Posted on 06/23/2006 12:56:05 PM PDT by sergey1973
The Sufi branch of Islam has enjoyed spectacularly good press in the West. Hailed as peaceful mystics who believe jihad is a spiritual quest, nothing violent or unpleasant, Sufism has attracted favorable attention and converts from all sorts of Westerners, from new agers in Marin County, California, to East Coast intellectuals. But Sufis are not necessarily all peace-loving meditative seekers of the divine.
The formation of the “The Sufi Jihadi Squadrons of Shaykh ‘Abd al-Qadir al-Gilani” in Iraq was recently announced at the jihadist website, “Jihad Unspun”. The Al-Gilani (d.1166) after whom they are named was in fact a Hanbali Sufi.
Sufi jihadists”(?)—a “Hanbali Sufi”(??)—haven’t we been lectured at great length about the singular evils of “Wahhabism” —rooted in the Hanbali school of Muslim jurisprudence, epitomized by Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328)—versus its Islamic “antithesis”, the ecumenical tradition of mystical Sufism???
Notwithstanding the musings of a Muslim journalist and neo-convert from Bolshevism to Sufi Islam (see his bizarre and treacly “profession of faith” here, and a clinical description of what this newly described syndrome represents), Sufism has been linked integrally to the Muslim institution of jihad war since the 11th century C.E.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Just because I call myself a Democrat doesn't make me one.
PING--another great historical article on Islam and India (and many other places).
"There is simply no peaceful branch of Islam.".
Sufism and Qaeda-al-Jihad
Sufi practices characterize Qaeda-al-Jihad in several ways. First, Qaeda-al-Jihad is organized as a Sufi-type brotherhood around Osama bin Laden who is the brotherhood’s spiritual leader or Shaykh. The initiation ceremony specific to many Sufi orders, called “bayat”, involves taking the hand of the group’s spiritual leader. The Prophet Muhammad established this ceremony when he allowed his companions to take his hand and commit themselves to vastly increase their love and loyalty to Allah and the Messenger, according to one report. (8) During the “taking hand” ceremony, the new Sufi initiate receives the blessings of the lineage, and a promise of spiritual protection along their life’s journey. “Members of al-Qaeda take bayat [an oath of allegiance] to their sheik, Bin Laden, as an act of initiation…Bayat means that the link between the one making bayat, the shaykh and Prophet Muhammad is unbroken. This makes a Sufi connection possible during the solemn moment of taking bayat (pact) with the shaykh, who is the link in the chain.” The initiate becomes connected to the chain and becomes a recipient of the light of Muhammad. Bayat is the ritual of accepting the shaykh as guide and coming under the protection of the lineage of the order. The number of actual members pledging bayat is unknown, but al-Qaeda is said to have trained as many as 5000 militants in camps in Afghanistan and perhaps Indonesia.” (8) Second, the Sufi aesthetic practice of wandering and withdrawing and living in caves is consistent with the way in which bin Laden and Zawahiri have been living. Some may say that they have been forced to the caves by Coalition forces, but the ease with which they have adapted to this barren and difficult way of life supports a Sufi influence. Third, Zawahiri travels around the mountains and valleys like a Sufi and even wears a turban and cloak suggestive of ancient Sufi attire. For example, Lawrence Wright wrote in September 2002: “Last March, a band of horsemen journeyed through the province of Paktika, in Afghanistan, near the Pakistan border. Predator drones were circling the skies and American troops were sweeping through the mountains. The war had begun six months earlier, and by now the fighting had narrowed down to the ragged eastern edge of the country. Regional warlords had been bought off, the borders supposedly sealed. For twelve days, American and coalition forces had been bombing the nearby Shah-e-Kot Valley and systematically destroying the cave complexes in the Al Qaeda stronghold. And yet the horsemen were riding unhindered toward Pakistan. “They came to the village of a local militia commander named Gula Jan, whose long beard and black turban might have signaled that he was a Taliban sympathizer. ‘I saw a heavy, older man, an Arab, who wore dark glasses and had a white turban,’ Jan told Ilene Prusher, of the Christian Science Monitor, four days later. ‘He was dressed like an Afghan, but he had a beautiful coat, and he was with two other Arabs who had masks on.’ The man in the beautiful coat dismounted and began talking in a polite and humorous manner. He asked Jan and an Afghan companion about the location of American and Northern Alliance troops. ‘We are afraid we will encounter them,’ he said. ‘Show us the right way.’ “While the men were talking, Jan slipped away to examine a poster that had been dropped into the area by American airplanes. It showed a photograph of a man in a white turban and glasses. His face was broad and meaty, with a strong, prominent nose and full lips. His untrimmed beard was gray at the temples and ran in milky streaks below his chin. On his high forehead, framed by the swaths of his turban, was a darkened callus formed by many hours of prayerful prostration. His eyes reflected the sort of decisiveness one might expect in a medical man, but they also showed a measure of serenity that seemed oddly out of place. Jan was looking at a wanted poster for a man named Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, who had a price of twenty-five million dollars on his head. Jan returned to the conversation. The man he now believed to be Zawahiri said to him, ‘May God bless you and keep you from the enemies of Islam. Try not to tell them where we came from and where we are going.’” Fourth, probably the most telling Sufi sign among Qaeda-al-Jihad members is their “disciplined emotionalism”, a Sufi trait long cultivated, particularly during long dikhrs. Yosri Fouda, an Egyptian journalist, noted the existence of “al-Qaeda chants,” which may be used during dikhrs. (9). Fouda also noted: “Bin Laden’s mentality is not much of a compromising one. I’ve not seen it either directly or indirectly, that bin Laden would ultimately like to sit down and talk about things. Zawahiri neither. At the same time I’m not sure if it’s in their eyes it is a zero sum games because they have already expressed certain things, have highlighted certain conditions…” Fouda’s analysis of Bin Laden and Zawahiri’s behavior is consistent with Al-Ghazzali’s position that analysis and discussion cannot bring one closer to the truth; only mysticism or intuition can achieve that, in the Sufi tradition. The disciplined emotionalism exhibited by Shaykh Bin Laden and his acolytes provides the stamina and focus necessary to triumph over the West through carefully imagined, designed, and executed terrorism atrocities produced over entire Sufi life times.
The only thing that gives me any hope for islam is the tenuous Iraqi government.
Someone better let ECUSA former Presiding Bishop Griswold know about this right away!
Sufi Islam is probabbly more dangerous than its other Wahabbist cousins- it allows an environment for very good brainwashing. Practically all of India's Muslims were converted that way- especially in places like Kashmir and Bengal.
From Sufism to Wahabbism, it's just a simple twist to perform the alteration.
Compare Kashmir in the '80s to Kashmir now.
The Ahmadiyya of India and Pakistan have renounced Jihad. They have also been officially sanctioned as non-Muslims by the Pakistani government.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.