Shams al-Ma'arif

History

The authorship of the Shams al-Ma'arif wa Lata'if al-'Awarif was historically attributed to the North African late 12th- early 13th century Sufi scholar Ahmad al-Buni who purportedly wrote it while living in Central Maghreb (modern-day Algeria); he died around 1225 CE (622 AH). However, Buni's authorship of the work is disputed. It has been suggested that another text, also known as the Shams al-Ma'arif found in the National Library of Damascus represents an authentic work of al-Buni, but it is very different from the more famous text of the same name, focusing on cosmology rather than magic, and works undoubtedly authored by al-Buni do not focus on magic, with the exception of Laṭāʾif al-ishārāt briefly mentioning esoteric properties of Arabic letters. Jean-Charles Coulon has argued that Shams al-Ma'arif wa Lata'if al-'Awarif cannot be an authentic work of al-Buni due to the presence of anachronisms within the text that are inconsistent with al-Buni's known authentic works, thus making it pseudepigrapha. Coulon argues that the work is part of a "corpus Buniam" of authors working in the tradition of al-Buni, some of which was falsely attributed to al-Buni himself. Al-Buni's reputation for esoteric magic was later further enhanced by the 15th century Ottoman scholar Abd al-Rahman ibn Muhammad al-Bistami, who extensively commentated on Buni's works, with a particular focus of al-Bistami being instructions for creating magical amulets and talismans. This was later followed by the composition of the expansive compilation work Shams al-maʿārif al-kubrā containing the Shams al-Ma'arif wa Lata'if al-'Awarif as well as other esoteric magic works including those by al-Bisṭāmī’, alongside authentic texts by al-Buni himself, which circulated in elite circles of the Ottoman Empire.

Scholars like Ibn Taymiyya have criticized the book and labeled the author, Al-Buni, as a deluded devil (Shaytan) worshipper. However, it continues to persist, and is still being read in public and studied in the present day, despite its questionable reputation. Some Sufi orders, such as the Naqshbandi-Haqqani order, have occasionally recognised its potential spiritual value, provided that the reader understands it.

After its first modern era printing in Beirut in 1985, the government of Saudi Arabia imposed a ban on the book. Ibn Jibrin, a Saudi scholar member of the Council of Senior Scholars and of the Permanent Committee for Scholarly Research and Ifta, has issued fatwa which forbid certain books, including the Shams al-Ma'arif.

In the 20th and 21st century AD, Shams al-Ma'arif grew in recognition and was adopted by the Order of Nine Angles, a global terrorist Satanist organization, as one of their influences. Although a translation into English has not been undertaken, there have been numerous renditions of a few of the more popular rituals found within the main treatise, as well as those that lie in its accompanying text. Some of these rituals have had various degrees of notability, but one of recurring presence in many publications is that of the Birhatiya (also known as The Ancient Oath or Red Sulphur).

In 2022 a partial English translation by Amina Inloes was published by Revelore Press as Shams al-Ma’arif: The Sun of Knowledge An Arabic Grimoire: A selected Translation.

In 2023, another English translation of the Shams al Ma'arif was published by Johann Voldemont as Shams al-Ma'arif: Talismans and Magic Squares. It focuses primarily on the talismans and magic squares contained within the text. Outside of the Arab and Western world, several editions of the book have been published in the Urdu and Turkish languages.