Sufism and Anarchism 1 of 2 

Not a Sufi, but I am a Batini (esotericist) Twelver Shi'ite who is also an Anarchist. This series is very interesting and good to see someone discussing (I have only come across a few videos on yt and merely several academic essays, and the work of PLW). I think Islam and Anarchism have a natural connection, same is true of ecology. The Islamic template (socio-politically, not religiously/spiritually) fits with several different political leanings, it fits with far left equally as much as far right, because it overall is actually rather centrist regarding most things (the Sunni caliphates were not representative, only one political expression).

Oh, interesting that this discussion exists. I am a Muslim philosophy student engaged in views and practices you find among Sufis. I don't like to call myself a Sufi because traditionally the masters of the path have been called that way and I am not even in a taqirah. Maybe interesting for this discussion would be that at least traditionally Islamic society and Islamic theology present politics that are at least non-statist and nowadays maybe an anti-state agenda would be most fitting for a Muslim. Political structure in pre-modern Muslim societies can be considered kind of communalist, neither the law nor the people being under strict control of the executive leader. It was not right to force non-Muslims to adhere to Islamic law but everybody, leaders or normal Muslims, equally were judged under it. The legislators often came out of their local communities and were favoring the poor and weak in their interpretation of the law. A good book that portrays pre-modern Islamic politics is "The Impossible State" by Wael Hallaq. Perhaps Sufism with its tariqas is a good example of how small communities organized itself in that way. I also think spirituality can be a good use as a psychotechnological tool to be less dependent on strong governments.

I pretty much liked the episode overall. It wasn't too orientalist, I would say. At some points I think for example Rumi must be interpretted more within an Islamic mindset. Many have done a good job on that. There is no doubt that he was controversial and not conforming but there is much to say about what was said that I don't intend to go too in-depth here. William Chittick portrays his teachings quite well systematically in "The Sufi Path of Love: The Spiritual Teachings of Rumi." A problem is at least in the expression, especially at the very end, how you categorized different Sufi practices, as if some would do the 5 pillars of Islam, others meditate, others do sema, others self-annihilate like Rumi. That's quite an unrealistic distinction, if you really mean it that literally. Rumi himself stayed until the very end a practicing Muslim. By the way, his Fihi ma Fihi, transcripts of his speeches written by his students, as well as his great work Masnawi, show quite well how he remained with all these religious aspects while being spiritual and mystical at the same time. So he practiced the 5 pillars, just like Sufi orders in general do. Additionally, the sema was invented by him, so to speak. The Mevlevi order in Turkey goes back to him. You might also find Mevlevis meditating or not. In any case, all Sufis would engage in some form of self-annihilation and these are just examples, including the 5 pillars of practice in Islam. Of course, there is a variety of teachings and practices among different Sufi orders, as you also touched on. I want to quickly go through some historical, spiritual and political points that might be interesting to mention. Shortly before Rumi wrote the Persian Sufi poet Fariduddin Attar from Nishapur who also influenced Rumi. In his "Conference of the Birds" several birds go on an arduous journey to find their king Simourgh, an allegory for the journey towards God. At the end, they will see Simourgh as a reflection of themselves for which eloquent Persian wordplay is used (si-murgh - thirty birds). That could make one think of the idea that everybody is one's own king or the king are the people, but primarily it is meant in a mystical sense. Attar general was quite the rebel in his poetry as well, be it in his controversial views or how he lets simple man criticize famous kings. The Sufi mystic that lived roughly in or closely before the time of Rumi was ibn Arabi whose son-in-law and most important interpretor was in close contact with Rumi. He isn't famous for political writings, but among Sufis he is known as Shaykh al-Akbar, the greatest teacher, because of his contributions to a mystical theology and metaphysics. Some more formal theologians and jurists found him very problematic, like ibn Taymiyyah who was a controversial figure in his own right. He is just interesting to mention because ibn Arabi's followers protested against ibn Taymiyyah who interpreted the former as having monistic views and therefore setting the relationship with individual subjects and God as the law-giver in danger. That's a very problematic reading of ibn Arabi in any case. Eventually the ruler put ibn Taymiyyah in prison for that. See the irony! :D Another critic of ibn Arabi was ibn Khaldun who was perhaps the first sociologist and also someone you can call a natural philosopher of history and politics. He had quite some liberal theories that would quite make the king or sultan the servant of the people rather than the other way around. He wrote positively about the asceticism of Sufism, but negatively about those who speak openly about mystical ideas about God and the world, like ibn Arabi. Very interesting places for Sufism politically are up to this day North and West Africa. It must be said that Sufism as such is very flexible in its way to organize individual and community life without neglecting its own ideas. Historically in Africa many rulers had consulted Sufi shuyukh or the rule was done by the shuyukh themselves. Generally in Muslim societies, there was a lot of self-determination within communities. After all, it cannot be spoken about statism before collonialism. Often rebellion against the European collonialists emerged out of Sufi orders, as it can be seen in the highly respected Emir Abdulqadir al-Jazairi, also a commentator on ibn Arabi, who fought against the French colonialists and would earn their admiration through his high chivalry. An interesting place to investigate would also be Senegal which is up to today deeply characterized by Sufism and the people there living a very spiritual life, largely inspired by the spiritual Sufi teacher Amadou Bamba and his non-violent movement during colonialism.

I absolutely love this topic, it’s not discussed or researched (enough).

Thank you for the program I recently became interested in both Sufism and anarchy along with Taoism. Trying to learn and get clear idea 🙏🏽✨

Wonderful ❤️🙏

Sufism in Turkey a lot of the Sufi orders supported the Ottoman rulers.

From a Western point of view Sufism could be seen as similar to anarcho-syndicalism with it's many small decentralized groups. Arabs in particular, are very politically aware with an astute analysis of newspapers and underground media and what political fringes /socio economic groups they represent.

Oh that channel seems nice

@Revolution and Ideology Can you make a video on Abu Dharr? Personally, I think his lifestyle and philosophy line up with both socialism and anarchism.

My dad was a “sufi” and he taught wing chun, sufis are followers of tassuwuf which is a way of life following the sunni ideology. It’s origin is stemmed from Sunnis. The prophet peace be upon him and his companions followed Tasawwuf. Sufis are basically orthodox Muslims. People have there own synonyms for Sufism and it’s followed by the vast majority of Muslims. Especially in South and west Asia, Turkey and in many countries within Africa. I hate how Muslims are portrayed and marketed by news outlets and throughout social media tho. I think making a minority group look like a majority group, for instance isis (who kill Sunni Muslims predominantly) gives immense leverage in harnessing power. They’re shown as the front face of Islam as though they’re some kind of fucking ambassadors. Pardon my french lol however this is not the case. It’s BS...I’m only a few minutes in lol and I’m looking forward to this podcast so imma keep listening. This should be dope

Khayam was a Sufi. Fitzgerald's translation is more of an interpretation to fit the mood of the certain class of uk society.

interesting video but I think y'all could benefit hugely from opening your minds to queer theory and viewing history through a queer lens.

Capitalism is an inherent facet of anarchism. Anarchism is not anti-capitalist. Propaganda stating otherwise is everywhere. Let's not fall for that. It's time to look up definitions, check them against their etymology, read between the lines, cross reference, and really understand what words mean. What concepts entail.