Sufi Heirs of the Prophet
The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of the Mediating
Sufi Shaykh
Arthur
F. Buehler (Author) & Annemarie
Schimmel (Frwd)
ABOUT THE BOOK
Sufi Heirs of the Prophet explores the multifaceted development of
personal authority in Islamic societies by tracing the transformation of one
mystical sufi lineage in colonial India, the Naqshbandiyya. Arthur F. Buehler
isolates four sources of personal authority evident in the practices of the
Naqshbandiyya—lineage, spiritual traveling, status as a Prophetic exemplar, and
the transmission of religious knowledge—to demonstrate how Muslim religious
leaders have exercised charismatic leadership through their association with
the most compelling of personal Islamic symbols, the Prophet Muhammad. Buehler
clarifies the institutional structure of sufism, analyzes overlapping
configurations of personal sufi authority, and details how and why revivalist
Indian Naqshbandis abandoned spiritual practices that had sustained their
predecessors for more than five centuries. He looks specifically at the role of
Jama’at ‘Ali Shah (d. 1951) to explain current Naqshbandi practices.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Arthur F. Buehler is a senior
lecturer in the Department of Religious Studies at Victoria University of
Wellington, New Zealand. He is senior editor of the Journal of the History of Sufism.
Dy. 339pp. with 7 b/w illustrations, 2
maps & 7 figures. (hb). 2015.
ISBN 978-81-215-1283-1. Rs 1195.
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