The Dawn Of Sufi Mysticism And The Taliban

The emergence of a uniquely formalized Islamic mysticism in the ninth and tenth centuries under the cosmopolitanism of the Abbasid tradition parallels its resurgence in the modern period, an age in which globalization and secularization are a source of constant contention among religious traditionalists. The modern response to an era of increasing secularism, however, has diverged: the occult and highly individualistic Sufi revival rests at one end of the spectrum, the fundamentalist Taliban at the other. The latter’s attacks against popular Sufism represent a shift toward religious orthodoxy and scripturalism in a phenomenon that is – perhaps ironically – analogous to the rejection of secularism that birthed Sufism itself.

Though the occult

Sufi mysticism and the Taliban undeniably have followed divergent paths, but they are rooted in a common origin: a response to and denial of secularism. The dawn of Sufism was from its onset a counter to perceptions of the Abbasid caliphate as one of decaying religious character and detachment from God; mystic goals and endeavors therefore reflect a rejection of such characteristics, a “spiritual struggle against one’s passions and mundane temptations” (Knysh 302). Some Sufis, like the famous al-Hallaj, practiced a brand of asceticism so extreme – radical, even – that they might “remain standing all the night” (Schroeder 527) or wear louse-ridden clothing. Unity with God became contingent upon utter renunciation of Abbasid secularism and, by extension, all worldly pleasures. It is quite surprising, then, that the Taliban’s dogma, though completely antithetical to Sufism’s, saw provenance in a parallel contemporary context. The Abbasid “enemy” is long past; in an era of extensive globalization and internationalism, the Taliban looks to the West now as Islam’s adversary. Much like the original Sufis, “the orthodox or fundamentalist movement” disavows “modernization” and secular “influence on the Islamic world” (Assam Tribune). The jihadism and anti-secularist violence advocated by the Taliban is a stark reversal of peaceful mystic gnosticism, but these conflicting creeds are responses to the same anxiety: that materialistic interests may subsume the purity of Islam