Forms of gnosis in Sulamī's Sufi exegesis of the Fāti&art1;a

This paper will look at the Sufi interpretations of Sūrat al-fāti&art1;a found in the early mystical Qur'an commentary known as the &art2;aqā'iq al-tafsīr by the well known Sufi, Abū ^c Abd al-Ra&art1;mān al-Sulamī (d. 1021). The Sufi tafsīr of this sūra will be read not only as a compilation of early mystical interpretations of the Qur'an, but also as a unique work by Sulamī himself. A close reading of the various Sufi authors' interpretations set out by Sulamī will show how his own positions concerning the fundamental Sufi concept of ma^crifa come about.     

“I will accept whatever is meant for us. I wait for that—day and night”: The search for healing at a Muslim shrine in Pakistan

This paper describes an ethnographic perspective on the role of a Muslim shrine in Pakistan. Most shrines in Muslim countries represent the Sufi tradition in Islam where followers seek healing and fulfilment of their wishes using Sufi saints as intermediaries. In Pakistan, the shrine of Hazrat Abdullah Shah Ashabi provides a significant religious, social, physical, and psychological resource where people engage in religious rituals, community living and healing rituals to address physical, emotional, and social ailments. In addition to the explanatory models of misfortune described by the informants, gender, poverty, availability of formal health services, and social support seem to play a significant role in emphasizing the position of the Sufi shrine in a Muslim setting.     

The Advent and Schisms of Sufi Orders in Mozambique, 1896–1964

Sufi identity and rituals became widespread among local Muslims during the colonial era due to the expansion of the Shadhuliyya and the Qadiriyya orders. But the history of Sufism in Mozambique has been little explored. Portuguese colonial officials began paying closer attention to Islam in general and Sufism in particular only toward the end of the colonial period, especially in the late 1960s. This sudden interest was prompted by the independence war that took place mostly in northern Mozambique, where significant numbers of Muslims lived. The colonial Secret Service was mandated to find out how and why Muslims were involved in the independence struggle and in which ways they could be subverted. Otherwise there has been very limited research on Sufism, especially since Mozambique achieved independence. This article examines the historical context into which the orders arrived, and what prompted their significant expansion, as well as the reasons why they subsequently split up into eight autonomous branches. It is based on archival research in Mozambique and Portugal and fieldwork conducted at Mozambique Island, and in Angoche, Nampula, Pemba and Maputo cities.     

In Defence Of Weak Psychological Egoism

Weak psychological egoism is the doctrine that anything an agent does intentionally, that agent does at least expecting thereby to realize one of her self-regarding ends. (Strong psychological egoism, by contrast, is the doctrine that agents act always intending thereby to realize a self-regarding end.) Though weak psychological egoism is a doctrine ultimately answerable to empirical evidence, we presently have excellent a priori reasons for accepting it and attempting to construct psychological theories that include it as an organizing principle. These reasons have mainly to do with the idea that to understand the motivation behind an action, we need to understand the force of the consideration that motivates the agent, and the way to do this is to find a self-regarding end associated in the agent's mind with acting on that consideration.     

A Religiological Analysis of Nursi's View of Sufism Expressed in the ‘Nine Allusions’ (Telvihât-ı Tis'a) of the Risale-i Nur

While Nursi stated explicitly that he was not a Sufi, he nevertheless expressed many Sufi perspectives in his work. In particular, his focus in the section of the Risale-i Nur called ‘Nine Allusions’ (Telvihât-? Tis'a) was Sufism. This article uses a method of analysing religious perspectives called ‘religiology’, in order to coherently and systematically unpack Nursi's attitudes to Sufism. Organizing his Sufi perspectives in the categories of epistemology, ontology (including theology, cosmology, and eschatology), anthropology, psychology, teleology, and methodology, the article demonstrates that he agrees with certain aspects of Sufism and disagrees with others.     

Pilgrimage today: the meaning-making potential of ritual

Pilgrimage on the Road to Santiago is flourishing, even in late modern times characterised by detraditionalisation, individualism and pluralism. A large number of these pilgrims is either not explicitly religious at all, or only moderately religious. Why, then, do they submit to this ancient Christian ritual, and what are the psychological consequences? After a short introduction to the study of implicit religiosity and different perspectives on rituals from the past to today, current research on pilgrimage is reviewed and pilgrimage to Santiago is analysed as a personal ritual from a perspective of implicit religiosity. In the psychological theory of implicit religiosity, rituals are identified as one of three universal religious structures (along with myths and experiences of transcending) with strong meaning-making potential. Personal rituals are defined as formalised patterns of action, pointing beyond the actual event to a particular meaning imbued by the actor. Data from 85 pilgrims on the Road to Santiago are presented. Motives for peregrination, base-line sources of meaning, experienced meaningfulness and crises of meaning are reported, as well as changes in sources of meaning, meaningfulness and crises of meaning immediately after the pilgrimage and four months later. The majority of pilgrims (about two third) is motivated by a “need for clarification.” Multidimensional scaling shows that pilgrims either travel for explicitly religious reasons (conviction) or in search of clarification (quest); they either draw motivation from vertical transcendence (religiosity or spirituality) or from apparently purely secular reasons, such as athletic challenge. Religious and spiritual motives are mostly reported by highly religious individuals. A need for clarification is primarily stated by individuals who suffer from a crisis of meaning. Crises of meaning are significantly more frequent among pilgrims before the journey than in the general population. For the entire sample of pilgrims, the meaning-making potential of pilgrimage is supported by the data. Directly after the journey, as well as four months later, pilgrims experience life as significantly more meaningful, and crises of meaning are overcome. Pilgrims also report a strengthened commitment to vertical selftranscendence, horizontal selftranscendence and selfactualisation. These changes occur independently of the motivation for pilgrimage.     

The Great Mandate,Sages and Sufism: Expounding Ma Dexin and his Sino-Muslim predecessors

Abstract: Ma Dexin (1794–1874), the prestigious Sino-Muslim philosopher, bridged Sufi ideas and Neo-Confucian philosophy by his handling of the concept of the Great Mandate. For Ma, the Sufi idea of ‘the Muhammadan Reality’, namely the reality of the perfect human, could be understood through an adoption and exploration of an ontological and cosmological interpretation of the Confucian concepts ‘sage’ and ‘ming’. The paper explains how Ma departed from the Neo-Confucian conceptual framework by holding that the Non-Ultimate had more ontological significance than the Supreme Ultimate. It is proposed that Ma's difference from the Neo-Confucians on that point explains his identification of the Great Mandate with the Non-Ultimate.     

Faqir or faker?: The Pakpattan tragedy and the politics of Sufism in Pakistan

On the night of April 1, 2001, over a hundred devotees were crushed to death in a mob stampede during the annual pilgrimage at the shrine of Pakistan's most famous Sufi saint, Baba Farid ad-Din Ganj-i Shakkar. This article explores this tragedy as a case study of the politics of Sufism. In today's Pakistan, Sufism remains an emotive, multi-valent and highly contested symbol—a lightning rod in the contestation over Islamic identity, authority and authenticity. While most Pakistanis view Sufi saints as the embodiment of Islamic virtue—true faqirs (‘impoverished ones’) committed to a life of piety, self-sacrifice and public service—the detractors of the tradition dismiss them as fakers. Faqir or faker? The opposing answers to this question reveal how the Sufi tradition is argued and debated in Pakistan and throughout the modern Muslim world. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, I examine the differing responses of the state, the shrine custodians and a group of Chishti Sabiri Sufi disciples to the Pakpattan tragedy of 2001. Focusing on the response of Sufi participants, I trace how a story of personal loss and national trauma was transformed into a narrative of sacrifice and sacralisation, with Sufism framed as Islamic orthodoxy.     

Illud tempus in Greek myth and ritual

This article offers a re-examination of Eliade's classic theory of rituals as repetitions of archetypal events that once upon a time took place in illo tempore. I confront the theory with ancient Greek myths and rituals, showing that it does fit them to some extent, although it needs to be modified and further elaborated. The Greeks were acutely aware of the ambivalence of mythical time, and their rituals were not just meant to evoke it but to keep it off as well. In myth things typically go wrong, and the task of ritual is to correct them, repeating the archetypal mistake in a non-literal way that makes it possible to relate to the mythical while leaving it safely detached behind the boundaries of the civilized world. The Greek vision of primordial time does not necessarily contradict the myth-and-ritual pattern proposed by Eliade, but it is interesting in that it emphasizes certain features of primordiality downplayed by him, thus inviting us to reconsider the meaning of the whole conception. This is what I attempt in the second part of my paper, in which I set the problem of ritual repetition in a different methodological perspective, interpreting it in accordance with contemporary, structuralist approaches to the study of Greek religion.     

Sufism and Gerotranscendence: The Impact of Way of Thinking, Culture, and Aging on Spiritual Maturity

This essay examines the similarities and dissimilarities between a gerotranscendental person's and a Sufi's view of ontological questions, of self and of social and individual relationships. Using the Life History Approach followed up by thematic semi-structured interviews, I studied thirteen Iranian Sufis residing in Sweden, dividing the interviewees into two groups according to the stage of their life in which they became familiar with the Sufi ideas: those who became familiar with Sufi ideas early in their life (30 years) are called early Sufis, and those whose familiarity with Sufi ideas came about in their later life (>30) are called later Sufis. The study posits that the existence of a cosmic view of self and the surrounding world can be observed among early Sufis due to their intemalization of the Sufi ideas in early life. Regarding later Sufis, we can hypothesize that the existence of such a cosmic view is not only due to the intemalization of Sufi ideas, but also to aging.     

Explaining Differences in Philanthropic Behavior Between Christians,Muslims, and Hindus in the Netherlands

Using survey data from the Netherlands, we find that Muslims have relatively high levels of religious philanthropic behavior and relatively low levels of secular philanthropic behavior, whereas Hindus have relatively low levels of religious philanthropic behavior and higher levels of secular philanthropic behavior. Results indicate that the community explanation and the conviction explanation of the relationship between religion and philanthropic behavior are both valid to some extent when it comes to differences in philanthropic behavior between Christians, Muslims, and Hindus. In addition, we find a relationship between group orientation in worship rituals on the relation between religion and philanthropic behavior. The more group-oriented the worship rituals, the stronger the relation between religion and philanthropic behavior. The results suggest that Durkheim’s theory (La Suicide: Etude de Sociologie. Presses Universitaires de France, Paris, 1897) may only be valid in a Christian context.     

Playing with spirituality: the adoption of mulid motifs in Egyptian dance music

This study introduces a trend of Egyptian dance music called mulid that is named after festivals held in honor of the Prophet Muhammad, his family, and Muslim saints. Distinct from Islamic pop in its grassroots sound and ambiguous approach to piety, this trend draws musically and lyrically on mulids and the Sufi tradition of inshad (spiritual, ritual-focused singing) in a youthful, boisterous dance style. The range of approaches it takes in doing so is wide, from that of appreciation for the danceable musicality of inshad, to a quest to impart ‘traditional’ moral messages to youth, to playful fun-making of Sufi ritual and the mulid milieu. This study examines the content of mulid dance songs, the festive and social contexts in which they are used, and some of the cultural debates surrounding them. In doing so, it explores the ambiguous ways in which Egyptian youth culture is appropriating notions of piety in grassroots musical entertainment. It further discusses why this fusion of street-smart attitudes and spiritual-based motifs, existing as it does outside of the ‘clean’ Islamic pop current, nonetheless typically fails to incite religious sensibilities.

Investigation of the Relationship Between Anxiety Levels of Patients Before Plastic Surgery Operation and Worship Practices in Muslims

There is an increasing interest in the effects of preoperative anxiety on the course and outcomes of surgical treatments and also in the studies about the anxiety-decreasing interventions. The present study aims to identify the relationship between the preoperative anxiety level of the individuals prior to aesthetic surgery operations such as nose, ear, eyelid, and mammoplasty and religious rituals such as performing prayers, fasting, and going to pilgrimage. The frequency of performing the religious rituals was identified through a questionnaire. The questionnaire included questions about the religious rituals such as performing prayers, going to a pilgrimage, and fasting as well as questions about sociodemographic features such as gender, age, and education level of the patients. Preoperative anxiety level was measured using the “Anxiety Specific to Surgery Questionnaire.” The nonparametric Mann–Whitney U test was used for the scale score comparisons of the two independent groups. The scale score comparisons of more than two groups were performed using the Kruskal–Wallis test. The relationships between age and scale scores were analyzed using the Spearman’s correlation coefficient. The study involved 117 patients who were planned to undergo an aesthetic surgery operation. The scale scores were significantly different according to the pilgrimage groups (p = 0.004). The scale scores were significantly different according to the level of fasting (p = 0.022). No significant differences were found between the scales scores of the groups who reported the frequency of performing prayer as never, sometimes or five times (p = 0.515). In conclusion, the present study found that Muslim people who performed religious rituals more often experienced less preoperative anxiety levels in plastic surgeries, which indicates that the belief level is an effective factor in preoperative anxiety levels. The findings of the present study indicate that patients’ beliefs and worship practices should be taken into consideration by doctors, operating room personnel, and even all health workers in order to decrease the anxiety levels of patients who will undergo surgery.

     

Withdraw or affiliate? The role of humiliation during initiation rituals

Initiation rituals can take different forms and empirical evidence is inconsistent as to whether these rituals promote affiliation among novices. We argue that experienced humiliation during initiations leads to less affiliation among novices, in particular when one is initiated as sole group member rather than as part of the group. We examined this hypothesis in three studies, using different paradigms. In Study 1 (N = 123), perceived severity of an initiation in the past was associated with lower affiliation with other novices; this relationship was mediated by experienced humiliation. Study 2 (N = 64) showed that public derogation in the lab led to more humiliation when participants were the only victim than when they were derogated as a group. Study 3 (N = 248), a vignette study, showed that a similar effect of social context was mediated by expected support from other novices. We conclude that severe initiations may, due to experienced humiliation, result in less rather than more affiliation with fellow novices.     

Crafting Sacrality from the tensile life of objects: learning about the material life of prayer beads from a Khaksari Sufi <Emphasis Type="Italic">Murshid</Emphasis>

Sufi mystical experiences and practices are populated with objects. Objects exist among masters as well as disciples and followers regardless of the meanings and significations that practices impose on them. The life of these objects begins before they are enacted into sociocultural and religious relationships, as they are crafted or traded before they take on the overwhelming semiosis ascribed to them by religious-cultural codes or social networks. This article presents an apprenticeship ethnographic journey in which I follow an Iranian Sufi master and, along with him, the tensile life of Sufi prayer beads, or tasbihs. I address prayer beads as an object prior to their gaining of any religious meaning in the networks of everyday life. Tracing the material life of prayer beads reveals how the “objectness” of the rosary preexists the material practices that give it meaning in the Sufi order. Through the approach of speculative realism I examine what it means to study a religious-object-in-itself. I follow the religiously loaded object and its spiritual emergence by way of object-oriented ontology to forgo the meanings and relationships that shadow the objects.     

Family rituals: Functions and significance for clergy and psychotherapists

Family rituals express patterned, repeated, symbolic communication that is ordered, evocative, socially meaningful, and directly impacts upon family functioning. Seasonal celebrations, rites of passage, family traditions, and patterned family interactions serve to organize the family, mediate individual expectations, regulate family subsystems, and facilitate change. Clergy and psychotherapists can use an understanding of family rituals to better understand individuals in their family context, promote change through prescribing rituals, and help clients create new, healing rituals.     

Obsessional-compulsive checking: Experimental replication and development

The purpose of this experiment was to resolve some inconclusive findings from an earlier study on the effects of compulsive checking rituals. Twelve obsessional-compulsive checkers carried out a provoking act followed by their compulsive checking ritual, in natural situations, under two conditions—E present and E absent. The provoking act produced subjective discomfort, tension, worry and anxiety; these feelings were reduced after completion of the checking ritual. Both the increases and post-ritual decreases in discomfort were more pronounced in the spontaneous occurrence condition (E absent). The results are consistent with the hypothesis that compulsive rituals serve to reduce discomfort.     

Social Customs and Demographic Change: The Case of Godparenthood in Catholic Europe

This article analyzes social norms regulating the selection of godparents in Italy and France. Based on Vatican statistics and European Values Study responses, the vast majority of children in Catholic Europe are baptized and birth rituals are considered important even by nonbelievers. Moreover, the dominant custom of selecting godparents from among kinsmen is a recent development, based on historical data. A new survey about the selection of godparents in Italy and France, conducted for this study, shows that godparents are chosen not for religious, but for social‐relational reasons. Selection of kinsmen is the norm, with uncles and aunts being the majority choice. For Italy, choice determinants are explored by means of multinomial regressions. The results are contrasted with demographic change to show that in lowest‐low fertility countries current godparenthood models are bound to disappear.