The Power of Popular Culture Chapter 10 Part # 1 Sufi Saints, Sufi Sinners, and Sufi Alternatives Sufi Traditions The image many Americans have of the Sufis is of a peaceful and tolerant version of Islam. Sufism, it is thought, shows the way to a religious future that will transcend the sectarianism of Islam and render obsolete Muslim terrorism in the Mid East, India, and the West. Surely, with the passage of time, Sufism will transform Islam and replace Sunni and Shiah and Salafi Islam with a form of the faith that is compatible with enlightened varieties of Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and other traditions. Sufism is everyone's great hope. Unfortunately, while there are good reasons to have positive feelings about some kinds of Sufism it is important to understand that there in fact are several forms of Sufi religion some of which are little different in terms of social behavior than the most militant and unethical versions of Islam in existence anywhere. Sufism is not "one thing," it is maybe a dozen related traditions that branched off from early Islam, a number of which did not branch very far and still retain the values of violent jihad, denigration of other religions, and general criminality promoted in the Koran and many of the Hadiths. And if we don't understand this basic fact any discussion of "Sufism" can only be futile. For the sake of simplicity we can identify three main Sufi traditions; these are, to put it in clear and unmistakable terms: (1) the complete idiots who would kill you if they could, (2) serious Sufis but who are trying to be modern and have some measure of toleration for other faiths even if they nonetheless are believing Muslims who regard the Koran as true, and (3) those Sufis who basically have a separate religion that may or may not be related to Islam. There are many of these in America, and they are similar to the Unitarians or even New Age spiritual groups and are very much in favor of harmony of religions. Some percentage of this population do not even consider themselves to be Muslims. So if someone says "Sufi," which kind of Sufi is he or she talking about? For the most part Americans assume that the only variety is the third category. They have this view -which was my own opinion for a good number of years until doing the necessary research- because it has been popularized by the Baha'i Faith whose founder was associated with the "good Sufis" for several years, because it was a belief of the Theosophists during the years they were influential in the United States, because this idea has become doctrine among 'liberal' churches like the United Church of Christ, because of the favorable opinions of people in the Humanities in colleges who regard poets like Rumi as representative of all Sufis, and because America's Sufis themselves want others to identify all of Sufism with their kinder and gentler version. However, this is misleading. Millions of Americans have seen the 1966 movie about cowboys set in 1862 New Mexico which made Clint Eastwood a star, "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." The Sufis are like that, some are basically good, some are bad but you can sometimes get along with them, and the others are criminals who are unfit for civilization. This model of Sufism is realistic even if, to repeat the point, since most Sufis in the United States are the "good version" there is an overwhelming tendency to think of all Sufis as good. After all, if 100% of every Catholic, Baptist, Buddhist, Mormon, or Methodist you meet seems to be virtuous and moral then it is natural to generalize and suppose that all the others are virtuous also.But, of course, there also are unsavory Catholics and bad news Baptists, and so forth, and it simply is false that all are moral and only embody virtue. The Sufis are similarly mixed; indeed, to insist on something else would either demonstrate ignorance or dishonesty. Let us consider Sufi saints. Sufism, like Christianity, has its own saints, that is, notable human beings almost always departed from this Earth many years ago, who are generally regarded within the religion as especially spiritual, the best possible exemplars of the presumed truths of faith, people who led lives from which the multitudes can draw inspiration. Of course, there are saints -or some equivalent- in a number of other religions. For example, the Sikhs recognize various of their past gurus as "sants," a word that means pretty much the same thing as "saints" but which is actually derived from sat, which means "truth" or "essence," unlike saint, which is a derivative of sanctus, "holy" or "sacred." The word sant may also be used by some Hindus, mostly in the North of India. And it features in Subud, where the term is borrowed from usage found among various Muslims in Indonesia who, in turn, borrowed it from Hindus. Religions often influence each other even if this may not be openly admitted. Hindus and Buddhists have their 'holy men' or 'enlightened beings' of one kind or another who have status we might think of as saintly, but unless influenced by Sufism or Christianity the word is not used.
Jews also have a similar view of especially venerated men (seldom women) who are regarded as particularly "righteous." The Hebrew word is Tzadik and although it can be made use of in at least a generalized sense among all Jews it has special meaning among the Hasidim, who see in such people a link to mysteries of the Kabbalah. The Christian concept of a saint has been adopted in several Pagan-Christian religions with African roots, namely Santería in Cuba, _Voudou_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitian_Vodou) n in Haiti, and Candomble and Umbamba in Brazil. In these cases, while there may be exceptions, a "saint" is primarily an African deity in the clothing of a saint recognized by the Catholic Church but who otherwise is not really Christian in any traditional sense of the word. Another Pagan usage has been obsolete for over a thousand years but has new meaning because of modern day interest in things Roman. This was the system of the so-called Universal Pagan Church of Julian the Apostate. In that case saints were people like Socrates, Aristotle, Plutarch, and the like. Mormons use the term in a generic sense to refer to all members of their Church but this custom is understood by others only as a courtesy. Saints in a Christian context, at least for Catholics, the Orthodox, and Anglicans, plus a few others like Lutherans and the Copts, are people such as the disciples and early Christian leaders (Matthew, Paul, Peter, Mary Magdalene, etc.), and others of more recent date like Thomas Aquinas and Mother Theresa. A few people, for example Albert Schweitzer, never archived "official" status as a saint but are so regarded in a de facto sense by large numbers of people In Sufi tradition a saint usually is the one-time leader of a Sufi order, usually its founder, but sometimes others who have notable reputations among the faithful for their wisdom or beneficial deeds. We can start with those who may be classified here as "Good." Best known, certainly among many Sufi groups in the United States, is Abd al-Qadir Gilani, often called Kilani or Jilani, a Persian who lived from 1077 until 1166 AD. He was a scholar and preacher who was based in Baghdad most of his life -where he eventually founded the _Qadiriyya_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qadiriyya) order. This tariqa, or school of Sufism, began as a fairly obscure sect within Islam that, over the course of centuries, spread far, indeed. In addition to the Mid East the _Qadiriyya_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qadiriyya) spread to Turkiye, Spain under the Moors, Morocco, Ethiopia, Somalia, India, and as far afield as China (in 1674). The Qadiriyya became widespread in India from whence it reached Ceylon / Sri Lanka. Its popularity in India was enhanced by the fact that the Qadiriyya had little or nothing to do with the Muslim conquest of the subcontinent. Indeed, it is possible to see Hindu influence upon at least some Qadiriyya principles. The leader who did the most to transform Qadiriyya Sufism into a more modern and humanistic faith was Sultan Bahu, active in Punjab (that part of the province now located in Pakistan) in the 1650-1691 era. It was Sultan Bahu who created the Dhikr method of religion that emphasized real world love toward others as essential to faith -rather than such activities as lengthy or complicated prayers, asceticism, or other extremes. Dhikr is more-or-less the Muslim equivalent of bhakti within Hinduism or even pietism among Christians. The objective is some form of union with the Divine but the means should be service to others, involvement in things of this world, and openness to experience. Nonetheless, Qadiriyya operates within Sunni tradition, it follows Hanbali law at least in a formal sense, but unlike other Sunnis is sympathetic to Shi'ah Islam and its traditions. An interesting sidelight is that in the years following the conquest of Iraq by the Ottoman Empire in 1534, Suleiman the Magnificent bestowed his patronage on the Qadiriyya -to the extent of building a great mausoleum dedicated to Gilani. From that point onward the Qadiriyya were loyal allies to the Ottoman Turks. American interest derives from: (1) the fact that Baha'u'llah, the founder of the Baha'i Faith, was influenced by this version of Sufism; his book, The Seven Valleys, was written in response to questions asked by Shaykh Muhyi'd-Din, a Qadiri Sufi, and (2) the existence of a sizable Sufi group in America, the Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship, active in Pennsylvania, New England, California, and elsewhere. The group has its headquarters in Philadelphia, where it has its own mosque, but there also is a communal farm located in Chester County, Pennsylvania, near the town of Coatesville - where Bawa Muhaiyaddeen was buried after his death in 1986. "Bawa," as he is referred to by his followers, lived in the United States from 1971 until his demise. His appeal was to people of just about every religion, without ethnic or racial bias. He also was one of the first religious leaders in America to make use of multi-media in his work, someone who painted elaborate art, recorded songs for his followers, wrote books, and produced many of his talks on audiocasettes. Bawa also was interviewed by a number of newspapers and was featured in an issue of Psychology Today and in the _Harvard Divinity Bulletin_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Divinity_Bulletin) . His followers sometimes have been inspired to create art or to write books of their own, hence, while anything but a national cultural factor, nonetheless have had local influence of their own. For example, Coleman Banks, a poet who is fluent in Farsi, translated a number of the works of Rumi, while Michael Green, an artist, created illustrations for the translations. Special mention should also be made of Denise Sati, another (and superlative) artist, who works in a variety of media, with focus on electronic creations, including animations. Denise is also known for artwork that uses circles as basic themes in her projects; she has been an influence on my own art ever since 1975. There is also a music group led by singer and songwriter _Aaron Weiss_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Weiss) . Which, added up, is a list of accomplishments that deserve all due credit, However, there are some serious problems, especially Bawa's pretensions. The most significant was his belief that his actions during the Iran hostage crisis of 1980 and early 1981 were decisive in ending the problem. To me this is nonsense. He wasn't the only 'holy man' to claim such invisible influence, Sri Aurobindo also said that his prayers on behalf of the allies changed the course of WWII, but such claims lack any proof and cannot be verified. But about Bawa..... First, it should be said that anyone who so desires can pick and choose from Koran verses to find almost any kind of sentiment he (or she) may desire. The real issue is the overall meaning as well as the many verses that are morally objectionable by American standards, especially the 70 or so jihad verses -out of 120 or so that discuss jihad in general terms- including passages that discuss spiritual struggle. But those 70 verses do exist, they are bloodthirsty, sadistic, and criminal in character. Which is only to broach the subject of the moral deficiencies in Muhammad's book -of which there are many. Still, I am hardly able to deny the fact that you can be highly selective and pull together a number of quotations that seem to be supportive of humanistic or Christian values. If that is what you want to find, if that is what you look for, if you are advocating a "liberal" worldview, that is what you will find -as if none of the other verses did not exist. This was my habit of thought in the years I was a Baha'i. But, while there is something to be said for an idealistic philosophy of life, such as that of the Baha'i Faith, it does no-one any good not to be objective and not to be a critical (careful and conscientious) reader. When you are you may discover, as I did, that the Koran, broadly speaking, is false from cover to cover. "False" meaning immoral, superstitious, authoritarian, demeaning toward other religions, and closed-minded. Hence Bawa's comment that as soon as the mullah's who ran the Islamic Republic of Iran gain a true understanding of the Koran "they will release the hostages immediately." A true understanding of the Koran, or something close to it, is what explains their criminal conduct to begin with. And what explains their persecution of Baha'is then and to this day, not to count the support of the regime for Islamist terrorists in Syria, Lebanon, and elsewhere. Bawa's claim, in other words, was an affectation. It does not add up. Other problems are far less serious but still are real enough. Did he really "meet" people like _Coleman Banks_ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coleman_Barks) in a dream the two of them shared once upon a time? Sure, uh-huh, and Mark Steyn met P.J. O'Rourke in a dream and the two of them write the way they do because of the friendship they struck up while sound asleep 500 miles apart twenty years ago. That is, skepticism would seem to be in order. There is much to be said on behalf of Qadiriyya Sufism, both its historic form represented by Gilani and its 20th century manifestation as found in the tradition developed by Bawa Muhaiyaddeen, but there are also legitimate grounds for criticism. -- -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
