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Sufism
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Sufi dervishes performing a ritual dance, Konya, Turkey.
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Sufi dervishes performing a ritual dance, Konya, Turkey.
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Also known as: Ṣūfiism, ahl al-haqiqah
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Category: History & Society
Key People:
Rūmī
al-Mahdī
al-Ḥallāj
al-Muḥāsibī
al-Ghazālī
Related Topics:
ḥāl
samāʿ
fana
maqām
tariqa
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Sufism, mystical Islamic belief and practice in which Muslims seek to find the truth of divine love and knowledge through direct personal experience of God. It consists of a variety of mystical paths that are designed to ascertain the nature of humanity and of God and to facilitate the experience of the presence of divine love and wisdom in the world. Islamic mysticism is called taṣawwuf (literally, “to dress in wool”) in Arabic, but it has been called Sufism in Western languages since the early 19th century. An abstract word, Sufism derives from the Arabic term for a mystic, ṣūfī, ...(100 of 7382 words)

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