Wow! eBook
Sufism: Love and Wisdom
Author(s): Jean-Louis Michon (Author), Roger Gaetani (Author), Seyyed Hossein Nasr (Foreword)
- Publisher: World Wisdom
- Publication Date: March 1, 2006
- Edition: First Edition
- Language: English
- Print length: 280 pages
- ISBN-10: 0941532755
- ISBN-13: 9780941532754
Book Description
For hundreds of years, the inner spiritual core of Islam has been the focus of Sufi thinkers. These essays allow the reader to understand the wisdom and history of Sufism.
Editorial Reviews
From the Publisher
The present work is one of the most valuable anthologies devoted to Sufism in a Western language and is in fact unique in its authenticity combined with diversity. In order to understand the value of this work, it is necessary to turn briefly to the history of the study of Sufism in the Occident. In contrast to the fields of theology, philosophy, and the sciences, there were no translations of Sufi texts into Latin during the Middle Ages. The knowledge received about Sufism in the West by such men as Dante and, somewhat later, St. John of the Cross came from vernacular languages, oral transmission, and personal contact. The first work to use the term “Sufism,” as ta’awwuf has come to be known in the West, was in fact written in 1821 by a German scholar by the name of August Tholuck, who wrote a study of the subject entitled Sufismus: sive Theosophia Persarum pantheistica. The later eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries were also witness to the translations of Sufi texts from both Persian and Arabic into English, German, French, and some other European languages. The works of such translators as Sir William Jones, von Hammer Purgstall, and Rückert began to be read in literary and even philosophical circles and attracted major figures such as Goethe and Emerson. But the influence of Sufism during the Romantic Movement remained for the most part literary, and not philosophical and metaphysical, at least not as these terms are understood in a traditional context.
About the Author
Roger Gaetani is an editor and long-time student of Sufism. He lives in Bloomington, Indiana.
Jean-Louis Michon is a traditionalist French scholar and art consultant who specializes in Islam in North Africa, Islamic art, and Sufism. His works include Autobiography of a Moroccan Sufi: Ahmad Ibn Ajiba (1747-1809) and Lights of Islam: Institutions, Cultures, Arts, and Spirituality in the Islamic City. He lives in Switzerland.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
It is said that when the destitute wandering dervish Shamsi Tabrîz met Rûmî, who was already a renowned scholar of exoteric and esoteric sciences, that Shamsi seized Rûmî s books and threw them into a pool of water. He offered Rûmî a choice: either join him in companionship in a state completely focused on the Spirit alone, or, if he preferred, Rûmî could retrieve his books mysteriously, they would not be damaged. In abandoning those precious volumes filled with religious doctrines and speculative spiritual ideas, Rûmî started upon his destined path to union with the Beloved. With Rûmî, we have reason to pause and ask ourselves: What use is it, after all, to be reading books on Sufism? Ultimately, wouldn t we be better served by turning our eyes from the page and instead engaging our tongues in the direct invocation of the Lord of the Universe? Regrettably, in this day and age few will have the good fortune to have the personal guidance of a Shamsi Tabrîz. Instead, we often turn to books, and from them we can get several types of benefit according to our individual needs. Some will read for data, for facts about Sufism, and they will find these in abundance in this book, though there is no systematic ordering of the essays. But the most profound benefit that can be derived from reading books on religion comes about when expositions of spiritual doctrines or ideas become keys to direct intellection within the reader. This, we hope, will be the fullest benefit of these essays: that while learning about a particular aspect of Sufism, the reader may come across one or more “keys” which will unlock doors to inner certainties; these corroborations within ourselves we may call “direct intellection.” Many keys to this kind of “inner proof ” of a universal metaphysical truth can be found throughout this book, if the reader is properly receptive. Such readers will not necessarily be converted into Sufis, which would only be possible for Muslims in any case they will simply access a level of intelligence that all too often remains dormant in our modern habits of thinking. These particular essays have been collected for several reasons: First, they are a sampler of the thought and approach of writers who Sufism: Love & Wisdom would consider themselves “traditionalists” or “perennialists.” We will say more on this further on. Second, amongst these writers there are some who are so eminent as to seemingly eclipse the newer generation of traditionalist writers, and so we have purposely included some essays from this younger group. Next, there are a number of European writers on Sufism whose works have not been presented adequately to the English-reading public. We have translated three outstanding essays on Sufism and present them here for the first time in English. Finally, we have sought to show the impressive range of writings that have come from the traditionalists approach to Sufism. Thus this collection includes some rather introductory and systematic surveys of Sufi doctrines, writings on historical topics, complex metaphysical examinations of specific Sufi practices or doctrines, and so on. Since the essays are organized in more or less alphabetical order by author, we would suggest that readers new to Sufism should begin with the article by William Stoddart and then move to other essays of specific interest.
