Chapter 12

"'Tis time, O ye Sellers, for one who hath sold himselfTo God, that he should arise and saddle amain.Fools! in the land of miscreants will ye abide,To be hunted down, every man of you, and to be slain?O would that I were among you, armèd in mail,On the back of my stout-ribbed galloping war-horse again!And would that I were among you, fighting your foes,That me, first of all, they might give death's beaker to drain!It grieves me sore that ye are startled and chasedLike beasts, while I cannot draw on the wretches profaneMy sword, nor see them scattered by noble knightsWho never yield an inch of the ground they gain,But where the struggle is hottest, with keen blades hewTheir strenuous way and deem 'twere base to refrain.Ay, it grieves me sore that ye are oppressed and wronged,While I must drag in anguish a captive's chain."

Qaṭarí b. al-Fujá’a, the intrepid Khárijite leader who routed army after army sent against him by Ḥajjáj, sang almost asQaṭarí b. al-Fujá’a.well as he fought. The verses rendered below are included in theḤamása395and cited by Ibn Khallikán, who declares that they would make a brave man of the greatest coward in the world. "I know of nothing on the subject to be compared with them; they could only have proceeded from a spirit that scorned disgrace and from a truly Arabian sentiment of valour."396

"I say to my soul dismayed—'Courage! Thou canst not achieve,With praying, an hour of lifeBeyond the appointed term.Then courage on death's dark field,Courage! Impossible 'tisTo live for ever and aye.Life is no hero's robeOf honour: the dastard vileAlso doffs it at last.'"

The murder of ‘Uthmán broke the Moslem community, which had hitherto been undivided, into twoshí‘as, or parties—oneThe Shí‘ites.for ‘Alí and the other for Mu‘áwiya. When the latter became Caliph he was no longer a party leader, but head of the State, and hisshí‘aceased to exist. Henceforth 'the Shí‘a'par excellencewas the party of ‘Alí, which regarded the House of the Prophet as the legitimate heirs to the succession. Not content, however, with upholding‘Alí, as the worthiest of the Prophet's Companions and the duly elected Caliph, against his rival, Mu‘áwiya, the bolder spirits took up an idea, which emerged aboutThe theory of Divine Right.this time, that the Caliphate belonged to ‘Alí and his descendants by Divine right. Such is the distinctive doctrine of the Shí‘ites to the present day. It is generally thought to have originated in Persia, where the Sásánian kings used to assume the title of 'god' (Pahlavíbagh) and were looked upon as successive incarnations of the Divine majesty.

"Although the Shí‘ites," says Dozy, "often found themselves under the direction of Arab leaders, who utilised them in orderDozy's account of its origin.to gain some personal end, they were nevertheless a Persian sect at bottom; and it is precisely here that the difference most clearly showed itself between the Arab race, which loves liberty, and the Persian race, accustomed to slavish submission. For the Persians, the principle of electing the Prophet's successor was something unheard of and incomprehensible. The only principle which they recognised was that of inheritance, and since Muḥammad left no sons, they thought that his son-in-law ‘Alí should have succeeded him, and that the sovereignty was hereditary in his family. Consequently, all the Caliphs except ‘Alí—i.e., Abú Bakr, ‘Umar, and ‘Uthmán, as well as the Umayyads—were in their eyes usurpers to whom no obedience was due. The hatred which they felt for the Government and for Arab rule confirmed them in this opinion; at the same time they cast covetous looks on the wealth of their masters. Habituated, moreover, to see in their kings the descendants of the inferior divinities, they transferred this idolatrous veneration to ‘Alí and his posterity. Absolute obedience to the Imám of ‘Alí's House was in their eyes the most important duty; if that were fulfilled all the rest might be interpreted allegorically and violated without scruple. For them the Imám was everything; he was God made man. A servile submission accompanied by immorality was the basis of their system."397

Now, the Shí‘ite theory of Divine Right certainly harmonised with Persian ideas, but was it also of PersianThe Saba’ites.origin? On the contrary, it seems first to have arisen among an obscure Arabian sect, the Saba’ites, whose founder, ‘Abdulláh b. Sabá (properly, Saba’), was a native of Ṣan‘á in Yemen, and is said to have been a Jew.398In ‘Uthmán's time he turned Moslem and became, apparently, a travelling missionary. "He went from place to place," says the historian, "seeking to lead the Moslems into error."399We hear of him in the Ḥijáz, then in Baṣra and Kúfa, then in Syria. Finally he settled in Egypt, where he preached the doctrine of palingenesis (raj‘a). "It is strange indeed," he exclaimed, "that any one should believe in theDoctrine of Ibn Sabá.return of Jesus (as Messias), and deny the return of Muḥammad, which God has announced (Kor. xxviii, 85).400Furthermore, there are a thousand Prophets, every one of whom has an executor (waṣí), and the executor of Muḥammad is ‘Alí.401Muḥammad is the last of the Prophets, and ‘Alí is the last of the executors." Ibn Sabá, therefore, regarded Abú Bakr, ‘Umar, and ‘Uthmán as usurpers. He set on foot a widespread conspiracy in favour of ‘Alí, and carried on a secret correspondence with the disaffected in various provinces of the Empire.402Accordingto Shahrastání, he was banished by ‘Alí for saying, "Thou art thou" (anta anta),i.e., "Thou art God."403This refers to the doctrine taught by Ibn Sabá and the extreme Shí‘ites (Ghulát) who derive from him, that the Divine Spirit which dwells in every prophet and passes successively from one to another was transfused, at Muḥammad's death, into ‘Alí, and from ‘Alí into his descendants who succeeded him in the Imámate. The Saba’ites also held that the Imám might suffer a temporary occultation (ghayba), but that one day he would return and fill the earth with justice. They believed the millennium to be near at hand, so that the number of Imáms was at first limited to four. Thus the poet Kuthayyir († 723a.d.) says:—

"Four complete are the Imámsof Quraysh, the lords of Right:‘Alí and his three good sons,each of them a shining light.One was faithful and devout;Karbalá hid one from sight;One, until with waving flagshis horsemen he shall lead to fight,Dwells on Mount Raḍwá, concealed:honey he drinks and water bright."404

The Messianic idea is not peculiar to the Shí‘ites, but was brought into Islam at an early period by Jewish and Christian converts, and soon established itself as a part of Muḥammadan belief. Traditions ascribed to the Prophet began to circulate, declaring that the approach of the Last Judgment would be heralded by a time of tumult and confusion, by the return of Jesus, who would slay the Antichrist (al-Dajjál),The Mahdí or Messiah.and finally by the coming of the Mahdí,i.e., 'the God-guided one,' who would fill the earth with justice even as it was then filled with violence and iniquity. This expectation of a Deliverer descended from theProphet runs through the whole history of the Shí‘a. As we have seen, their supreme religious chiefs were the Imáms of ‘Alí's House, each of whom transmitted his authority to his successor. In the course of time disputes arose as to the succession. One sect acknowledged only seven legitimate Imáms, while another carried the number to twelve. The last Imám of the 'Seveners' (al-Sab‘iyya), who are commonly called Ismá‘ílís, was Muḥammad b. Ismá‘íl, and of the 'Twelvers' (al-Ithná-‘ashariyya) Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan.405Both those personages vanished mysteriously about 770 and 870a.d., and their respective followers, refusing to believe that they were dead, asserted that their Imám had withdrawn himself for a season from mortal sight, but that he would surely return at last as the promised Mahdí. It would take a long while to enumerate all the pretenders and fanatics who have claimed this title.406Two of them founded the Fáṭimid and Almohade dynasties, which we shall mention elsewhere, but they generally died on the gibbet or the battle-field. The ideal which they, so to speak, incarnated did not perish with them. Mahdiism, the faith in a divinely appointed revolution which will sweep away the powers of evil and usher in a Golden Age of justice and truth such as the world has never known, is a present and inspiring fact which deserves to be well weighed by those who doubt the possibility of an Islamic Reformation.

The Shí‘a began as a political faction, but it could not remain so for any length of time, because in Islam politics always tend to take religious ground, just as the successful religious reformer invariably becomes a ruler. The Saba’ites furnished the Shí‘ite movement with a theological basis; andthe massacre of Ḥusayn, followed by Mukhtár's rebellion, supplied the indispensable element of enthusiasm. Within a few years after the death of Ḥusayn his grave atShí‘ite gatherings at Karbalá.Karbalá was already a place of pilgrimage for the Shí‘ites. When the 'Penitents' (al-Tawwábún) revolted in 684 they repaired thither and lifted their voices simultaneously in a loud wail, and wept, and prayed God that He would forgive them for having deserted the Prophet's grandson in his hour of need. "O God!" exclaimed their chief, "have mercy on Ḥusayn, the Martyr and the son of a Martyr, the Mahdí and the son of a Mahdí, the Ṣiddíq and the son of a Ṣiddíq!407O God! we bear witness that we follow their religion and their path, and that we are the foes of their slayers and the friends of those who love them."408Here is the germ of theta‘ziyas, or Passion Plays, which are acted every year on the 10th of Muḥarram, wherever Shí‘ites are to be found.

But the Moses of the Shí‘a, the man who showed them the way to victory although he did not lead them to it, is undoubtedlyMukhtár.Mukhtár. He came forward in the name of ‘Alí's son, Muḥammad, generally known as Ibnu ’l-Ḥanafiyya after his mother. Thus he gained the support of the Arabian Shí‘ites, properly so called, who were devoted to ‘Alí and his House, and laid no stress upon the circumstance of descent from the Prophet, whereas the Persian adherents of the Shí‘a made it a vital matter, and held accordingly that only the sons of ‘Alí by his wife Fáṭima were fully qualified Imáms. Raising the cry of vengeance for Ḥusayn, Mukhtár carried this party also along with him. In 686 he found himself master of Kúfa. Neither the result of his triumph nor the rapid overthrow of his power concerns ushere, but something must be said about the aims and character of the movement which he headed.

"More than half the population of Kúfa was composed ofMawálí(Clients), who monopolised handicraft, trade, and commerce. TheyTheMawálíof Kúfa.were mostly Persians in race and language; they had come to Kúfa as prisoners of war and had there passed over to Islam: then they were manumitted by their owners and received as clients into the Arab tribes, so that they now occupied an ambiguous position (Zwitterstellung), being no longer slaves, but still very dependent on their patrons; needing their protection, bound to their service, and forming their retinue in peace and war. In theseMawálí, who were entitled by virtue of Islam to more than the 'dominant Arabism' allowed them, the hope now dawned of freeing themselves from clientship and of rising to full and direct participation in the Moslem state."409

Mukhtár, though himself an Arab of noble family, trusted theMawálíand treated them as equals, a proceeding whichMukhtár and theMawálí.was bitterly resented by the privileged class. "You have taken away our clients who are the booty which God bestowed upon us together with this country. We emancipated them, hoping to receive the Divine recompense and reward, but you would not rest until you made them sharers in our booty."410Mukhtár was only giving theMawálítheir due—they were Moslems and had the right, as such, to a share in the revenues. To the haughty Arabs, however, it appeared a monstrous thing that the despised foreigners should be placed on the same level with themselves. Thus Mukhtár was thrown into the arms of theMawálí, and the movement now became not soPersian influence on the Shí‘a.much anti-Umayyad as anti-Arabian. Here is the turning-point in the history of the Shí‘a. Its ranks were swelled by thousands of Persians imbued with the extreme doctrines of the Saba’ites which have beensketched above, and animated by the intense hatred of a downtrodden people towards their conquerors and oppressors. Consequently the Shí‘a assumed a religious and enthusiastic character, and struck out a new path which led it farther and farther from the orthodox creed. The doctrine of 'Interpretation' (Ta’wíl) opened the door to all sorts of extravagant ideas. One of the principal Shí‘ite sects, the Háshimiyya, held that "there is an esoteric side to everything external, a spirit to every form, a hidden meaning (ta’wíl) to every revelation, and to every similitude in this world a corresponding reality in the other world; that ‘Alí united in his own person the knowledge of all mysteries and communicated it to his son Muḥammad Ibnu ’l-Ḥanafiyya, who passed it on to his son Abú Háshim; and that the possessor of this universal knowledge is the true Imám."411So, without ceasing to be Moslems in name, the Shí‘ites transmuted Islam into whatever shape they pleased by virtue of a mystical interpretation based on the infallible authority of the House of Muḥammad, and out of the ruins of a political party there gradually arose a great religious organisation in which men of the most diverse opinions could work together for deliverance from the Umayyad yoke. The first step towards this development was made by Mukhtár, a versatile genius who seems to have combined the parts of political adventurer, social reformer, prophet, and charlatan. He was crushed and his Persian allies were decimated, but the seed which he had sown bore an abundant harvest when, sixty years later, Abú Muslim unfurled the black standard of the ‘Abbásids in Khurásán.

Concerning the origin of the oldest theological sects in Islam, the Murjites and the Mu‘tazilites, we possess too little contemporary evidence to make a positive statement. It is probable that the latter at any rate arose, as Von Kremer has suggested, under the influence of Greek theologians,especially John of Damascus and his pupil, Theodore Abucara (Abú Qurra), the Bishop of Ḥarrán.412Christians were freely admitted to the Umayyad court. The ChristianThe oldest theological sects.al-Akhṭal was poet-laureate, while many of his co-religionists held high offices in the Government. Moslems and Christians exchanged ideas in friendly discussion or controversially. Armed with the hair-splitting weapons of Byzantine theology, which they soon learned to use only too well, the Arabs proceeded to try their edge on the dogmas of Islam.

The leading article of the Murjite creed was this, that no one who professed to believe in the One God could beThe Murjites.declared an infidel, whatever sins he might commit, until God Himself had given judgment against him.413The Murjites were so called because they deferred (arja’a= to defer) their decision in such cases and left the sinner's fate in suspense, so long as it was doubtful.414This principle they applied in different ways. For example, they refused to condemn ‘Alí and ‘Uthmán outright, as the Khárijites did. "Both ‘Alí and ‘Uthmán," they said, "were servants of God, and by God alone must they be judged; it is not for us to pronounce either of them an infidel, notwithstanding that they rent the Moslem people asunder."415On the other hand, the Murjites equally rejected the pretensionsmade by the Shí‘ites on behalf of ‘Alí and by the Umayyads on behalf of Mu‘áwiya. For the most part they maintained a neutral attitude towards the Umayyad Government: they were passive resisters, content, as Wellhausen puts it, "to stand up for the impersonal Law." Sometimes, however, they turned the principle of toleration against their rulers. Thus Ḥárith b. Surayj and other Arabian Murjites joined the oppressedMawálíof Khurásán to whom the Government denied those rights which they had acquired by conversion.416According to the Murjite view, these Persians, having professed Islam, should no longer be treated as tax-paying infidels. The Murjites brought the same tolerant spirit into religion. They set faith above works, emphasised the love and goodness of God, and held that no Moslem would be damned everlastingly. Some, like Jahm b. Ṣafwán, went so far as to declare that faith (ímán) was merely an inward conviction: a man might openly profess Christianity or Judaism or any form of unbelief without ceasing to be a good Moslem, provided only that he acknowledged Allah with his heart.417The moderate school found their most illustrious representative in Abú Ḥanífa († 767a.d.), and through this great divine—whose followers to-day are counted by millions—their liberal doctrines were diffused and perpetuated.

During the Umayyad period Baṣra was the intellectual capital of Islam, and in that city we find the first traces of aThe Mu‘tazilites.sect which maintained the principle that thought must be free in the search for truth. The origin of the Mu‘tazilites (al-Mu‘tazila), as they are generally called, takes us back to the famous divine and ascetic, Ḥasan of Baṣra (†728a.d.). One day he was asked to give his opinion on a point regarding which the Murjites and the Khárijites held opposite views, namely, whether those who had committeda great sin should be deemed believers or unbelievers. While Ḥasan was considering the question, one of his pupils, Wáṣil b. ‘Aṭá (according to another tradition, ‘Amr b. ‘Ubayd) replied that such persons were neither believers nor unbelievers, but should be ranked in an intermediate state. He then turned aside and began to explain the grounds of his assertion to a group which gathered about him in a different part of the mosque. Ḥasan said: "Wáṣil has separated himself from us" (i‘tazala ‘anná); and on this account the followers of Wáṣil were named 'Mu‘tazilites,'i.e., Schismatics. Although the story may not be literally true, it is probably safe to assume that the new sect originated in Baṣra among the pupils of Ḥasan,418who was the life and soul of the religious movement of the first centurya.h.The Mu‘tazilite heresy, in its earliest form, is connected with the doctrine of Predestination. On this subject the Koran speaks with two voices. Muḥammad was anything but a logically exact and consistent thinker. He was guided by the impulse of the moment, and neither he nor his hearers perceived, as later Moslems did, that the language of the Koran is often contradictory. Thus in the present instance texts which imply the moral responsibility of man for his actions—e.g., "Every soul is in pledge(with God)for what it hath wrought"419; "Whoso does good benefits himself, and whoso does evil does it against himself"420—stand side by side with others which declare that God leads men aright or astray, as He pleases; that the hearts of the wicked are sealed and their ears made deaf to the truth; and that they are certainly doomed to perdition. This fatalistic view prevailed in the first century of Islam, and the dogma of Predestination was almost universally accepted. Ibn Qutayba,however, mentions the names of twenty-seven persons who held the opinion that men's actions are free.421Two among them, Ma‘bad al-Juhaní and Abú Marwán Ghaylán, who were put to death by ‘Abdu ’l-Malik and his son Hishám, do not appear to have been condemned as heretics, but rather as enemies of the Umayyad Government.422The real founder of the Mu‘tazilites was Wáṣil b. ‘Aṭá († 748a.d.),423who added a second cardinal doctrine to that of free-will. He denied the existence of the Divine attributes—Power, Wisdom, Life, &c.—on the ground that such qualities, if conceived as eternal, would destroy the Unity of God. Hence the Mu‘tazilites called themselves 'the partisans of Unity and Justice' (Ahlu’l-tawḥíd wa-’l-‘adl): of Unity for the reason which has been explained, and of Justice, because they held that God was not the author of evil and that He would not punish His creatures except for actions within their control. The further development of these Rationalistic ideas belongs to the ‘Abbásid period and will be discussed in a subsequent chapter.

The founder of Islam had too much human nature and common sense to demand of his countrymen such mortifyingGrowth of asceticism.austerities as were practised by the Jewish Essenes and the Christian monks. His religion was not without ascetic features,e.g., the Fast of Ramaḍán, the prohibition of wine, and the ordinance of the pilgrimage, but these can scarcely be called unreasonable. On the other hand Muḥammad condemned celibacy not only by his personalexample but also by precept. "There is no monkery in Islam," he is reported to have said, and there was in fact nothing of the kind for more than a century after his death. During this time, however, asceticism made great strides. It was the inevitable outcome of the Muḥammadan conception of Allah, in which the attributes of mercy and love are overshadowed by those of majesty, awe, and vengeance. The terrors of Judgment Day so powerfully described in the Koran were realised with an intensity of conviction which it is difficult for us to imagine. As Goldziher has observed, an exaggerated consciousness of sin and the dread of Divine punishment gave the first impulse to Moslem asceticism. Thus we read that Tamím al-Dárí, one of the Prophet's Companions, who was formerly a Christian, passed the whole night until daybreak, repeating a single verse of the Koran (xlv, 20)—"Do those who work evil think that We shall make them even as those who believe and do good, so that their life and death shall be equal? Ill do they judge!"424Abu ’l-Dardá, another of the Companions, used to say: "If ye knew what ye shall see after death, ye would not eat food nor drink water from appetite, and I wish that I were a tree which is lopped and then devoured."425There were many who shared these views, and their determination to renounce the world and to live solely for God was strengthened by their disgust with a tyrannical and impious Government, and by the almost uninterrupted spectacle of bloodshed, rapine, and civil war. ḤasanḤasan of Baṣra.of Baṣra († 728)—we have already met him in connection with the Mu‘tazilites—is an outstanding figure in this early ascetic movement, which proceeded on orthodox lines.426Fear of God seized on him so mightily that, in the words of his biographer, "it seemedas though Hell-fire had been created for him alone."427All who looked on his face thought that he must have been recently overtaken by some great calamity.428One day a friend saw him weeping and asked him the cause. "I weep," he replied, "for fear that I have done something unwittingly and unintentionally, or committed some fault, or spoken some word which is unpleasing to God: then He may have said, 'Begone, for now thou hast no more honour in My court, and henceforth I will not receive anything from thee.'"429Al-Mubarrad relates that two monks, coming from Syria, entered Baṣra and looked at Ḥasan, whereupon one said to the other, "Let us turn aside to visit this man, whose way of life appears like that of the Messiah." So they went, and they found him supporting his chin on the palm of his hand, while he was saying—"How I marvel at those who have been ordered to lay in a stock of provisions and have been summoned to set out on a journey, and yet the foremost of them stays for the hindermost! Would that I knew what they are waiting for!"430The following utterances are characteristic:—

"God hath made fasting a hippodrome (place or time of training) for His servants, that they may race towards obedience to Him.431Some come in first and win the prize, while others are left behind and return disappointed; and by my life, if the lid were removed, the well-doer would be diverted by his well-doing, and the evildoer by his evil-doing, from wearing new garments or from anointing his hair."432"You meet one of them with white skin and delicate complexion, speeding along the path of vanity: he shaketh his hips and clappeth his sides and saith, 'Here am I, recognise me!' Yes, we recognise thee, and thou art hateful to God and hateful to good men."433"The bounties of God are too numerous to be acknowledged unless with His help, and the sins of Man are too numerous for him to escape therefrom unless God pardon them."434"The wonder is not how the lost were lost, but how the saved were saved."435"Cleanse ye these hearts (by meditation and remembrance of God), for they are quick to rust; and restrain ye these souls, for they desire eagerly, and if ye restrain them not, they will drag you to an evil end."436

"You meet one of them with white skin and delicate complexion, speeding along the path of vanity: he shaketh his hips and clappeth his sides and saith, 'Here am I, recognise me!' Yes, we recognise thee, and thou art hateful to God and hateful to good men."433

"The bounties of God are too numerous to be acknowledged unless with His help, and the sins of Man are too numerous for him to escape therefrom unless God pardon them."434

"The wonder is not how the lost were lost, but how the saved were saved."435

"Cleanse ye these hearts (by meditation and remembrance of God), for they are quick to rust; and restrain ye these souls, for they desire eagerly, and if ye restrain them not, they will drag you to an evil end."436

The Ṣúfís, concerning whom we shall say a few words presently, claim Ḥasan as one of themselves, and with justiceḤasan of Baṣra not a genuine Ṣúfí.in so far as he attached importance to spiritual righteousness, and was not satisfied with merely external acts of devotion. "A grain of genuine piety," he declared, "is better than a thousandfold weight of fasting and prayer."437But although some of his sayings which are recorded in the later biographies lend colour to the fiction that he was a full-blown Ṣúfí, there can be no doubt that his mysticism—if it deserves that name—was of the most moderate type, entirely lacking the glow and exaltation which we find in the saintly woman, Rábi‘a al-‘Adawiyya, with whom legend associates him.438

The origin of the name 'Ṣúfí' is explained by the Ṣúfís themselves in many different ways, but of the derivationswhich have been proposed only three possess any claim to consideration, viz., those which connect it with σοφός (wise) or withṣafá(purity) or withṣúf(wool).439The first two are inadmissible on linguistic grounds,The derivation of 'Ṣúfí.'into which we need not enter, though it may be remarked that the derivation fromṣafáis consecrated by the authority of the Ṣúfí Saints, and is generally accepted in the East.440The reason for this preference appears in such definitions as "The Ṣúfí is he who keeps his heart pure (ṣáfí) with God,"441"Ṣúfiism is 'the being chosen for purity' (iṣṭifá): whoever is thus chosen and made pure from all except God is the true Ṣúfí."442Understood in this sense, the word had a lofty significance which commended it to the elect. Nevertheless it can be tracked to a quite humble source. Woollen garments were frequently worn by men of ascetic life in the early times of Islam in order (as Ibn Khaldún says) that they might distinguish themselves from those who affected a more luxurious fashion of dress. Hence the name 'Ṣúfí,' which denotes in the first instance an ascetic clad in wool (ṣúf), just as the Capuchins owed their designation to the hood (cappuccio) which they wore. According to Qushayrí, the term came into common use before the end of the second century of the Hijra ( = 815a.d.). By this time, however, the ascetic movement in Islam had to some extent assumed a new character, and the meaning of 'Ṣúfí,' if the word already existed, must have undergone a corresponding change. It seems to me not unlikely that the epithet in question marks the point ofdeparture from orthodox asceticism and that, as Jámí states, it was first applied to Abú Háshim of Kúfa (ob.before 800a.d.), who founded a monastery (khánaqáh) for Ṣúfís atThe beginnings of Ṣúfiism.Ramla in Palestine. Be that as it may, the distinction between asceticism (zuhd) and Ṣúfiism—a distinction which answers, broadly speaking, to thevia purgativaand thevia illuminativaof Western mediæval mysticism—begins to show itself before the close of the Umayyad period, and rapidly develops in the early ‘Abbásid age under the influence of foreign ideas and, in particular, of Greek philosophy. Leaving this later development to be discussed in a subsequent chapter, we shall now briefly consider the origin of Ṣúfiism properly so called and the first manifestation of the peculiar tendencies on which it is based.

As regards its origin, we cannot do better than quote the observations with which Ibn Khaldún († 1406a.d.) introduces the chapter on Ṣúfiism in the Prolegomena to his great historical work:—

"This is one of the religious sciences which were born in Islam. The way of the Ṣúfís was regarded by the ancient Moslems andIbn Khaldún's account of the origin of Ṣúfiism.their illustrious men—the Companions of the Prophet (al-Ṣaḥába), the Successors (al-Tábi‘ún), and the generation which came after them—as the way of Truth and Salvation. To be assiduous in piety, to give up all else for God's sake, to turn away from worldly gauds and vanities, to renounce pleasure, wealth, and power, which are the general objects of human ambition, to abandon society and to lead in seclusion a life devoted solely to the service of God—these were the fundamental principles of Ṣúfiism which prevailed among the Companions and the Moslems of old time. When, however, in the second generation and afterwards worldly tastes became widely spread, and men no longer shrank from such contamination, those who made piety their aim were distinguished by the title ofṢúfísorMutaṣawwifa(aspirants to Ṣúfiism).443

From this it is clear that Ṣúfiism, if not originally identical with the ascetic revolt of which, as we have seen, Ḥasan ofThe earliest form of Ṣúfiism.Baṣra was the most conspicuous representative, at any rate arose out of that movement. It was not a speculative system, like the Mu‘tazilite heresy, but a practical religion and rule of life. "We derived Ṣúfiism," said Junayd, "from fasting and taking leave of the world and breaking familiar ties and renouncing what men deem good; not from disputation" (qíl wa-qál).444The oldest Ṣúfís were ascetics and hermits, but they were also something more. They brought out the spiritual and mystical element in Islam, or brought it in, if they did not find it there already.

"Ṣúfiism," says Suhrawardí,445"is neither 'poverty' (faqr) nor asceticism (zuhd), but a term which comprehends the ideasThe difference between asceticism and Ṣúfiism.of both, together with something besides. Without these superadded qualities a man is not a Ṣúfí, though he may be an ascetic (záhid) or a fakír (faqír). It is said that, notwithstanding the excellence of 'poverty,' the end thereof is only the beginning of Ṣúfiism." A little further on he explains the difference thus:—

"The fakír holds fast to his 'poverty' and is profoundly convinced of its superior merit. He prefers it to riches because he longs for the Divine recompense of which his faith assures him ... and whenever he contemplates the everlasting reward, he abstains from the fleeting joys of this world and embraces poverty and indigence and fears that if he should cease to be 'poor' he will lose both the merit and the prize. Now this is absolutely unsound according to the doctrine of the Ṣúfís, because he hopes for recompense and renounces the world on that account, whereas the Ṣúfí does not renounce it for the sake of promised rewards but, on the contrary,for the sake of present 'states,' for he is the 'son of his time.'...446The theory that 'poverty' is the foundation of Ṣúfiism signifies that the diverse stages of Ṣúfiism are reached by the road of 'poverty'; it does not imply that the Ṣúfí is essentially a fakír."

The keynote of Ṣúfiism is disinterested, selfless devotion, in a word, Love. Though not wholly strange, this idea was very far from being familiar to pious Muḥammadans, who were more deeply impressed by the power and vengeance of God than by His goodness and mercy. The Koran generally represents Allah as a stern, unapproachable despot, requiring utter submission to His arbitrary will, but infinitely unconcerned with human feelings and aspirations. Such a Being could not satisfy the religious instinct, and the whole history of Ṣúfiism is a protest against the unnatural divorce between God and Man which this conception involves. Accordingly, I do not think that we need look beyond Islam for the origin of the Ṣúfí doctrines, although it would be a mistake not to recognise the part which Christian influence must have had in shaping their early development. The speculative character with which they gradually became imbued, and which in the course of time completely transformed them, was more or less latent during the Umayyad period and for nearly a century after the accession of the House of ‘Abbás. The early Ṣúfís are still on orthodox ground: their relation to Islam is not unlike that of theThe early Ṣúfís.mediæval Spanish mystics to the Roman Catholic Church. They attach extraordinary value to certain points in Muḥammad's teaching and emphasise them so as to leave the others almost a dead letter. They do not indulge in profound dialectic, but confine themselves to matters bearing on practical theology. Self-abandonment, rigorous self-mortification, fervid piety, and quietism carried to the verge of apathy form the main features of their creed.

A full and vivid picture of early Ṣúfiism might be drawn from the numerous biographies in Arabic and Persian, whichIbráhím b. Adham.supply abundant details concerning the manner of life of these Muḥammadan Saints, and faithfully record their austerities, visions, miracles, and sayings. Here we have only space to add a few lines about the most important members of the group—Ibráhím b. Adham, Abú ‘Alí Shaqíq, Fuḍayl b. ‘Iyáḍ, and Rábi‘a—all of whom died between the middle and end of the second century after the Hijra (767-815a.d.). Ibráhím belonged to the royal family of Balkh. Forty scimitars of gold and forty maces of gold were borne in front of him and behind. One day, while hunting, he heard a voice which cried, "Awake! wert thou created for this?" He exchanged his splendid robes for the humble garb and felt cap of a shepherd, bade farewell to his kingdom, and lived for nine years in a cave near Naysábúr.447His customary prayer was, "O God, uplift me from the shame of disobedience to the glory of submission unto Thee!"

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