by ANNEMARIE SCHIMMEL MYSTICAL DIMENSIONS OF ISLAM The Universit y of North Carolina Press Chapel Hill 244 / SUFI ORDERS AND FRATERNITIES very popular, but fo r him the samdc was mainly a practical device to dissipate the lust of the dervishes, which might otherwise find other, more dangerous ways of distraction. Abu Sa cid's name is , or rather was , usually connecte d wit h th e first examples of Persian mystical poetry. He is the alleged author of a number o f poem s in which the ruba'i, quatrain, with it s rhyme scheme a a x a, is used as a vehicle for mystical thought. We ca n b e quite sure that none of the quatrains formerly attributed t o him are actually his ; according t o hi s ow n statement , his love-intoxicate d teacher Bishr ibn Yasin was the author o f such verses—a genre tha t later became very popular. 20 A true representative of early Sufi poetry in quatrains, thoug h i n a popular meter and vernacular speech, is Baba Tahir, who died i n Khorramabad in the first part of the eleventh century. 21 Abu Sa cid passed away in 1049 . It is said that on his deathbed h e bestowed his khirqa t o Ahmad-i Jam Zandapil , who was just abou t to be born. Ahmad-i Jam was a Persian saint who was the opposite of Ab u Sa cld i n almos t ever y respect: stern , prou d o f his mystical power, drawing people to repentance, not t o love, and ofte n usin g his spiritual strengt h for revenge and punishment. 22 Abu Sa cid's tomb was destroyed when the wild Ghuzz tribes con- quered Mayhan a about 1180 . B y that time , th e first real Suf i fra- ternities had come into existence—namely, the Suhrawardiyya and the Qadiriyya, which even today are influential in large areas of the Muslim world. THE FIRST ORDERS cAbduDl-Qahir Abu Najib as-Suhraward i (d. n68), 23 the founder o f the Suhrawardiyya , was a disciple o f Ahmad Ghazzali , 20. Hermann Ethe, "Die Rubacls des Abu Sacid ibn Abulchair," Sitzungsberichte der bayrischen Akademie de r Wissenschaften, philologisch-historische Klasse, 1875 , 1878. 21. See Ja n Rypka , History o f Iranian Literature (Dordrecht , 1968) , p . 234 , o n Baba Tahir. 22. Vladimir Ivanow, " A Biography of Shaykh Ahmad-i Jam, " Journal o f th e Royal Asiatic Society, 1917 ; Fritz Meier , "Zu r Biographi c Ahmad- i Gam' s und zu r Quellen - kunde vo n Gami' s Nafahdtu^l-uns," Zeitschrift de r Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft 9 7 (1943) ; Heshma t Moayyad , Di e "Maqdmdt" de s Gaznawi, eine legen- dare Vita Ahmad-i Gams, genannt Zandapil, 1049-1141 (Frankfurt , 1958) . 23. Hellmut Ritter, "Philologika IX : Di e vier Suhrawardi, " Der Islam 24-2 5 (1935 - 36), deal s wit h th e tw o Suhrawardi s mentione d her e an d th e shaykh al-ishraq; se e chapter 6 of thi s book . SUFI ORDERS AND FRATERNITIES / 245 Imam Ghazzall's younger brother. Suhraward i is the author o f one of th e most widely read handbooks o f mystical education, Addb al- muridln, "Th e Manner s o f th e Adepts, " a classi c that ha s bee n translated into th e different Islami c language s and ha s often bee n imitated. Even more influential than he was his brother's son, Shihabuddm Abu Haf s c Umar as-Suhraward i (1145-1234) , wh o studie d unde r him and whose treatise on Sufi theories, cAwdrif al-mcfarif, was— partly i n th e Arabi c original , partl y i n translation — even mor e widely read than hi s uncle's book an d becam e one of the standar d works taught in Indian madrasas in courses on Sufism.24 It certainly enhanced th e influenc e of th e Suhrawardiyy a order , whic h soo n spread into India . Abu Haf s cUmar entered upon a political career as well; h e be- came shaykh ash-shuyukh, the official Suf i master of Baghdad, unde r the caliph an-Nasi r at a time when this last enterprising membe r of the Abbasid dynasty dreamed o f reviving the stagnant spiritua l lif e throughout the Islamic lands and was trying to unite Islami c ruler s in defense against the Mongol threat. Abu Hafs served as the caliph's ambassador to the Ayyubid rulers of Egypt and Syria as well as to the Seljukids o f Rum, whose power ha d just reached it s apex i n thei r flourishing capita l o f Konya — the plac e tha t wa s to becom e a ne w center of mystical and religious life in the years following Suhrawar- di's visit. Abu Hafs cUmar's friendly relations with the ruling classes also determined the attitude of his followers in India in later centu- ries; they were usually more open to the exigencies o f the world and more willing to accept political participation than their brethren i n other orders . Abu Haf s cUmar helped th e caliph propagate hi s ideas of renew- ing th e futuwwa ideals ; i t ha s even bee n suggeste d tha t an-Nasi r organized the futuwwa order, in part, to diffuse Suhrawardl's teach- ings.25 For al l practica l purposes , th e calip h ha d institutionalize d the so-called futuwwa movement, which was closely connected with Sufism. H e too k th e investitur e ceremony o f neighboring Musli m rulers with the "futuwwa trousers" and headgear as a sign of their allegiance to him. 24.cAwarif al-ma^-drif (Bulaq, 1289 h./iSga-gs), at the margin of Ghazzall's Ihya*. H. Wilberforce Clarke, trans., The "^Awariful-Ma^drif" written in the thirteenth century b y Shaikh Shahnbu^d-Din Umar bi n Muhammad-i Suhrawardi (1891 ; reprint ed., New York, 1970) , from a Persian translation of the Arabi c text. 25. Herbert Mason, Two Medieval Muslim Statesmen (Th e Hague, 1971) , p. 124 . 246 / SUFI ORDERS AND FRATERNITIES Essentially, the idea of futuwwa goes back to early Sufism. The fata i s "the young man," "th e brav e youth," generou s an d faithful . The Kora n had called the Seven Sleepers fttyan (plural of fata; Sur a 18:10). Hallaj use d th e ter m fo r those who excel by their absolut e faithfulness and loyalty to treaties, including, particularly, Iblis and Pharaoh, wh o remained faithfu l t o their claims . But generally th e term wa s connected wit h C AH ibn Ab i Talib, as the sentenc e goes: "There is no fata but CA1I, and no sword but Dhirl-Fiqar."26 The ter m jawanmard, th e Persia n translatio n o f fata, i s used i n the hagiographies for many Sufis, ofte n fo r those who ar e classifie d among th e sincere malamatls. This connection i s quite likely ; an d Sulami, wh o had compose d a treatise abou t th e Maldmatiyya, de - voted a treatis e t o th e futuwwa a s well, in whic h h e enumerate d 212 definitions of the true fata. Qushayr I followed him b y treatin g the futuwwa i n a special chapter o f his Risala. "The fata i s he wh o has no enemy, and who does not care whether he is with a saint or an infidel; and Muhammad was the perfect fata, for at Doomsday every- body will say 'I,' but he will say 'My community' " (Q 103). On th e whole, one may accept Ibn c Arabi's definition that a fata i s he wh o honors those senior to him, who shows mercy to those junior or in- ferior to him, and prefers those who are his equals to himself. The Sufi ideal of Uhdr, t o prefer others to oneself, is brought t o it s per- fection in the futuwwa concept. In the early thirteenth century, an- Nasir tried once more to revive these ideas, but withou t much suc- cess. Yet futuwwa groups existed in several parts of the Near East, where they constituted an important factor in the social life. In Tur - key, the related groups of the akhi, in which only blameless men of respectable professio n were accepted a s members, maintaine d th e futuwwa ideals throughout the next centuries; the North African traveler Ib n Battut a (d . 1368 ) has told, i n hi s travel account , ho w well he was received by these hospitable sodalities in Anatolia. Ou t of them associations like the "socialist" movement of Akhi Evran in the fourteenth century came into existence ; the relations betwee n futuwwa group s an d th e guild s hav e bee n studie d severa l times , though with different conclusions. At the same time that the elder Suhraward i lai d th e foundatio n 26. Franz Taeschner, "Da s futuwa-Rittertum de s islamischen Mittelalters, " in Bei- trdge zu r Arabistik, Semitistik un d Islamkunde, ed . Richard Hartman n and H . Scheel (Leipzig, 1944) , an d numerou s other article s about thi s topic. See Taeschner's article futuwwa i n Encyclopedia of Islam, zd ed., with additions by Claude Cahen.