Global Sufism Essay — Beda Eastman

Blog / Writing Archive

Email:
bedaeastman@gmail.com

April 2025

As a product of globalisation, Sufism’s place within the religion of Islam has shifted – both in the East and West. This essay critically reflects on the opposing views on Sufism held by fundamentalist Muslim scholars vs in the Western spiritual field, both of which separate Sufism from its historical place in mainstream Islam.

Sufism is commonly defined as a branch of Islam which focuses on mysticism, asceticism, and inward spiritual purification. It has existed as an organised practice since the formative years of Islam, and has played a central role in Islamic theology, cultures, and communities ever since. In the last century, however, a rift has formed between Sufism and mainstream Islam as the religion adapts to a globalised world; in Asia, Islamic governments and religious revivalist groups have condemned Sufism as something corrupted by outside traditions and deviant from the ‘pure’ form of Islam. Meanwhile, Sufism has become increasingly popular in the West, sometimes altogether separate from its Islamic roots – seen as a meditative spiritual practice, much as aspects of Buddhism and Hinduism have, for example, been adopted in the rise of new age spirituality. Both of these perspectives remove Islam from Sufism – whether to dismiss it or to co-opt it – which ultimately misrepresents the vital role Sufism has played in the manifestation of Islam throughout its history.

To understand the importance of Sufism in Islamic history, one must understand how ingrained it was in scholarship and in practice. The general consensus around the origins of Sufism – or Tasawwuf as it is known in Arabic – is that ascetic Islamic groups began to emerge during the late seventh century as a reaction to the Umayyad Caliphate’s emphasis on worldly power and gain (Anjum 2003, p. 233), though Sufi practitioners trace their teachings back to the Companions of the Prophet (Dickson, 2022). The context of Sufism’s conception indicates that from the very beginning it acted in response to political and social climates. At this time, its form was of small groups that focused on “mystical philosophy” (Elias 1998, p. 595) and ascetic living; later, between the 8th and 12th centuries, formal modes of Sufi scholarship and famous Sufi thinkers emerged, eventually forming into Orders or tariqas with structured theologies, teachings, and chains of leadership (Sedgwick 2018). According to Wormser (2015, p. 110) “most Muslims were Sufis in one way or another” from the 11th century up until the 1800s. Most influential Islamic scholars whose writings continue to be revered and studied today, were involved with Sufi tariqas during their lifetimes. For example, the founding scholars of the four madhabs – schools of thought – that give structure to Sunni Islam, each spoke of the necessity of Sufism in Islamic practice.
(The following statements are widely attributed to the four Imams and cited in many Sufi forums, but the primary sources are not available in English, so may be treated with caution.) Imam Malik (711 - 795AD) who founded the Maliki madhab, followed by almost a quarter of Muslims today, is quoted as saying “He who practices Tasawwuf (Sufism) without learning Sacred Law (Fiqh) corrupts his faith, while he who learns Sacred Law (Fiqh) without practicing Tasawwuf corrupts himself. Only he who combines the two proves true (‘Ali al-Adawi, vol. 2, p. 195)” (Rami 2015). Imam Hanifa – whose Hanafi madhab is the largest, adhered to by roughly 35% of Muslims – and Imam Shafi’i – Shafi'i school, 15% of Muslims – both made claims about spending years with Sufis, and having “benefited” from doing so (Rami 2015). Imam Shafi’i is even attributed to have said that “If a person did not exercise Sufism at the beginning of the day, he would not reach [noon] except as an idiot (Abu Nu’aym, [following a chain of narration])” (Rami 2015). Imam Hanbal, founder of the Hanbali school, described Sufis as a “fountain of knowledge” with the “most spiritual power” (Rami 2015).
Essentially, an understanding that Sufism must go hand-in-hand with Islamic jurisprudence was embedded in the beliefs of the most influential scholars. Their teachings have shaped normative Islam since the 8th century; and yet, contemporary discussions of these great Imams exclude Sufism from their vocabulary.

Sufism has long played a central role socially and politically as well as in Islamic scholarship. Traditionally, Sufi sheikhs were held in high regard in Muslim communities, and were granted positions of authority (Sedgwick 2018). The counsel of these sheikhs was sought after, and some were placed as “religious advisors” to rulers and sultans (Elias 1998, p. 603). Sufism also helped not just to spread Islam throughout Asia, but to maintain Islam’s survival against colonial attacks. It was a major contributor to the spread of Islam in Asia and Africa (Elias 1998); the appeal of Sufism’s openness to diversity, its celebration of art and music, and focus on personal, inward mysticism assisted peaceful conversions to Islam far more than proselytising or force did (Wormser 2015). However, Sufism is not inherently pacifist: Islam grants people the right to defend themselves in the face of injustice (Qur’an 22:39) and this is reflected in the historical roles partaken by Sufi leaders in Southeast Asia. Aljunied (2024) writes that Sufis were pivotal in the "resistance against the encroachment of European powers in Muslim lands,” and characterises the presence of mystics in the fight against colonial efforts as “Sufi warriorism.” Some Sufis learned a Malay martial art called silat, and even used guns (Aljunied 2024). A specific example is that of the Dutch occupation of Indonesia from the 17th to the 20th centuries. Up until the 1900s Indonesia’s Islamic population was “predominantly Sufi” (Howell 2001, p. 703) and many Sufi tariqas actively participated in “mobilising the masses” physically against Dutch colonisers, such as the Naqshbandi Order in the 1800s during the Padri wars (Hidayat & Savitri 2024, p. 586). Sufis also worked to strengthen the presence of Islam through teaching, which the Qadiri Order were “instrumental” in doing, to oppose Dutch governmental policies (Hidayat & Savitri 2024, p. 588). Throughout this period of occupation, the number of followers of these Sufi tariqas rose significantly, evidencing how Sufism and the activism of the tariqas provided “spiritual guidance and purpose” during the oppressive reign of colonial foreign powers (Hidayat & Savitri 2024, p. 586). Sufism would have represented not only a faith practice but a source of motivation and resilience; a striving to maintain indigenous identity and autonomy, and thus, Sufism becomes equated with championing morality.

So – what changed? Despite the clear evidence of an extensive record of honouring of and adherence to Sufism by Muslims for a thousand years, today the popular theological narrative is one that condemns mystical practice. A “hostility” towards Sufism has emerged in the 20th century (Spannaus 2021, p. 161) due to weighty political factors that have swayed the Islamic environment at large. The beginning of this shift goes back to the reformist scholar Muhammad ibn Abd Al-Wahhab (1703 - 1792AD), born in Najd – now part of Saudi Arabia – who espoused a strict interpretation of Islam which “attack[ed] a number of widespread practices he considered immoral and perversions of true religion,” including Sufism (Spannaus 2021, p. 151). Abd Al-Wahhab did not allow for diversity of opinion in the religion, reviling any sect that differed from his own. His ideas were deemed controversial and he was “expelled” from his village; nevertheless, he had built a following and was welcomed into a nearby community by none other than Muhammad ibn Saud, the man who would establish the first Saudi state (Spannaus 2021). Abd Al-Wahhab and ibn Saud formed an alliance: in return for his support of Saud’s political leadership, ibn Saud would give Abd Al-Wahhab a “position of religious authority” with which he could spread and implement his extremist version of Islam (Spannaus 2021, p. 151). Thus, throughout the Saudi rule of Arabia, “military and economic resources” have been used to spread Wahhabism, which has also benefited the expansion of the Sauds’ political strength (Spannaus 2021, p. 152), as they could use it to “legitimise and reinforce” their “kingdom” (Valentine 2015, p. 66). As Valentine (2015, p. 30) aptly puts it, Abd Al-Wahhab is “a man who would have a considerable effect on the modern development of Islam.” As the Saudi state solidified, particularly after its unification in 1932, funding of Wahhab’s restrictive, exclusive theology inculcated in the Muslim psyche a strong suspicion of Sufism.

The manifestation of Wahhabism is clear; in many Islamic countries, teaching of Wahhabi doctrine has been directly funded in schools, mosques, and universities, as well as in the media. Saudi Arabia has financed the construction of these institutions and sent clerics to Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Malaysia etc. and has even sent funds to the Taliban in Afghanistan (Valentine 2015). The Wahhabi form of Islam also enforces suppressive rules about women, art, and ethnicity; “Saudi school children are taught not only the supremacy of Wahhabism but the supremacy of the Arab peoples” (Valentine 2015, p. 281). Through these means, young 21st century Muslims have grown up with a curated view of Sufism – that it is something opposing, and indeed threatening, to the sanctity of the ‘pure’ form of Islam as defined by the Saudi state. Sufism went from being “ubiquitous” and “indivisible” from Islam to being seen as a sort of “low Islam”; a superstitious deviation influenced by “folk” beliefs (Zerrabih-Zadeh 2024, p. 1). In Saudi Arabia and consequently many other countries, Sufis are actively persecuted and their practices are banned. For example, sites deemed holy by Sufis have been destroyed, such as the demolition of tombs of important Islamic figures, like that of the wife of the Prophet Muhammad, Khadija, and many other Companions (Osser 2015) (Spannaus 2021, p. 156). Saudi law states that anyone who venerates tombs or publicly carries Sufi literature and does not repent, commits apostasy and thus may be punished by death (Valentine 2015). Sufi Orders around the world have been compelled to go underground, from the Qadiri Order in Nigeria (Valentine 2015, p. 251), to Sufi sheikhs in Bangladesh who face assassination (Laleh-Naz 2023). Notably, this shows that Sufism still exists in the Muslim world, in spite of the repression its practitioners face. Whether subdued or in secret, many tariqas maintain the support of devoted students of Tasawwuf, who hold onto the newly controversial belief that Sufism is an integral tenet of Islam.

Sufism in the West, however, has been painted in an entirely different light. Around the time when stigma of Sufism grew strong in the East, its popularity gained in the West: at the beginning of the 20th century, there was an emergence of “spiritual teachers” in the “Euro-American sphere” who were influenced by “Eastern mysticism” and “Oriental esotericism” (Zerrabih-Zadeh 2024, p. 2). Converts and Sufi migrants in the early to mid 1900s pioneered the adaptation of Sufi Orders to the Western world as a “meditative practice shared by all religions” (Zerrabih-Zadeh 2024, p. 2). These Orders formed a version of Sufism that was considered separate from Islam, at a time where Islam was disparaged by the West. Dickson (2022, p. 11) describes this detachment as perceiving Sufism as a “foreign mystical flower” while Islam is the “legalistic Islamic desert.” This, of course, is an Orientalist perspective of Eastern religion; a romanticisation of Sufism which simultaneously mischaracterises Islam by removing its spiritual component. These Sufi Orders of the West, described as “quasi-Muslim” or “non-Muslim,” were a “contextualisation” of Sufism into Western culture (Küçük 2008, p. 296); taking Sufism’s love of music and poetry but leaving behind the structure of the organised religion it came from.
A famous example of this is that of the Persian Sufi poet Rumi (1207 - 1273AD), who is one of the most well-known and celebrated Muslim writers around the world. He was also a jurist and scholar of Islam, and his poems express a deep, spiritual love for God as He is known in the Islamic faith. In recent decades, his work has become hugely popular in the West, but translations tend to “impose one’s own cultural and religious values,” with a “disregard” for the “integrity” of the poems (Paracha 2024, p. 61-62). Where Rumi’s original works explicitly mention Islamic concepts of God, the Prophet Muhammad, or the Qur’an, English translations have chosen vaguer words, making Rumi more “palatable” to the Western audience (Paracha 2024, p 63). Paracha (2024, p. 64) argues that this is a “disfigurement” of his work that also functions to “commercialise” it; it certainly does a disservice to the true endeavours and passions of Rumi’s life. This act of “literary colonisation” (Paracha 2024, p. 62) is symbolic of the wider appropriation of Sufism that reflects the West’s refusal to understand or appreciate Islam – even the parts it chooses to claim.

Just as there remain Sufi tariqas in Muslim countries which persevere despite the implementation of Wahhabi intolerance, there are also tariqas in the West that adhere to Islam, finding the traditional coexistence of Islamic jurisprudence and Sufi mysticism. What Dickson (2022, p. 14) defines as “juristic Sufism” – the “conception of Sufism and shari’a” together – does have a place in the contemporary world. Some tariqas, such as the Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Order, have a stronger emphasis on observing Islamic law than others. Michael E. Asbury (2022) studies this Order’s influence in Western countries: in the 1970s, the Indian sheikh Azad Rasool (1920 - 2006AD) of the Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Order established a School of Sufi Teaching through which he aimed to spread his teachings to the West. He was vastly successful as his school now has groups “on every inhabited continent” with members of both Muslim and non-Muslim backgrounds (Asbury 2022, p. 107). Since Rasool’s Order identifies itself as Islamic and teaches a form of Sufism that functions within the tenets of Islam, and has spread on such a large global scale, it combats the ‘quasi-Muslim’ Orders with a “re-orthodoxisation of Sufism in the West” (Asbury 2022, p. 108). Ultimately, the way that Sufism has expanded in the modern world is not uniform; as a practice, it has adapted and responded to different social and political contexts, but always surviving and maintaining its position as a characteristic of Islamic tradition.

Islam was never meant to be homogenous; there is a verse in the Qur’an that states “We made you in peoples and tribes so that you may get to know one another” (49:13). The way that the religion has diversified is aligned with this verse which encourages companionship across nations and communities. The attempt by Wahhabism to limit Islamic scholarship and expression to one particular mode – to control the spiritual practice of nearly two billion Muslims worldwide – is not only impossible, but also antithetical to the history and message of Islam. It is a reaction against the effects of globalisation; but from its inception the religion had a range of schools of thought, of Sufi Orders, all coexisting regardless of their differences. The way that Sufism has sustained itself, both in the East and West, in the face of different but equally lobotomising affronts, is evidence to the fact that mysticism has and always will exist in Islam. Neither fundamentalism nor Orientalist pursuits have succeeded in disconnecting Sufism from the role it has played since it augmented the theosophies of the great Imams, and since it spurred the resistance in Indonesia. Sufism cannot truly exist without Islam; nor can Islam in its entirety exist without Sufism.

Reference List

Aljunied, K. (2024). Sufi Warriorism in Muslim Southeast Asia. Sociology Lens, 37(4), 502–516. https://doi.org/10.1111/johs.12474

Anjum, T. (2006). Sufism in History and its Relationship with Power. Islamic Studies, 45(2), 221–268.

Asbury, M. E. (2022). Naqshbandi Mujaddidi Mysticism in the West: The Case of Azad Rasool and His Heirs. In Sufism in the Modern World (pp. 104–133). MDPI Journals.

Dickson, W. R. (2022). Sufism and Shari‘a: Contextualizing Contemporary Sufi Expressions. In Sufism in the Modern World (pp. 9–21). MDPI Journals.

Elias, J. J. (1998). Sufism. Iranian Studies, 31(3/4), 595–613.

Hidayat, A. A., & Savitri, A. D. (2025). Sufi Orders in the Colonial Era: An Analysis of Their Urgency and Impact. HISTORIA: Jurnal Program Studi Pendidikan Sejarah, 13(2), 585–600.

Howell, J. D. (2001). Sufism and the Indonesian Islamic Revival. The Journal of Asian Studies, 60(3), 701–729. https://doi.org/10.2307/2700107

Küçük, H. (2008). A Brief History of Western Sufism. Asian Journal of Social Science, 36(2), 292–320. https://doi.org/10.1163/156853108x298752

Laleh-Naz. (2023, November 20). The scattered legacies of Bengal’s Sufis. The Daily Star. https://www.thedailystar.net/opinion/views/news/the-scattered-legacies-bengals-sufis-3474101

Osser, E. (2015, November 19). Why is Saudi Arabia destroying the cultural heritage of Mecca and Medina? The Art Newspaper. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2015/11/19/why-is-saudi-arabia-destroying-the-cultural-heritage-of-mecca-and-medina

Paracha, A. (2024). Orientalizing the East: The West’s Misrepresentation of Rumi’s Poetry. Delos; Gainesville, 39(1), 61–78. https://doi.org/10.5744/delos.2024.1005

Rami. (2015, November 27). The Islamic Scholars On Tassawwuf Throughout History. Ghayb.com. https://ghayb.com/2015/11/the-islamic-scholars-on-tassawwuf-throughout-history/

Sedgwick, M. (2018). Sufi Religious Leaders and Sufi Orders in the Contemporary Middle East. Sociology of Islam, 6(2), 212–232. https://doi.org/10.1163/22131418-00602007

Spannaus, N. (2018). Evolution of Saudi Salafism. In Modern Islamic Authority and Social Change, Volume 1 (pp. 150–171). Edinburgh University Press.

Valentine, S. R. (2015). Force and Fanaticism: Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia and Beyond. Oxford University Press.

Wormser, P. (2015). The Spread of Islam in Asia through Trade and Sufism. In Routledge Handbook of Religions in Asia (pp. 109–122). Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Zarrabi-Zadeh, S. (2024). Preface to the Special Issue “Sufism in the Modern World.” In Sufism in the Modern World (pp. 1–8). MDPI Journals.

“As long as my soul stays in my body,
I am a slave of the Qur’an and the dust on the path of Muhammad, the Chosen One.
If someone interprets my words in any other way,
That person I deplore, and I deplore his words.”

- Jalal ud-Din Rumi