The Naqshbandi ( fa, نقشبندی)), Neqshebendi ( ku, نه‌قشه‌به‌ندی), and Nakşibendi (in

Turkish Turkish may refer to: *a Turkic language spoken by the Turks * of or about Turkey ** Turkish language *** Turkish alphabet ** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation *** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey *** Turkish communities and mi ...

) is a major Sunni

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood * Heterarchy, a system of organization wherein the elements have the potential to be ranked a number of d ...

Sufism Sufism ( ar, ''aṣ-ṣūfiyya''), also known as Tasawwuf ( ''at-taṣawwuf''), is a mystic body of religious practice, found mainly within Sunni Islam but also within Shia Islam, which is characterized by a focus on Islamic spirituality, ...

. Its name is derived from Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari. Naqshbandi masters trace their lineage to the

Islamic prophet Prophets in Islam ( ar, الأنبياء في الإسلام, translit=al-ʾAnbiyāʾ fī al-ʾIslām) are individuals in Islam who are believed to spread God's message on Earth and to serve as models of ideal human behaviour. Some prophets a ...

Muhammad Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد; 570 – 8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the monot ...

through

Abu Bakr Abu Bakr Abdallah ibn Uthman Abi Quhafa (; – 23 August 634) was the senior companion and was, through his daughter Aisha, a father-in-law of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, as well as the first caliph of Islam. He is known with the honori ...

, the first

Caliph A caliphate or khilāfah ( ar, خِلَافَة, ) is an institution or public office under the leadership of an Islamic steward with the title of caliph (; ar, خَلِيفَة , ), a person considered a political-religious successor to th ...

of Sunni Islam and Ali, the fourth Caliph of Sunni Islam. It is because of this dual lineage through Ali and

through the 6th Imam Jafar al Sadiq that the order is also known as the "convergence of the two oceans" or "Sufi Order of Jafar al Sadiq".

History

The Naqshbandi order owes many insights to Yusuf Hamdani and Abdul Khaliq Gajadwani in the 12th century, the latter of whom is regarded as the organizer of the practices and is responsible for placing stress upon the purely silent ''

invocation An invocation (from the Latin verb ''invocare'' "to call on, invoke, to give") may take the form of: *Supplication, prayer or spell. *A form of possession. * Command or conjuration. * Self-identification with certain spirits. These forms a ...

''. It was later associated with Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari in the 14th century, hence the name of the order. The name can be interpreted as "engraver (of the heart)", "pattern maker", "reformer of patterns", "image maker", or "related to the image maker". The way is sometimes referred to as "the sublime sufi path" and "the way of the golden chain." Afterwards, a branch or sub-order name was added. From 'Ubeydullah Ahrar to Imam Rabbani, the way was called "Naqshbandiyya-Ahrariyya"; from Imam Rabbani to Shamsuddin Mazhar "Naqshbandiyya-Mujaddadiyya"; from Shamsuddin Mazhar to

Khalid al-Baghdadi Khalid (variants include Khaled and Kalid; Arabic: خالد) is a popular Arabic male given name meaning "eternal, everlasting, immortal", and it also appears as a surname.Naqshbandiyya-Khalidiyya"; "Naqshbandiyya-Mustafvi" (Khalidi) and so on.

South Asia

The Naqshbandiyya order became an influential factor in Indo-Muslim life and for two centuries it was the principal spiritual order in the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographical region in Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian Ocean from the Himalayas. Geopolitically, it includes the countries of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India ...

. Baqi Billah Berang (No. 24 in the Naqshbandi-Haqqani Golden Chain) is credited for bringing the order to India during the end of the 16th century. He was born in Kabul and brought up and educated in Kabul and Samarqand, where he came in contact with the Naqshbandiyya order through Khawaja Amkangi. When he came to India, he tried to spread his knowledge about the order, but died three years later. His disciple Ahmad Sirhindi (No. 25 in the Naqshbandi-Haqqani Golden Chain) took over after his death. Later he became known as Mujaddad-i-Alf-i-Thani. It was through him that the order gained popularity within a short period of time.

Shah Waliullah Dehlawi Quṭb-ud-Dīn Aḥmad Walīullāh Ibn ʿAbd-ur-Raḥīm Ibn Wajīh-ud-Dīn Ibn Muʿaẓẓam Ibn Manṣūr Al-ʿUmarī Ad-Dehlawī ( ar, ‎; 1703–1762), commonly known as Shāh Walīullāh Dehlawī (also Shah Wali Allah), was an Islami ...

was an 18th-century member of the order.

Syria

The Naqshbandiyya was introduced into Syria at the end of the 17th century by Murad Ali al-Bukhari, who was initiated in India. Later, he established himself in Damascus, but traveled throughout Arabia. His branch became known as the Muradiyya. After his death in 1720, his descendants formed the Muradi family of scholars and sheikhs who continued to head the Muradiyya. In 1820 and onward, Khalid Shahrazuri rose as the prominent Naqshbandi leader in the Ottoman world. After the death of Khalid in 1827, his order became known as the

Khalidiyya Naqshbandiyya Khalidiyya, Khalidiyya or Khalidi is the title of a branch of the Naqshbandiyya Sufi lineage, from the time of Khalid al-Baghdadi until the time of Shaykh Ismail ash-Shirwani. The Khalid’îyyah tariqa silsila References * G ...

, which continued to spread for at least two decades. In Syria and Lebanon, the leaders of every active Naqshbandiyya group acknowledged its spiritual lineage, which had retained the original Naqshbandiyya way. Later a strife between Khalid's khalifas led to disruption of the order, causing it to divide. When political leader Musa Bukhar died in 1973, the pre-Mujaddidi line of the Naqshbandiyya in Greater Syria came to an end. One of the only branches to have survived till recently is the one based in the

khanqah A khanqah ( fa, خانقاه) or khangah ( fa, خانگاه; also transliterated as ''khankah'', ''khaneqa'', ''khanegah'' or ''khaneqah''; also Arabized ''hanegah'', ''hanikah'', ''hanekah'', ''khankan''), also known as a ribat (), is a buildi ...

al-Uzbakiyya in Jerusalem. The number of its members had increased at the end of the 19th century. The Farmadiyya branch, which practices silent and vocal

, is still present in Lebanon and is named after Ali-Farmadi.

Egypt

During the middle of the 19th century Egypt was inhabited and controlled by Naqshbandis. A major Naqshbandi

was constructed in 1851 by Abbas I, who did this as a favor to Naqshbandi sheikh Ahmad Ashiq. Ahmad Ashiq headed the order till his death in 1883. Ahmad Ashiq's was a practicer of the Diya'iyya branch of the

. In 1876, sheikh Juda Ibrahim amended the original Diya’iyya, which became known as al-Judiyya, and gained a following in al-Sharqiyya province in the eastern Nile Delta. During the last two decades of the 19th century two other versions of Naqshbandiyya spread in Egypt. One of these was introduced by a Sudanese, alSharif Isma'il al-Sinnari. Al-Sinnari had been initiated into the Khalidiyya and Mujaddidiyya by various sheikhs during his time in Mecca and Medina. Initially, he tried to obtain a following in Cairo but was not able to, therefore he resorted going to Sudan. It is from there that the order spread into Upper Egypt from 1870 onward under Musa Mu’awwad, who was al-Sinnari's successor. Muhaamad al-Laythi, son of al-Sinnari, was the successor after Mu’awwad's death. The Judiyya and the

branches spread in the last decades of the 19th century and continued to grow and are still active today. Muhammad Amin al-Kurdi led a branch until his death in the early 1900s, after his death the branch was headed by his son Najm a-Din El-Kurdi until his death in 1988 then his son; PHD.Abdelrahman El-Kurdi, the deputy dean of Al-Azhar university led the branch for 2 years but he died of cancer, after his death the branch was headed by PHD.Mohamed Deyaa Aldin El-Kurdi until his death in 2001. Now that Branch is headed by counseller/Judge Mohamed "seif" El-Kurdi. The El-Kurdi family are also part of the Islamic prophet Mohammed's Bloodline. Unfortunately, none of the early orders survived far into the 20th century. The longest living group of

based Naqshbandis lived in the khanqah of sheikh Ahmad Ashiq, which closed in 1954. This is when all the

s in Egypt were closed and the awqaf supporting these establishments were taken over by the Ministry of Awqaf. The buildings were either assigned a different function or demolished as part of urban renovation programs.

China

Ma Laichi brought the Naqshbandi () order to China, creating the Khufiyya () Hua Si Sufi ; ("

Multicolored Mosque The Huasi Mosque () is a mosque in China built during the reign of the Chenghua Emperor (r. 1465–1487) in the Ming dynasty. Buddhist temples and imperial palaces were the architecture on which the construction for the mosque was based. It was c ...

") menhuan. Ma Mingxin, also brought the Naqshbandi order, creating the Jahriyya () menhuan. These two menhuan were rivals, and fought against each other which led to the

Jahriyya Rebellion In the Jahriyya revolt () of 1781 sectarian violence between two suborders of the Naqshbandi Sufis, the Jahriyya Sufi Muslims and their rivals, the Khafiyya Sufi Muslims, led to Qing intervention to stop the fighting between the two, which in tur ...

, Dungan revolt, and Dungan Revolt (1895). Some Chinese Muslim Generals of the Ma Clique belonged to Naqshbandi Sufi menhuan including Ma Zhan'ao and Ma Anliang of the Khufiyya Naqshbandi menhuan. Ma Shaowu, and Ma Yuanzhang were other prominent leaders from the Jahriyya Naqshbandi menhuan.

Prominent sheikhs

Abdul Khaliq Ghijduwani Abdul Khaliq Ghijduvani (died 1179) was one of a group of Central Asian Sufi teachers known simply as Khwajagan (the Masters) of the Naqshbandi order. Abdul Khaliq was born in the small town of Ghijduvan, near Bukhara. His father had migrated to ...

(d. 1179), prominent sheikh whose teachings became known as the way of the Khojas (teachers) or Khwajagan (masters). * Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari (1318–1389), the founder of the Sufi Naqshbandi Order. * Khwaja Ahrar (1404-1490 AD), established the order in general. * Ahmad al-Farūqī al-Sirhindī (1564–1624), commonly known as Imam Rabbani, a

mujaddid A ''mujaddid'' ( ar, مجدد), is an Islamic term for one who brings "renewal" ( ar, تجديد, translit= tajdid, label=none) to the religion. According to the popular Muslim tradition, it refers to a person who appears at the turn of every ...

and leading Naqshbandi Sheikh from India. * Mawlana Khalid (1779–1827), the sheikh whom all the different branches of the Order in the Middle East and Caucasus spread from. * Uthman Sirâj-ud-Dîn Naqshbandi (1781-1867), was an 18th-century influential sufi, saint and

Islamic scholar In Islam, the ''ulama'' (; ar, علماء ', singular ', "scholar", literally "the learned ones", also spelled ''ulema''; feminine: ''alimah'' ingularand ''aalimath'' lural are the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of religious ...

. *

Sheikh Ali Hisam-ad-Din Naqshbandi Shah Muhammad Ali Hisâm-ad-Dîn Naqshbandî ( Arabic: الشيخ مُحَمَّدْ علي حسام الدين نقشبندي, fa, محمد علي حسام الدین نقشبند, Turkish: Şâh Ali Hüsâmeddîn) also known as Hâzrat-i Shâ ...

(1861 - 1939) was a 19th-century sufi, awliya' and

born in Tawella.

Practices

Criteria of a sheikh

The following would always apply to genuine Sufi Naqshbandi masters or sheikhs: * They must comply with the Sacred Law. * They must adhere to the

Sunnah In Islam, , also spelled ( ar, سنة), are the traditions and practices of the Islamic prophet Muhammad that constitute a model for Muslims to follow. The sunnah is what all the Muslims of Muhammad's time evidently saw and followed and pass ...

. * They must be a

scholar A scholar is a person who pursues academic and intellectual activities, particularly academics who apply their intellectualism into expertise in an area of study. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or research ...

. There can be no tasawwuf without

knowledge Knowledge can be defined as awareness of facts or as practical skills, and may also refer to familiarity with objects or situations. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is often defined as true belief that is disti ...

. * They must not engage in Bid'ah (religious innovation). * They accept interaction with other

disciples A disciple is a follower and student of a mentor, teacher, or other figure. It can refer to: Religion * Disciple (Christianity), a student of Jesus Christ * Twelve Apostles of Jesus, sometimes called the Twelve Disciples * Seventy disciples in ...

of the order. * They do not accept the personal certification of dead persons, in dreams, or through special spiritual experience (rawhani). There is a rare exception to this rule according to the uwaisi concept of transmission, where someone who lived before can train and transmit knowledge to someone who came later. * They receive written personal certification only in the presence of witnesses.

11 principal teachings

Known as the

Eleven Naqshbandi principles The Eleven Naqshbandi principles or the "rules or secrets of the Naqshbandi", known in Persian as the ''kalimat-i qudsiya'' ("sacred words" or "virtuous words"), are a system of principles and guidelines used as spiritual exercises, or to encou ...

, the first eight were formulated by Abdul Khaliq Gajadwani, and the last three were added by Baha-ud-Din Naqshband Bukhari. * Remembrance ( – fa, یاد کرد, links=no): Always orally and mentally repeating the dhikr. * Restraint ( – fa, بازگشت, links=no): Engaging in the heart repetition of the al-kalimat at-tayyiba phrase – "La-ilaha il-allah muhammadur rasul-allah". * Watchfulness ( – fa, نگاه داشت, links=no): Being conscientious over wandering thoughts while repeating Al-kalimat at-tayyiba. * Recollection ( – fa, ياد داشت, links=no): Concentration upon the Divine presence in a condition of dhawq, foretaste, intuitive anticipation or perceptiveness, not using external aids. * Awareness while breathing ( – fa, هوش در دم, links=no): Controlling one's breathing by not exhaling or inhaling in the forgetfulness of the Divine. * Journeying in one's homeland ( - fa, سفر در وطن, links=no): An internal journey that moves the person from having blameworthy to praiseworthy properties. This is also referred to as the vision or revelation of the hidden side of the shahada. * Watching one's step ( - fa, نظر بر قدم, links=no): Do not be distracted from purpose of the ultimate journey. * Solitude in a crowd ( - fa, خلوت در انجمن, links=no): Although journey is outwardly in this world, it is inwardly with God. * Temporal pause ( - fa, وقوف زمانی, links=no): Keeping account of how one spends his or her time. If time is spent rightfully give thanks and time is spent incorrectly ask for forgiveness. * Numerical pause ( - fa, وقوف عددی, links=no): Checking that the dhikr has been repeated in odd numbers. * Heart pause ( - fa, وقوف قلبی, links=no): Forming a mental picture of one's heart with the name of God engraved to emphasize that the heart has no consciousness or goal other than God.

Types of concentration

Muraqaba

Muraqaba is known as spiritual communion. In this practice one tries to unveil the mystery of life by losing oneself in it. One imagines his heartbeats calling out the name of the almighty. It is highly believed that it is true that our heart calls out for Allah with every beat. But it is our hearts which are draped by sins and so the heartbeat is heard as dhak dhak and not Allah Allah. Muraqaba is done by sitting in a lonely place with eyes closed and maintaining a calm position, imagining your exterior eyes closed, interior eyes opened, your heart calling out for Allah, and trying to hear the word 'Allah' in each and every heartbeat.

Tawajjuh

Tawajjuh is the basis of spirituality. It's the process of transferring spiritual light (Faiz) that shaykh transfers from his enlightened heart to his or her murid's (student) heart. This light leads the way to enlightenment and makes truth differentiate from false. No spirituality is possible without Tawajjuh. This is how Islamic spirituality differs from other spiritual practices. In Islamic spirituality, murid tends to be more and more in the company of his shaykh to receive Faiz through Tawajjuh that makes enlightenment an easier process as his heart day by day enlightens up to God's presence and his commands towards him and humanity. Process of Tawajjuh is like lighting a candle from another candle. The candle that lightened the other loses nothing, and the candle that got lighted, gains everything.

History

South Asia

Syria

Egypt

China

Prominent sheikhs

Practices

Criteria of a sheikh

11 principal teachings

Types of concentration

Muraqaba

Tawajjuh

See also

References

Notes

Citations

Further reading

External links