Mysticism in early Islam

Mysticism in Islam emerged earlier than customarily acknowledged, long before Islamic mysticism became known as Sufism. The presence and teachings of early Muslim mystics are attested in original literary works from as early as the later part of the second/eighth century. Ever since, Islamic mysticism has been alive and active in literature and among practicing individuals, centers, and brotherhoods. Conventionally referred to as Sufism, in Arabic taṣawwuf, Islamic mysticism is a complex cultural-religious-spiritual phenomenon, which, in one form or another, has been present and active alongside other Islamic fields, such as jurisprudence (fiqh), theology (kalām), and philosophy (falsafa). ¹ Since the sixth/twelfth century, Sufis have tended to identify themselves as adhering to “brotherhoods” (ṭuruq, sing. ṭarīqa). Affiliates of a ṭarīqa in any given generation see themselves as connected via an uninterrupted chain (silsila) to their ancestral founding fathers from whom they had received a “hidden” or “inner” knowledge (al-ʿilm al-bāṭin). These ancestral founding fathers, in their turn, are believed to have received this esoteric teaching directly from the illustrious and pious personalities of the first generations – the Prophet’s Companions (al-ṣaḥāba) or even the Prophet himself. Thus, for example, the Naqshbandi brotherhood (al-ṭarīqa al-naqshbandiyya), named after the eighth/fourteenth century Bukharan master Bahāʾ al-Dīn Naqshband, sees itself and its eponymous founder as transmitters of the inner teaching which had been bequeathed to them by Abū Bakr, the first Caliph.