(i.) God alone exists; God is the only reality, all else is illusive. This is the Sufi rendering of the doctrine of the unity of God. Strictly speaking “God” here signifies the Agent Intellect, that is to say, the revelation of God who in Himself is unknowable, but the Sufi does not make this philosophical distinction clear, or else deliberately regards the revelation of God as God. But in man there is a rational soul, which is to God as a mirrored image is to the object which it reflects, and is capable of approaching the Divine reality. As other than God is merely illusive it is obvious that a knowledge of God the Reality cannot be attained by the medium of created things, and thus the Sufis were led, like the neo-Platonists, to attach greater value to immediate intuition by the rational soul than to the use of arguments, and so to place direct revelation above what is ordinarily described as reason. This is a line of development common to all forms of mysticism, and results in a preference for ecstasy or similar spiritual experience above the record of past revelation as given in the Qur´an. The doctrine of ecstasy (hal or maqama) was first formulated by Dhu n-Nun, and implies fana or “passing away,” i.e., insensibility to the things of this world, and finally baqa or “continuance” in God. Usually this experience is accompanied by loss of sensation, though this is not always the case, and there are many legends of Sufi saints which represent them as totally unconscious of violence of wounds; and this is not confined to legend, for most extraordinary sufferings are endured, apparently with perfect placidity, by darwishes at the present day, perhaps in accordance with psychological laws which are imperfectly understood, and this is the underlying idea in the exercises undergone by the Rifa`i darwishes and others. The exercise known as zikr (dhikr) or “remembering,” in accordance with the command in Qur. 33, 41, “remember God often,” is an attempt to make an advance towards the ecstatic state. It was perhaps under Sufi influence that we find philosophy inclining to prefer knowledge obtained by immediate intuition; it was certainly under such influence that ecstasy is treated as a means of obtaining such direct apprehension of truth in the later philosophers.
(ii.) The Sufi doctrine of God as the only reality has a direct bearing not only on creation but also on the problem of good and evil. As a thing can only be known by its opposite, light by darkness, health by sickness, being by non-being, so God could only be made known to man as reality contrasted with non-reality, and the mingling of these two opposites produces the world of phenomena in which light is made known by a background of darkness, which darkness is itself only the absence of light: or, as being proceeds by successive emanations from the First Cause, and becomes weaker or less real in each emanation as it recedes further from the great Reality, it incidentally becomes more perceptible as it becomes less real. Thus evil, which is merely the negation of the moral beauty of the Reality, appears in the latest emanation as the unreal background which is the inevitable result of a projection of the emanation from the First Cause, who is entirely good, into a world of phenomena. Evil is therefore not real, it is merely the result, the inevitable result, of the mingling of reality with unreality. In fact, this is implied in the doctrine that all other than God is unreal.
(iii.) The aim of the soul is union with God. This doctrine of tawhid, as we have seen, received early expression in Muslim mystic theology. Dr. Nicholson is of opinion that “the Sufi conception of the passing away (fana) of individual self in universal being is certainly of Indian origin. Its first great exponent was the Persian mystic Bāyazīd of Bistām, who may have received it of his teacher, Abū `Alī of Sind (Scinde.)” (Nicholson: Mystics of Islam, p. 17.) But this is only one particular way of presenting a doctrine which has a much wider range and is present in all mystical teaching, including that of the neo-Platonists. In the highest sense it is the basis of Sufi ethics, for the summum bonum is defined as the union of the individual soul with God, and all is good which helps towards this, all is evil which retards it, and this is true of Christian and all other forms of mysticism equally. We cannot say definitely that the doctrine of the unitive state is borrowed from neo-Platonism, from Buddhism, or from Gnosticism; it is the common property of all, and is the natural conclusion from the mystics premises as to the nature of God and of the human soul. It may well be that certain presentations of this doctrine show Indian details, but in this as in all other parts of Sufi speculation it seems that the constructive theory employed in forming a theological system was neo-Platonic: even in mysticism the Greek mind exercised its influence in analysing and constructing hypotheses.
At quite an early age the soul’s desire for union with its Divine source began to be clothed in terms borrowed from the expression of human love. With some hesitation we may say, perhaps, that this is distinctly oriental, although it was so only as a means of expressing a desire which is characteristic of all mysticism. We find the same, at a later period, though in a much more restrained fashion, in Christian mysticism, and it is not easy to see the actual line of contact, if any. Perhaps we must be content to regard it as independently developed as a means of expressing the soul’s longing.
The rise of Sufi teaching was not without opposition, and this was mainly on three grounds (i.) the Sufis advocated constant prayer in the form of unceasing silent intercourse with God, and by this tended to discard the fixed salawat or five obligatory prayers at appointed hours, one of the compulsory duties of Islam and one of its distinctive marks. Ultimately the Sufi position was that these fixed ritual observances were for the people at large who had not made any advance in the deeper spiritual knowledge, but might be disregarded by those who were more mature in grace, a position which is closely parallel to that attained by the philosophers. (ii.) They introduced zikirs or religious exercises, consisting in a continuous repetition of the name of God, a form of devotion unknown to older Islam, and consequently an innovation. And (iii.) many of them adopted the practice of tawakkul, or complete dependence on God, neglecting all kinds of labour or trade, refusing medical aid in sickness, and living on alms begged from the faithful. All these were “innovations,” and as such met with very definite opposition, mostly, no doubt, because they were repugnant to the sober tone of traditional Islam, which has always been suspicious of oriental fanaticism. The more serious objection, that it really dispensed with the religion of the Qur´an is implied if not expressed; it introduced an entirely new concept of God and a new standard of religious values; if Sufi ideas prevailed the practices of the Muslim religion would be at best the tolerable and harmless usages of those who were not initiated into vital religion. In fact, however, the philosophical principles brought forward by the neo-Platonic Aristotelian works in general circulation were so far influential and regarded as reconcileable with the Qur´an that Sufism, in so far as it was neo-Platonic, did not appear to be destructive of Islam, but only at variance with customary usage.
Nevertheless, Sufism was generally looked upon as heretical, not only from the “innovations” we have mentioned, but because of the close alliance between the doctrines of its extremer advocates and those of the more advanced Shi`ites. It is indeed most significant that it developed chiefly amongst the same elements which gave the readiest hearing to philosophy and still adhered to Zoroastrian and Masdekite ideas. No doubt the ill repute of Sufism was largely due to the bad company it kept. It was not until the time of al-Ghazali (d. 505) that Sufism began to take its place in orthodox Islam. Al-Ghazali, left an orphan at an early age, had been educated by a Sufi friend, and, after becoming an Ash`arite and as such acting as president of the Nazimite academy at Baghdad, found himself in spiritual difficulties, and spent eleven years in retirement and in the practices of devotion, with the result that when he returned to work as a teacher in 449 his instruction was strongly leavened by mysticism, practically a return to the principles he had been taught in his early years. As al-Ghazali became in course of time the dominant influence in Muslim scholasticism, a modified and orthodox Sufism was introduced into Sunni theology and has since held its own. At the same time he reduced Sufism to a scientific form, and gave, or rather supported, a terminology derived from Plotinus. Such a Sufism may be described as Muslim mystic theology purged of its Shi`ite accretions. This admission of a modified Sufism into the orthodox church of Islam took place in the sixth century A.H.
In the following century Sufism appeared in Spain, but there it arrived as transmitted through an orthodox medium, and hence differs from Asiatic mysticism. The first Spanish Sufi seems to have been Muhyi d-Din ibn `Arabi (d. 638), who travelled in Asia and died at Damascus. He was a follower of Ibn Hazm, who, as we shall see later, represents a system of jurisprudence of a type more reactionary even than that of Ibn Hanbal. In Spain itself the leading Sufi was `Abdu l-Haqq ibn Sab`in (d. 667), who shows the more characteristic Spanish attitude of a Sufi who was also a philosopher, for Spanish Sufism was essentially speculative. Like many other philosophers of the Muwahhid period he adhered outwardly to the Zahirites, the most reactionary party of the narrowest orthodoxy.
In the 7th century, also, we have Jalalu d-Din Rumi (d. 672), who practically completes the golden age of Sufism. Although a Persian he was an orthodox Sunni. He was a native of Balkh, but his father was compelled to leave that city and migrate westward, and finally settled at Qonya (Iconium), where he died. Jalalu d-Din had been educated by his father, and after his death he sought further instruction at Aleppo and Damascus, where he came under the influence of Burhanu d-Din of Tirmidh, who had been one of his father’s pupils, and continued his training in Sufi doctrines. After this teacher’s death he came in touch with the eccentric but saintly Shams-i-Tabriz, a man of great spiritual power but illiterate, who left a great impress on his age by his tremendous spiritual enthusiasm and the strange crudity of his conduct and character. It was after the death of Shams-i-Tabriz that Jalalu d-Din commenced his great mystical poem, the Masnawi, a work which has attained an extraordinary eminence and reverence throughout the whole of Turkish Islam. As already mentioned, Jalalu d-Din founded an order of Darwishes known as the Mawlawi order, or “dancing darwishes,” as they are called by Europeans.
The whole course of doctrinal Sufism begins with Dhu n-Nun and ends with Jalalu d-Din; later writers do little more than repeat their teaching in new literary form, and it will be sufficient to select a few typical examples. In the 8th cent. we have `Abdu r-Razzaq (d. 730), a pantheistic Sufi who wrote a commentary on and defended the teaching of Muhiyyu d-Din ibnu l-`Arabi. He advocated the doctrine of free will on the ground that the human soul is an emanation from God, and so shares the Divine character. This world, he holds, is the best possible world: differences in condition exist and justice consists in accepting these and adapting things to their situation; ultimately all things will cease to exist as they are reabsorbed in God, the only reality. Men are divided into three classes: the first contains the men of the world, whose life centres in self and who are indifferent towards religion; a second class contains the men of the reason, who discern God intellectually by his external attributes and manifestations; and as a third class are the men of the spirit, who perceive God intuitively.
Although Sufism has now taken a recognised place in the life of Islam, it was not allowed to pass without occasional challenge. The leading opponent was the Hanbalite reformer, Ibn Taymiya (d. 728), who represented the reactionary but popular theology. He rejected formal adherence to any school, dismissed all importance attached to Ijma or “consensus” save that based on the agreement of the Prophet’s Companions; he denounced the scholastic theology of al-Ash`ari and al-Ghazali, and defined the Divine attributes on the lines laid down by Ibn Hazm. At that time the Sufi an-Nasr al-Manbiji was prominent in Cairo, and to him Ibn Taymiya wrote a letter denouncing the Sufi doctrine of ittihad as heresy. From this arose a quarrel between the two rival forces of Islam, traditional orthodoxy and mysticism, in the course of which Ibn Taymiya suffered persecution and imprisonment. Towards the end of his life, in 726, he issued a fatwa or declaration of opinion against the lawfulness of the reverence paid to the tombs of saints and of the invocation of saints, the Prophet himself included. In this he was the precursor of the Wahibi reformation of the 18th cent. A.D. MSS. exist in which the works of Ibn Taymiya are copied out by the hand of `Abdu l-Wahhab, who was evidently a close student of that reformer, all of whose theories he reproduces.