Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light
Author: Sachiko Murata
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 282
Release: 2000-08-03
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780791446379

The first study in English of Islamic thought in China, this book shows that this tradition was informed by both Sufism and Neo-Confucianism; translations of two classic works are included.

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light
Author: Sachiko Murata
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2000-08-03
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780791446386

The first study in English of Islamic thought in China, this book shows that this tradition was informed by both Sufism and Neo-Confucianism; translations of two classic works are included.

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light
Author: Sachiko Murata
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2000-08-03
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780791446386

The first study in English of Islamic thought in China, this book shows that this tradition was informed by both Sufism and Neo-Confucianism; translations of two classic works are included.

The First Islamic Classic in Chinese

The First Islamic Classic in Chinese
Author: Sachiko Murata
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2017-03-27
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 1438465076

A translation of Wang Daiyu’s Real Commentary on the True Teaching, the first and most influential work written in the Chinese language on Islam. Published in 1642, Wang Daiyu’s Real Commentary on the True Teaching was the first significant presentation of Islam in the Chinese language by a Muslim scholar. It set the standard for the expression of Islamic theology, Sufism, and ethics in Chinese, and became the literary foundation of a school of thought that has been called “Muslim Confucianism.” In contrast to Muslim scholars writing in every other language, Wang avoided Arabic words, opting instead to reconfigure the religion in terms of Chinese concepts and categories. Employing the terminology of Neo-Confucian philosophy, his overview of Islam is thus both congenial to the mainstream Islamic tradition and reaffirms Confucian teachings about the human duty to establish harmony between heaven and earth. This book will appeal to those curious about the manner in which Islam has flourished in China over the past thousand years, as well as those interested in dialogue among religions and the significance of religious diversity.

To Rebuild the Empire

To Rebuild the Empire
Author: Josephine Chiu-Duke
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2000-03-02
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0791492869

To Rebuild the Empire provides the first complete critical study in any language of Lu Chih (Lu Hsuan-kung, 754-805), one of traditional China's most important prime ministers and a pivitol figure in T'ang dynasty China's struggle for survival toward the end of the eighth century. The work also provides an intellectual history of an era, beginning about the middle of the T'ang Dynasty (618-907), that was influential in the revival and transformation of Confucianism. Josephine Chiu-Duke reconstructs and examines both Lu Chih's intellectual commitments, as shown in his efforts to rebuild the T'ang empire, and his significance for the Confucian tradition. This book is important for its assertion of the need to look at the political dimension of the mid-T'ang Confucian revival; its presentation of a more subtle and nuanced understanding of the reconciliation of Confucian commitments and practical considerations; and its discriminating employment of more accurate concepts that help move the field of T'ang intellectual history beyond the usual moralist/pragmatist dichotomy. The work represents a welcome advance over the existing literature in any language.

The Throne Carrier of God

The Throne Carrier of God
Author: Jamal J. Elias
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 1995-01-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780791426111

This book constitutes a comprehensive investigation of the life and teachings of one of the most famous Sufis of the Iranian world. Simnānī spent his early life as a courtier at the Ilkhanid Mongol court and was a cherished companion of the emperor Arghun. After a mystical experience on the battlefield, he turned his back on a life of luxury and became a Sufi. He advanced rapidly in his spiritual quest and soon became one of the most influential Sufi masters in Iran. Working primarily from the most Arabic and Persian manuscripts of Simnānī’s writings, the author has analyzed Simnānī's thinking to show the overall coherence of his world-view and to demonstrate the importance of his ideas to the development of Islamic mysticism. Along with this analysis, the author provides a detailed account of Simnānī's life and times, as well as a systematic description of Simnānī's instructions for Sufi practioners of all levels.

The Butterfly as Companion

The Butterfly as Companion
Author: Kuang-ming Wu
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 532
Release: 1990-01-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780887066856

Thorough, serious, yet fun to read, this is a translation of the text and an exposition of the philosophy of Chuang Tzu the Taoist of ancient China.

Intuitive Instructional Speech in Sufism

Intuitive Instructional Speech in Sufism
Author: Martin A. M. Gansinger
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2022-08-17
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1527585719

The Sufi tradition remains one of the most mysterious and least understood systems of self-realization. This book demystifies the practice of the sohbet—an ad hoc discourse—as the central instructional tool in the globally influential Naqshbandi-Haqqani Order. It approaches the practice using categories of improvised music to establish a framework for analyzation. Its ritualized formal structure, illustrated via selected talks of Shaykh Nazim Adil al-Haqqani, discloses the underlying—and assumingly primary—function to provoke prolonged states of raised awareness in listeners and condition their sympathetic nervous system. In an extensive discussion based on several years of field research in Cyprus, the book relates this intention to similar practices in other traditional knowledge systems by proposing psychophysical interpretations based on psychology, biochemistry, neuroscience, or quantum physics. It will appeal to scholars and students of Sufism, Islamic studies, and comparative religion, as well as those interested in performance studies and improvised music, interpersonal communication, and education.

Insights into Sufism

Insights into Sufism
Author: Ruth J. Nicholls
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 220
Release: 2020-07-31
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1527557480

Sufism has long constituted one of the most powerful drawcards to people embracing Islam. This book considers a broad range of questions relating to Sufism, including its history, manifestations in various countries and communities, its expression in poetry, women and Sufism, and expressions among popular spirituality. In addition, the volume challenges the long-held view of Sufism as being necessarily peaceful, through a consideration in one paper of Sufis engaging in violent Jihad. The book works at the interface between the scholarly and the practical, using rigorous methodology to ensure that its findings are reliable, while also giving attention to how Sufi thinking impacts the daily lives of Sufis. This represents an original and important dimension of this study, given the significant role played by Sufis throughout Islamic history in enriching discussion of intellectual and charismatic questions, as well as informing popular practice among “Folk” Muslims.

Philosophical Sufism

Philosophical Sufism
Author: Mukhtar H. Ali
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2021-07-29
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1000418294

Analyzing the intersection between Sufism and philosophy, this volume is a sweeping examination of the mystical philosophy of Muḥyī-l-Dīn Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 637/1240), one of the most influential and original thinkers of the Islamic world. This book systematically covers Ibn al-ʿArabī’s ontology, theology, epistemology, teleology, spiritual anthropology and eschatology. While philosophy uses deductive reasoning to discover the fundamental nature of existence and Sufism relies on spiritual experience, it was not until the school of Ibn al-ʿArabī that philosophy and Sufism converged into a single framework by elaborating spiritual doctrines in precise philosophical language. Contextualizing the historical development of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s school, the work draws from the earliest commentators of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s oeuvre, Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qūnawī (d. 673/1274), ʿAbd al-Razzāq al-Kāshānī (d. ca. 730/1330) and Dawūd al-Qayṣarī (d. 751/1350), but also draws from the medieval heirs of his doctrines Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī (d. 787/1385), the pivotal intellectual and mystical figure of Persia who recast philosophical Sufism within the framework of Twelver Shīʿism and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 898/1492), the key figure in the dissemination of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s ideas in the Persianate world as well as the Ottoman Empire, India, China and East Asia via Central Asia. Lucidly written and comprehensive in scope, with careful treatments of the key authors, Philosophical Sufism is a highly accessible introductory text for students and researchers interested in Islam, philosophy, religion and the Middle East.