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Sufi philosophy

Philosophy in Sufism

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Lab · Class 6–12Buddhist Art at Sanchi

According to Sufi Muslims, it is a part of the Islamic teaching that deals with the purification of inner self and is the way which removes all the veils between the divine and humankind. It was around 1000 CE that early Sufi literature, in the form of manuals, treatises, discourses and poetry, became the source of Sufi thinking and meditations. Sufi philosophy, like all other major philosophical traditions, has several sub-branches, including cosmology and metaphysics, as well as several unique concepts.

History

The emergence of Sufi thought is commonly linked to the historical developments of the Middle East in the seventh and eighth centuries CE following the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and its development took place throughout the centuries after that. Between the 10th and 12th centuries, Sufism became a widely spread discipline in the Muslim world. One influential early writer on Sufi philosophy was the Muslim scholar and theologian Al-Ghazali (1058–1111). He discussed the concept of the self and the causes of its misery and happiness. Sufism in the Muslim world emerged and grew as a mystical, somewhat hidden tradition in the mainstream Sunni and Shia denominations of Islam, state Eric Hanson and Karen Armstrong, likely in reaction to "the growing worldliness of Umayyad and Abassid societies". Sufism was adopted and then grew particularly in the frontier areas of Islamic states, where the asceticism of its fakirs and dervishes appealed to populations already used to the monastic traditions of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Christianity.

By the end of the 13th century, Sufism had become a well-defined science of spiritual awakening throughout the Islamic civilization, an "Islamic Golden Age". No important domain in the civilization of Islam remained unaffected by Sufism in this period. Several tariqahs (Sufi orders) were founded. Furthermore, a class of notable Sufi Muslim philosophers, theologians, and jurists, such as Hankari, Ibn Arabi, and Abu Saeed Mubarak Makhzoomi, led this age who trained and generated historical specimens of philosophers and geniuses now read worldwide such as Avicenna, al-Ghazali, etc. An important mark made in the history of Sufi philosophy has been made by Abdul Qadir Jilani with his jurisprudence and philosophy of Sufism that made him define the Sufi orders. Jilani's adopted order was Qadiriyya and the offshoot he started later became known as Sarwari Qadiri. Several other orders were also founded in this era.

Sufis were highly influential and greatly successful in spreading Islam between the 10th and 19th centuries, particularly to the furthest outposts of the Muslim world in the Middle East and North Africa, the Balkans and Caucasus, the Indian subcontinent, and finally Central, Eastern, and Southeast Asia. Some scholars have argued that Sufi Muslim ascetics and mystics played a decisive role in converting the Turkic peoples to Islam between the 10th and 12th centuries and Mongol invaders in Persia during the 13th and 14th centuries, mainly because of the similarities between the extreme, ascetic Sufis (fakirs and dervishes) and the Shamans of the traditional Turco-Mongol religion.

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