What was the source of the theology developed in the newer Sufism? Undoubtedly this was neo-Platonic, as has been proved by Dr. Nicholson (Selected Poems from the Diwan of Shams-i-Tabriz, Camb., 1898, and The Mystics of Islam, Lond. 1914), and by Prof. Browne (Literary Hist. of Persia, Lond., 1902, chap. xiii.), and forms part of the influence which came into Islam at the introduction of Greek philosophy under the `Abbasids. But as in philosophy and other cultural transmissions direct Greek influence was preceded by an indirect influence brought to bear through Syriac and Persian, so it was also in neo-platonic theology, for neo-Platonic influences had already been brought to bear upon the Syrians and Persians in the pre-Islamic period. In the forefront of the later direct influence must be placed the so-called Theology of Aristotle, which it is no exaggeration to describe as the most prominent and the widest circulated manual of neo-Platonism which has ever appeared. It is, as we have already stated, an abridged translation of the last three books of Plotinus’ Enneads. Now the mysticism of Plotinus is philosophical and not religious, but it lends itself to a theological interpretation very easily, just as neo-Platonism as a whole very readily became a theological system in the hands of Jamblichus, of the pagans of Harran, and such like; and the Sufis were inclined to make this application, whilst the falasifa confined themselves to its philosophical side. It seems probable that the influence of the Pseudo-Dionysius was brought to bear upon Islam about the same time. The Pseudo-Dionysian writings consist of four treatises, of which two, a treatise “On Mystical Theology” in five chapters, and a treatise “On the Names of God” in thirteen chapters, have been the chief source of Christian mystical theology. The first reference to these writings occurs in A.D. 532, when the claim was made that they were the work of Dionysius, the Areopagite, a pupil of St. Paul, or at least represent his teaching. In several places the writer cites Hierotheus as his teacher, and this enables us to identify the source as a Syrian monk named Stephen Bar Sudaili, who wrote under the name of Hierotheus (cf. Asseman, Bibl. Orient. ii. 290-291). This Bar Sudaili was abbot of a convent at Edessa, and was involved in controversy with James of Sarugh, so that we may refer the writings to the latter part of the 5th century A.D. They were translated into Syriac very soon after their first appearance in Greek, and, as familiar to Syriac Christians, must have become indirectly known to the Muslims. We have no direct evidence as to their translation into Arabic, but Mai gives fragments of other works of Bar Sudaili which appear in Arabic MSS. in his Spicilegium Romanum (iii. 707). The traditional view of the relations between Sufism and philosophy is described in the anecdote cited by Prof. Browne (Lit. Hist. of Persia, ii. 261, from Akhlag-i-Jalali) of the Sufi Abu Sa`id b. Abi l-Khayr (d. 441 A.H. = 1049 A.D.), who is said to have met and conversed with Ibn Sina; when they parted Abu Sa`id said of Ibn Sina, “What I see, he knows,” whilst Ibn Sina said, “What I know, he sees.”
But there were other influences of a secondary character at work in `Iraq and Persia which become important when we remember that it was the subject population of those parts which had, to a large extent, replaced the Arabs as the leaders of Islam during the `Abbasid period. In connection with the Sufis probably we cannot refer any influence to the Zoroastrian religion proper, which had a non-ascetic and national character; but the Manichæan and Masdekite religions, the two “free churches” of Persia, show a definitely ascetic tone, and when we find, as is the case, that many of the early Sufis were converts from Zoroastrianism, or the sons of such converts, we are inclined to suspect that, though professing that recognised religion, they were in all probability actually Zindiqs, that is to say secretly heretics and initiates of the Manichæan or Masdekite sect making external profession of the more recognised cult, as was the common practice of these Zindiqs. Note must also be made of the Gnostic influences transmitted through the Saniya of the fen country between Wasit and Basra, the Mandæans, as they are called to distinguish them from the so-called Sabians of Harran. The Sufi Ma´ruf of Karkh was himself the son of Sabian parents. And again we must not ignore the probability of Buddhist influences, for Buddhist propaganda had been active in pre-Islamic times in Eastern Persia and Transoxiana. Buddhist monasteries existed in Balkh, and it is noteworthy that the ascete Ibrahim b. Adham (d. 162—cf. supra) is traditionally described as a prince of Balkh who left his throne to become a darwish. On closer examination, however, it does not appear that Buddhist influence can have been very strong, as there are essential differences between Sufi and Buddhist theories. A superficial resemblance exists between the Buddhist nirvana and the fana or reabsorption of the soul in the Divine Spirit of Sufism. But the Buddhist doctrine represents the soul as losing its individuality in the passionless placidity of absolute quiescence, whilst the Sufi doctrine, though also teaching a loss of individuality, regards everlasting life as consisting in the ecstatic contemplation of the Divine Beauty. There is an Indian parallel to fana, but it is not in Buddhism, but in the Vedantic pantheism.
It is generally accepted that the first exponent of Sufi doctrine was the Egyptian, or Nubian, Dhu n-Nun (d. 245-246), a pupil of the jurist Malik b. ´Anas, who lived at the time when there was much percolation of Hellenistic influence into the Islamic world. He was indeed nearly contemporary with `Abdullah, the son of Maymum, whose work we have already noticed. Dhu n-Nun’s teaching was recorded and systematized by al-Junayd of Baghdad (d. 297), and in it appears essential doctrine of Sufism, as of all mysticism, in the teaching of tawhid, the final union of the soul with God, a doctrine which is expressed in a way closely resembling the neo-Platonic teaching, save that in Sufism the means whereby this union is to be attained is not by the exercise of the intuitive faculty of reason but by piety and devotion. Still the two come very close when we find in the teachings of the later philosophers that the highest exercise of reason consists in the intuitive apprehension of the eternal verities rather than in any other activity of the intellect. Al-Junayd is stated by Jami to have been a Persian, and it is chiefly in Persian hands that the doctrines of Sufism develop and turn towards pantheism. Both agnosticism and pantheism are present practically in the later neo-Platonism; agnosticism as regards the unknowable First Cause, the God from the Agent Intellect is an emanation, a doctrine which develops in the teaching of the philosophers and of the Isma`ilians and kindred sects; but Sufi teaching centres its attention upon the knowable God, which the philosopher would describe as the Agent Intellect or Logos, and this develops more usually in a pantheistic direction. The doctrines thus developed and expressed by al-Junayd were boldly preached by his pupil, ash-Shibli of Kurasan (d. 335).
Al-Husayn b. Mansur al-Hallaj (d. 309) was a fellow-student of ash-Shibli, and shows Sufism as allied with extremely unorthodox elements. He was of Zoroastrian descent and closely in touch with the Qarmatians, and seems to have held those doctrines which are usually associated with the ghulat or extreme Shi`ites, such as transmigration, incarnation, etc. He was put to death as a heretic for declaring “I am the truth”, thus identifying himself with God. The accounts given of him show great differences of opinion: for the most part the earlier historians, approaching the subject from an orthodox stand-point, represent him as a wily conjurer who by pretended miracles gained a number of adherents, but later Sufi writers regard him as a saint and martyr who suffered because he disclosed the great secret of the union between the soul and God. The doctrine of hulul, or the incarnation of God in the human body, was one of the cardinal tenets of the ghulat. According to al-Hallaj, man is essentially divine because he was created by God in his own image, and that is why, in Qur. 2, 32, God bids the angels worship Adam. In hulul, which is treated as tawhid taking place in this present life, the deity of God enters the human soul in the same way that the soul at birth enters the body. This teaching is a fusion of the old pre-Islamic Persian beliefs as to incarnation and the philosophical theories of neo-Platonism, of the Intellect or rational soul or spirit, as it is more commonly called by English writers, the part added to the animal soul is an emanation from the Agent Intellect, to which it will ultimately return and with which it will be united (cf. Massignon: Kitab al-Tawasin, Paris, 1913). This is an extremely interesting illustration of the fusion of oriental and Hellenistic elements in Sufism, and shows that the theoretical doctrines of Sufism, whatever they may have borrowed from Persia and India, receive their interpretative hypotheses from neo-Platonism. It is interesting also as shewing in the person of al-Hallaj a meeting-point between the Sufi and the philosopher of the Isma`ilian school.
Very similar was the teaching of Abu Yazid or Bayazid of Bistam (d. 260), who was also of Zoroastrian descent. The pantheistic element is very clearly defined: “God,” he said, “is an unfathomable ocean”; he himself was the throne of God, the preserved Tablet, the Pen, the Word—all images taken from the Qur´an—Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Gabriel, for all who obtain true being are absorbed into God and become one with God.
Pantheistic views and the doctrine of hulul occur frequently in Sufi teaching, but they are by no means universal. Indeed, we cannot make any accurate statement of Sufi doctrine in detail, but only of general principles and tendencies. The Sufis do not form a sect, but are simply devotees of mystical tendencies spread through all the branches of the Muslim community. In the 3rd cent. they are most prominent amongst the Shi`ites, and so Shi`ite views seem to be incorporated in Sufism, but they form no integral part of it. Precisely similar conditions occur in Christianity where mysticism has flourished in the extremer Protestant sects as well as in the contemplative orders of the Catholic Church, and, in spite of theological differences, has a very considerable amount of common material. Only it must be noted that no basis of mysticism exists unless some such relations between the human soul and God are pre-supposed, as are suggested by neo-Platonism. Christian mysticism, in the true sense, does not begin in the West until the works of the Pseudo-Dionysius were translated into Latin in the 9th cent. A.D., and Muslim mysticism dates from the translation of the Theology of Aristotle. On the other hand, it must also be noted that mysticism exercises a strong modifying influence on theology generally. The tendency of mysticism is towards a latitudinarian type: it is consequently opposed, consciously or unconsciously, to definite dogmatic teaching and so to speculative theology and philosophy.
Superficially Muslim mysticism seems to be organised like a sect. Reference is often made to the various “grades” of Sufis. But these are not official grades like those of the Isma`ilians and similar bodies, but denote successive stages on the path of personal holiness: it is no more than a fanciful terminology, perhaps borrowed from some of the sects because it seems that Sufism flourished earliest and most freely in some of the extremer Shi`ite groups. It was, and is, most usual for the beginner in the path of holiness to put himself under the direction of some experienced spiritual guide, who acts as his teacher, and is known as sheikh, murshid, or pir. In many cases this pupilage involves absolute and blind obedience to the teacher, because the renunciation of personal wishes and inclinations and all that can be described as self-will is one of the forms of abnegation required of those who seek to be weaned from earthly interests. From the grouping of devotees around some prominent teacher has arisen the foundation of darwish confraternities, sometimes as sodalities of laymen, who pursue their secular occupations and meet from time to time for religious exercises and instruction, and sometimes as permanent communities living in strict obedience under a sheikh. Traces of such monastic institutions appear in Damascus about 150 A.H., and in Khurasan some fifty years later. None of the existing orders of Islam, however, seem to be of so early a date. We hear of a sheikh Alwan (circ. 149), whose shrine is at Jedda, and who is the reputed founder of the Alwaniya community, a body now existing only as a subdivision of the Rifa`ite order. There are also orders known as the Adhamiya, Bastamiya, and Saqatiya, which trace their origin to Ibrahim b. Adham (cf. above), to Bayazid Bastami, and to Sari as-Saqati respectively, but whose real origin is uncertain.
In the 6th century we are on surer ground. There is no reason to question the claim of the Rifa`ite order to trace its foundation to Abu l-`Abbas Ahmad b. `Ali l-Hasan `Ali ibn Abi l-`Abbas Ahmad Rifa`i (d. 578), a native of the village of Umm Abida, near the junction of the Tigris and Euphrates. In his lifetime he gathered a large body of disciples, whom he incorporated in an order in 576, the members living in community under a sheikh, to whom they owed unquestioning obedience, but having also, like other orders, a number of lay adherents. Dying without issue the headship of his order passed to his brother’s family. It exists to-day in two main branches (i.) the Alwaniya, already mentioned, and (ii.) the Gibawi, who are best known from their association with the ceremony of the dawsa, at which the sheikh used to ride over the prostrate bodies of his followers. Of all the orders now flourishing in Egypt it is the one most inclined to fanatical observances at its zikr or prayer-meeting, the members cutting themselves, driving sharp skewers and knives into their bodies, swallowing snakes, etc., and in prayer allowing the name of God oft-repeated to become at last no more than a half articulate groan. They are usually distinguished by black-turbans. The Qadariya claim `Abdu l-Qadir Jilani (d. 561) as their founder. At their zikr there is none of the fire-eating, serpent-swallowing, or self-mutilation of the Rifa`ites, but only the name of God is repeated, always clearly enunciated and followed by a pause. The Badawiya were founded by Abu l-Fita Ahmad (d. 675), whose shrine is at Tanta, in Lower Egypt. The zikr is of a sober kind, the Divine name being repeated in a loud voice without cutting, fire-eating, etc. The Mawlawiya or dancing darwishes were founded by the Persian mystical poet Jalalu d-Din Rumi, the author of the poem known as the Masnawi. The Suhrwardiya trace their origin to Shihabu d-Din, a pantheistic Sufi of Baghdad, who was put to death by Saladin in 587.
In each of these orders a special course of instruction has taken a more or less conventional form, and there have been certain great teachers whose writings have come into use as manuals, and so have impressed their views upon Sufism generally. Yet the fact remains that Sufi teaching is essentially eclectic, and can be formulated only in broad principles and tendencies. Of these the following seem to be of most general application:—