Shi'i Islam and Sufism

Denis Hermann is Director of the Institut Français de Recherche en Iran (IFRI) in Tehran and Associate Member of the Centre for Iranian Studies at SOAS, University of London. His research is mainly concerned with Qajar Iran, Twelver Shi'ism and the Constitutional Revolution in Iran of 1906–1911. His most recent publication is Le shaykhisme à la période qajare: Histoire sociale et doctrinale d’une École chiite. Mathieu Terrier is a research fellow at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) in Paris. An historian of Islamic thought, his research deals mainly with the relationship between Shi'i Islam, philosophy and Sufism. His most recent publication is Histoire de la sagesse et philosophie shi'ite: “L’Aimé des cœurs” de Qu'b al-Dîn Ashkevarî.

The edited volume, Shi'i Islam and Sufism: Classical Views and Modern Perspectives offers new, powerful insights into the long-debated issue regarding the intellectual interactions and mutual influences occurring between Shi'i Islam and Sufi doctrines and practices. Despite the long-standing and extensive body of studies on Sufism and the considerable progresses made over the past few decades in the field of Shi'i Studies, the mutual relationship between Imami Shi'ism and Sufism has been little explored. The present work, thanks to the contributions of some amongst the most renowned scholars in the field of both Sufism and Shi'ism, effectively contributes to build a comprehensive historical picture of these two major currents within Islam, both from a textual and doctrinal point of view. Moreover, by probing political, historical, doctrinal and sociological developments, this volume offers a systematic exploration of the Shi‘i-Sufi relationship. This is attained by looking, inter alia, at the social history of Shi'i-Sufi brotherhoods such as the Ni'matullahiyya, and by analyzing the way the relations between Shi'ism and Sufism have been depicted and perceived in other literary Sufi traditions. Particularly significant is that the present volume also seeks to examine the nature and advance of alternative literature to anti-Sufi discourses in Shi'i pre-modern and modern works.

• IntroductionChapter I. ‘Classical Views and New Perspectives on Imami Shi‘ism and Sufism Relations in Pre-Modern and Modern Periods’, Denis Hermann, Institut Français de Recherche en Iran, Iran; and Mathieu Terrier, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, France First Part: Alternative to anti-Sufi Discourses in Shi'i Pre-Modern and Modern LiteratureChapter II. ‘Defense of Sufism among Twelver Shi‘i thinkers of the Pre-Modern and Modern Era: Topics and Arguments’, Mathieu Terrier, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, FranceChapter III. ‘The Limits of “Orthodoxy”?: Notes on the Anti-Abu Muslim Polemic of Early 11th/17th Iran’, Andrew Newman, University of Edinburgh, UKSecond Part: The Social History of a Shi'i-Sufi Brotherhood : The Ni'matullahiyya Chapter IV. ‘The Ni'mat’ullahi Order in the Fifteenth Century: Institutionalisation and Patronage of Architecture’, Peyvand Firoozeh, Wissenschaft Koleg, GermanyChapter V. ‘The Mujaddid and the Majdhub. Shah ‘Ali Rida (d. 1801) and the Different Narratives of the Ni‘matullahi Renewal’, Fabrizio Speziale, University Sorbonne nouvelle - Centre national de la recherche scientifique, FranceChapter VI. ‘The institutionalisation of Ni‘matullahi Sufism during the Pahlavi era: a study of the establishment of the Husayniyya Amir Sulaymani as a waqf in Tehran’, Denis Hermann, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, France; and Omid Rezai, Sazman-i Awqaf wa Umur-i Khayriyya, IranChapter VII. ‘Hidden in Plain Sight: Secrecy, Occultation and the Cultivation of Private Archives’, Seema Golestaneh, Indiana University, Bloomington, USAThird Part: The Relations between Shi'ism and Sufism in other Literary Sufi Traditions Chapter VIII. ‘Sufism and Shi‘ism in South Asia: shahadat and the evidence of the sindhi marsiya’, Michel Boivin, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, FranceChapter IX. ‘Red Sulphur, Great Remedy, and the Supreme Name: Perceptions of the People of the House (Ahl al-Bayt) and Twelve Imams in Alevi-Bektashi Faith’, Riza Yildirim, Emory University, USAChapter X. ‘The Khaksar Sufi Shi‘i order: an updated introduction’, Alexandre Papas, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, FranceChapter XI. ‘'Ajam Sufis and Shi'i Spirituality in 19th Century Iran’, Lloyd Ridgeon, University of Glasgow, UKChapter XII. Two Khaksar treatises of the XIXth century (translated from Persian): Risala-yi faqiriye (‘The Booklet of Poverty’), translated by Mehrdad Arabestani, University of Tehran, IranRisala-yi Chahardah Khanavadah (‘The Fourteen Families’), translated by Yaser Mirdamadi, University of Edinburgh, UKBibliographyIndex