RELG 367: Sufism
Professor: Waleed El-Ansary
tel: (803) 777-7003
email: ansary@sc.edu
Office: Rutledge 331
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Spring 2007
MW 3:35-4:50
BA 302
Office hours: TR 9:30-10:30
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Course Description:
This course starts with the investigation of the resources available for the study of Sufism (Islamic mysticism) and various approaches used in this field. It then turns to the study of basic Sufi doctrines and practices followed by its history. It concludes with discussions of the influence of Sufism on various facets of Islamic civilization and society and the situation of Sufism in the contemporary Islamic world and the West.
Course Requirements:
Midterm
Final
Paper |
30%
40%
30%
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The mid-term and final exams will consist of essay questions in which there is a range of choice, e.g. choose three of four questions.
Undergraduate students are expected to write a term paper of ten pages on a subject of their choice which must be approved by the instructor in advance of its completion. Graduate students must write a research paper of some twenty five pages on a subject of their choice which they must treat in depth.
Required Reading:
- Sufism: A Short Introduction by William Chittick (Oxford, Oneworld Publications Ltd., 2000), for a concise introduction to various aspects of Sufism drawing extensively from original Sufi writings.
- What is Sufism? by Martin Lings (Cambridge, The Islamic Texts Society, 1999), for its discussion of the doctrines and methods of Sufism.
- Mystical Dimensions of Islam by Annemarie Schimmel (Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 1975), for its scholarly survey of the teachings and history of Sufism.
- Sufi Essays by Seyyed Hossein Nasr (Chicago, Kazi Publications, 1999), for its application of the principles of Sufism to some contemporary problems.
- Teachings of Sufism by Carl Ernst (Boston, Shambala, 1999), for a carefully constructed anthology of traditional Sufi texts in English.
- Inner Dimensions of Islamic Worship by Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazzali, trans. Muhtar Holland (Leicester, The Islamic Foundation, 1983), for selections from his monumental Ihyā' 'Ulūm al-Dīn on the harmony between Islamic law and mysticism in the context of "the pillars of Islam."
- The Book of Wisdom by Ibn 'Atā'illāh al-Iskandarī, trans. Victor Danner (New York, Paulist Press, 1978), for one of the most important works in Arabic on the essence of Sufism by a thirteenth-century scholar of Islamic law
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Course Outline:
1. Meaning of Sufism and mysticism; the study of Sufism in the West; methods for its study; sources available for the study of Sufism; the relation of Sufism to the rest of the Islamic tradition.
2. The Sufi conception of the Divinity, the archetypal realiti¬es - the unity of Being.
3. The Universe - the cosmos as theophany.
4. Man as the vicegerent of God, the doctrine of universal man.
5. Meditation, contemplation and invocation; individual and 'communal' practices.
6. The spiritual virtues - their individual and collective significance.
7. The Sufi science of the soul ("psychotherapy"); the master and disciple relationship.
8. Sufism in earlier Islamic history.
9. Sufism after the Mongol invasion.
10. The Sufi orders.
11. Sufism and its influence upon philosophy and science.
12. Sufism and its influence upon literature, music and the plastic arts including architecture.
13. Sufism and Islamic society.
14. Sufism in the contemporary world.
15. Conclusion.
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