05.3 PP 51 78 Reform Sufism in South Asia

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Pnina Werbner
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I n the Introduction to the hagiography of the reform Naqshbandi Sufi

saint, Zindapir, the ‘Living Saint’, who died in his lodge near Kohat,
Pakistan, in 1999, poet and devoted khalifa (vicegerent) of Zindapir Rab
Nawaz writes:
Contemporary Muslim students (talib) who study in religious

schools, the vast portion of their life passes in studying formal
[religious] sciences.They remain denied those sciences that allow
for the purification of the soul and cleansing of the heart. This is
the very reason why the majority of ‘ulama expend their entire
efforts in polemical disputation and conflict, and in becoming
orators from whom other than sedition and corruption, no
positive outcome is attained. In religious seminaries, words
remain but meaning is lacking. Traditionally people used to
reach meanings through the acquisition of knowledge, from
which they attained the recognition of the holy essence (zat) of
the Messenger of Allah. For the ‘ulama of today, and in today’s
madrassahs, this language (baat) is no longer there. Refinement
of the soul, ascetic discipline and struggle, contemplation by
way of the ‘illuminating lights’, and the highway that is mystical
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52 / Islamic Reform in South Asia
knowledge of the divine essence and attributes, of true principles,

are totally ignored. (Rab Nawaz n.d.: 8)1
On the other hand students of secular science, Rab Nawaz comments, are
equally misled, believing that ‘religious edicts and practices are meaningless
and futile’:
Religion in their eyes stabs like a thorn and to escape from its
tradition and obligations is their paramount duty. They believe
today’s savoury2 progress to be authentic and real progress;
thought of the Afterlife and Judgement Day does not appear
to them even in a dream. Their whole life is spent in worldly
superficialities and carnal pleasures. [until] finally, they depart
the world wanting, with hearts burdened by hundreds of
regrets. In this irremediable era, should a man of felicity (sahib-i
sa’adat) desire attainment of the true unity of God (tawhid)
and distinction, then he must seek out the companionship and
fellowship of the People of God (i Allah) and acquire faiz (divine
light)3 and blessings (barkat); otherwise through the study of their
sayings and practice, he can match his exterior (zahir) and hidden
(batin) [self] with them.
The contours of reform Sufism in South Asia, of matching the ‘interior’

with the ‘exterior’, are evident in this passage. Unlike the formal knowledge
acquired from either the learned clerics or secular scientists, it opens the
way to a ‘deeper’ religion beyond the open text.4
1
Rab Nawaz’s hagiography of Zindapir has been translated by Jon Hamidi. I am grateful to Jon and to
the British Academy for the generous funding it provided for this translation, and to the descendents
and followers of Zindapir for allowing and encouraging it. Research on Zindapir’s Sufi cult was
supported by the ESRC and Leverhulme Trust from 1988 to 2000.
2
As opposed to sweet, in contrast to ‘halawat’ (sweetness) mentioned previously.
3
Buehler (1998) translates faiz as ‘effulgence’; others translate it by analogy with the Christian idea as
‘grace’. It differs from baraka, the saint’s power of generative fecundity, proliferation and procreation.
4
The dual concepts of zahir and batin are fundamental to Sufi mysticism, which seeks to reach esoteric
knowledge beyond the text and the ‘created’ world, which is regarded as illusory. I discuss this contrast
further below in relation to Sirhindi and Sufi theosophy.
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The opposition between the open text of the Shari’a5 and hidden
mystical knowledge was posited by the eponymous Sufi reformist of South
Asia, Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi. I begin this essay with a brief discussion of his
central reformist message. To further disentangle what is meant by reform
Sufism as theory and practice, I then review a scholarly debate on whether
there occurred from the eighteenth century onwards a radical historical
break, a new phase in Sufi worship, less contemplative and more activist.
While this debate focuses on mystical theosophy, I argue for the need to
recognize Sufi renewal through movement in space and the colonization of
new territories for Islam. In the second part of the essay I turn to the specific
case of a practising Naqshbandi reform Sufi saint in Pakistan in order to
illustrate reform Sufism’s defence of ritual practices (‘amal), worship (ibadah)
and the veneration at saint’s shrines as being in conformity with orthodox
theological standards, against accusations of unlawful innovation (bida’) and
idolatry (shirk). In the third part I return to the issue of mystical ascetic
practice and belief, as seen through the eyes of a Naqshbandi khalifa who
draws on Sirhindi’s writings, in order to show how reform Sufism integrates
the body into a holistic neo-platonic theory of cosmic renewal.
My case study of a living Naqshbandi saint and his closest deputies
(khalifas) in contemporary Pakistan discloses the way reform Sufism,
expressed in ideas and ritual practices of sobriety, shari’a, ascetism and
inclusiveness, embodies saintly charisma, grounded in an elaborate
cosmology of transcendence.6 At the same time, communal rituals sustain
the formation of a Sufi tariqa, a saintly trans/regional cult or order (tariqa).
In the case analysed the saint’s cult extended during his lifetime throughout
Pakistan and even beyond it, with ritual worship focused on Ghamkol Sharif,
5
The Shari’a, the ‘straight path’, is broadly defined as the religious laws of Islam, including Koran, Sunna
(sayings and events in the life of the Prophet Muhammad, known as hadith) and, secondarily, the legal
corpus that developed, including the four Schools of Law (madhabs) and ongoing interpretations. Thus
Eickelman and Piscatori (1996: 26) argue that ‘Emendations and additions to a purportedly invariant
and complete Islamic law (shari’a) have occurred throughout Islamic history, particularly since the
mid-nineteenth century.’ Shari’a is thus the path of orthodoxy in Islam, by which is meant the current
acceptable definition of Islamic legal understandings and theology. As I show below, Sirhindi had his
own more specific understanding of Shari’a.
6
The issue of embodied ascetic practices has been taken up in relation to women’s pietist reform
movements in Egypt (Mahmood 2005) and Pakistan (Ahmad 2009). As I explain below, in Sufi ascetic
bodily practice the process effects an opposite transformation to that analysed by Mahmood: for
pietists work on the body leads to spiritual elevation and ‘submission’ to God but the body remains
earthbound; for Sufis, work on the soul leads to bodily transformation, in which the body comes to
be suffused with divine light and subsists beyond death. See my discussion below.
the sacred centre of the cult. Against simplistic stereotypes of Sufism as

‘traditionalist’,‘syncretic’,‘contemplative’ or ‘popular’, appealing primarily to
the superstitious, uneducated masses, I show that reform Sufism is Islamically
orthodox and attractive to Pakistani elites as well as the rural masses by
virtue of the moral and spiritual qualities it embodies and promotes. 7
Paradoxically, while centred on a world renouncer, I argue that reform
Sufism fosters inworldly ascetic practices that have an elective affinity, as
Weber argued in the case of the early Protestants, with worldly success.8
Second, while being apparently authoritarian and hierarchical, reform
Sufism, like Sufism more generally, thrives in modern, democratic contexts,
and this despite its often critical stance vis-à-vis the state.The extensive Sufi
networks that have developed around reform saints’ lodges in South Asia
are organizations that foster peaceful inter-ethnic and intercultural relations
among diverse groups of followers in the name of an inclusive God. Hence,
most major new Sufi orders in South Asia, including even some Chishtiyya
orders which allow what some regard as deviant devotional singing, are
those that have followed reformist traditions in building up their orders’
geographically dispersed networks.
Throughout the paper I echo other contributions to this volume in
arguing that despite their polemical critiques and mutual vilification of
one another, divisions among Muslim reformist movements are in many
senses ambiguous and fluid.9 There are, nevertheless, I propose, discernable
differences between reform Sufis and more scripturally oriented reformists
with regard to practice, even though eschatological notions of death and
rebirth blur differences between them. Exceptional in this regard are Saudi
Wahhabis and South Asian Ahl-i-Hadith, and it is also possible, I propose,
to delineate a specific constellation of belief and practice that typify Sufi
reform cults and make them distinct from other Sufi cults in South Asia.
7
Orthodoxy here refers to adherence to the ‘straight path’ of the Shari’a (see ftn. 5). The distinction
made is between ba-shar and bi-shar Sufi orders, orthodox and heterodox (see Frembgen 2008). The
Urdu word for orthodoxy is έ΍αΥ΍ϝωϕ̵Ω‫—؟‬Rasikh-ul-Aqeeda or Saheeh-ul-Aqeeda (‘right conviction’).
Orthodox is also translated in Urdu as Taqleed Pasand (preferring imitation).
8
In the case of disciples of the reform saint I studied, the saint inculcates in followers the moral virtues
of frugality, obedience, sobriety and respect which are particularly suited for successful promotion in
the bureaucratic contexts in which most of the disciples work (the army, the police, large factories,
government ministries, etc.).
9
See, for example, the Introduction, and the chapters by Edward Simpson and Irfan Ahmad.
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In South Asia, the influence of reform Sufism is linked specifically to Shaykh
Ahmad Sirhindi’s revision of Ibn ‘Arabi’s theosophy10 and the prominent
role Naqshbandi Sufis have played in the reform movement (Weismann
2007). Given, however, the influence that Naqshbandi figures have equally
played within reformist anti-Sufi movements in South Asia,11 the need is, I
propose, to disclose the fine doctrinal and ritual resemblances and differences
between anti-Sufi and Sufi reformists—especially with regard to the Sufi
ontology of an ‘economy of light’ and of life after death —of the Prophet
and God’s auliya (‘friends’, i.e. the saints)—as these are embodied in Sufi
ritual and organizational practice.
Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi, the foundational figure in the early Sufi reform
movement, was born in the Punjab in 1564 (d. 1625). His fame as a scholar
led to an invitation to the Moghul court of Akbar in Agra where he stayed an
unspecified time before being initiated in Delhi into the Naqshbandi order
in 1599–1600 AD. He became a leading pir (Friedmann 1971: xiii), writing
numerous letters which set out his views (the Maktubat), and which include a
series attacking the ‘heretical’ Hindu-Muslim syncretism promoted by Akbar
(ibid.).12 Against that, he forcefully affirmed the ‘complete compatibility of
his mystical insights with the Shari’ah’ (ibid.: 24). Indeed, he was ‘convinced
that the Shari’ah should be the touchstone of Sufi experience’ (ibid.). Shari’a
was, however, defined by Sirhindi in Sufi terms as having an outward (zahir)
form and an inner (batin) essence (ibid.: 45). Only those who reach beyond
the formal (i.e. textual) text to its essence will enjoy paradise, he argued, by
comprehending the ambiguous verses of the Qur’an. It is solely through
essence that Sufis can reach the supreme mystical stage (ibid.) and hence
paradise (jannat). As I show in more detail below, in Sirhindi’s revision of
10
Ibn ‘Arabi (d. 1240), an Andalusian Muslim philosopher buried in Damascus, developed an elaborate
theosophy of the mystic’s journey through ascending mystical spheres in order to reach ultimately
to unification with God (see Corbin 1969; Schimmel 1975). His theory of the Sufi ‘imagination’ is
foundational for all subsequent Sufi theosophical speculation, even in the case of those, like Sirhindi,
who oppose him.
11
Most prominently, the founder of the Deobandi movement, Shah Walliyu’llah, was a Naqshbandi.
Nadwat al Ulama was founded in Kanpur in 1892 by followers of the Naqshbandi Mujaddidi master,
Fadl al-Rahman Ganj Muradabadi, and later by Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali al-Nadwi (d. 1999) (Weismann
2007: 149). Abul Ala Maududi was born to a Chishti family and towards the end of his life began
initiating disciples.
12
He was imprisoned for a year for his outspoken criticisms.
Ibn ‘Arabi’s theosophy, the ultimate mystical achievement, wahdat a-wujud

(‘unity of existence’ in God), is replaced by wahdat a-Shuhud, the ‘witnessing’
of God, following which the mystic returns (‘descends’) back to the world
to guide others on the true path.
Sirhindi’s advocacy of Islamic orthodoxy, i.e. strict adherence to Islamic
law, in conjunction with mystical practice, has remained a central defining
feature of reform Sufism.The mystic begins his journey with shari’a. Shari‘a
and tariqa (the Sufi way) form aspects of a single synthesis, although Sirhindi
‘clearly valued the inner, essential aspect of the shari‘a above its outward or
formal one’ (Lizzio 2006: 40). The ‘reformist’ aspect of Sirhindi’s message,
contained in his voluminous published letters, is encapsulated in his theory
of recurrent, cyclical Islamic renewal. He himself claimed to be the renewer
of the millennium (muaddid-i alf-i thani).13
Along with shari’a, reform Sufis in the Naqshbandi tradition stress
sobriety. As Buehler has argued,
[t]he Prophetic sobriety exemplified by Abu Bakr represented

the mode of an advanced spiritual guide. It was the sobriety
of a Sufi who, having subdued his carnal nature, experienced
intoxication, and traversed various stages of the Path, returned
to the world outwardly behaving like any ordinary pious person.
He had become extraordinarily ordinary. Sobriety, in addition, fit
conveniently with the Naqshbandi emphasis on strict adherence
to Islamic law and on imitating the way of the Prophet. (Buehler
1998: 92–93)
Sirhindi’s seventeenth century reformist message anticipated the

revivalist movements which swept across the Hijaz and North Africa in
the nineteenth century,14 as well as the Chishti revivalist movement of the
same and later period in South Asia (see Gilmartin 1979).These movements
transcended localized cults in setting new standards of religious excellence
and a new ideology of ritual practice. In renewing the stress on the shari’a
13
For an authoritative analyses of Sirhindi’s thought see, in addition to Friedmann (1971), Ahmad (1969:
40–42), Rahman (1968), Subhan (1960: 286–95) and ter Haar (1992). For the role of the Naqshbandi
in the reform movement following Sirhindi see Weismann (2007: 55 and passim).
14
For detailed historical and ethnographic accounts of these see, for example, Clancy-Smith (1990,
1994); Cornell (1998); Evans-Pritchard (1949); Sedgwick (2005); and Trimingham (1971: 105–27).
and on the austere practices of fasting and prayer, and in reformulating the
relationship between Sufi saint and follower, the impact of these movements
was profound and far-reaching.
In many senses, however, the movements may be regarded as part of a
continuous process of renewal and not as radically unique events. Sufi cults
are continuously revived through the periodic rise of new regional cults
focused upon a holy man who ventures beyond the current boundaries of
the established Islamic world and who founds a new centre, generating a
regional organization around it in the course of time (see Werbner 2003).
What reform movements share with ascendant local Sufi regional cults is,
above all, a renewal through movement in space. This makes sense organizationally
as well. Old shrines become enmeshed in endemic succession disputes
which dissipate the power of the centre and of the current holders of
saintly title. Such disputes challenge the moral authority of the centre and
its trustees (see Gilmartin 1984; Gilsenan 1982: 240–41; Jeffery 1981). The
shrine retains its sacred power but the present gaddi nishin (shrine guardians)
cannot fully recapture its organizational authority.15
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The rise of Sufi reform movements in the Hijaz in the nineteenth century
led some scholars to theorize the historical emergence of an entirely new
type of Sufism. Those supporting this thesis argued that ‘neo-Sufi’ reform
movements reconceptualized Sufi theosophy, above all by denying its
hierarchies of saints and saintly spheres of being (wilayat).16 Thus, Fazlur
Rahman proposed that neo-Sufi movements rejected the medieval tariqas,
the brotherhoods, as essentially ‘aberrant’, with Sufism affirmed as ‘purified
by a recourse to the inner, spiritual life of the Prophet’ (1979). The Sanusi,
an offshoot of the Idrisi order, ‘rejected the idea of a union with God and
postulated instead a union with the spirit of the Prophet Muhammad as
the only possible and legitimate goal for the Sufi’ (ibid.). In moral terms,
Rahman proposes, Al Sanusi espoused peace and forbade excessive love of
worldly goods (ibid.: 208). Indeed, he says, ‘the whole tone of the reform-
struggle and its programme is in terms of moral positivism and social weal
rather than in terms of other-worldly spirituality’ (ibid.: 209).
15
For an example, see Edward Simpson (Chapter 8).
16
I discuss these below.
Echoing Rahman, Trimingham argued similarly that the Egyptian

Shaykh Ahmad ibn Idris, based in the Hijaz, responded to the Wahhabi
anti-Sufi challenge by seeking to ‘preserve the inner (batini) aspects of Islam,
rejected completely by the Wahhabis, along with full acceptance of the
zahiri aspect, and vigorously condemned the accretions which had debased
the orders’ (Trimingham 1971: 106). Like Rahman, Trimingham believes
that rather than chains of authorities or mystical union with God, the
neo-Sufis privileged ‘union with the spirit of the Prophet.’ The new orders’
stress was ‘liturgical and ethical’ rather than ‘esoteric’, but at the same time
they were expansionist, ‘moved by a missionary fervour to augment their
membership’(ibid).
This theorizing of a radical ideological and ethical break between old
and new Sufism has been challenged, however, by a number of scholars.
Most prominently, O’Fahey and Radtke (1993) have argued that the
‘clichéd consensus’ about the rise of neo-Sufism disregards the writings of
Sufis like Al Sanusi or Ibn Idris themselves.The need is ‘for a greater degree
of scholarly convergence between text and context,’ they say (ibid.: 54). In
the Middle East founders of new Sufi orders were, like Sirhindi in South
Asia, ‘highly educated and articulate men’ (ibid.).17 Far from introducing a
kind of ‘Sufi Wahhabism’ privileging Hadith studies and the relation with
the Prophet, or rejecting the murshid-murid relationship between master and
disciple, nineteenth century Sufi reformers, they say, continued practices such
as zikr (‘remembrance’ or recitation of God’s name) and sama’ (devotional
musical gatherings); the Sufi reformers assumed ‘unquestioningly the need
for a spiritual master’ (ibid.: 59) whose disciples must obey the Shaykh in all
things, even beyond the grave (ibid.); against Wahhabism, Sufi knowledge
was of the inner truth of Hadith that comes only from God (ibid.: 61).
O’Fahey and Radtke also deny as ‘nonsensical’ the cliché that neo-Sufis
movements supposedly subscribed exclusively to the ‘Muhammadan way’,
tariqa muhammadiyya, beyond the divisions between named Sufi orders, or
that they denied the mystic’s ultimate aim of union with God (ibid.: 70).
For Sufi reformers the ‘visualization’ of the Prophet, imitatio Muhammadi,
17
In his survey of early Moroccan awliya Cornell found that a high proportion had advanced education
and 22 per cent were fuqaha (Cornell 1998: 106 and chapter 4 more generally).This was also true of the
nineteenth century reformer saints who wrote extensively (see, for example, Knut 1995 and Sedgwick
2005) and even in the twentieth century (Lings 1971). As I explain in this article, the same was not
necessarily true of South Asian practising reform Sufis.
remained, they say, as for all Sufis, merely a stage in the ‘annihilation’ of the
self (fana) on the way to reaching God (ibid.).18
Sufi reformers were divided fundamentally from Saudi Wahhabis
over the ontological status of Muhammad after his death (ibid.: 71), an
issue I return to below. Nor did they reject Ibn ‘Arabi’s theosophy. What
was new about these movements, O’Fahey and Radtke argue, was their
expansion into unexplored regions in the Sudan, Somalia, Cyrenaica and
the Central Sahara, and the creation of networks of lodges throughout these
areas. Rahman’s analysis, according to Mark Sedgwick, stemmed from his
‘reformist agenda’: he regarded earlier forms of Sufism as pervaded by
‘spiritual hypnotism’, ‘orgiastic rituals’, ‘superstitions’, ‘exploitation’ and
‘charlatanism’; against that, most researchers today recognize that placing
Sufism in opposition to orthodoxy is unjustified (Sedgwick 2005: 28).
Chih sums up several of the key defining features of reform Sufis in
Egypt which, as we shall see, are shared with their South Asian counterparts:
they refrain, she notes, from ‘extravagant claims concerning sainthood
(walaya), divine grace (baraka) and supernatural powers (karamat)’ (Chih
2007: 25).Yet this very self-abnegation by the saint of his charismatic power,
continuously extolled by his followers, leads if anything, in my observation,
to a magnification of a saint’s charisma.
One further point needs to be made that is peculiar to South Asia.
The rise of reform movements such as the Deobandis, led by religious
scholars, which was initiated by the eighteenth century Sufi and scholar
Shah Waliu’llah, himself a Naqshbandi (see Metcalf 1982: 37–45), and the
subsequent rise of the more radical Ahl-i-Hadith movement, influenced by
Ibn Tammiya and the Wahhabi movement in the Hijaz, generated a counter-
movement of religious scholars in defence of Sufism and Sufi practices
(ibid.: 296–314).These ‘ulama, known collectively as Barelvis, were educated
in their own religious seminaries (Malik 1998).19 They were not saints or
mystics although some aspired to be so. Thus, a division-of-labour emerged
in South Asia between learned scholars in the Sufi tradition and saintly
world-renouncers; this contrasts with the Middle Eastern Sufi reform trend
18
Visualization of the Sufi master (tasawwur-e-shaikh), followed by visualization of the Prophet are key
mystical techniques of self ‘annihilation’ which I discuss further below (see also Werbner 2003).
19
Green (2011: 19–20) calls the Barelvis a ‘counter-reformist’ movement. Soares (2005: 185) also uses
this term in the case of Mali.
in which scholarship, mysticism and sainthood were often combined in the

case of founding saints.20
Within the reformist milieu of debate and contestation that arose in
late nineteenth century British India (Metcalf 1982: 232–34; Reetz 2006),
the attack on institutionalized Sufism focused primarily on practice. There
appeared to be far less difference in the beliefs of the reformers and their
opponents—the defenders of Sufi practice—regarding the ontological
premises of mystical Islam. It was relatively easy, then, for the saintly founders
of new orders to discard ‘offensive’ practices although they did retain,
despite anti-Sufi reformist criticism, key Sufi organizing rituals crucial
for the expansion and perpetuation of their regional cults. These rituals
remained, as before, essentially embedded in eschatological premises about
life after death and the mystical journey of the soul.To explain this further, I
turn now to the case of a living Sufi Refomist saint before considering the
detailed critique by the reformists of Sufi practice.
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For the secular observer as for the Muslim reformist, the obsequious
prostration of supplicants at the tombs of dead saints, or disciples’ obeisant
kissing of a living saint’s hands and the edges of his gown, summon up a
world of magic and superstition. It is a world that seems utterly remote from
the imaginary universes, ideal symbols and abstract qualities described in the
works of famous Sufis.
To bridge the apparent gap between ritual custom and abstract theosophy
we need to bear in mind that the persona of a saint, alive or dead, his very
body, is believed by Sufi followers to be suffused with divine light and to
irradiate divine sanctity. So powerful is this embodiment that merely to
touch anything that has come into contact with the saint is to absorb some
of his magical potency. In South Asia great saints like Zindapir often stand
in danger of being mobbed by crowds of devotees and must be protected
from the intense love that their followers feel for them. It is this feature of
charismatic embodiment which provides a clue to the integral relationship
between Sufi theosophy and the apparently superstitious practices at saints’
shrines.
20
See ftn. 16.
Zindapir was, above all, an army saint.21 His career started as a tailor
contractor in the British and then Pakistani army where his early circle of
companions was forged. The majority of his disciples were, or had been,
soldiers. Others were members of the police force or worked in large
government departments and factories. Many had subsequently become
labour migrants to Britain and the Gulf or had risen to prominence in civilian
life. His following highlights the attraction of Sufi saints in the reformist
tradition to workers in modern bureaucratic contexts. The fact that they
are pir-bhai (fraternal Sufi ‘brothers’) as well as comrades-in-arms served
to deepen relations of amity between murids (disciples). The camaraderie
they forged in one context seemed to spill over into the other to create
multiple relations of enduring obligation and trust. The fraternity of co-
membership in a single Sufi order countered formal relations of hierarchy in
bureaucratic and military settings and enabled disciples to exert autonomous
moral reasoning vis-à-vis superiors, as Ewing too has argued (Ewing 1993).
While stressing hierarchy and the total authority of the saint, then, in reality,
reform Sufism appears thus to encourage autonomous decision-making and
individuality in secular daily life. As others too have pointed out, disciples
can access jobs in the modern sector through connections forged at the
lodge with government officials and managers in large firms, mediated
through the saint and his khalifas, and this is a further pragmatic aspect of
membership in the order.
The regional cult founded by Zindapir falls clearly within the reformist
tradition, one which emerged as we have seen as early as the seventeenth
century among Naqshbandi Sufi followers. In line with strict Naqshbandi
practice, during his lifetime Zindapir prohibited the playing of instrumental
music, radio and television (including its ownership) at the lodge, although
he did allow the singing of praise poems to the Prophet (n’at), and of loud,
melodic forms of zikr, which became over time the hallmark of the order.
Protecting himself against accusations of claims to mercenary charlatanism,
there were no collection boxes at the lodge. In line too with his reformist
inclinations, he did not allow his picture to be taken for fear, he said, that
it would become an object of worship, though pictures did surface after
his death. He reprimanded ‘ulama who praised him rather than Allah. His
followers were asked not to extol his karamat. In his eyes, the true miracles
21
For a full account of Zindapir see my monograph (Werbner 2003).
he had performed were those of building the darbar (lodge), nestled in the
valley, and especially the free provision of food to all wayfarers at the langar,
the free kitchen whose food nurtured the multitudes who came to seek his
blessings. In line with the order’s strict adherence to shari’a, his instructions
to supplicants invariably included the injunction to say the five daily prayers.
He himself barely spoke about the Sufi mystical journey, to the frustration
of his close khalifas like Hajji Karim, whose mystical theory I present below.
Yet he was a visibly practising ascetic who ate very little, no meat or other
luxuries, and reputedly never slept. Repeatedly, he stresses his credo of
world renunciation as captured by the aphorism: ‘The world and religion
[dunya te din] are like two sisters. If you marry one, you cannot marry the
other; to which he would add: ‘If you turn your back to the world you will
face God’ (dunya ki taraf pith kare ton khuda ki taraf mun hota hey). His stress
was thus on ethics and morality.
Such self-consciousness, restraint and ascetism, the taming of desire and
stress upon shari’a, are not to be taken, however, as a sign of Sufi ‘decline’,
or the diminution of faith in the perfection of the shaikh and his powers of
intercession. Nowhere did I encounter an apologetic double-consciousness
in the face of modernity of the kind that Ewing (1997) reports from
her fieldwork among Sufi saints and followers. On the contrary, feelings
of love and devotion expressed by both ordinary and modern, educated
murids (disciples) and khulafa (vicegerents, deputies, emissaries), for Zindapir
were so intense that these murids found it inconceivable that anyone who
encountered the shaikh would not, like them, be totally overwhelmed by his
extraordinary spirituality.
In a series of morality tales, Zindapir repeatedly mocked ‘ulama and
politicians alike for their mendacity and their false attempts to claim powers
belonging to God alone (Werbner 2003: 87–92, 95–98). His closeness
to Allah, even beyond the Prophet was signalled by his inclusiveness: he
welcomed foreigners, Christians and members of other faiths, as had his
murshid, Baba Qasim, the saint of Mohra Sharif at Muree, at the foothills of
the Himalayas.
One of the least understood features of Sufism in South Asia is why
it remains attractive to apparently Westernized, high ranking civil servants,
army officers, politicians, businessmen and professionals, as well as to large
numbers of relatively uneducated villagers. Sufism, at least reform Sufism,
appears to appeal to the educated and powerful, as well as the vast mass of
low ranking followers.
This continued elite attraction to Sufi orders stems, I found, from a

peculiar understanding of worldly success and predestination in Sufi Islam.
A key role of the saint is believed to be his ability to act as mediator for
his disciples with God on the Day of Judgement, asking forgiveness for
them and thus assuring that they go to jannat, paradise. Disciples are, in
other words, dependent upon the saint not only for blessings in the world,
but for eternal salvation. This leads to the further belief that worldly
achievements are divine rewards for obeying the edicts and instructions of
the saint regarding religious observance and daily practice, which include
the multiple repetition of specific religious litanies (wazifa) allocated by him
alone. As bringer of divine blessing, he is believed to be able to change the
course of nature, to sway the will of God, and thus to affect the predestined
movement of the universe. This assumption is at the root of the repeated
stories by disciples about the miracles performed by the shaykh, despite
the saint’s objection to the telling of such narratives. Hence if, after their
initiation, disciples succeed in their businesses, in arranging marriages for
their children, in obtaining job promotions, in passing examinations or tests,
in finding work as labour migrants—in short, in any of their endeavours,
they interpret this as a sign of God’s blessing conferred upon them via
their saint. The saint’s own accumulation of wealth is similarly regarded.
Discipleship thus constitutes a legitimation of personal worldly success.22
$GVYGGPBid’aCPFShirk
The objection to notions of saintly intercession is one of the main
accusations levelled against Sufi practice by scriptural reformists along with
their objection to devotional rituals at the lodge. The claim is that these
rituals constitute bid’a, unlawful innovation, not mentioned in the scriptures,
and that furthermore, the practices are shirk, making the saint a ‘partner’
with God and thus challenging the monotheistic principle of tawhid, the
singularity and unity of God. Sufis deny these accusations, arguing that their
devotions are directed toward God alone via His chosen ‘friends’, the awliya
or saints.
Sufi rituals, in general, as practised at Zindapir’s lodge, are relatively
simple: animal sacrifice, food or money offerings, langar (blessed food
distributed to lodge visitors), zikr (the repetitive remembrance of God’s
22
For a more extensive discussion of this point, and the paradox of individuality of the otherworldly saint
by contrast to other reformist movements, see Werbner (1996).
name or of Qur’anic verses), blessing, collective prayer and supplication

(du‘a). These rituals, it should be noted, all have a powerful ethical dimension;
they contain notions of Godly and saintly nurture, care and generosity. It is,
in fact, a common Muslim practice to ask a virtuous person to pray on one’s
behalf, or for mourners to pray on behalf of the dead in order to speed their
passage to paradise. Healing rituals include dam, the ‘blowing’ of a Qur’anic
verse on an afflicted persons and tawiz, the handing out of amulets written
with Qur’anic verses or magic squares, neither of which are unIslamic and
are often practised by Deobandis as well.The exorcism of jinns or evil spirits
does not in itself deviate from the Qur’an, which mentions the existence
of jinns. Zindapir was careful, however, not to physically ‘beat’ the afflicting
jinn out of a person as is common in many Sufi lodges in South Asia.
Instead he ‘talked’ to the jinns and persuaded them to leave the person.They
became his followers, I was told, living in the mountains and enjoying the
sukun, the healing tranquility, of the lodge (see Werbner 2003: chapter 10).
None of the rituals performed at the lodge, Zindapir’s followers argued,
deviate from Islamic orthodoxy, the ‘straight path’ of the shari’a. It is above
all Sufi communal rituals that are regarded by the scriptural reformists as
illegitimate accretions: celebrations of the Prophet’s birthday and ritual
processing in urban areas; prostration at the shrine or grave of a saint, and
the washing and laying of dupattas (cloths) or flowers on it. Also somewhat
suspect is bai’at, the oath of allegiance entered into by a disciple (murid) with
his guide and Shaykh (murshid), although Deobandis and Tablighi in the
nineteenth century took bai’at from leading Deobandis in large numbers
(Metcalf 1982: 80; Reetz 2006: 126–28). Claims to saintly karamat, miracles,
are disapproved of by the reformists, though again, were widely attributed
to Deobandi shaikhs and regarded as emanting from God (ibid.: 176–77).
Above all scripturalist reformists object to the ‘urs, the culminating event
in the annual cycle of a saint’s lodge,23 a religious festival commemorating
the ‘wedding’ or unification of the saint with God at the moment of his
mortal death (e.g. Metcalf 1982: 153, 157, 273). The ‘urs encompasses many
of the smaller ritual acts of offering, sacrifice and supplication associated
with worship at a lodge. The ‘urs is, scholars agree, the major organizing
ritual of a Sufi order, gathering together the saint’s khalifas (vicegerents) and
murids (disciples),‘ulama (clerics), poets, nat or qawwali devotional singers
23
This is known widely as mawlid in the Middle East and ‘arus in Bangladesh (see Landell Mills 1998).
Whatever their appellation, such festivals are invariably celebrated annually for departing saints.
and the masses. ‘Urs rituals are occasions to initiate new members and to
renew and revitalise followers’ connection with the saint, each other, and
Allah. During the ‘urs, departed saints in the silsila (chain of saints leading to
the founder of the lodge), it is believed, gather to attend the congregation.
Having sacrificed hundreds of animals and fed thousands of pilgrims who
have travelled great distances, the culminating ritual act of the ‘urs is the
du’a, the supplication by the saint to God on behalf of the community.24
Older and specialist shrines develop over time elaborate rituals
performed during the ‘urs, and these may last for several weeks. It is perhaps
such elaborations that have incurred the wrath of the reformers. At the
shrine of Nagore Sharif in Tamil Nadu, for example, the kanduri festival, as
it is known, lasts 14 days and includes mendicants’ processions with flags,
musical pipes and other paraphernalia, an illuminated chariot, model boats,
an elaborate ship model, cannon firing, fireworks, processions of long-
haired malang faqirs and Hindu merchant groups, western musical bands,
the installation of a ‘ritual saint’, a play of lemon throwing, sandalwood
smearing, ritual blessing and miraculous water drinking by the sea (Saheb
1998). All these would undoubtedly be defined as bida’ by the reformists.
During the increasingly popular contemporary‘urs at the shrine of Lal
Shahbaz Qalandar in Sindh, there is intoxication, music, quantities of mehndi
smeared from large pots, singing, dohl drumming, ecstatic dancing, mingling
of the sexes, and cannabis smoking—‘an archaic, magical and yet palpably
physical world in which I became acquainted with an Islam marked by
trust, tolerance and a feeling of togetherness; of trances and a Dionysian
spirituality—a joyful counter-culture in contrast to that of a rather cheerless
appearing orthodox Islam’ (Frembgen 2011: 3). The event lasts a full two
weeks, with pre-‘urs rituals performed in earlier months.25
24
For a detailed discussion of the ‘urs as the hub of a Sufi order see Werbner (2003: chapter 9); see also in
particular Reeves (1990) on the ritual and organizational complexity of a mawlid at a famous shrine in
upper Egypt, which gathers a massive crowd of close to a million devotees from many related branch
orders, and Gilsenan (1973).
25
The mingling of Sunni, Shi’a and Hindus at the ‘urs was historically widespread. Green (2011: 68–78)
describes the carnivalesque entertainment and cosmopolitan atmosphere at such festivals in nineteenth
century Bombay and its vicinity which attracted ‘Hindus, Muslims, Parsis and others’. Even though, as
he points out, one may ‘question whether the social differences between these pilgrims did ever melt
away in a Turnerian experience of “comunitas”’ (ibid.: 72) such shrine festivals undoubtedly provide a
cosmopolitan framing which counters a tendency towards sectarian Sunni-Shi’a violence and religious
communalism in South Asia (see Freitag 1989 and the discussion in Werbner and Basu 1998: 19–20).
Frembgen’s comment cannot be taken, then, simply as a ‘romanticising’ of Sufi inclusiveness, particu-
At the shrine of Bava Gor in South Gujarat studied by Basu, rituals of

ordeal are performed for three Sidi saints, including rites of exorcism and
spirit possession. At the ‘urs, Sidi gather to perform trance dances through
which they experience a state of ecstatic love for the saints (Basu 1998).
Shi’as, Sunnis and Hindus mingle at all these shrines. This too would be
regarded by the reformists as bida’.
As well as novel ritual practices, the ‘urs in most of the older shrines
in South Asia draw vast crowds to their colourful bazaars, selling abundant
food and drink and blaring filmi music; dancing girls and prostitutes are
reputed to contribute to the ‘sinful’, carnivalesque atmosphere surrounding
the ‘urs. When orthodox Auquf Departments in the Ministries of Religious
Affairs of both India and Pakistan take over these shrines, they are quick
to ‘purify’ them, while also depriving the local shrine descendants—often
whole villages—of a lucrative source of income deriving from pilgrims.26
6JG2TQDNGOQH+PVGTEGUUKQPCPFShirk
1PVQNQIKGUQH.KHGCHVGT&GCVJ
If the customs at some of the older Sufi shrines in South Asia may be
regarded as unlawful innovations, bida’, to what extent are the central rituals
of the ‘urs, and its very raison d’être, also shirk? The answer to this question is
by no means self-evident: there is no clear opposition, as there is between
Catholicism and Protestantism, between Sufis and scriptural reformists in
South Asia with regard to the key issue of intercession. Reetz remarks that
‘even among the more radical reform groups, there was no agreement on
what would undermine monism. … The accusation of ‘associationism’
(shirk) was levelled indiscriminately against others, while for their own
group scholars justified respect or worship of symbols other than Allah’
(Reetz 2006: 104). Indeed, on closer inspection many of the scriptural
reformists subscribe to the same ontological and eschatological premises as
do reform Sufi followers of mystical path.
larly so since Shi’a in Pakistan whose saint is buried at the shrine of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar have been
subject to violent sectarianism since the Iranian revolution.
26
This is discussed by Phillipon (2013) in relation to the Mian Mir shrine in Lahore.
The nineteenth century Deobandis, unlike the Saudi Wahhabis27 or their

Hanafi counterparts in South Asia, the Ahl-i-Hadith,‘believed in the physical
survival of prophets and saints after their death and in the immortality of
their bodies as well as their souls’ (Ahmad 1969: 107). Barelvis believed that
the ‘Prophet was himself light, present and observant (hazir o nazir) in all
places. As light he had no shadow. He was human but his humanity was of a
different order from that of other men’ (Metcalf 1982: 301; see also Ahmed
1993: 127). Even for Ahl-i-Hadith the Prophet is insan-i-kamil, the perfect
man, to be emulated to the finest detail. According to Qasim Nanotawi, a
prominent Deobandi, the Prophet did not die at all, though others dispute
this.28 The Prophet continues to appear in ‘true dreams’, even to Salafi
Islamists such as Al Qaida and Taliban leaders (Edgar 2011).29 He remains
thus an active agent influencing the course of events in the world. Only in
the case of Wahhabis ‘The dead, including the Prophet, were declared to
have entered barzakh, where they awaited the day of Resurrection without
being able to help the living through any form of intercession’ (Peskes 1999:
159). For Wahhabi and Ahl-i-Hadith followers, the relationship to God is
unmediated and direct.These extreme scripturalists deny even the evidence
from the scriptures of mediated appeal to God, for example the fact that the
Prophet prayed for rain on behalf of the community (Kugle 2007: 277–78).
So too the Koran, while repeatedly asserting that on the Day of Judgement,
‘no soul shall have power (to do) aught for another: For the command,
that Day, will be (wholly) with Allah’ (82: 18–19), also says repeatedly that
27
‘Wahhabi’ is often used as a term of vilification in South Asia by Barelvis in particular to imply that
a person has placed him or herself beyond the pale of the true Muslim community, the ‘Ahl-e Sunna
wa Jamaat’. My reference here, however, is specifically to Saudi Hanbali Wahhabis, followers of the
doctrine of Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (d. 1792 AD), who rejected entirely any notions of in-
tercession including even prayer (du’a) on behalf of the community or the marking of graves, which
he regarded as idols (see Kugle 2007: 271–92).The South Asian Hanafi Ahl-i-Hadith are influenced by
his thinking (Metcalf 1982: 277–78).
28
Jamal Malik, Personal communication, referring to Zubair Al Zia: hayat al-Nabi, pp. 15–16, 17–18. Bar-
bara Metcalf writes (personal communication) that ‘Husain Ahmad Madani in his booklet on India as
a kind of holy land for Muslims, written in the early 1940s, argues that the graves of the holy men are
like radio towers, emitting baraka until the day of judgement—a reason for not supporting the demand
for Pakistan. Malik adds that ‘I don’t know about Maududi/Ahl-i-Hadith on this but I think this at-
titude is pretty standard.’ It is ironic that among the few Muslims who do not believe the Prophet is an
active agent in the world are the Salafiyya, who copy him unto the smallest detail
29
‘Islamist’ refers broadly to Islamic movements espousing political Islam. While Al Qaeda have been
described as Salafi jihadists, Osama Bin Laden constructed his persona in the classic image of a Sufi
world renouncer (Devji 2005: 42–44). Other contemporary Salafis (who aim to recreate the age of the
Prophet in all its minute details) are non-violent.
‘They will have no power of intercession, save him who hath made a covenant
with his Lord’ (19: 85–87; emphasis added); in other words, that the power of
intercession is granted to chosen persons by God alone.30 Barelvi ‘ulama and
Sufi reformists rely on this latter idea, namely that God’s ‘friends’ (awliya) and
the Prophet are granted the power of intercession, to justify Sufi practices
and belief in intercession on the Day of Judgement.
It is worth I think exploring in greater depth the epistemology and
ontology behind Sufi practice and notions of intercession as arising from
the ontological state of life after death. Once accepted, these mystical ideas
makes perfect sense of so-called ‘popular’ devotions at saints’ tombs and the
centrality of the ‘urs. My discussion refers back to the debate outlined at the
outset of this essay on neo-Sufism and the extent to which the rise of this
movement was associated with the rejection of saintly mediation. The central
place accorded in Sufi Islam to ascetism as the source of charismatic power
can be placed within a broad genealogy of theorizing of ritual embodiment
in anthropology, though the directionality of transformation, as we shall
see—from body/cosmos to self denial to cosmic body—is perhaps unique
to mystical traditions.31
Sufi theosophy is entirely devoted to describing and authenticating
the transformation of the persona of the saint through Sufi practice. This
ritual passage is postulated to be as much physical as it is spiritual, and it
occurs as a mystic ‘kills’ his carnal soul and reaches closer and closer towards
sacred intimacy with God. I was instructed in the mystic’s journey by Hajji
Karim, a khalifa of Zindapir who deeply aspired to reach the heights of
mystical revelation. Despairing of experiencing these revelations first-
hand, he sought knowledge in the Maktubat of Sirhindi (n.d.)32 and other
Naqshbandi texts. I have selected some passages from a longer account (see
Werbner 2003: chapter 9) to convey the complexity of Sufi thought in the
Naqshbandi tradition that leads to the notion of living agency after physical
death. Hajji Karim told me:
30
For the full range of quotations on intercession from the Koran and Hadith, see http://www.answer-
ing-islam.de/Quran/Contra/intercession.html (accessed 12 August 2011).
31
Kugle (2007: 11–14), for example, traces a genealogy of the theoretical discussion of ritual embodiment
in anthropology from Mauss and Douglas to Bourdieu, who developed Mauss’s notion of ‘habitus’.
More recently, Foucault’s theorizing of technologies of bodily practice in ancient Greece has inspired
an interest in pietist Muslim self-discipline (Mahmood 2005).
32
I am uncertain what version of the Maktubat he used.
‘It is generally believed that a human being is made of four, ‘unsar,

elements, fire, water, air and clay, but in fact, he is made of 10 elements.
The other six are nafs [vital soul/spirit], qalb [heart], ruh [eternal soul], sirr
[secret thing], khafi [‘silence’, more secret], and akhfa [the most secret].33
These 10 elements originate in the universe. A human being is the essence,
concentration, encapsulation, of all these elements. He reflects in miniature
the whole universe, the ‘great universe’,‘alam-e-kabir, the macrocosm.We see
ourselves and think we are nothing. But each human being contains within
him powers which, if opened up, enable a man to see the whole universe
created by God. A human being is an ‘alam-e-saghir, a ‘small universe’—
he mirrors the whole universe within him. He is a picture [image] of
God’s creation. A person can leave the world of appearances, of ephemeral
creations [i.e. the empirical world of the senses], if he knows the way; and
he can reach out to the eternal world.’
‘A human being is designed so that in his chest are spaces for the entry
of divine lights. We call these spaces lata’if. A latifa (sing.) is something very
fine. The lata’if are located on the body (see figure 1): the first, latifa-el-Admi
[of Adam], is located just under the heart; the second, latifa-el Ibrahimi, is the
ruh which is located on the right side of the chest, under the right breast; the
third, the latifa of Moses, sirr, is located just above the heart; the fourth latifa,
of Jesus, khafi, is located on the right, above the breast, above the ruh, the fifth
latifa, that of Muhammad (P.B.U.H.), akhfa, is located at the centre. Prophecy
is at the top, sainthood at the bottom [i.e. the lata’if are ranked with akhfa
being the most superior]. The sixth latifa, the nafs, is located in our tariqa,
Naqshbandiyya, at the centre of the forehead. The seventh and final latifa,
latifa qalbia, is composed of the four elements: air, water, fire and clay.’
‘This latifa may start anywhere in the body and flow outwards to clean
the whole body. These are the seven treasures in the human body. The first
five lata’if parallel the eternal world, ‘alam-e-amr, while the nafs and the four
elements parallel the ephemeral world of creations, ‘alam-e-khalq.’
‘In the middle of the circle of possibilities is an arch, the ‘arsh-e-mu’allah,
the throne where God sits (though of course, He does not really sit, He has
no body). The ‘arsh-e-mu’allah is the division between the two worlds. The
33
Buehler (1998: 105–07) translates these as Soul (nafs), Heart (qalb), Spirit (ruh), Mystery (sirr), Arcanum
(khafi) and Super-Arcanum (akhfa). I prefer to translate ruh as ‘soul’ since the ruh bears strong similarities
to the Christian soul that survives after a person’s death. In Christianity there is no concept equivalent
to nafs, which is both the breath of life and the desiring, active ego of an individual.
human heart, qalab, reflects this division in ‘alam-e-saghir, the small universe,
that of a human being. Mirroring the ‘arsh-e-mu’allah, the qalab separates
between the five (superior) chest lights and the other five lata’if. It divides
‘alam-e-saghir, a human being, as the arsh-e-mu’ allah divides ‘alam-e-kabir.’
Qalbiya
All my senses
four elements
NAFS
Holy Spirit
AKHFA
Most
Hidden
KHAFI SIRR
Hidden Secret
RUH QALB
Soul Heart
Figure 1 The seven bodily lights
‘In order to achieve the first stage of knowledge on the Sufi path a
person seeks annihilation in his Sufi shaikh. We call this stage fana fi’l-shaikh.
Through fana fi’l-shaikh the small universe is revealed. Once a man sees
this sphere, the circle of possibilities is revealed to him. But Sufis do not
simply want to study God’s creations; they wish to study God Himself,
His power and creativity. In order to do so they must move beyond this
circle, they must break out of ‘alam-e-amr into the third sphere. To do so
a person must seek annihilation in the Prophet, fana fi’l-rasul. The third
sphere, located above and beyond the universe, is the sphere of the shadows
of God’s attributes. There are five dominions: they are, in ascending order,
the dominions of Adam, Abraham and Noah, Moses, Jesus, and finally, the
wilayat muhammadiya, that of the Prophet Muhammad. Through continuous
Sufi (ascetic) practice a person can finally achieve knowledge of this third
sphere. The divine lights coming from heaven have different colours: green
(akhfa), black (khafi), white (sirr), red (ruh) and yellow (qalb).’
Figure 2 Journey of the soul
It is impossible here to spell out in detail the whole journey of the soul,
besides making the point that in Hajji Karim’s rendition of Naqshbandi Sufi
theory the system comes to be highly elaborated through the principles of

repetition and accretion. The movement from sphere to sphere or, in the
later stages, between sub-spheres within a single sphere, may be visualized
as the ascent of a mountain. The climber aims for the mountain peak but
when it has been scaled it turns out to have been only a lower peak, a
plateau. In the distance the climber can see the rising peak of the mountain
still to be scaled, and so on.
The journey of the soul is in principle never complete. The final stage of
Muhammad is the stage of pure love. Sirhindi says that when he completed
this journey it clearly appeared that if he took one step further he would
step into pure non-existence. The unbreachable chasm separating God and
Man in Sufi thought generally, however, and Sirhindi’s in particular creates
the potential for almost infinite elaboration of spheres and sub-spheres,
ranked realities and origins of origins, shadows and names of shadows. Hajji
Karim continued by explicating the ethical dimensions of the Sufi journey
and embodied transformation:
‘The challenge in Sufism is to overcome the arrogance of the soul,
gharur takabar, which is equivalent to thinking the soul, the self, is God. The
nafs is where all evil things grow. The heart [qalb] is where all good things
grow. It is the first to reach out to God. Nafs belongs to Sufiya only. When
a person points to himself, saying “I” or “me”, in ‘Arabic “ana”, in Urdu
“men”, that is the nafs. In Sufism one must break the ana, fight the nafs,
know that one is made by God. A person who comes into the world thinks
he is everything. The nafs is pride, arrogance, vanity. The ruh is related to
air, sirr to water, khafi to fire and akhfa to clay. The four elements are the
curtain between a human being and God’s zat. According to the Mujaddid-i
Alf-i Thani [i.e. Sirhindi], the nafs is a curtain between the person and God’s
attributes. When this curtain is removed then everything is done for the
sake of Allah. After that what remains are not human curtains but only
curtains of divine light. God Himself can never be seen.’
‘The difference between a shaykh and an ordinary man is that the shaykh
is a person who has taken his ruh out of this world before he dies. When a
great pir dies his soul goes to the stage it reached during his lifetime, even
further. It can see the zat, God’s being, although there are different stages,
many curtains, within this dominion. In our tariqa one of the highest ranked
saints is the ghaus, the sustainer, but the most elevated rank [mansab] is that
of qayummiyid—the qayyum is a supreme saint in the hierarchy of saints.
Our saint celebrates the day he achieved his rank [in the ‘urs]. No one really
knows what rank he has reached.’
‘In the final stage of the journey of the soul, baqa bi’l-lah, the soul lives
forever. The nafs is finally transformed as the soul of a human being is taken
out of the shadow to reach the attributes. It comes back to earth linked
both to God and to people, to human beings.This is nafs mutma‘inna. At this
point the saint has a new body, he lives forever. Sufis are alive in the grave and their
bodies are left untouched in the earth. Their souls are active, they can hear and see
what is happening, they can help people after their death. They do not die. Instead
of dying they are transferred from one world to another, they have wasal
kar gae [met with God], parda kar gae [gone behind the curtain]. They reach
out to heaven even while still alive so they cannot die. Their souls can leave
their bodies at will. But according to the Shari’at, they are not allowed to
reveal that they have these powers. Only the prophets are allowed to reveal
their powers.Yet all the prophets and saints are able to help people after their
death. This is a secret thing.’ (Hajji Karim, emphasis added)
In this cosmic journey, if love is mentioned, it is within an economy
of light or divine grace in which it refers to a physiological, cognitive and
ontological state of being suffused or nurtured by light emanating from
God. Light is thus the key operator of the system: levels and intensities of
light refer to levels of achieved gnosis. Light is transferred via the different
spheres of being to the person.34
In the final analysis, the charisma of a Sufi saint, including a reformist
saint, derives in the eyes of followers from his asceticism, which is seen
to effect a bodily ritual transformation, suffusing the saint with light and
making him a conduit to God’s blessings in the world.
%QPENWUKQP
Zindapir was a Sufi saint in the classical sense of the word: his stress on
sobriety and orthodoxy did not lead him to a denial of his status as pir or of
the importance of the ‘urs and all the rituals associated with it. Despite his
disclaimers, stories of his karamat circulated widely. The sacred mythology
of his rise to sainthood combined miraculous signs from God with morality
34
Thus Corbin (1969: 191) argues: ‘Light is the agent of the cosmogony, because it is the agent of Rev-
elation, that is to say, of knowledge.’
tales. He was uniformly admired, even by the educated and wealthy, for
his evident ascetism, world renunciation, generosity and dedication to his
followers. He was a ‘man of God’, perceived to be so even by politicians
and ‘ulama. Even while still living, he could see into the hearts of men and
women wherever in the world they happened to be.35 During his lifetime
he had built up his extensive order and the lodge through voluntary labour
and the devotion of his murids and khalifa. After his death in 1999, the ‘urs
continued under the supervision of his son and grandson. No doubt, over
time new rituals will be introduced that might arouse the wrath of strict
reformists. So far, however, the lodge has been spared by even the strict
scripturalist Taliban despite their large concentrations in its vicinity.
4GHGTGPEGU
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3

I n the Introduction to the hagiography of the reform Naqshbandi Sufi

Contemporary Muslim students (talib) who study in religious

knowledge of the divine essence and attributes, of true principles,

The contours of reform Sufism in South Asia, of matching the ‘interior’

the sacred centre of the cult. Against simplistic stereotypes of Sufism as

Ibn ‘Arabi’s theosophy, the ultimate mystical achievement, wahdat a-wujud

[t]he Prophetic sobriety exemplified by Abu Bakr represented

Sirhindi’s seventeenth century reformist message anticipated the

Echoing Rahman, Trimingham argued similarly that the Egyptian

in which scholarship, mysticism and sainthood were often combined in the

This continued elite attraction to Sufi orders stems, I found, from a

name or of Qur’anic verses), blessing, collective prayer and supplication

At the shrine of Bava Gor in South Gujarat studied by Basu, rituals of

The nineteenth century Deobandis, unlike the Saudi Wahhabis27 or their

‘It is generally believed that a human being is made of four, ‘unsar,

Figure 1 The seven bodily lights

Figure 2 Journey of the soul

theory the system comes to be highly elaborated through the principles of

———. 1984. ‘Shrines, Succession, and Sources of Moral Authority’. In

Peskes, Esther. 1999. ‘The Wahhabiyya and Sufism in the Eighteenth

Weismann, Itzchak. 2007. The Naqshabandiyya: Orthodoxy and Activism in a

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