the market princi-
ple of supply and demand also raises issues pertaining to the very meaning of
initiation, membership, and hierarchy, as well as the place of e-Sufism within
the context of the much-debated advent of “post-Islamism.” If confirmed, how
will such trends, all highlighted by social science research since the mid-1990s,
affect our global understanding of this multidimensional socio-technological
change and its challenges, notably, to sociological categories such as commu-
nity and virtual experience?

1 Socio-Industrial Legacies and Backdrops

The height of social reach was achieved by Ṣūfīs in the years following World
War I. Since then, they faced a succession of challenges, from Muslim reform-
ist critique to state regulation and the loss of socioeconomic power. Toward
the middle of the twentieth century, the propagation of movable-type print-
ing and the expansion of schooling to the masses had already generated an
unprecedented pluralisation of religious authority and doctrine, emphasised
by new media technologies and forms of association (e.g., Eickelman, Clash
of cultures, 290–5). The influence of Sufism continued to decline, along with
the social significance of early modern agro-pastoral landholdings on which
its social force had long relied, and in spite of state support of certain ṭuruq in
certain areas at certain times, against rapidly mushrooming Islamist organisa-
tions (e.g., Weismann; Sabra in this volume).
Some Ṣūfī traditions, however, could be passed on, albeit in modern shapes
and forms, or through commodification, e.g., by music recordings. In Europe,
North America, Japan, and Australia, Ṣūfīs began to appeal to audiences in
the ever-growing labour and trading diasporas, in new English, French, or
Russian cultural idioms. And at the turn of the 2000s, with the exile of a num-
ber of leading shaykhs from their countries of origin, new forms of Sufism
appeared, primarily in the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation
Cyber Sufism 407

and Development) countries, though in ever closer interaction with the tradi-
tional abode of Islam (Green, 214–5). The enlargement of Sufism’s territorial-
ity itself was largely prepared by the massive migrations, both rural/rural and
rural/urban, which began in the last quarter of the twentieth century (even
in such a polity as the USSR: cf. Shikhaliev). Among other features of this
evolution, we can mention the increasing appeal to urban educated middle
classes, stimulated by shaykhs henceforth equipped with science or medical
degrees and/or allied with pious industrialists; and the blurring of boundaries
between religious and academic discourses—the result of frequent partner-
ships between sacred lineages and university teachers for the redesigning and
modernisation of traditions and saint cults of rural origin (e.g., Dudoignon, A
surrogate aristocracy).

2 The Ṣūfī Tradition in the First Internet Revolution

The diffusion of the internet in the 1990s was instrumental in strengthen-

ing several features of this modernity. Early websites, in fact, used new ways
of broadcasting information, thereby prolonging the letterpress revolution,
with analogous effects on the further diversification of written production
(e.g., Gonzalez-Quijano, La Renaissance Arabe; Chih, Mayeur-Jaouen and
Seesemann, 13–6), and on the general evolution of spiritual authority (e.g.,
on Twelver Shīʿa marjaʿiyyat, Rosiny; on Alevi dedes, Sökefeld; Dressler).
Innovation itself directly resulted from socio-demographic changes that had
been in evidence for decades. Innovation was spurred on in the 2000s by new
feelings of insecurity among children of first-generation migrants (e.g., Bunt
and Cheruvallil-Contractor, on Sufism in Great Britain; Rytter, on South Asian
Muslim practitioners in Denmark). Diaspora contexts proved decisive in the
activities of Ṣūfī groups (either imported, deprived of a pre-existing migrant
community, or those that involved actors raised in the West) (Green, 221;
Piraino, 97–9). The spread of Sufism to the former colonial metropolises was
aided by the internet, which came to fulfil three functions: it provided infor-
mation regarding Sufism while also enhancing its visibility; it transcended dis-
tances between disciples and itinerant masters or marabouts operating from a
sacred city such as Touba for Senegalese and Guinean Murīds/Mourides; and it
offered a space where religious experiences could be reaffirmed, for example,
by sharing rituals by video (cf. Milani and Possamai, Nimatullahiya; and Milani
and Possamai, Sufism, on several branches of the Niʿmatullāhiyya between Iran
and Australia; on the Mouride segment of the Tijāniyya between Francophone
West Africa, western Europe, and Canada, see Traoré; Bondaz).
408 Dudoignon

A number of ṭuruq occasionally participate in the introduction of com-

puter science and information technology into the “Third World”; this led to
an increase in their size, and, after a century of gradual decline, their shaykhs
and khalīfas acquired a new territoriality and recovered lost positions of in-
fluence. Displaying digital versions of the Qurʾān and the ḥadīth, undertak-
ing digitalisations of Islamic literature for the public, these sites, sometimes
unofficial and requiring account numbers, of such diverse Ṣūfī organisations
as the Algerian-born ʿAlāwiyya, the cross-border Senegalese and Guinean
Murīds/Mourides, the varied branches of the Iranian Niʿmatullāhiyya, and the
Italian Aḥmadiyya Idrīsiyya Shādhiliyya, resorted to the internet to keep ranks
closed. Such services as mailing lists, contact details of zāwiyas and of dargāhs
worldwide, even Ṣūfī dating websites such as the one for the Naqshbandiyya
Khālidiyya Ḥaqqāniyya, increased communitas (that is, a sense of belonging
was deepened by confidential sharing or collective listening to the teachings
or group chants of a shaykh seldom seen in public) as did access to charismatic
counselling or to dream interpretation (by e-mail request). Discourses of cul-
tural resistance against diverse hegemonies that varied according to the audi-
ences targeted, have also helped fuel a sense of community, as the defence of
Persian cultural legacy ( farhang) did among modern Niʿmatullāhīs (van den
Bos, 62–5). The Moroccan-born Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya has also been a pio-
neer in the preservation and dissemination of tradition through globalisation.
Since its reform by Shaykh Ḥamza (al-Budshīshī) (d. 2017) in the 1970s, it has
become appealing to French-speaking educated urbanites, men and women,
in France, Belgium, and Canada and has inspired the construction of a trans-
national Francophone community (Haddad, 204–6; Dominguez Diaz, 62–77).
Some, however, in the universe of the ṭuruq, developed new relationships
to the medium, and passed from Sufism online to online Sufism, as it were,
helped by the boom of the social media from the mid-2000s onwards.

3 The Fuqarāʾ in Command? Web 2.0 and Its Irregular Impacts

The first social media/networks appeared worldwide in 1997, followed in the

early 2000s by web 2.0. The Wikipedia model revealed that users, rather than
professional content producers, predominated over the medium. Indeed,
cable TV in the 1960s and 1970s had already opened the way for expressions of
non-mainstream voices, before passing to the control of larger companies. It
was only around 2004, however, that one could observe the quick expansion of
“peer-driven” platforms that relied on individual computer users to upload the
bulk of their content, and on readers to filter the information conveyed. Half a
Cyber Sufism 409

decade later, a new generation of low-cost PCs flooded the international mar-
ket, followed (since 2013) by the mass diffusion of 4G smartphone applications
that opened the era of “micropreneur” activity (cf. Ryan, 181): developing digi-
tal skills was no longer only the preserve of rich countries and upper classes.
What impact did this new turning point have on the role of the fuqarāʾ (ordi-
nary Ṣūfīs) in the practice and diffusion of Sufism? Granted with a hermeneutic
dimension of orality suitable to multiple interpretations and to contestation of
authority and expression of alternative voices, web 2.0 has led to a fragmen-
tation of the canon, which resulted in a challenge to the traditional figures
of authority and in the development of mechanisms of confrontation (Varlik,
50–1, 60–1). Globalisation, however, proceeded diversely, sometimes paradoxi-
cally. Telling illustrations of this complex, sometimes unpredictable evolution
are provided by three ṭuruq of diverse origin, all of which maintain a strong
global presence, especially in cyberspace—viz., the Tijānī Murīds/Mourides,
the Naqshbandiyya Ḥaqqāniyya, and certain branches of the Niʿmatullāhiyya.
Among the Naqshbandīs and the Niʿmatullāhīs, the ṭarīqa itself has come to
coexist with new non-initiatory trends, and today, traditionalist discourses are
often associated with services available to wider audiences. In particular, during
the 2010s, the Ḥaqqānīs’ web presence has grown, thanks to its many YouTube
channels and Google groups, its presence on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and
the development of iPhone applications (Piraino, 100–3). In addition, the rela-
tive youth of the disciples of the Ḥaqqāniyya, the authoritative role played by
khalīfas in the Naqshbandiyya, and this organisation’s structural fluidity have
allowed its murīds to develop blogs and websites of their own. Moreover, not
content with disseminating knowledge, the Murīds/Mourides, the Ḥaqqāniyya
and the Niʿmatullāhīs display online supernatural powers based on images en-
dowed with the baraka of their respective quṭbs and reformers from the late
nineteenth century, namely Shaykh Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke, Shaykh Nazım
Kıbrısı of Cyprus, and Shaykh Javād Nūrbakhsh. They have also used music
and videos subtitled in several European languages (rather than written docu-
ments in the classical Islamic idiom) the former’s US sites offer the opportunity
to take the bayʿa (oath of allegiance) online (Nielsen, Draper, and Yemelianova;
Haddad; Milani and Possamai, The Nimatullahiya; Bondaz, 261–4; Piraino).

4 From Sufism Online to Online Sufism?

Making smartphone applications (especially on Facebook) “a place to live re-

ligion” (Piraino, 103), the Ḥaqqānīs and Niʿmatullāhīs have gone farther than
most other ṭuruq, for which sharing by telephone emotions experienced in the
410 Dudoignon

framework of Ṣūfī sociability remains a disputable deed. Such an evolution

has multiple implications for the future development of Sufism of course, but
also of the internet itself, in its interactions with religion. In fact, as we have
seen, Sufism online remained confined to a limited set of functions: providing
basic information about and defending the ṭuruq (against growing anti-Ṣūfī
currents); organising events; and facilitating master/adept contact. There was
little space for individual initiative or prospects, save for the selective discov-
ery of texts and participation in discussions about orthopraxy. Traditional
ṭuruq, from this viewpoint, were making the most of the new industrial asset,
as were certain madrasas, after half a century of parallel decline. After all, the
internet contents of both institutions did not differ much from those given in
the real world (including fundraising campaigns for Islamic aid organisations:
e.g., Eickelman, Madrasas in Morocco, and on Deobandi madrasas in South
and Southwest Asia: Zaman, 77–81; Dudoignon, Sunnis online, 48–52; on the
Muslim Brotherhood movement: Gonzalez-Quijano, Communautés virtuelles,
204). For the ṭuruq, as for diverse madrasa networks, online communication
has, in many instances, strengthened centralist tendencies (on murābiṭūn/
marabouts operating from Touba, in Senegal: Traoré, 65; and more generally
Howell and van Bruinessen, 11–2). Online Sufism, however, as dispensed by the
Naqshbandiyya Ḥaqqāniyya and by diverse branches of the Niʿmatullāhiyya,
has opened different perspectives, because these traditions are especially open
to diverse audiences (the Ḥaqqānīs are particularly lenient regarding the initi-
ation process, the murīds’ observance and conduct, the definition of member-
ship and, overall, the hierarchy, a fact that has, apparently threatened to lead
to the dissolution of the ṭarīqa).
Such tendencies have led, of course, to an extreme diversification of Ṣūfī
practices and discourses, sometimes in one and the same tradition, with strong
opposition between countries with old, structured, and hierarchised Muslim
communities and those without (e.g., Haddad, 202, on the Ḥaqqāniyya and
the Būdshīshiyya between Paris and Montreal). In the diaspora, high turnovers
of disciples, growing numbers of syncretistic believers and the adoption—at
least vis-à-vis some of the ṭarīqa’s audience—of a consumerist discourse on re-
ligion have transformed some Ṣūfī spiritual lineages into marketing brands. In
this way, religion has evolved into a client/healer therapeutic relationship em-
bodied, for instance, in “psychological Sufism” as practiced by the psychiatrist
Javād Nūrbakhsh (on the “MacDonaldisation” of the online Niʿmatullāhiyya in
the Australian context, cf. Milani and Possamai, The Nimatullahiya, esp. 61).
De-Islamised, fusion Sufism, influenced by the post-1960s stress on spiritual-
ity, was a response to the eclecticism of the global religious marketplace. As a
result, this “neo-Sufism” has become central in debates over the phenomena
Cyber Sufism 411

of post-Islamism and secular religion. However, from a top-down viewpoint at

least, here we have dealt with what is, perhaps, a two-dimensional (or multidi-
mensional) Sufism, one that characterises modern-day spiritual entrepreneur-
ship on the one hand and, on the other hand, within the Ṣūfī tradition proper,
a rapidly growing inventory of globalised, multi-audience ṭuruq. A distinctive
feature brought about by the proliferation of hybrid forums is the further blur-
ring of boundaries between religious officialdom, the universe of the ṭuruq, the
academy, the media and the public—the internet being sometimes perceived
as an instrument of verification and approval.

5 Some Conclusions

Participants and internet audiences in the old and new worlds of Islam, es-
pecially those of generations X and Y (born with the internet and with social
media), show an increasingly eclectic, flexible, and practical relationship to
belief, knowledge, and belonging in the context of electronic taṣawwuf as well
as in their overall participation in other spiritual e-sociability. The global chal-
lenge that this phenomenon represents for the long-term viability of the ṭuruq
requires a truly multidisciplinary study of Sufism as the distinct site of varied
online communities. It cannot be dealt with simply through the institutional
and content analyses that still prevail in the field. A combination of global
social science approaches is necessary to comprehend not only the religious
uses of this multidimensional technological revolution, but also the religious
perceptions of this new medium, with particular attention to audience/viewer
usage and practice. The internet per se subverts such categories as “minority
religious groups,” while also questioning the distinction between public and
private, central and marginal, orthodox and heterodox, religious and secular,
and confirming the more general ambivalence of the phenomenon of religion
(Hackett, 73). The flexibility of the information conveyed via web 2.0 has re-
sulted in a form of return to orality and in a new stage of exegetic competition,
one that simultaneously accentuates the symbolic significance of orthopraxy
(e.g., Ryan, 138–9). In spiritual life as in the political sphere during the 2010s,
new technologies of communication have exerted a concurrently liberating
effect in documentation, coordination, and mobilisation. In this context, the
flexible affiliations of e-Sufism allow for the creation of a wide public sphere
that can, eventually, escape the logics of both the state and marketplace
(Gonzalez-Quijano, Arabités numériques, 95–6; Dagnaud, 57).
In the meantime, we can state that Sufism has survived against all odds,
managing to “preserve much of its charm” (Weismann, 280), and maintaining
412 Dudoignon

a viable stake in the global religious market by adjusting to new technologies

and organisational formats. After cable TV and cellular telephony in the last
third of the twentieth century, cyberspace has widely continued the task of
preserving religious rituals and traditions. Enabled by web 2.0, with an oral
character suitable to contest authority and to express alternative voices, the in-
ternet, simultaneously, has been strengthening the masters’ control over their
pupils by means of an inner normalisation that may stifle, sometimes, initia-
tives (Gonzalez-Quijano, Communautés virtuelles, 203). The internet, at the
same time, was operating as a sacred space and as a vector of new or reinforced
sacred territorialities (as we have seen, through the development of identities
specifically Persian, for part of the Niʿmatullāhiyya, or Francophone for cer-
tain Būdshīshīs and Ḥaqqānīs; see also Hermansen; Werbner). In a parallel de-
velopment, social media have, since the mid-2000s, facilitated connection to
wider, more amorphous communities to discuss matters seen as out of place
in wider society, in a quest for mentors and justification of the orthopraxy of
their chosen lifestyles. If the development of cyber Sufism remains as unpre-
dictable as that of the internet as a whole, and if the individual has tended
to become its primary agent, it is in complex interaction, sometimes even in
increasing competition with a typology of more traditional and traditionalist
institutional actors.

Bibliography

Algar, Hamid, Sufism. Principles and practice, Oneonta, NY 2015.

Bondaz, Julien, Images culturelles et écrans mourides. Deux cas de controverse
iconographique et religieuse sur Internet, in F. Duteil–Ogata et al. (eds.), Le reli-
gieux sur Internet (Paris 2015), 261–74.
Bos, Matthijs van den, Elements of neo-traditional Sufism in Iran, in M. van Bruinessen
and J. D. Howell (eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York
2007), 61–75.
Bunt, Gary R., [email protected]: “British Muslim” identities in cyberspace, Islam and
Christian-Muslim Relations 10/3 (1999): 353–62.
Campbell, Heidi, Making place for religion in internet studies, Information Society 21
(2002): 309–15.
Cheruvallil-Contractor, Sariya, Online Sufism—young British Muslims, their inter-
net “selves” and virtual reality, in R. Geaves & Th. Gabriel (eds.), Sufism in Britain
(London 2015), 161–76.
Cyber Sufism 413

Chih, Rachida, Catherine Mayeur-Jaouen, and Rüdiger Seesemann, The nineteenth

century: A Sufi century?, in R. Chih, C. Mayeur-Jaouen, and R. Seesemann (eds.),
Sufi literary production and printing in the nineteenth century (Würzburg 2015), 3–24.
Dagnaud, Monique, Le modèle californien. Comment l’esprit collaboratif change le
monde, Paris 2016.
Dominguez Diaz, Marta, Women in Sufism. Female religiosities in a transnational order,
London and New York 2014.
Dressler, Marku, The modern Dede. Changing parameters for religious authority in
contemporary Turkish Alevism, in G. Krämer and S. Schmidtke (eds.), Speaking for
Islam. Religious authorities in Muslim societies (Leiden 2006), 269–94.
Dudoignon, Stéphane A., Sunnis online. The Sunni confessional internet in Iran,
AS 63/1 (2009): 29–66.
Dudoignon, Stéphane A., A surrogate aristocracy? Sufi adab, modernity, rurality and
civilisation in ex-Soviet Central Asia, in C. Mayeur-Jaouen and L. Patrizi (eds.), Adab
and modernity. A ‘civilisation process’? (Leiden 2019), 527–51.
Eickelman, Dale F., Clash of cultures? Intellectuals, their public, and Islam, in S. A.
Dudoignon, H. Komatsu, and Y. Kosugi (eds.), Intellectuals in the modern Islamic
world. Transmission, transformation, communication (London and New York 2006),
289–304.
Eickelman, Dale F., Madrasas in Morocco. Their vanishing public role, in R. W. Hefner
and M. Q. Zaman (eds.), Schooling Islam. The politics and culture of modern Muslim
education (Princeton 2007), 131–48.
Eickelman, Dale F. and Jon W. Anderson, Redefining Muslim publics, in D. F. Eickelman
and J. W. Anderson (eds.), New media in the Muslim world. The emerging public
sphere (Bloomington, IN 2003), 11–18.
El Naggar, Shaimaa, The impact of digitalization on the religious sphere: Televangelism
as an example, Journal of Islam and Muslim societies 4/2 (2014): 189–211.
Gonzalez-Quijano, Yves, La Renaissance arabe au XIXe siècle: médiums, médiations,
médiateurs, in B. Hallaq and H. Toelle (eds.), Histoire de la littérature arabe moderne,
1: 1800–1945 (Arles 2007), 71–113.
Gonzalez-Quijano, Yves, Communautés virtuelles de la toile arabe. Une nouvelle fab-
rique du social, in Y. Gonzalez-Quijano and T. Guaaybess (eds.), Les Arabes parlent
aux Arabes. La révolution de l’information dans le monde arabe (Arles 2009), 193–208.
Gonzalez-Quijano, Yves, Arabités numériques. Le printemps du Web arabe, Arles 2012.
Green, Nile, Sufism. A global history, Chichester 2012.
Hackett, Rosalind I. J., Religion and the internet, Diogenes 53/3 (2006): 67–76.
Haddad, Mouloud, Zawiya réelle, zawiya virtuelle. Soufisme, francophonie et nou-
velles technologies au Québec, Globe: Revue internationale d’études québecqoises 11/1
(2008): 197–208.
414 Dudoignon

Hermansen, Marcia, Global Sufism. “Theirs” and “Ours,” in M. Dressler, R. Geaves, and
G. Klinkhammer (eds.), Sufis in western societies. Global networking and locality
(London 2009), 26–45.
Howell, Julia Day and Martin van Bruinessen, Introduction, in M. van Bruinessen and
J. D. Howell (eds.), Sufism and the ‘modern’ in Islam (London and New York 2007),
3–18.
Milani, Milad and Adam Possamai, The Nimatullahiya and Naqshbandiya Sufi orders
on the internet. The cyber-construction of tradition and the McDonaldisation of
spirituality, Journal of the academic study of religion 26/1 (2013): 51–75.
Milani, Milad and Adam Possamai, Sufism, spirituality and consumerism. The case
study of the Nimatullahiya and Naqshbandiya Sufi orders in Australia, Contemporary
Islam 10/1 (2016): 67–85.
Nielsen, Jorgen S., Mustafa Draper, and Galina Yemelianova, Transnational Sufism. The
Haqqaniyya, in J. Malik and J. Hinnels (eds.), Sufism in the west (London and New
York 2006), 103–14.
Piraino, Francesco, Between real and virtual communities. Sufism in western societies
and the Naqshbandi Haqqani case, Social compass 63/1 (2016): 93–108.
Rosiny, Stephan, Internet et la marja’iyya. l’autorité religieuse au défi des nouveaux
médias, Maghreb–Machrek 178 (2004): 59–74.
Ryan, Johnny, A history of the internet and the digital future, London 2013.
Rytter, Mikkel, Transnational Sufism from below. Charismatic counselling and the
quest for well-being, South Asian Diaspora 6/1 (2014): 105–9.
Shikhaliev, Shamil, Downward mobility and spiritual life. The development of Sufism
in the context of migration in Dagestan, 1940s–2000s, in S. A. Dudoignon and
C. Noack (eds.), Allah’s Kolkhozes. Migration, de-Stalinisation, privatisation and the
new Muslim congregations in the Soviet realm (1950s–2000s) (Berlin 2014), 398–420.
Sökefeld, Martin, Alevism online. Re-imagining a community in virtual space,
Diaspora: a journal of transnational studies 11/1 (2002): 5–38.
Traoré, Diahara, Entre profane et sacré. Usages d’Internet et islam dans deux commu-
nautés musulmanes ouest-africaines à Montréal, Anthropologica 54/1 (2002): 61–9.
Varlik, Selami, Le discours islamique sur Internet. Oralité de l’écriture et fragmentation
de l’autorité, in F. Duteil–Ogata et al. (eds.), Le religieux sur Internet (Paris 2015),
49–64.
Weismann, Itzchak, Sufism in the age of globalisation, in L. Ridgeon (ed.), The Cam-
bridge companion to Sufism (New York 2014), 257–81.
Werbner, Pnina, Transnational and regional cults, in L. Ridgeon (ed.), The Cambridge
companion to Sufism (New York 2014), 282–300.
Zaman, Muhammad Qasim, Tradition and authority in Deobandi madrasas of South
Asia, in R. W. Hefner and M. Q. Zaman (eds.), Schooling Islam. The politics and cul-
ture of modern Muslim education (Princeton 2007), 61–86.
Index

Page numbers in bold refer to illustrations shrine of 118, 121, 339

silsila for 369
ʿAbbādān 106, 161, 175–176, 362–363 on wealth 222
ʿAbbās i, Ṣafavid ruler 86, 324 Abū Saʿīd, Timūrid prince 308–309
ʿAbbāsid dynasty Abū Sulaymān al-Dārānī 363
and futuwwa brotherhoods 353 Abū ʿUthmān al-Ḥīrī 199
see also under specific rulers Abū l-Anwār al-Sādāt 36, 220
ʿAbd al-ʿĀl 392 Abū l-Fatḥ al-Wāsiṭī 389, 393
ʿAbd al-Ghanī l-Nābulusī 233 Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Abī Bakr al-Harawī 148
ʿAbd al-Ḥaqq Muḥaddith Dihlavī 263 Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī, Marīnid sultan 120
ʿAbd al-Khāliq Ghijduwānī 297 Abū l-Ḥasan Bustī 260
ʿAbd al-Qādir ii 87 Abū l-Wafāʾ al-Baghdādī 399
ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jazāʾirī (Abdelkader) 256, Acre, siege of 316
276–277, 318, 326–327 ādāb (rules of conduct). see rules of conduct
ʿAbd al-Quddūs Gangohī 263 Ādāb al-murīdīn (Abū Najīb) 193
ʿAbd al-Raḥīm 389 ādāb al-murīdīn (rules of conduct for seekers
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī 43, 243, 268, 307 of the path) 116–117
ʿAbd al-Razzāq 388, 389 ādāb al-shurb (etiquette of drinking) 201
ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (son of al-Jīlānī) 388, 389 ādāb al-ṣuḥba (ādāb of companionship)
ʿAbd al-Wāḥid b. Zayd 362 190
abdāl (apotropaic saints) 272, 273 ādāb al-ẓāhira (ādāb of exterior manners)
ʿAbdallāh Aqtash 98 193
ʿAbdallāh Ḥajjām 90 Adam (biblical figure) 89, 98
Abdelkader (ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jazāʾirī) 256, ʿādāt (customs) 328
276–277, 318, 326–327 advice literature 267–268, 307–309
Abdelqadir (né Dallas, Ian) 180 Āfāq, Khwāja Hidāyatallāh 270–271,
ʿAbdullāhī (brother of ʿUthmān Dan Fodio) 322–324, 351
324–325 Aflākī 94–95
Abraham (biblical figure) 89, 97–98, 388 Africa. see North Africa; West Africa
Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī 37 Afshari, Mehran 14, 89–99
Abū ʿAlī l-Fārmadhī 303–304 agriculture 40, 50, 51, 121–122, 242–243, 247,
Abū Ayyūb al-Anṣārī 42–43, 339 282, 349
Abū Bakr, caliph 278, 307, 386, 396 ʿahd (pact) 195–196, 204, 208, 211, 297, 308,
Abū l-Ḥasan Pūshangī 91 337
Abū Ḥātim al-ʿAṭṭār 364, 365 ahl al-ḥadīth (traditionists) 62
Abū Madyan al-Shuʿayb (Sidi Boumediene) ahl al-ṣuffa (“people of the porch”) 28, 29,
120, 149, 258, 296, 380 116
Abū Manṣūr al-Maghribī 199 Aḥmad (son/successor of ʿUmar b. Saʿīd Tall)
Abū l-Najīb Suhrawardī 193, 390 326
Abū al-Nūr Islamic Center (Damascus) 280 Aḥmad b. al-Mubārak al-Lamaṭī 272
Abū Rashīd Quṭb al-Dīn al-Abharī 390 Aḥmad al-Badawī 44, 340, 388, 392
Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr Aḥmad al-Bakkāʾī 388
clairvoyance of 303, 311 Aḥmad Bamba. see Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke
influence of 260 Aḥmad Barelwī 151, 256, 276–277, 278
khānqāh of 202, 300 Aḥmad al-Dardīr 220
as mediator 205 Aḥmad Ḥammadī 223–224
rules of conduct of 63, 106–107, 177, 370 Aḥmad Kāsānī Dahbidī 19, 194, 268, 309
416 Index

Aḥmad Khān Sial 87 Aleppo 111, 111, 112, 130, 132, 148, 232, 241,
Aḥmad Khiḍruwiyya 91 344, 390–391, 399
Aḥmad Rūmī 98 Algeria
Aḥmad Samʿānī 7 anti-colonial resistance/jihād in
Aḥmad al-Sharīf 275, 328, 382 20, 277–278, 318, 326–327
Aḥmad Yasawī 121, 165, 241–242, 395 French colonial rule in 2, 67, 131
Aḥmad-i Jām French opposition to Sufism in 354–355
on Abū Saʿīd b. Abī l-Khayr 260 rehabilitation of Ṣūfī institutions in 69,
political involvement of 261 285
on sanctity 265 ṭarīqa admitting women in 349
shrine of 121, 158, 159, 163, 166 ṭarīqa officials in 348
Aḥmadiyya. see Badawiyya worship of saints in 152
Aḥmadiyya Idrīsiyya Shādhiliyya 408 see also under specific dynasties, regions/
Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke 50–51, 229, cities, Ṣūfī orders
282–283, 319, 409 ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib 41–42, 96, 145, 307, 348, 369,
Aḥrār, Khwāja ʿUbaydallāh 386–387
agricultural enterprise of 121–122, Alī b. ʿUthmān 389
242–243 ʿAlids, cult of 147
political influence of 127, 262, 324 Alī l-Khawwāṣ 198, 267
protection system of 39, 121–122, 206 Alī l-Riḍā 41–42
and succession 381 al-ʿAllāmī, Taqī l-Dīn 266
supernatural powers of 309, 311 Almohad dynasty 259
mention of 398 Almoravid dynasty 259
ʿĀʾisha 363 alms (ṣadaqa) 81, 218, 219, 271
Ajmer 107–108, 127, 148–149, 158, 168, 400 alms tax (zakāt) 58, 167, 218, 219, 271
Akbar, Mughal emperor 127–128, 149, 310 altruism
(akbar) jihād (greater jihād) 117, 257, 315, legal regulation of 218
320 pre-Islamic notions of 219
akhadha ʿan-hu al-ṭarīqa 368 profits to benefactors of 218
akhawāt (sisters) 170 in Sufism 14, 17, 91, 218–225
akhī associations 37–38, 208, 231, 343 terminology used for 219
see also futuwwa brotherhoods see also alms; alms tax; donations; waqfs
akhīs (brothers). see futuwwa brotherhoods Amasya 244, 245
Akhlāq matbūliyya (al-Shaʿrānī) 205 ʿAmīlī, Bahāʾ al-Dīn 83
Akhlāq-i muḥsinī (Kāshifī) 267–268 al-Amīn 92
Akkoyunlu (Āq Qoyūnlū) 270, 312, 324 Amīr Khusraw 127
AKP (Justice and Development Party; Turkey) amīr al-muʾminīn 277, 278, 325, 326, 327,
47 329
akrama (to treat with reverence, to amīrs (senior local governors) 38–39, 114
honor) 219 ʿāmma (common believers) 189
al-Aksarāyī, Ḥamīd al-Dīn (Somuncu Anatolia
Bābā) 399 futuwwa brotherhoods in 14, 37, 38,
ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Khaljī 84 93–95, 208, 343
Alatas, Ismail Fajrie 21, 374–382 rural Sufism in 18, 242–248
al-ʿAlāwī, Aḥmad 138, 393 Ṣūfī institutions in
ʿAlawī dynasty 34, 153, 340 political influence of 129
ʿAlawī lineages 386–387 shrine complexes in 119, 124–125
ʿAlawiyya 138, 377, 380, 393, 408 tekkes in 114–115, 159
Albania 234, 281–282, 342, 355, 358 and urbanisation 228, 231, 232
Index 417

Ṣūfī orders from 398–400 awliyāʾ Allāh (friends of God) 117, 189–190
see also under specific dynasties, cities, Awrād al-aḥbāb wa-fuṣuṣ al-ādāb
Ṣūfī orders (Yaḥyā Bākharzī) 193
Anavatan Partisi (Motherland Party) 281 Awrangabad 82, 86, 158, 168
Anawati, Georges Chehata 6 Awrangzeb, Mughal emperor 168, 317
al-Andalūs 115, 175, 178 al-ʿAydarūs family 379
Anṣārī l-Harawī, ʿAbdallāh 17, 42, 43, 81, 121, ʿAyn Māḍī 133, 327
165, 209, 260, 297 ʿAynī, Ṣadr al-Dīn 99
Anṣār/Mahdiyya 201, 283 ʿayyār (class of warriors) 91–92
antinomian Sufism 30, 37, 227, 260, 341 Ayyub Khan, Muhammad 284
al-Anwār al-qudsiyya fī maʿrifat qawāʿid al- Ayyūbid dynasty
ṣūfiyya (al-Shaʿrānī) 194, 197–198 patronage of Ṣūfī activities by 13, 32, 64,
apotropaic saints (abdāl) 272, 273 85, 108, 161, 266, 386
Āq Qoyūnlū (Akkoyunlu) 270, 312, 324 relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans of
Aq Shams al-Dīn 265, 400 266
Āqāsī, Mīrzā Ḥājjī 312 see also under specific rulers
ʿaqd (contracts) 336–337 Aʿẓam Shāh 168
Arab Socialist Renaissance Party (Ḥizb Azerbaijan 126, 270, 323, 381, 391, 397, 398
al-Baʿth al- ʿArabī l-Ishtirākī) 279–280
Arabic language 17, 92–94, 95–96, 99 Bā ʿAlawī 380
Arberry, Arthur John 2–3, 5, 345 Bābā, Sīdī 203
arbitration. see mediation/arbitration Bābā Farīd 340, 355
architecture, of Ṣūfī lodges 162–166 Bābā Ilyās Khurāsānī 243, 244, 245,
Ardabil 126, 166, 229, 269 259–260
Arghūn, Īlkhānid ruler 306, 307 Bābā Isḥāq 259–260
Arslān-bāb (Bābā) 241 Bābā Kamāl Jandī 395
al-ʿArūsī, Aḥmad 220 Bābā Palangpūsh 82, 86, 221, 317
asceticism (zuhd) 10, 13, 19, 28–29, 92, 201, Baba Selim Kaliçani 281–282
225, 294, 300, 316, 337, 341, 362–363 Bābā Ṭāhir ʿUryān 260
(aṣghar) jihād (lesser jihād) 117, 257, 315 Bābā Tükles 242
aṣḥāb al-balad (masters of the city) 272 Bābāʾī revolt 246, 249, 259–260
aṣḥāb al-nawba (people of the turn) 272 Bābāʾīs 259–260
ʿAshīra Muḥammadiyya (Muḥammadan Babakhanov family 279
Clan) 356 Bābur, Abū l-Qāsim, Timūrid prince
ashrāf (noble descendants of the Prophet) 308–309
278, 350 Bābur, Mughal ruler 263
asmāʾī orders 387 Badawiyya (Aḥmadiyya) 392, 393
Asrār al-tawḥīd fī maqāmāt al-shaykh Abū Badr al-Dīn (Bedreddīn) 249
Saʿīd (Muḥammad b. Munawwar) 107 Baghdad 14, 37, 62–63, 64–65, 69, 83, 84,
assemblies (majlis) 19, 204, 299–300 92, 107, 116, 122, 132, 133, 148, 149, 158,
āstānas, use of term 157–158 175–177, 190–193, 227, 241, 256, 257, 276,
Atatürk, Muṣṭafā Kemāl 134, 152, 355 292, 294, 295, 299, 300, 304, 336, 337,
ʿAṭṭār, ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn 396 344, 345, 347, 353, 364, 366, 370, 376,
authority 379, 388–90, 399
imitatio Muḥammadi 269, 274 al-Baghdādī, Mawlānā Khālid 133, 194–195,
Sharifian model of 268, 269 397
of Ṣūfī saints 267–273 Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband 83, 153, 163, 164,
ʿAwārif al-maʿārif (al-Suhrawardī) 116–117, 262, 297, 396
192, 193, 196, 208, 363, 367, 391 Bahāʾ al-Dīn Walad 297, 305, 310, 311
418 Index

Bahāʾ al-Dīn Zakariyyāʾ Multānī 390, 391 Bektaş Veli, Hacı (Bektāsh, Ḥājjī) 35, 41, 122,
Bākharzī, Sayf al-Dīn 262, 395 124, 125, 153, 243, 399
Bākharzī, Yaḥyā 193 Bektāshiyya/Bektāşiyye
l-Bakrī, ʿAlī 278 abolition of 35, 342
al-Bakrī, Muḥammad 36, 47, 278 and akhī associations 208
al-Bakrī, Muṣṭafā 194 establishment of 398
Bakriyya 36, 396, 398 founder of. see Bektaş Veli, Hacı
Bālim Sulṭān 399 and Janissaries 35, 265, 317–318, 342, 399
Balkans. see under specific countries/regions organisational structure of 342
Balkh 42–43, 256, 294, 364 political influence of 35
al-Balkhī, Shaqīq 257, 368 re-establishment of 281–282
Balyānī, Amīn al-Dīn 85, 261 relations between sultans and 265
Bamba, Amadu 179, 209 and Sayyid Ghāzī’s shrine 125
banning spiritual practices of 399
of Ṣūfī activities spread of 22, 123, 232
in Albania 355 Ben Badis/Bin Bādīs 152
in China 136, 355 Bengal 40, 67, 389, 390, 400
in Malaysia 69 Berke Khān 262
in Saudi Arabia 151, 355 Bhutto, Zulfikar Ali 284
in Turkey 46, 48–49, 135, 152, 210, 234 Bible 337
in USSR 136, 152, 279, 355 Bidar 163, 163, 168
see also state control Bishr b. Ḥārith al-Ḥāfī 89
Bāqī bi-Llāh 126–127 al-Bisṭāmī, Abū Yazīd 190, 297, 396
Baqīʿ cemetery 151 Black, Christopher 343
baraka (blessings) 16, 17, 21, 59, 83–86, blessings (baraka) 16, 17, 21, 59, 83–86,
117–119, 128, 129, 137, 150, 161, 187, 188, 117–119, 128, 129, 137, 150, 161, 187, 188,
190, 203, 211, 284, 339, 367–368, 374, 190, 203, 211, 284, 339, 367–368, 374,
375, 401, 409 375, 401, 409
baraka bureaucracy 19, 256, 279–285 Boko Haram 320
Bardhi, Baba Reshat 281–282 Bosnia-Herzegovina 15, 67, 69, 135, 228–229
basant festival (spring festival) 87 Bouteflika, Abdelaziz 285
al-Bashīr, ʿUmar 283 Braudel, Fernand 12
Basra 176, 241, 293, 362, 364 brothers (ikhwān) 94, 170
bathhouse workers 97, 99 see also disciples/students/followers
bayʿa (oath of allegiance) 196, 204, 297, 326 Brown, Peter 189, 206
337, 348–349, 367, 409 al-Budshīshī, Shaykh Ḥamza 408
Baybars i, Mamlūk sultan 353 Bukhara 35, 99, 153, 163, 164, 193, 242, 380,
Baybars ii al-Jāshnikīr, Mamlūk sultan 32, 396
221–222, 338 Burhān al-Dīn Gharīb 82, 85, 264, 400
Bāyezīd ii, Ottoman sultan 228, 265 butchers 85, 96–98
Bayrāmiyya/Bayrāmiyye 22, 399–400
Baysunghur, Timūrid prince 42 Cairo
Bayt al-Ḥikma 63 khānqāhs in 32, 33, 36, 85, 108, 232, 235,
bazm (royal banquets) 299, 300, 311 266, 342, 399
Bedreddīn (Badr al-Dīn) 249 as religious centre 149, 347, 353
begging (suʾāl) 13, 29, 82, 89, 90, 167, 212, shrine complexes in 41, 83, 120
222–223 veneration of Ṣūfī masters in 119, 220,
begging bowls (kashkūls) 341, 342 272
Begtimur, Armanid ruler 304 zāwiyas in 158, 194
behaviour, rules of. see rules of conduct cash waqf 62
Index 419

Catholic Church 346 Chodkiewicz, Michel 189

Caucasus 9, 19, 131, 277, 278, 316, 319–320, Choudhury, Rishad 233
327–328, 397 circle (daaira) 235
Çelebī, Pīr ʿĀdil 399 cities
Çelebī, Pīr Ḥusayn 399 Ṣūfī institutions in
censorship (ḥisba) 258 impact of cities on 232–236
Central Asia impact on cities of 228–230
anti-colonial resistance in 131, 317 impact on social fabric of 230–232
relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans Sufism in 227
in 42, 65, 147, 255, 261–262, 267–268, see also rural areas
306 clairvoyance (firāsa) 198, 255, 263, 311
rural Sufism in 121, 241–243, 246 classifications, of Ṣūfī orders 385–387
Ṣūfī orders from 394–398 Clayer, Nathalie 6, 17–18, 227–236
see also under specific countries/cities, cloak. see khirqa
dynasties, Ṣūfī orders clothing
centralisation, of Ṣūfī activities. see state of ascetics 362–363
control of futuwwa brotherhoods 94–95, 343
Ceyhan, Semih 21–22, 385–401 khirqa 21, 263, 298, 337, 339, 363–366
Chaghatayids 261 mending of 363
see also under specific rulers muraqqaʿa 363–366
chains (silsilas). see silsilas of Ṣūfīs 364–366
chains of transmission (isnāds) 348, treatises on 365–366
367–368, 376 codes. see rules of conduct
Chardin, Jean 1–2 coffee consumption 18, 232–233
charity. see donations colonialism
al-Charkhī, Yaʿqūb 396 Ṣūfī response to
chief attendants (naqīb al-nuqabāʾ) 200 in general 273, 318–319
chief shaykhs (shaykh al-shuyūkh) 32, 64, in Algeria 277–278, 318, 326–327
108, 266, 353, 357 in Caucasus 277, 319, 327–328
chiefs (nuqabāʾ) 200–201, 273 in Central Asia 317
Chih, Rachida 16–17, 187–212, 235 in India 276
Chihil majlis (al-Simnānī) 307 in Libya 275, 328, 382
China 5, 135, 136, 233, 270, 346, 351, 355, 376, in Mali 274, 325
390, 395, 397 against Ottoman Empire 275
see also under specific regions, Ṣūfī orders in Senegal 282–283
Chishtī, Mawdūd 265 and Sufism 67–68, 131, 134, 194, 256,
al-Chishtī, Muʿīn al-Dīn 108, 122, 127, 273–279
148–149, 158, 299, 400 common believers (ʿāmma) 189
Chishtī Ṣābirīs 209, 284 Companions (ṣaḥāba) 116, 187
Chishtiyya companionship (ṣuḥba/ṣuḥbat) 17, 170, 188,
branches of 400 190, 192, 196, 204, 208, 362, 366, 392,
establishment of 66, 107–108, 400 400
founder of. see Chishtī, Muʿīn al-Dīn conduct, rules of. see rules of conduct
political influence of 263–264 Les confréries musulmanes du Hedjaz
shrines of 148–149, 168 (Le Chatelier) 2
spread of 126–127, 400 Les confréries religieuses musulmanes
views of, on donations 82 (Depont & Coppolani) 2, 273
mention of 276 conversions
Chittick, William 7–8 to Islam 86, 146, 149, 242, 261, 262
chivalry (futuwwa). see futuwwa to Sufism 138, 209, 309
420 Index

Cook, David 19–20, 315–320 death commemorations (ʿurs) 44, 86, 149,
Cooley, Charles Horton 11 170, 200, 339, 355
Coppolani, Xavier 2 decline
Corbin, Henry 4 in Ṣūfī lodges 130–132, 345
Cornell, Vincent 37, 39 in Sufism 3, 195, 233–234, 406, 408, 410
Coşan, Esat 281 deconstruction, concept of 2
council of godly men (dīwān al-ṣāliḥūn) dede (grandfather). see Ṣūfī masters
272–273 Dede Garkın 243, 244, 245
council of the saints (dīwān al-awliyāʾ) 256, Dedeköy 244
272, 278–279, 297–298 Delhi 82, 84, 86, 126–127, 132, 133, 168, 169,
countryside. see rural areas 263, 276, 390
court advisers Democratic Unionist Party (al-Ḥizb
Ṣūfīs as al-Ittiḥādi al-Dīmūqrāṭī) 356
in early period 303–306 Deobandi 16, 151, 410
in modern period 312 Depont, Octave 2
in post-Mongol period 306–312, deputies (muqaddam) 20, 187, 210, 347–350
344–345 dergāh (central shrine) 35, 137–138
see also under specific Ṣūfī masters Derrida, Jacques 2
craftsman. see merchants/craftsman dershanes (classrooms) 356
crusades/crusaders 108, 316 Dhakhīrat al-mulūk (Sayyid ʿAlī Hamadānī)
cult of saints. see Ṣūfī saints 267
customs (ʿādāt) 328 dhikr ceremonies (ḥaḍra) 170, 200, 210, 348,
351, 352, 354
daaira (circle) 235 dhikr/ ṭarīq al-khafī (silent ritual repetition)
al-Dabbāgh, Abd al-ʿAzīz 272 387
al-Dāghestānī, ʿAbdallāh 138 Dhū l-Nūn al-Miṣrī 147, 190
dahiras (religious societies) 51–52 digitalisation 408
Dallas, Ian (Abdelqadir) 180 Dingiray 325
Damascus 43, 64, 65, 86, 109–110, 132, 133, disciple-master relationship
138, 150, 159, 178, 204, 232, 241, 266, 272, in general 187, 191, 195–199, 336
276, 277, 280, 300, 304, 338, 342, 345, based on Qurʾān and Sunna 196–197
353, 390, 391, 397, 399 and love and trust of master 202–203
Damāwandī, Muḥammad Ḥusayn Naṣr Allāh reciprocity in 204
312 and rules of conduct. see rules of conduct
l-Daqqāq, Abū ʿAlī 89, 197, 368–369 and serving the master 199–204
daras (estates) 51 and shaykhs’ attitude 198
dargāh (shrine complexes). see Ṣūfī al-Sulamī on 368
shrine complexes disciples/students/followers (murīds) 207
Darqawiyya 180, 393 in general 348–349
darvīsh (beggar), use of term 341 relationships of
Darwīsh Āhū-pūsh 260 with master. see disciple-master
al-Dasūqī, Ibrāhīm 388, 392, 393 relationship
Dasūqiyya 392–393 with other disciples 205, 208
Data Darbar (Lahore) 44–46 dispensations (rukhṣa/rukhaṣ) 193, 366
Dātā Ganj Bakhsh (al-Hujwīrī). see al-Hujwīrī dīwān al-awliyāʾ (council of the saints) 256,
Dāʾūdiyya branch 388 272, 278–279, 297–298
Dāya al-Rāzī, Najm al-Dīn 267, 395 dīwān al-ṣāliḥūn (council of godly men)
Ḍayfa Khātūm 112 272–273
De Jong, Frederick 6, 47 Dīwān al-Waqf al-Sunnī (Iraq) 69
Index 421

Dīwān-i ḥikmat (al-Yasawī) 241, 395 al-Farāhīdī, al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad 174

Diyanet (Turkey’s directorate of religious Farīd al-Dīn Ganj-i Shakar 82, 87, 263, 400
affairs) 49, 50 Faridi, Shahidullah 284
donations (futūḥ/fatḥ) Fāriẓiyya 388
by artisan guilds 86 Fatehpur Sikri 128, 168, 169
from non-Muslims 86–87 Fawāʾid al-fuʾād (Ḥasan Dihlavī) 263
as part of rituals 82 felt hats (tājs) 341, 342
refusal vs. acceptance of 81–83 Fez 39, 133, 172, 258, 268, 269, 272
for Ṣūfī lodges 35, 85, 167 finances
for Ṣūfī shrines 85 of Ṣūfī institutions
Dudoignon, Stéphane A. 22, 405–412 in general 351–352
Dungan revolt 317 alms tax (zakāt) 167
al-Dūrī, ʿIzzat Ibrāhīm 69 begging 167
Durkheim, Emile 11–12 donations 35, 85, 167
Durocher, Maxime 228 patronage. see patronage
duty to rebel 258 waqfs 31–34, 35, 63–64, 119–120, 167,
duwayra (small house). see Ṣūfī lodges 221–222, 338, 352
firāsa (clairvoyance) 198, 255, 263, 311
education system, of Gülen movement 50 Firdawsī 297
Egypt Firouzeh, Peyvand 15–16, 157–170
relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans in Firozabad 168
19, 38, 266, 311 followers. see disciples/students/followers
rural saints in 44, 240 France
Ṣūfī activities in colonialism of
forming of associations 235 in general 2, 318–319
state control of 47–48, 135, 153, 233, in Algeria 277–278
278–279, 354 in Senegal 282–283, 326
Ṣūfī institutions in in Sengambia 50–51
khānqāhs in 108–110 see also colonialism, Ṣūfī response to
and political legitimisation 153 Sufism in 137, 408
ribāṭs in 178–179, 345 fraternity (ukhuwwa) 208, 212
zāwiyas in 114, 194, 202–203, 206, 207 see also futuwwa brotherhoods
Ṣūfī orders from 392–393 friends of God (awliyāʾ Allāh) 17, 117,
waqfs system in 13, 68 189–190
see also under dynasties, regions/cities, frontier spirit 147, 174
Ṣūfī orders Fuḍayl b. ʿIyāḍ 316
elite of the elite (khāṣṣat al-khāṣṣa) 189 Fulani jihād 318, 324
enraptured by God (majdhūb) 31, 211–212 Fulani people 274, 318, 324
Ephrat, Daphna 15, 105–139 fuqarāʾ (poor or ordinary Ṣūfīs) 59, 114, 191,
Erbakan, Necmettin 281 408–409
Ernst, Carl 8–9 Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya (Ibn al-ʿArabī) 81
Eşrefoğlū ʿAbdallāh Rūmī 124 futūḥ/fatḥ (donations). see donations
Europe, Sufism in 50, 70, 138, 209, 234, 256, Futuvvat nāma (Najm al-Dīn Zarkūb) 96
280, 406, 407 futuwwa (chivalry)
see also under specific countries books of 38, 95–98
brotherhoods/fraternities. see futuwwa
Fakhr al-Dīn ʿAlī Kāshifī 308 brotherhoods
Faqīh Rūḥ al-Dīn Rāmgardī 85 definition of 91
faqīr (impoverished) 221 origins of 91–92
422 Index

futuwwa (chivalry) (cont.) al-Ghazwānī, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbdallāh

progenitors of 96 40, 269
Sufism and al-Ghijduwānī, ʿAbd al-Khāliq 297, 395, 396
in general 14, 37–38 Ghulām ʿAlī 133
and asceticism 92 Gīsū Darāz, Sayyid Muḥammad 168
introduction into 90–91, 219 globalisation, of Sufism 50–53, 137, 209,
and social urban fabric 231 234, 407, 409
three levels of 219–220, 223 God, complete trust in 82, 89–90, 224
futuwwa brotherhoods Green, Nile 9, 43
in general 342–343, 358 Gril, Denis 197
and ʿAbbāsid dynasty 353 Guardamar 175
in Anatolia 13, 94–95, 208, 343 Guénon, René 4
clothing of 94–95, 343 guilds
conditions for acceptance into 92 in Bukhara 99
and crusaders 316 donations by 86
hierarchies within 92–93 patronage of 85–86
initiations into 93–94, 343 treatise on 98–99
in Iran 95, 343 see also futuwwa; futuwwa brotherhoods;
persons excluded from 96–97 merchants/craftsman
repression of 343 Gulbarga 168
and Sufism 316 Gülen, Fethullah 50, 137
terms of address within 94 Gülen movement 50, 137
treatises on 38, 95–98, 343 Gulzār-i abrār (Shaṭṭārī) 401
see also akhī associations
futuwwat-nāma (treatises on futuwwa) 38, ḥabs/ḥubūs/aḥbās (pious endowments). see
95–98, 343 waqfs
al-Ḥaddād, Abū Ḥafṣ 89, 190, 191, 294–295,
Gaborieau, Marc 6 365
Gabriel, Angel 98 ḥadīths 3, 7, 63, 64, 89, 132, 133, 146, 175, 191,
Gambia, religious groups in. see under specific 192, 199, 202, 229, 256, 257, 259, 267,
religious groups 284, 293, 296, 315, 337, 348, 367, 376,
gardens (rawḍa) 235 408
Gardet, Louis 6 see also isnāds
Garkınī ṭarīqa 243 Ḥaḍramawt 379, 380
Gauharshād, Timūrid queen 42 ḥaḍras (dhikr ceremonies) 170, 200, 210,
Gāzurgāh 121, 163, 165 348, 351, 352, 354
Geertz, Clifford 83–84 al-Ḥāfiẓ, Muḥammad 209
gender segregation 50 Ḥafṣid dynasty 38, 116
Geoffroy, Eric 8 Haji Jalaluddin 280
ghawth (poles). see quṭb/aqṭāb Ḥājjī Bayrām Walī 399, 400
Ghawthiyya branch 388 Ḥājjī Bektāsh. see Bektaş Veli, Hacı
al-Ghazālī, Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad 13, 18, Ḥakīm Ātā (Sulaymān Bāqirghānī) 242, 395
28, 29, 107, 170, 177, 201, 255–259, 267 al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī 147, 189–190, 191, 256
Ghāzān Khān 261 Hamadānī, Sayyid ʿAlī 95, 267, 395
Ghāzī Khusrev Beg 229 al-Hamadānī, Yūsuf 241, 395, 396
Ghāzī Muḥammad 277 Ḥamdūn Qaṣṣār 89, 90
Ghaznawī, Nūr al-Dīn Mubārak 390 Hamès, Constant 234
ghazw (raids) 315 Ḥāmidiyya Shādhiliyya 356
see also jihād Hammoudi, Abdallah 198–199, 203
Index 423

Ḥamza, Shaykh 203 shrine of 44

Ḥamza(t) Bek 277 mention of 265
al-Ḥanafī, Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad 40, Hülegü, Mongol ruler 65, 261
297, 311–312 Ḥulvī/Ḥulwī 386
Ḥarāfīsh 30 Humāyūn, Mughal emperor 128, 168
al-Harawī, ʿAbdallāh 219–220, 223 Ḥusayn Bāyqarā, Timūrid ruler 42, 43, 121,
l-Ḥarīrī, ʿAlī 389 165, 262
Ḥarīriyya 389 Ḥusayn Wāʿiẓ Kāshifī 94
Hart, Kimberly 49 Ḥusnāʾ 221
Hārūn al-Rashīd, Abbāsid caliph 316 Ḥusniyya 341–342
al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī 362, 368, 369 Hussein, Saddam 68–69, 285
Ḥasan Dihlavī 263
Ḥasan Jurī 86 Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, Muḥammad 41, 132,
Ḥasan Pasha 220 150–151, 355
Ḥātim al-Aṣamm 364, 368 Ibn al-ʿArabī, Muḥyī l-Dīn
Haṭṭin, Battle of 316 on adab 296
Hausa people 318, 325 books of 297
l-Ḥawārī, Aḥmad b. Abī 364 on donations 81
hayba (reverential fear) 198 shrine of 43, 150
Ḥaydar 269 on silsilas 369
Ḥaydariyya 30, 86, 212, 245–246 transmission of teachings of 231
health care 247–248 Ibn al-ʿArīf 259
Heidemann, Stefan 64 Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Allāh al-Iskandarī 266, 345, 394
The heritage of Sufism (Lewisohn) 5 Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Abū l-ʿAbbās 212
hermitage (ṣawmāʿa) 31, 157 Ibn Barrajān 259
al-Ḥifnāwī, Muḥammad 220 Ibn Baṭṭūṭa 37–38, 94, 114, 343
hijra (migration) 274–276, 318, 319 Ibn al-Fāriḍ 297
ḥimāyat (protection) system 39, 121–122 Ibn Ḥamdīn 258
Hinduism 263 Ibn Ḥanbal 363
ḥisba (censorship) 258 Ibn Idrīs, Aḥmad 195, 274
Historiography (Knysh) 1 Ibn al-Jawzī 29, 83
Ḥizb al-Baʿth al- ʿArabī l-Ishtirākī (Arab Ibn Jubayr 300
Socialist Renaissance Party) 279–280 Ibn Karrām 161, 177
al-Ḥizb al-Ittiḥādi al-Dīmūqrāṭī (Democratic Ibn Kathīr 316
Unionist Party) 356 Ibn Khafīf 176, 365
Hoexter, Mariam 60, 61 Ibn al-Miʿmār 92–94, 95, 96
Hofer, Nathan 11–12, 14, 16, 58–70, 174–180, Ibn al-Mubārak 90, 175, 257, 296, 316
345 Ibn Munawwar 90, 118
hospices 15, 64, 105, 106, 108, 150, 174, 176, Ibn Nadīm 368
177, 179, 221 Ibn Qasī 259
hospitality, at Ṣūfī lodges 194, 199, 202, 204, Ibn al-Qaysarānī (al-Maqdisī, Abū l-Faḍl)
206, 210, 231, 247 366
Hospitaller knights 316 Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya 29, 41
Hüdāyī, ʿAzīz Maḥmūd 400 Ibn Qunfudh, Aḥmad b. Ḥusayn 220
al-Hujwīrī (Dātā Ganj Bakhsh) Ibn Taymiyya 29, 41, 150
on begging 223 Ibrāhīm al-Aʿzab 389
on branches of Sufism 369 Ibrāhīm b. Adham
on clothing 366, 367 as ascetic-cum-warrior 106, 338
on al-Nūrī 224 on earning living 90
424 Index

Ibrāhīm b. Adham (cont.) Īnjū dynasty 261

legend of 256–257, 294 institutionalisation, of Sufism 66, 116,
on muraqqaʿa 364 192–193, 224–325
title of 297 institutions, sociological theory of 11
mention of 316 see also Ṣūfī institutions
Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī 388, 392, 393 insurrections/revolts 246, 248–249,
Ibrāhīm Zāhid al-Jīlānī 390–391, 397 259–260, 275, 327–328
Idrīs (biblical figure) 98 see also jihād
Idrīs, Muḥammad 275, 329, 382 Internal Rules for the Sufi orders (al-lāʾiḥa
Idrīs al-Fāsī, Aḥmad b. 133, 274, 381 al-dākhiliyya lil-ṭuruq al-ṣūfiyya) 279
Idrīsid dynasty 269, 275, 378–379 internet, Sufism and 407–412
Idrīsiyya 381 Introduction au soufisme (Geoffroy) 8
Ifrīqiyya 82, 115, 116, 147, 178, 194, 257, 393 An introduction to the history of Ṣūfism
see also under specific dynasties; under (Arberry) 5
specific Ṣūfī orders Iqbāl, Jāvīd 45
Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn (al-Ghazālī) 28, 258 Iqbāl, Muḥammad 45
ijāza (licences) 347–348, 376, 394 Iran
ikhwān (brothers) 94, 170 futuwwa brotherhoods in 95, 343
see also disciples/students/followers relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans
Ikhwān al-Muslimūn (Muslim Brotherhood) in 261
46, 48, 152, 280, 355, 357 Ṣūfī institutions in 121, 126, 229
ʿilāj rūḥānī (spiritual healing) 203 Ṣūfī orders from 394–398
Ilkhānid dynasty 165, 261, 306–307 Ṣūfī temporal sovereignty in 269–270
see also under specific rulers see also under specific dynasties, regions/
illiteracy 240, 247 cities, Ṣūfī orders
Īltutmish, Shams al-Dīn 263 Iraq
ʿImād al-Dīn ʿUmar 266 Ṣūfī orders from 388–391
imarets (soup kitchens) 32, 33, 35, 38, 228 waqfs system in 68–69
imitatio Muḥammadi 269, 274 see also under specific dynasties, regions/
impoverished (faqīr) 221 cities, Ṣūfī orders
India ʿIrāqī, Fakhr al-Dīn 165, 391
anti-colonial resistance/jihād in 276– ʿIsā Beg 229
277, 278, 317 ʿĪsāwiyya 346, 347
British opposition to Sufism in 354–355 Isfahan 83, 241, 305
relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans al-Iṣfahānī, Abū Nuʿaym 19, 296
in 263–265 Īshān Mengli 261
Ṣūfī institutions in ishanate 271
khānqāhs in 107–108, 126, 127 Ishānism 151
political influence of 129 Iskender, ʿAlī Dede 228
shrine complexes in 127, 129 İskenderpaşa Mosque 48
Ṣūfī orders from/in Islam
in general 126–127 conversions to 146, 242, 261
overview 400–401 mysticism in. see Islamic mysticism
political influence of 263–264 reform in 3–4, 151, 324–326
see also under specific dynasties, regions/ ribāṭ-style 180
cities, Ṣūfī orders spread of 67, 146, 211, 229, 240–242, 257,
Indonesia 19, 47, 148, 195, 234, 235, 256, 264–265
280–281, 379, 393, 397, 400 two-tier model of 37
initiatory mantle (khirqa). see khirqa Islamic law 218, 277
Index 425

Islamic Law and Society (journal) 60 Janissary Corps (elite Ottoman troops) 19,
Islamic mysticism 35, 265, 317–318, 342, 399
definitions of 335 Javād Nūrbakhsh, Shaykh 7, 409, 410
organisation of Javānmard Qaṣṣāb 97­­­–99
in general 335–336 javānmardī (chivalry). see futuwwa
as debasement 335 Jawāmiʿ ādāb al-ṣūfiyya (al-Sulamī) 192
disciple-master relationship. see al-Jawhara al-muḍīʾah fī sulūk al-ṭālib wa-
disciple-master relationship nuṣḥ al-barīya (Ibrāhīm al-Dasūqī) 393
futuwwa brotherhoods. see futuwwa Jaysh Rijāl al-Ṭarīqa al-Naqshbandiyya (Men
brotherhoods of the Army of the Naqshbandiyya) 320
itinerant brotherhoods 341–342, 358 al-Jazūlī, Muḥammad 40, 116, 268–269,
lodges. see Ṣūfī lodges 346, 394
orders. see Ṣūfī orders/networks/paths Jazūliyya Shādhiliyya 18, 149, 178, 247, 256,
studies on 335 268–269, 346, 347
Islamic mysticism: A short history (Knysh) Jerusalem 18, 108, 109, 110, 232, 342, 390, 391
9–10 al-Jibāwī, Saʿd al-Dīn 391
Islamic Society of North America (isna) Jibrīl b. ʿUmar 274
69–70 jihād
Islamisation 67, 146, 211, 229, 240–242, 257, of Abdelkader (Algeria) 277–278, 318,
264–265 326–327
see also jihād of Aḥmad Barelwī (India) 276–277, 278
Ismāʿīl, Khedive 354 of Aḥmad al-Sharīf (Libya) 275, 328, 382
Ismāʿīl Ḥaqqī Bursavī 400 against crusaders 316
Ismāʿīl i, Ṣafavid ruler 126, 312, 324, 381 of Dan Fodio (Nigeria) 273–274, 318,
Ismāʿīl al-Inbābī 119 324–325
Ismāʿīl Khān 270, 271 lesser vs. greater 257, 315
Ismāʿīl Rūmī 124 of Shāmil (Caucasus) 277, 278, 319–320,
isnāds (chains of transmission) 348, 327–328
367–368, 376 Sufism and 257, 317–320
ʿiṣyān (rebellion). see insurrections/revolts of Tall (Mali and Senegal) 274, 319,
Italy, colonialism of 275, 328–329, 382 325–326
īthār (preferring the other). see selflessness types of 315–316
itinerant brotherhoods 20, 30, 211, 341–344, use of term 315
358 see also frontier spirit; insurrections/
revolts
al-Jabanyānī, Abū Isḥāq 257 al-Jīlānī, ʿAbd al-Qādir 122, 158, 298
Jadidism 151 books of 389
al-Jaghbūb 229 Dan Fodio’s vision of 318
Jahānabādī, Shāh Kalīm Allāh 82 saintly eminence of 388
Jahangir, Mughal emperor 310 shrine of 69, 347, 389
Jalāl al-Dīn Ḥusayn Bukhārī 390 worship of 148
Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī, Mawlānā 2, 122, 124, 125, mention of 369, 379
137, 153, 166, 167, 170, 231, 265, 297, 305, al-Jīlī, Jamāl al-Dīn 395
344, 358, 399 Jinnah, Ali 284
Jalwatiyya/Celvetiyye 22, 399, 400 Job, biblical figure 98
Jamāl Phatrī, Sayyid 389 Jong, Frederick de 6, 47
Jāmī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān 43, 243, 268, 307 The Journal of Economic and Social History of
Jamʿiyyat al-ʿUlamāʾ al-Muslimīn the Orient 60
(Ulamāʾ Association) 152 journeying (rūḥānī) 387
426 Index

al-Junayd, Abū l-Qāsim establishment of 398

on Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād 191, 294–295 founder of. see al-Khalwatī, ʿUmar
and disciple-master relationship 316 organisation of 36
eight rules of 177 relations between sultans and 130,
on political life 256 265–266
on serving kings 310–311 rules of conduct of 201
mention of 37 spiritual practices of 398, 400
Junayd b. Ibrāhīm Ṣafawī 269, 324, 397 spread of 123, 194, 312, 394, 398
jurisdiction (wilāya) 265 superintendents of 200
Juybārī family 380 mention of 86, 194
Jūzjānī, Minhāj-i Sirāj 263 Khāmūsh, Niẓām al-Dīn 396
Khan, Hussain Ahmad 14, 81–87
Kabbani, Hisham 138 Khan, Nusrat Fateh Ali 47
Ḳāḍīzādelī movement 62 Khānqāh al-Farāfra 111, 112
al-Kalābādhī, Abū Bakr 365 Khānqāh al-Farāfra (Aleppo) 111, 112
Kamāl al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān 261 khānqāhs/khānaqāhs (Ṣūfī lodges)
Karamustafa, Ahmet 37, 227 in Egypt 108–110
Karrāmiyya 31, 63, 106, 161, 177, 191, 365 establishment of 106, 338
Kart dynasty 261 feeding of poor by 33
Kāsānī Dahbidī, Aḥmad (Makhdūm-i finances of. see finances
Aʿẓam) 19, 194, 268, 309 functions of 112–113
Kashf al-maḥjūb (al-Hujwīrī) 44, 366 in India 107–108, 126, 127
Kashgar 271, 323, 351 institutional structure of 113
al-Kāshifī, ʿAlī b. Ḥusayn al-Wāʿiẓ 262, practice of majlis in 299
267–268 prayer practices at 32–33
Kāshifī Sabzawārī 96 rules of conduct for. see rules of conduct
kashkūls (begging bowls) 341, 342 spread of 107–112
Kasnazān, ʿAbd al-Karīm Shāhī 285 use of term 157–158, 370
Kasnazāniyya 284–285 see also Ṣūfī lodges (in general)
Kay Khusraw ii, Saljūq sultan 243 al-Kharkūshī, Abu Saʿd (or Saʿīd) ʿAbd al-
Kayqubād i, Saljūq ruler 243, 305 Malik b. Muḥammad 294, 363, 365
Kazakhstan 121, 165, 241–242 al-Kharrāz, Abū Saʿīd 89, 208, 225
al-Kāzarūnī, Abū Isḥāq 176, 191, 257, 261 khāṣṣa (spiritual elite) 189
al-Kāzarūnī, Bahāʾ al-Dīn 119 Khatmiyya 133, 283, 356
khādim (superintendents) 20, 170, 199–200, al-Khawwāṣ, Ibrāhīm 368
203, 339, 340, 347 Khazīnī 268
Khāksārs 99, 317 khidma (service) 17, 188, 199–204, 206, 210,
al-khalʿa (robe of honour) 298 222, 224, 296
khalīfa (divine lieutenancy on earth) 297, Khiḍr, Qurʾānic figure 146, 348
311 khilaʿ (robe of honour) 337
Khalīl Būrghāzī 96 khilāfa (Prophet’s legacy) 297
Khalīlullāh, Shāh 162–163, 163, 168 khirqa (initiatory mantle transmitted from
khalwa/khalwat (seclusion) 230, 328, 389, master to disciple) 21, 263, 298, 337, 339,
398 343, 363–369
al-Khalwatī, ʿUmar 398 Khrushchev, Nikita Sergeyevich 136
Khalwatiyya/Halvetiyye khulafāʾ (master’s deputies) 21, 200, 385,
as asmāʾī order 387 401
branches of 398 Khuldabad 168, 229, 264
chiefs of 200–201 al-Khuldī, Jaʿfar 368
Index 427

Khurāsān 106–107, 339 Lacombe, Olivier 6

Khusraw ii, shah of Iran 243 Lahore 44–46, 87
al-Khwāfī, Zayn al-Dīn 390 al-lāʾiḥa al-dākhiliyya lil-ṭuruq al-ṣūfiyya
khwāja, use of term 297 (Internal Rules for the Sufi orders) 279
Khwāja ʿAbdallāh Anṣārī 17, 42, 81, 121, 165, Lālā, ʿAlī 395
209, 260, 297 al-Lamaṭī, Aḥmad b. al-Mubārak 272
Khwāja Āfāq 270, 271, 322, 323, 329, 351 Lane, E. W. 342
Khwāja ʿAlī 269, 397, 399 law, Ḥanbalī school of 29, 307
khwājagān 91, 242, 262, 297, 322, 395, 396 Le Chatelier, Alfred 2
Khwājagān path 396 Lemeẓāt (Ḥulvī) 386
Khwājas/Khojas 129–130, 262, 322, 351 Lewisohn, Leonard 5
Khwārazm Shāh, Alāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Libya
304 anti-colonial resistance/jihād in 20, 275,
Kīmiyā-yi saʿādat (al-Ghazālī) 258, 267 328, 382
al-Kirmānī, Awḥad al-Dīn 390 unification of 329, 382
Kirmānī, Shāh Shujāʿ 91 see also under specific dynasties, regions/
Kırşehir 95, 122, 124, 125 cities, Ṣūfī orders
Kitāb adab al-mulūk fī bayān ḥaqāʾiq al- licences (ijāza) 347–348, 376, 394
taṣawwuf (anon.) 295–296 Little Senegal (New York City) 52
Kitāb ādāb al-ṣuḥba (al-Sulamī) 192, 294 lodge-tomb complexes. see Ṣūfī shrine
Kitāb al-bayāḍ wa-l-sawād (al-Sīrjānī) 366 complexes
Kitāb al-futuwwa (Ibn al-Miʿmār) 92–94, 95 al-Lumaʿ fī l-taṣawwuf (al-Sarrāj) 190–191,
Kitāb al-futuwwa (al-Sulamī) 90–91, 219 365
Kitāb al-jihād (ʿAbdallāh b. al-Mubārak) 257
Kitāb khalʿ al-naʿlayn (Ibn Qasī) 259 Māʾ al-ʿAynayn 319
Kitāb lubs al-muraqqaʿāt ( Ibn Khafīf) 365 Mā rawā-hu al-asāṭīn fī ʿada al-majīʾ ilā
Kitāb al-tadbirāt al-ilāhiyya fī iṣlāḥ al- l-salāṭīn (al-Suyūṭī) 267
mamlaka al-insāniyya (Ibn al-ʿArabī) Macedonia 135, 282
297 Madagh 209–210
Kitāb tahdhīb al-asrār (al-Kharkūshī) 294 al-Madanī, Muḥammad Ẓāfir 393
Kızılbāş/Qizilbāsh 270, 323–324, 342, 398 Maʿdhūriyya 341–342
Knysh, Alexander 9–10 madrasas
Köksal, M. Fatih 96 and internet 410
kolkhoz system 279 state patronage of 165, 177
Komuniteti Bektashian Kryegjyshata and Ṣūfī lodges 107, 109, 112, 113, 122, 158,
Botërore Bektashiane (Bektashi 163, 165, 230, 370
Community–World Bektashi Chief use of term 158
Grandfather Centre) 281–282 waqfs for 31, 45, 63–64
Konya 35, 122, 124, 125, 153, 166, 167, 170, 232, Maghrib 14, 16, 18, 37, 38, 65, 115, 133, 145,
265, 347, 399 147, 149, 178, 179, 204, 232, 249, 255, 258,
Kosovo 135–136, 282 269, 274, 326, 378–380, 393, 396, 405
Kotku, Mehmed Zahid 49, 281 see also North Africa
Kubrā, Najm al-Dīn 262, 395 Māhān 166
Kubrawiyya 66, 395, 396 Maḥāsin al-majālis (Ibn al-ʿArīf) 259
Kufa 241, 362 Mahdism 178, 248–249, 258, 274
Kuftārū, Aḥmad 280 Mahdiyya. see Anṣār/Mahdiyya
al-Kuntī, Sīdī Mukhtār b. Aḥmad 389 Maḥmūd ii, Ottoman sultan 35, 68, 276,
Kurdistan 19, 256, 275–276, 284 399
428 Index

Majd al-Dīn Baghdādī 395 master’s deputies (khulafāʾ) 21, 200, 385,
majdhūb (enraptured by God) 31, 211–212 401
majlis (assemblies) 19, 204, 299–300 Mathnavī-yi maʿnavī (Rūmī) 2, 230–231
al-Majlis al-Āʿlā lil-Ṭuruq al-Ṣūfiyya (Supreme Mauritania 51, 209, 229, 234, 319, 394
council of Sufi orders) 135, 354 mausoleums. see Ṣūfī shrines
Majlis al-Qawmī lil-Dhikr wa-l-Dhākirīn Mauss, Marcel 264
(National assembly of remembrance and Maussian gift obligations 264
those who remember) 283 Mawlānā Khālid al-Baghdādī 275, 276
Majlis al-Ṣūfī (Sufi Council) 21, 354, 358 Mawlānā Nāṣirī Siwāsī 95, 96–97
Maktūbāt (al-Sirhindī) 397 Mawlawiyya/Mevleviyye
Malāmatiyya/Melāmīs 90–91, 227, 233, 341, establishment of 123, 398
365 as musammā order 387
Malaysia 69, 393, 397 relations between sultans and 130, 265
Maldives 67 spiritual practices of 399
Malfūẓāt-i Naqshbandiyya 82, 317 spread of 22, 347, 399
Mali 46, 153, 229, 235, 274, 325, 379 tekkes of 66, 137, 158
Mālik b. Dīnār 362 Mawlāy Idrīs 272
Malik Ḥusayn 262 Mawlāy Sulaymān, Moroccan sultan 133
Malik Zayn al-Dīn 264 mawlids (saints’ birthdays) 44, 47, 60, 119,
Mamlūk dynasty 16, 30, 33, 38, 62, 65, 111, 148, 187, 207, 210, 220, 339, 351, 352, 389,
112, 148, 165, 240, 266, 292, 311, 345, 353, 392, 394
386 Mayeur-Jaouen, Catherine 16, 145–153, 205
see also under specific rulers al-Mayūrqī, Abū Bakr 259
al-Maʾmūn, Abbāsid caliph 62–63, 92, 293 mazārs (shrines). see Ṣūfī shrines
Manāqib al-ʿārifīn (Aflākī) 94–95 McGregor, Richard 17, 218–225
Manbaʿ al-abḥār fī riyāḍ al-abrār meals, preparing and serving of 201–202
(Khazīnī) 268 Mecca 15, 28, 42, 43, 60, 108, 117, 132–133,
Manṣūr al-Baṭāʾiḥī 389 149, 176, 178, 219, 274, 325
Manṣūr al-Ḥallāj 303 Meclis-i Meşāyiḥ (Council of Shaykhs) 354
Mantaz 120 mediation/arbitration 39, 84, 190, 205–206,
maqāms. see Ṣūfī shrine complexes; Ṣūfī 262, 311–312, 340
shrines Medina 28, 116, 151, 219, 277, 283, 363, 389,
Maqdīsh, Maḥmūd 273 400
al-Maqdisī, Abū l-Faḍl (Ibn al-Qaysarānī) Meḥmed ʿAlī, Ottoman governor 36, 47
366 Meḥmed ii, Ottoman sultan 42, 66, 400
maraboutism (miuridizm) 149, 278 Meier, Fritz 10
Marabouts et khouan (Rinn) 2 merchants/craftsman
Maratha rulers/nobility 86 futuwwa and 37–38, 91–95
Marīnid dynasty 38, 65, 116, 147, 249, see also guilds
268–269 metaphors of royalty
see also under specific rulers in general 292–293
marriage 51, 52, 190, 197, 338–339, 350, 352 in Christianity 293
Marsy, François-Marie de 2 in Islam 293
Maryamiyya 138 in Judaism 293
Mashhad 42, 146 in Sufism
mashhads 146 and adab 294–298
Masjid Touba (New York City) 52 and royal banquets 299–300, 311
Maṣmūda Berbers 178 Mevlānā. see Rūmī, Jalāl al-Dīn
Massignon, Louis 5 Mevlana Museum 170
Index 429

Mevleviyye/Mevlevī mending of clothes by 363

central authority of 347 see also ḥadīths
endowments made to 35 Muḥammad ʿAbdallāh Ḥasan 319
naming of 344 Muḥammad ʿAlī Pasha 278, 354
new organisational forms within 356 Muḥammad b. ʿAbdallāh 283
mention of 319 Muḥammad b. ʿAlī l-Idrīsī 275
migration (hijra) 274–276, 318, 319 Muḥammad b. Munawwar 107
Mīhana/Mīhna (Khurasan) 191, 339 Muḥammad b. Wāsiʿ 296
Milli Selamet Partisi (National Salvation Muḥammad Bashārā 60
Party) 281 Muḥammad Bello 274, 325
Ministry of Awqāf Muḥammad al-Ḥājjī 340
in Egypt 47–48, 278–279 Muḥammad al-Ḥanafī 40, 297, 311
in Pakistan 44–45 Muḥammad al-Mahdī 275, 382
al-Mīrghanī, Abdallāh al-Maḥjūb 133 Muḥammad Mallāwah 263–264
al-Mīrghānī, Muḥammad ʿUthmān 283 Muḥammad Tughluq 83–84
Mīrghaniyya 133 Muḥammad Yār 86–87
mirrors for princes 267–268, 309 Muḥammadan way (al-ṭarīqa
Mirṣād al-ʿibād min al-mabdaʾ ilā l-maʿād al-muḥammadiyya) 268, 269, 271, 274
(Dāya al-Rāzī) 267 Muḥammadiyya Shādhiliyya 46, 356
miuridizm (maraboutism) 149, 278 al-Muḥāsibī 364
“Le modèle prophétique du maître spirituel muḥibb (admirers) 20, 348–349
en islam” (Gril) 197 Muḥriz b. Khalaf 257–258
modernity, and Sufism 134–136 Muḥyī l-Dīn 326
see also new media Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī 108, 122, 127, 148–149,
Molé, Marijan 6 158, 299, 400
monastic orders 346 Mujaddidiyya 66, 127, 133, 276, 396–397
Morocco founder of. see Sirhindī, Aḥmad
intertribal arbitration by shaykhs in 205 al-mulūkiyya al-ṣūfiyya (the royalty of Ṣūfīs)
revival of Sufism in 138 295
Ṣūfī institutions in Munya bt. Maymūn 118–119
political influence of 18, 129, 133, 134, muqaddams (deputies) 20, 187, 210,
205, 209, 355 347–350
and political legitimisation 38, 69, 153 al-Muqaddasī 146, 161
ribāṭs in 39, 64, 115, 147 al-Murābiṭ 178, 258–259
shrine complexes in 118–119 murābiṭūn (pious warriors) 62, 149, 175, 180,
zāwiyas in 17, 40, 65, 115–116 340, 410
Ṣūfī shaykhs as local rulers in 34, 129, Murād i, Ottoman sultan 35
340 muraqqaʿa (patched frock) 21, 337, 363–366
Ṣūfī temporal sovereignty in 268–269 murīd (disciple). see disciples/students/
waqfs system in 69, 355 followers
see also under specific dynasties, regions/ Murīdiyya
cities, Ṣūfī orders establishment of 50–51
al-Mubārak, ʿAbdallāh b. 90, 175, 257, 296, estates of 51
316 founder of. see Aḥmadu Bàmba Mbàkke
Mughal Empire 40, 122, 127–129, 131, 149, 317 hospices of 179
see also under specific rulers political influence of 282–283
Muḥammad, Prophet religious societies of 51–52
cult of relics of 150 spread of 51
descendants of 350, 375, 379, 380 and urbanisation 229
430 Index

Murīdiyya (cont.) lineage of 386

in USA 52–53 and modernity 134–135
use of internet by 408, 409 as musammā order 387
and Wolof ethnic group 209 political influence of 35, 262, 308–309
murīds (disciples, students) 20, 93, 170, protection system of 121–122, 206,
195, 196, 209, 259, 278, 322, 328, 329, 242–243
335–337, 348–349, 357, 409, 410 rural Sufism of 242–243
murīdūn revolt 259–260 spiritual practices of 397
al-Mursī, Abū l-ʿAbbās 266, 393 spread of 123–124, 126–127, 242, 263,
musammā orders 387 396–397
Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwān al-Muslimūn) succession in 380–381
46, 48, 152, 280, 355, 357 and al-Yasawī’s legacy 241
Muṣṭafā al-Bakrī 194 see also Khwājas/Khojas; under specific
Musta’in Romly 280–281 branches
al-Mustanṣir ii, Abbāsid caliph 353 Naqshbandiyya Āfāqiyya 270–271, 397
muṭahharan (ritual purity) 197 Naqshbandiyya Haqqaniyya 138
mutashābihūn (imitators) 344 Naqshbandiyya Isḥāqiyya 270
mutaṭawwiʿa (volunteer fighters) 338–339 Naqshbandiyya Khālidiyya 133, 194–195,
mutṭawiʿūn (volunteers) 316 275, 277, 319, 347, 397
Muwāḥḥid dynasty 120, 147, 259 Naqshbandiyya Khālidiyya Ḥaqqāniyya
Mystical dimensions of Islam (Schimmel) 408, 409
4–5 Naqshbandiyya Kuftāriyya 280
mysticism. see Islamic mysticism Naqshbandiyya Mujaddidiyya 66, 127, 133,
The mystics of Islam (Nicholson) 2 276, 396–397
Mystique musulmane (Anawati & Gardet) 6 nasab (hereditary lineage)
Les mystiques musulmans (Molé) 6 definitions of 374–375
myths 98, 245, 348 importance of 375
vs. silsilas 378–381
Nadwat al-ʿUlamāʾ 280 use of term 374
nafsānī journeying 387 al-Naṣīḥa al-kāfiya (Zarrūq) 268
Nāgawrī, Ḥamīd al-Dīn 390 Naṣīḥat al-mulūk (al-Ghazālī) 267
Nahdlatul Ulama (Awakening of Scholars) al-Nāṣir al-Dīn Allāh, ʿAbbāsid caliph 192,
280–281 304
Naʾīn, Ṣafāʾ al-Salṭanah ʿAlī Khān 312 Nāṣir al-Dīn Awrān/Evren 94–95
nait (North American Islamic Trust) al-Nāṣir Faraj b. Barqūq 311
69–70 al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh, ʿAbbāsid caliph 38, 92,
Najīb al-Dīn ʿAlī b. Buzghush (d. 678/1280) 95, 192, 345, 353, 369
390 al-Nāṣir Muḥammad b. Qalāwūn 32
Najm al-Dīn Rāzī 198, 395 Nasr, Seyyed Hossein 4
Najm al-Dīn Zarkūb 94, 95, 96 al-Naṣrabādhī 197, 368, 369
al-Nakhshabī, Abū Turāb 364 National assembly of remembrance and
naqīb al-nuqabāʾ (chief attendants) 200 those who remember (Majlis al-Qawmī
Naqshband, Bahāʾ al-Dīn 83, 153, 163, 164, lil-Dhikr wa-l-Dhākirīn) 283
262, 297, 396 nationalisation, of Ṣūfī actvities. see state
Naqshbandiyya control
banning of 48–49 nationalism, and Sufism 284
branches of 396–397 Nawrūz Rūmī 98
establishment of 396 Nazım Kıbrısı, Shaykh 7, 138, 409
founder of. see Naqshband, Bahāʾ al-Dīn Neoplatonism 2, 28, 223
and jihād 317 neo-Sufism 69, 271, 410–411
Index 431

neo-tarikats 49 oath of allegiance (bayʿa) 196, 204, 297, 326,

New Age religiosity/spirituality 138, 234 327, 337, 348–349, 367, 409
new media O’Brien, Cruise 51
Sufism and Ocak, Ahmet Yaşar 18, 239–249
in general 47, 49, 405–406 Ohlander, Erik 346
internet 407–412 Opus Dei 346
social media/networks 408–409 oral cultures 243, 245
and social-industrial Les ordres mystiques dans l’islam
legacies 406–407 (eds. Popovic & Veinstein) 6–7
new technologies, Sufism and 132 Orientalist/Orientalism 1–2, 4, 261
Niasse, Ibrāhīm 282 Otmān Bābā 265
Nicholson, Reynold Alleyne 2 Ottoman dynasty
Nigeria 229, 273–274, 283, 318, 320, 324–325 and futuwwa 38, 85
see also under specific Ṣūfī orders and futuwwa brotherhoods 343
Niʿmatullāh Walī, Shāh 163, 166, 168, 170 and Janissaries/Bektāshiyya 19, 35, 316,
Niʿmatullāhiyya 5, 22, 86, 170, 407–410, 412 319, 342, 399
Nīshāpūr 37, 42, 64, 89, 147, 176, 190–192, relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans
241, 365, 370 in 265–266
al-Nishāpūrī, Abū Ḥafṣ al-Ḥaddād 90, 190, and Ṣūfī activities
191, 264, 295, 365 patronage of 123–124, 125–126, 150, 228,
Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ 82, 83–84, 85, 127–128, 229, 248
168, 169, 199, 264, 400 state control of 36, 130–131, 233, 278, 354
Niẓām al-Dīn Maḥmūd 261 waqfs system in 33, 47, 58, 62, 68, 353
Niẓām al-Mulk 165, 260, 292, 303–304 Özal, Korkut 281
Niẓāmī Bākharzī 307 Özal, Turgut 281
nomadic societies 27, 130, 229, 239–243, Özbek Khān 242
245–246, 318
non-conformism 248–249 pact (ʿahd) 195–196, 204, 208, 211, 297, 308,
non-Muslims, donations by 86–87 337
North Africa Pakistan 8, 14, 19, 44–45, 69, 137, 153, 195,
ribāṭs in 31, 147, 178 200, 209, 256, 284, 320
Ṣūfī orders from 393–394 Papas, Alexandre 1–22, 18–19, 225, 234,
see also under specific dynasties, countries/ 255–286, 381
cities, Ṣūfī orders Pārsā, Muḥammad 396
North American Islamic Trust (nait) Partai Politik Tarekat Islam 280
69–70 Patrizi, Luca 19, 292–301
Nouakchott 234 patronage
Nubia 147 of artisan guilds 85–86
nudhūr (donations). see donations of madrasas 165
nuqabāʾ (chiefs) 200–201, 273 of relics 69
Nūr al-Dīn al-Iṣfahānī 120 of Ṣūfī activities
Nūr al-Dīn Zāde 265–266 in general 42–43, 64–65, 167–168, 353
Nūr al-Dīn Zangī 64, 111, 266 by ʿAbbāsid dynasty 345, 369
Nūrbakhsh, Javād 7, 410 by Ayyūbid dynasty 32, 85, 108, 266
al-Nūrī, Abū l-Ḥusayn 17, 223, 224, 364 of Mamlūk dynasty 30
Nur/Nurcu (light) movement 21, 48, by Mughal Empire 127–128
134–135, 137, 234, 356 by Ottoman dynasty 123–124,
Nursi, Said 48, 50, 134–135, 234, 356 125–126, 150, 228
432 Index

patronage (cont.) founder of. see al-Jīlānī, ʿAbd al-Qādir

by ruling elite 113 and jihād 325
by Saljūq dynasty 38–39, 64, 107, naming of 344
167–168 spiritual practices of 389
by Timūrid dynasty 42–43, 121 spread of 124, 126, 379, 388–389
sytem of, of Naqshbandiyya 121–122, succession in 379
206 mention of 276, 277, 280, 319, 326
Paul, Jürgen 39 see also under specifc branches
peanut farming 50, 51, 282 Qājār, Muḥammad, Shāh of Persia 312
people of the turn (aṣḥāb al-nawba) 272 Qājār, Nāṣir al-Dīn, Shāh of Persia 312
Persatuan Tarbiyah Islamiyah (Union for qalandar (uncouth), use of term 341
Islamic Education) 280 Qalandars
Persian language 14, 17, 30, 95–99, 220, 221, Karamustafa on 37
263, 297 and patronage 30
pilgrimages (siyāḥa) 208 popularity of 342
see also Ṣūfī shrine complexes and Saljūq dynasty 260
Pinto, Paulo 15, 105–139 support for 245–246
pious endowments. see waqfs way of life of 20, 30, 96, 212, 341–342,
pious warriors (murābiṭūn) 62, 149, 175, 340 358, 399
pīr (founding figure). see Ṣūfī masters; under Qarakhānid dynasty 241
specific Ṣūfī orders Qaramānids 124
Pīr Maʿbar Kʾhandāʾit 264 Qaṣīda al-rāʾiyya (Abū Madyan
Pīr Shāh Dawla 389 al-Shuʿayb) 296
poles (quṭb) 193, 272, 298, 388, 409 Qāytbāy, Mamlūk sultan 149
political influence al-Qināʾī, ʿAbd al-Raḥīm 178–179
of Ṣūfī masters 129–130, 187, 193–194, qiyām (revolt). see insurrections/revolts
262, 303–312, 322 Qizilbāsh/Kızılbāş 270, 323–324, 342, 398
of Ṣūfī orders 30, 34–36, 129–130, 262, qubbas. see Ṣūfī shrine complexes
263–264, 270, 282–283, 308–309 al-Qubruṣī, Nāẓim 7, 138, 409
political legitimisation Qurʾān
Ṣūfī masters and 260, 262 2:263–64 219
Ṣūfī shrines used for 153 2:271 219
waqfs used for 59, 64, 136 2:274 219
poor, the 13, 17, 29, 30, 32, 33, 40, 45, 51, 59, 3:104 258, 316
105, 107, 115, 125, 157, 162, 170, 191, 202, 3:110 316
208, 220–221, 224, 235, 240, 349, 362 7:26 363–364
Popovic, Alexandre 6–7 8:11 309
poverty/wealth 13, 27, 28–30 10:62–5 189
printing 18, 134, 233, 406 12:53 315
protection (ḥimāyat) system 39, 121–122 25:12 266
proto-Ṣūfīs 316, 336, 362–363 25:52 315
psychological Sufism 410 35:32 189
49:1–5 196
al-Qādir, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. ʿAbd 388 53:33 197
Qādiriyya Būdshīshiyya 17, 200, 203, 59:9 224
209–210, 408, 410 106 201
Qādiriyya/Qādiriyye 112 201
as asmāʾī order 387 digital versions of 408
central authority of 347 on selflessness 219
establishment of 387 Quraysh 375
Index 433

al-Qushayrī, Abū l-Qāsim in the Maghrib 178–179

books by 81, 91, 192, 195, 197, 316, 336, in Morocco 115
365 in Ramla 176
on clothing 365 rules of conduct for. see rules of conduct
as court advisers 303–304 spread of 177–179
on l-Daqqāq 197 in sub-Saharan Africa 179
on l-Daqqāq 368–369 al-Suhrawardī on 117
on royalty of Ṣūfīs 296 use of term 157–158, 174–175, 338, 370
teaching of Sufism by 17, 64, 107 in West Africa 179–180
quṭb/aqṭāb (poles) 193, 272, 298, 388, 409 for women 33–34, 221, 349
Qutlugh Khān 264 see also Ṣūfī lodges
al-Rifāʿī, Aḥmad 388, 389
Rabbani, Wahid Bakhsh Sial 284 Rifāʿiyya
Raḍwān, Shaykh 206, 207 establishment of 389
Rāghib, Yūsuf 148 lack of central authority of 347
Ragrāga 147 spiritual practices of 390
Ramla 176 spread of 22, 130, 210, 389–390, 392–393
Ranjit Singh, maharaja 86–87 mention of 86, 319
Rasāʾil Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ 293–294 Rinn, Louis 2
Rashaḥāt ʿayn al-ḥayāt (al-Kāshifī) 262 Risāla (al-Qushayrī) 81, 192, 195, 197, 316,
rawḍa (gardens) 235 365
rebel, duty to 258 Risāla-yi ādāb al-ṣiddīqīn (Kāsānī Dahbidī)
rebellions. see insurrections/revolts 194
Refah Partisi (Welfare Party) 281 Risāla-yi tanbīh al-salaṭīn (Kāsānī
reform Dahbidī) 309
in Islam 3–4, 151, 324–326 Risale-i nur külliyatı (Nursi) 134–135
Sufism and 47, 132–133, 233, 351, 354 ritual purity (muṭahharan) 197
see also bureaucratisation; rituals
institutionalisation of Badawiyya (Aḥmadiyya) 205
religious practices. see spiritual practices donations as part of 82
religious societies (dahiras) 51–52 at Ṣūfī shrines
retirement (ʿuzla) 223 in general 149
reverential fear (hayba) 198 criticism on 151
revolts. see insurrections/revolts see also Ṣūfī festivals
Ribāṭ al-Baghdādiyya (Cairo) 33 rosaries (tasbīhs) 341
Ribāt al-Maʾmūniyya (Bagdad) 304 Ross, Eric 229
Ribāṭ Nakūr (Nakūr) 115 royal banquets 299–300, 311
Ribāṭ Shākir (of Maṣmūda Berbers) 118–119, rūḥānī (journeying) 387
178 rukhṣa/rukhaṣ (dispensations) 193, 366
Ribāṭ Tīṭ-n-Fiṭr (of Ṣanhāja Berbers) 178 Rukn al-Dīn, Shaykh 83–84
Ribāṭ Zawjat Ināl 221 Rukn al-Dīn al-Sujāsī 390
ribāṭs ([Ṣūfī] outposts) rules of conduct (ādāb)
at ʿAbbādān 106, 175 in general 106–107, 177, 187–188
in Baghdad 177 based on Qurʾān and Sunna 196–197
early history of 175–177 codification of 192
in Egypt 178–179 importance of 190–192
establishment of 106, 147, 338 and metaphor of royalty 294–298
functions of 113 for novices 116–117
at Guardamar 175 Rūmī, Eşrefoğlū ʿAbdallāh 124
434 Index

Rūmī, Jalāl al-Dīn (Mevlānā) Ṣafī l-Dīn al-Ardabīlī 126, 166, 229, 269, 323,
poetry of 137, 230–231 381, 397
on relationship Ṣūfīs and Ṣafwat al-taṣawwuf (al-Maqdisī) 366
rulers 305–306 ṣaḥāba (Companions) 116, 187
shrine of 125, 153, 166, 167 sāḥas (zāwiyas in Upper Egypt) 202–203,
tekke of 170, 358 206
mention of 2, 122, 124, 265, 297, 344, 399 Said, Kurdish Khālidī Shaykh 48
rural areas Saʿīd al-Suʿadāʾ/Ṣalāḥiyya (Cairo) 32, 85,
illiteracy in 240 108, 266
Ṣūfī institutions in, functions of saints’ birthdays (mawlids) 44, 47, 60, 119,
246–248 148, 187, 207, 210, 220, 339, 351, 352, 389,
Sufism in 392, 394
in general 39–40, 239–241 Saladin. see Ṣalāh al-Dīn b. Yūsuf, Ayyūbid
Naqshbandiyya 242–243 ruler
and nomadic tribes 243, 245–246 Salafism/Salafīs 41, 46–47, 69, 150, 153, 195,
non-conformist dimension 320, 405
of 248–249 Salafiyya 132, 134
sources on 240 Ṣalāh al-Dīn b. Yūsuf, Ayyūbid ruler
Wafāʾiyya 243 founding of khānqāhs by 32, 85, 108, 266
Yasawiyya 241–242 khānqāh in commemoration of 111, 111,
see also cities 112, 112
Russia 4, 131, 151, 273, 277, 319, 327, 406 ‘Ṣalāḥiyya’ (Jerusalem) 108, 109, 110
see also Soviet Union al-Salāḥiyya Saʿīd al-Suʿadāʾ 85
Salāmān va Absāl (ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī)
Sabra, Adam 13–14, 27–53 268
al-Sabtī, Abū l-ʿAbbās 224 Ṣāliḥ, Ibrāhīm 283–284
Sabzevar 86 Salīm Chishtī 128, 169
ṣadaqa (alms) 81, 218, 219 Sālimiyya 176
Saʿdī dynasty 34 Saljūq dynasty
Saʿdiyya 391–392 and Qalandars 260
Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Ardabīlī 269, 323 relations between Ṣūfīs and sultans
Ṣadr al-Dīn Ibrāhīm Ḥammūya 261 in 243, 246, 260, 265, 305
Ṣadr al-Dīn Shāh 87 state patronage of Sufism by 15, 32,
SADUM (Spiritual Directory of the Muslims 38–39, 64, 107, 113–114, 165, 167–168
of Central Asia) 279 see also under specific rulers
Ṣafavid dynasty Salmān al-Fārsī 96, 97
founding of 34, 126 al-Samanūdī 196
relations between Ṣūfīs and 269–270 sanctity (walāya) 19, 117, 118, 147, 189, 198,
repression of futuwwa brotherhoods 206, 227, 256, 265, 268, 271, 272, 292,
by 343 379
and Ṣafaviyya 323–324, 381 Ṣanhāja Berbers 178
see also under specific rulers al-Sanhūtī, Yāsīn b. Ibrāhīm 306
Ṣafaviyya Sanjar b. Malikshāh, Saljūq sultan 260
establishment of 126 al-Sanūsī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī 67, 206, 275,
founder of. see Ṣafī l-Dīn al-Ardabīlī 348, 381
leadership of 269 Sanūsiyya 20, 67, 209, 229, 275, 319,
and Ṣafavid dynasty 323–324, 381 328–329, 381–382, 394
spread of 397 founder of. see al-Sanūsī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī
temporal sovereignty of 269–270 saqqāʾ (water-carriers) 201, 347–348
Index 435

Sarajevo 228–229, 234 long existence of 351

Sarbidarān movement 86 naming of 344
Ṣārı Ṣaltūq 228 political influence of 30
Sarī l-Saqaṭī 89, 175, 368 relations between sultans and 266
Sarmast, Ṣūfī 264 spiritual practices of 394
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr 28, 190–191, 208, 222, spread of 66, 116, 149, 345, 393
365 and trade 29–30
Saryazdī, Dhū l-Riyāsatayn Qāḍī Muḥammad see also under specific branches
b. Jaʿfar 312 Shāh Ismāʿīl 34, 269–270, 381
Sassanid dynasty 293, 300 Shāh Maḥmūd 82
Saudi Arabia 46, 151, 355 Shāh Musāfir 82, 84, 86
ṣawmāʿa (hermitage) 31, 157 Shāh Wālī Allāh 86
Sayf al-Dīn Bākharzī 262, 395 Shāhrukh, Timūrid ruler 42, 121
al-Ṣayyād, ʿIzz al-Dīn Aḥmad 389 Shambhala guide to Sufism (Ernst) 8–9
Ṣayyādiyya 389 Shāmil, Imām 19, 256, 277, 278, 319–320,
al-Sayyid al-Badawī 44, 340, 388, 392 327–328
Sayyid Ghāzī (al-Baṭṭāl) 124–125 Shams-i Tabrīz 358
Sayyid Jalāl al-Dīn Bukhārī 84 Shaqīq al-Balkhī 257, 368
Sayyid Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Kamāl Sharaf al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh, Īnjū ruler 261
al-Dīn b. ʿAjlān 86 al-Shaʿrānī, ʿAbd al-Wahhāb
sayyids (descendants of the Prophet) 350, books by 17, 194, 197–198, 205, 308
375, 379, 380 on al-Junayd 310–311
Schimmel, Annemarie 4–5, 345 on khirqa 298
Schuon, Frithjof 138 on mediation 205
seclusion (khalwa) 230, 328, 389, 398, 400 on people of the turn 272
secularisation 47, 50, 134, 151–152, 195, 355 on reverential fear 197–198
Sedgwick, Mark 4, 20–21, 335–359 on sainthood 296
selflessness (īthār) supernatural powers of shaykhs 311
acts of 218 zāwiya of 194
moral value of 219 al-Sharīf, ʿAbdallāh 205–206
terminolgy used for 219 Sharifian Sufism 21, 378–379
three levels of 219–220, 223–225 Shaṭṭār, ʿAbdallāh 400
transformative possibilities of 222 Shaṭṭārī, Muḥammad Ghawthī 401
see also altruism; futuwwa Shaṭṭāriyya 312, 400–401
Selim i, Ottoman sultan 43 Shawqiyya 341–342
Senegal 14, 50–53, 179, 209, 229, 235, 248, Shaykh Saʿīd 275
256, 282–283, 319, 325–326, 394, 407, shaykh al-shuyūkh (chief shaykhs) 32, 64,
408, 410 108, 266, 353, 357
see also under specific Ṣūfī orders Shaykh Ẓahīr 98
service (khidma) 17, 188, 199–204, 206, 210, al-Shiblī 190, 257, 364, 368
222, 224, 296 Shihābiyya. see Suhrawardiyya
shadd (girdle belt) 93, 343, 353 Shīʿism 4, 8, 32, 34, 41, 96, 121, 126, 147, 257,
al-Shādhilī, Abū l-Ḥasan 13, 29–30, 222, 344, 268, 323, 324, 342, 348, 378, 397
345, 351, 392, 393 al-Shirwānī, Yaḥyā 398
Shādhiliyya shrine firms 43–44
branches of 346–347, 393–394 see also Ṣūfī shrine complexes; Ṣūfī
establishment of 393, 408 shrines
founding of Saʿdī dynasty by 34 Sidi Boumediene (Abū Madyan al-Shuʿayb)
grades of muḥibb 349 120, 149, 258, 296, 380
leader of. see al-Shādhilī, Abū l-Ḥasan Sīdī Shākir 118–119
436 Index

Sikandar Lodī 264 by Ottoman Empire 130–131, 233

Sikh Empire 340 in Pakistan 44–45, 284
silent ritual repetition (dhikr/ ṭarīq al-khafī) in Syria 135
387 in USSR 279–280
silsilas (spiritual lineage) see also banning
in general 21, 308, 312, 348 of waqfs 45, 68–69
of ʿAlawiyya 377 Strothmann, Linus 44
definitions of 375–376 students. see disciples/students/followers
importance of 376, 378 suʾāl (begging) 13, 29, 82, 89, 90, 167, 212,
isnāds as model for 367–369, 376 222–223
as link to Prophet 378 sub-Saharan Africa 16, 67, 178, 179, 229, 230,
vs. nasab 378–381 396
as spiritual genealogy 242, 378 succession 21, 34, 231, 350–351, 374, 380–382
use of term 374 Sudan 133, 256, 274, 275, 283–284, 352, 356,
al-Simnānī, ʿAlāʾ al-Dawla 19, 306–307 398
al-Sirhindī, Aḥmad 127, 276, 397 Sufi Council (Majlis al-Ṣūfī) 354, 358
al-Sīrjānī, Abū l-Ḥasan 366 Ṣūfī dynasties. see Ṣūfī sultanates/caliphates
sisters (akhawāt) 170 Sufi essays (Nasr) 4
Skender-Vakuf 228 Ṣūfī festivals 44, 86, 87, 119, 148, 149, 339,
smartphone applications 409 355, 389, 392
social media/networks 408–409 Ṣūfī hagiographies 39–40, 306
Ṣofyalı Bālī Efendī 265–266 Ṣūfī households 36, 44
Sokoto Caliphate 179, 274, 324–325 Ṣūfī institutions
soldiers. see ʿayyār bureaucratisation of 256, 279–285
Somuncu Bābā (al-Aksarāyī, Ḥamīd al-Dīn) definitions of 11, 13
399 impact of cities on 232–236
soup kitchens (imarets) 32, 33, 35, 38, 207, Knysh on 10
228 lodges. see Ṣūfī lodges
Soviet Union. see Russia longue durée approach to 12
Soviet Union (USSR) mystical dimensions of 12–13
Ṣūfī activities in shrines. see Ṣūfī shrine complexes; Ṣūfī
banning of 136, 152, 279, 355 shrines
state control of 279–280 state control of. see state control
see also Russia and urbanisation 152, 228–230
Spiritual Directory of the Muslims of Central waqfiyya of 60
Asia (SADUM) 279 Ṣūfī lineages
spiritual elite (khāṣṣa) 189 ʿAlawī 386–387
spiritual healing (ʿilāj rūḥānī) 203 heads of. see Ṣūfī masters
spiritual lineage (silsilas). see silsilas of Naqshbandiyya 386
spiritual practices nasab in. see nasab
of Ṣūfī orders 32–33, 299, 387, 389, 390, silsilas in. see silsilas
391, 394, 395–396, 398, 399 Ṣūfī lodges (in general)
see also Ṣūfī festivals in general 105, 157, 338, 357
spring festival (basant festival) 87 architecture of 162–163
Srinagar 158 in Baghdad 64–65
state control closing of 135–136
of Ṣūfī activities decline in 345
in general 46–47, 352–354, 358 early history of 159, 161
in Egypt 47–48, 135, 233, 278–279, 354 functions of
Index 437

in general 66–67 as local rulers 322–330, 340

as centres for worship of saints. see see also under specific
Ṣūfī shrine complexes; Ṣūfī shrines shaykhs-sultans
as centres of agriculture 242, 243, as mediators 39, 84, 190, 205–206,
246 262, 311–312, 340
education/proselytising 230–231, 248 as patron saint of guilds 208
as foci for regional cults 128 and political legitimisation 260, 262
health care 247–248 sacred character of 196
hospitality/food dispensation 199, as saints. see Ṣūfī saints
202, 205, 207, 247 and succession. see succession
securing of roads/mountain supernatural powers of 198, 255, 263,
passes 247 303, 309, 311
and sociability 230–232 titles of 36, 278, 329
Ṣūfī bodies in 161–162 veneration of. see Ṣūfī saints
in urbanisation 228–230 visiting of 209–210
incorporation of, into Ṣūfī networks 345 see also under specific shaykhs
institutionalisation of. see The Sufi orders in Islam (Trimingham) 3,
institutionalisation 335
life at 170 Ṣūfī orders/networks/paths (ṭarīqas)
and madrasas 165 banning of. see banning
permanent residents at 199–200 becoming voluntary associations 234
political dominion and 128–129 vs. Catholic monastic orders 346
in rural areas 345 classifications of 387
spread of 65, 192, 193–194 continuity of 385–386
state control of. see state control and cult of saints. see Ṣūfī saints
terminology used for 31, 157–159, 178 educational methods of 387
waqfiyya of 170 emergence of 345–346, 376
see also khānqāhs/khānaqāhs; ribāṭs; finances of. see finances
zāwiyas; under specific lodges founding figures of. see under specific orders
Ṣūfī manuals 188, 190–193, 194 heads of. see Ṣūfī masters
Ṣūfī masters (shaykhs/pīrs) incorporation of lodges into 345
in general 170 influence on society of 386
advice literature of 267–268, 308, 309 institutionalisation of. see
assets of 36 institutionalisation
backgrounds of 349 and internet 408–411
non-conformist 248–249 and Janissaries 35, 265, 317–318, 342, 399
officials of 199–200 life cycle of 351
political influence of 129–130, 187, lineages of. see Ṣūfī lineages
193–194, 262, 303–312, 322 as marketing brands 410
relationships of membership of 348–349
with disciples. see disciple-master naming of 34, 344, 347, 386
relationship officials of 199–202, 347–348
with sultans 260–273, 303–312 orders and suborders 346–347
roles of see also under specific orders and
in general 204–205 suborders
as defender of the poor 220 organisation of 36, 44, 356–357
education/proselytising 261–262 part-time participation in 344
feeding of the poor 220–221 political influence of. see political
as kingmakers 168, 262 influence
438 Index

Ṣūfī orders/networks/paths (ṭarīqas) (cont.) rituals at 149, 151

recruitment for 209 and royal funerary sites 168
silsilas of. see silsilas state control of. see state control
spiritual practices of 32–33, 299, 387, terms used for 145–146
389, 390, 391, 394, 395–396, 398, 399 and urbanisation 152
spread of 122, 194–195 visiting of
succession in. see succession in general 41, 117–118, 339
support for 386 criticism on 41–42, 150
transnational 50–53 for health reasons 339
tribal affiliations of 208–209, 350–351 by women 339
see also under specific Ṣūfī orders see also shrine firms; Ṣūfī shrine
Ṣūfī poetry 47 complexes; under specific shrines
Ṣūfī saints (walī/awliyāʾ) Sufi studies
authority of 267–273 dichotomy in 2, 3–4, 7
concept of 227 growth in 1
and council of godly men 272–273 historical development of
cult of before 1990s 1–6
in general 41, 117–120, 147–148 from 1990s onwards 6–10
criticism on 150–152 Ṣūfī sultanates/caliphates 322–330
modernisation of 407 in general 322, 329–330
Moroccan 37, 39 and anti-colonial resistance 326–328
from ribāṭ system 344 Khwājas/Khojas 322–323
see also Ṣūfī shrine complexes; Ṣūfī Ṣafavid dynasty. see Ṣafavid dynasty
shrines; under specific saints Sanūsī Kingdom 328–329, 381–382
Ṣūfī Sarmast 264 Sokoto Caliphate 179, 324–325
Ṣūfī shrine complexes (dargāhs) Tukulor Empire 274, 325–326
in general 105 Ṣūfīs
in Anatolia 124–125 clothing of 364
buildings contained in 120 coffee consumption of 232–233
in Cairo 120 as court advisers. see court advisers
development of 118, 120, 339 insurrections led by. see insurrections/
finances of. see finances revolts
in India 127, 129 and jihād. see jihād
in Iran 121, 126 as missionaries 39, 67
in Morocco 118–119 occupations of 83
in rural areas 340 and patronage. see patronage
use of term 157–158, 300 relationships of
see also shrine firms; Ṣūfī shrines with Hindus 263–264
Ṣūfī shrines with sultans 260–266
celebration of festivals at 44 roles of
definitions of 145 in general 190
desecration of, by Salafīs 46 as mediators. see mediation/
early history of 146–147 arbitration
expansion of 147–150 and settling of uninhabited lands 40,
festivals at 44, 86, 87, 148, 339 66–67, 246
finances of. see finances as warriors 264, 276–277
guidebooks about 148 and urban social fabric 230–232
patronage of. see patronage use of new media by 47, 49
and political legitimisation 153 and working vs. relying on God 83, 89–90
rediscovering of 42–43 see also Sufism
Index 439

Sufism and societies/geographies 37–40

altruism in 218–225 studies on 61
antinomian 30, 37 and Sunnī culture 191
and asceticism 28–29, 92, 225, 336, 341, terminology of. see terminology
362–363 in urban areas. see cities
in Baghdad 227 waqfs influences on 61–62
banning of. see banning see also Ṣūfī institutions; Ṣūfī lineages;
beginnings of 37, 316, 336, 362–363 Ṣūfī lodges; Ṣūfī masters; Ṣūfī orders/
charismatic form of 225–226 networks/paths; Ṣūfī saints; Ṣūfī
and colonial powers. see colonialism shrine complexes; Ṣūfī shrines; Ṣūfī
conversions to 138, 209 sultanates/caliphates; Ṣūfīs
and court etiquette 299–300 Sufism: A beginner’s guide 7
criticism on 150–152 Sufism: A global history 9
as cultural heritage 137 Sufism: A new history of Islamic mysticism
in cyberspace. see new media (Knysh) 9–10
decline in 3, 195, 233–234, 406 Sufism: An account of the mystics of Islam
festivals in. see festivals (Arberry) 2–3
and futuwwa. see futuwwa Suharto 280
and futuwwa brotherhoods. see futuwwa Suhayl Sharwānī 98
brotherhoods ṣuḥba/ṣuḥbat (companionship) 17, 170, 188,
gender practices in 349 190, 192, 196, 204, 208, 362, 366, 392, 400
globalisation of 50–53, 137, 209, 234, al-Suhrawardī, Abū l-Najīb 116, 177, 193, 222,
407, 409 344–345, 390
hierarchies in relation to God in 189 al-Suhrawardī, ʿUmar
influences on waqfs of 59–60 on begging 222
institutionalisation of. see books by 95, 116–117, 192, 193, 196, 343,
institutionalisation 363, 367
institutions. see Ṣūfī institutions on clothing 367
itinerant brotherhoods in 341–342 as court adviser 304, 344–345
and jihād 317–320 on khirqa 363
and modernity 134–136 and patronage 345, 369
see also new media on ribāṭs 117, 175
and nationalism 284 ribāṭs of 192–193, 369
and new technologies 132 on rules of conduct 196
nomadic societies and 243, 245–246 spreading of futuwwa by 38
non-doctrinal dimensions of 7 on Ṣūfī masters 196
orders. see Ṣūfī orders/networks/paths on ṣuḥba and ukhuwwa 208
origin story of 28 on superintendents 200
patronage of. see patronage Suhrawardiyya
and pious warriors 175 establishment of 390
political influence of. see political khānaqāh of 85
influence leader of. see al-Suhrawardī, Abū l-Najīb
and poverty/wealth 27, 28–30 naming of 344
and reform. see reform spiritual practices of 391
reliquary 69 spread of 66, 126–127, 345, 390–391
revival of 136–137, 209 suicide bombings 46
rule-based 177 al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān
in rural areas. see rural areas on adab 191–192, 294
saintly rulership in 256, 267–273 on altruism 219
and Salafism 46–47, 69, 320 books by 91, 192, 368
440 Index

al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (cont.) Tāj al-ʿĀrifīn Abū l-Wafāʾ al-Baghdādī 388
on clothing 365 Tajammuʿ al-Waḥda al-Waṭaniyya
duwayra of 176, 370 al-ʿIrāqī (Coalition of the Iraqi National
on al-Ḥaddād 190 Unity) 285
on Ibrāhīm b. Adham 256–257 Tajikistan 136, 279
on master-disciple relationships 368 tājs (felt hats) 341, 342
teaching of Sufism by 64 takiyyas 158, 159
on visiting shrines 148 ṭalibés (disciples, students) 51, 325, 329
al-Sulamī, Izz al-Dīn b. ʿAbd al-Salām 297 see also disciples/students/followers
Sulaymān Bāqirghānī (Ḥakīm Ātā) 242, 395 Tall, ʿUmar b. Saʿīd 274, 319, 325–326
Sulaymāniyya 49–50, 285 Tamerlane. see Tīmūr, Timūrid ruler
Süleymān i, Ottoman sultan 125 Ṭanṭā 20, 44, 340, 392
sulṭān, use of term 297 Tarim Basin 130, 270–271, 323, 351
Sulṭān Walad 98, 265, 297 ṭarīqa (Ṣūfī orders). see Ṣūfī orders/networks/
sultans, relationships with Ṣūfī paths
masters 260–273, 303–312 al-ṭarīqa al-muḥammadiyya
Summer, William Graham 11 (Muḥammadan way) 268, 269, 271, 274
Sunayd b. Dāwūd al-Miṣṣīṣī 296 tasbīhs (rosaries) 341
Sunnī Islam 39, 108, 115, 148, 191, 265, 268, Tāshufīn ibn ʿAlī, Almoravid sultan 258–259
307, 317, 341, 342 taṣrīf, taṣarruf (supernatural powers). see
superintendents (khādim) 20, 170, 199–200, supernatural powers
203, 339, 340, 347 tawakkul (complete trust in God) 82,
supernatural powers 89–90, 224
online display of 409 al-Tawfīq 278
of Ṣūfī masters 198, 255, 263, 303, 309, Tāybād 163, 164
311 al-Ṭayyib, Muḥammad 202–203
Supreme Council of Sufi Networks (Egypt) Tegüder Aḥmad 261
48 tekkes/tekiyye/tekye (Ṣūfī lodges)
Supreme council of Sufi orders (al-Majlis in Anatolia 114–115
al-Āʿlā lil-Ṭuruq al-Ṣūfiyya) 135, 354 in Bosnia-Herzegovina 135
al-Suyūṭī 267 of Hacı Bektaş 35
Sy, Muṣṭafā 282 use of term 157–159, 338
Sy, Tidjane 282 Templar knights 316
Syria terminology
Ṣūfī activities in, state control of 93, 135, used for
136, 149, 319, 397, 398, 401 address 94, 170
Ṣūfī institutions in altruism/selflessness 219
in general 14, 15, 108, 113, 136, 165, 177 Ṣūfī lodges 31, 157–159, 174–175, 178, 338,
bureaucratisation of 256, 279–280 370
Ṣūfī orders from 391–392 Ṣūfī shrines 145–146
waqf policy in 64 temporal power 297–298, 311
waqfs system in 68 see also metaphors of royalty
Thāqib Dede 399
Ṭabaqāt al-ṣūfiyya (Anṣārī) 81 Thibon, Jean-Jacques 21, 362–371
Ṭabaqāt al-ṣūfiyya (al-Sulamī) 368 Threshold Society 356
Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī (Jūzjānī) 263 Tidhkārbāy Khātūn 33
table manners 202 al-Tijānī, Aḥmad 133, 194–195, 274, 284, 394
Tabrīzī, Jalāl al-Dīn 390 Tijāniyya
Taflīqa, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Bū 285 apolitical stance of 327
Ṭāhir Dhū l-Yamīnayn 92, 188 establishment of 133, 194–195, 394
Index 441

founder of. see al-Tijānī, Aḥmad ukhuwwa (fraternity) 208, 212

political influence of 67, 283 ʿulamāʾ (religious scholars) 59, 151, 232, 261,
spread of 325, 330, 394, 409 336–340, 344, 347, 349, 350, 352–358
and tribal affiliations 209 Ulamāʾ Association (Jamʿiyyat al-ʿUlamāʾ
and urbanisation 229, 235 al-Muslimīn) 152
mention of 274 Ulema-Madžlis 135
Tīmūr, Timūrid ruler (Tamerlane) 121, 166, ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb 363
241, 262 Ungaria, Georgius de 124
Timūrid dynasty 42–43, 121 United Kingdom (uk) 137, 180, 276, 328
see also specific rulers United States of America (usa) 52–53,
al-Tirmidhī, al-Ḥakīm 147, 189–190, 191, 256 69–70, 138, 356
Touba 51–52, 229, 282, 407, 410 urban areas. see cities
Traditionalism 4, 138 urbanisation 52, 66, 145, 146, 151, 152,
trans-imperial mobility 233 228–230
Triaud, Jean-Louis 229 ʿurs (death commemorations) 44, 86, 149,
tribal saints 246 170, 200, 339, 355
Trimingham, John Spencer 3–4, 206, 335 ʿUthmān Dan Fodio (ʿUthmān b.
Tughril iii, Saljūq sultan 304 Fodiye) 20, 273–274, 318–319, 324–325
al-Tuhāmī, Shaykh Yāsīn 47 Uways al-Qaranī 148, 348
Tukulor Empire 274, 325–326 uwaysī (mode of transmission) 148
Tunisia 38, 133, 134, 152, 153, 193–194, 257 ʿUyūn al-ajwiba fī funūn al-asʾila
see also under specific regions, Ṣūfī orders (al-Qushayrī) 365
al-Turābī, Ḥasan 283 Uzbekistan 19, 99, 136, 147, 153, 242, 256, 279
Turbat-i Jām 121, 159, 160, 163, 166 ʿuzla (retirement) 223
Turkestan (city) 121, 165, 166, 241 Uzun Ḥasan Āq Qoyunlū 165, 324
Turkestan (region) 18, 129–130, 256, 270, 271,
309, 390, 395, 396 vaqf/vakıf (pious endowments). see waqfs
Turkey Vazīr al-Dīn, Shaykh 263–264
Islamic bourgoisie in 48 Veinstein, Gilles 6–7
revolt against Kemalis regime in 275 Vikør, Knut 20, 322–330
rural Sufism in 241–242 visiting (ziyāra)
Ṣūfī activities in of masters 209–210
banning of 46, 48–49, 135, 152, 210, of shrines
234, 355, 358 in general 41, 117–118, 145, 339
forming of associations 234 criticism on 41–42, 150–151
Ṣūfī institutions in by women 339
bureaucratisation of 21, 256, 281 see also Ṣūfī saints
tekkes in 123, 135, 152, 153, 241 vocal ritual repetition (dhikr/ṭarīq al-jahrī)
Sufi studies in 1 387
see also under specific dynasties, regions/ Les voies d’Allah (eds. Popovic & Veinstein)
cities, Ṣūfī orders 6–7
Turkish language 37, 96, 99, 232, 269, 297,
323 Wade, Abdoulaye 283
Turkmen 34, 245–246, 260, 269, 270, 285 Wafāʾ family 379
ṭuruq (pl. of ṭarīqa). see Ṣūfī orders/ Wafāʾiyya 36, 221, 243, 399
networks/paths Wahhābī movement 132, 151
al-Tustarī, Sahl 176, 197, 258 walāya (metaphysical closeness to God)
189–190
ʿUbaydallāh b. Maḥmūd 309 walāya (sanctity) 19, 117, 118, 147, 189, 198,
ʿUbbād 120 206, 227, 256, 265
442 Index

walī/awliyāʾ (saints), use of term 311 Wolper, Ethel Sara 228

see also Ṣūfī saints women
waqf irṣādī 62 and gender segregation 50
waqf mushtarak 65 as muqaddams 349
Waqf Ordinance (Pakistan; 1979) 45–46 ribāṭs for 33–34, 221, 349
waqf trustee (mutawallī/nāẓir) 58 visiting of shrines and lodges by 118–119,
waqfiyya/waqf-nāma (endowment deeds) 128, 177, 193, 203, 339
definition of 58
of Ṣūfī institutions 60 Xidaotang 233
waqfs (pious endowments)
in general 27 al-Yasawī, Khwāja Aḥmad 121, 165, 241–242,
banning of 68 395
colonial authorities and 68 Yasawiyya
definition of 58 establishment of 395
development of 58 founder of. see al-Yasawī, Khwāja Aḥmad
influence on Sufism of 59–60 rural Sufism of 18, 241–242
management of 60 spiritual practices of 395–396
revival of 70 spread of 268, 395
state control of 45, 68–69 support for 245–246
studies on 60–61 Yavari, Neguin 19, 303–312
types of 58 Yavuz, Hakan 48
uses of Yugoslavia 135, 234
for political legitimisation 59, 64, 136 Yūsuf u Zulaykhā (Jāmī) 243
for public services 64
for Ṣūfī institutions 31–34, 35, 63–64, zakāt (alms tax) 58, 167, 218, 219, 271, 338
119–120, 150, 167, 221–222, 338, 352 Zarcone, Thierry 6
in support of jihād 62–63 Zarrūq, Aḥmad 268, 394
for transmission of knowledge 63–64 Zauqi, Muhammad 284
widespread use of 58–59 zāwiyas (Ṣūfī lodges)
see also waqfs in Egypt 114, 202–203, 206, 207
warfare finances of. see finances
and proto-Ṣūfīs 19, 174, 316 functions of 113–114, 194
see also ʿayyār; futuwwa; Janissary Corps; in Libya 275
jihād in Maghrib 149
Wāṣiliyya 341–342 in Morocco 115–116
al-Wāsiṭī, Abū l-Fatḥ 389, 393 in Tunisia 193–194
water-carriers (saqqāʾ) 201, 347–348 use of term 157–159, 338
Wazīrat al-Awqāf (Ministry of religious Zayn al-Dīn Abū Bakr Tāybādī 163, 164
endowments) 135 Zayn al-Dīn, Malik 264
wealth/poverty 13, 27, 28–30 Zayn al-Dīn Shīrāzī 168
web 2.0 408–409 Zayn al-Dīn Yūsuf 120
Weber, Max 11 Zaynab (wife of Sultan Ināl) 221
Werbner, Pnina 225 Zia ul-Haq, Muhammad 284
West Africa 20, 51, 67, 179–180, 195, 274, 318, Zindapir 137
319, 324, 325, 327, 330, 407 ziyāra (visiting). see visiting
see also under specific countries/cities, zuhd (asceticism) 10, 13, 19, 28–29, 92, 175,
dynasties, Ṣūfī orders 201, 225, 294, 300, 316, 337, 341, 362–363
wilāya (jurisdiction) 265 zuhhād (wandering renunciants) 18, 62, 255
Wolof people 51, 209