Bayazid Bastami

For the Ibadi of the Berber tribe, see Abu Yazid.
Bayazid Bastami
Cover from a lacquer mirror case with multiple scenes, attributed to Mohammad Esmail Esfahani; the top scene depicts Bayazid Bastami and disciples. Created in Qajar Iran in the second half of the 19th century
Born804 CE
Bastam, Qumis region, Abbasid Caliphate (modern Bastam, Semnan Province, Iran)
Died874 CE[2]
bastam, Kumis area, Abbasid Caliphate (Present-day Semnan province of Iran)
EraAbbasid Era, (Islamic Golden Age)
RegionWestern Asia
SchoolSunni[1]
Main interests
Mysticism, Philosophy
Notable ideas
Sukr
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Abū Yazīd Ṭayfūr bin ʿĪsā bin Surūshān al-Bisṭāmī (al-Basṭāmī) (d. 261/874–5 or 234/848–9),[3] commonly known in the Iranian world as Bāyazīd Basṭāmī (Persian: بایزید بسطامی), was a Persian[4][5][6][7] Sufi from north-central Iran.[5][8] Known to future Sufis as Sultān-ul-Ārifīn ("King of the Gnostics"), Bisṭāmī is considered to be one of the expositors of the state of fanā, the notion of dying in mystical union with Allah.[9] Bastami was famous for "the boldness of his expression of the mystic’s complete absorption into the mysticism."[10] Many "ecstatic utterances" (شطحات shatˤħāt) have been attributed to Bisṭāmī, which lead to him being known as the "drunken" or "ecstatic" (Arabic: سُكْر, sukr) school of Islamic mysticism. Such utterance may be argued as, Bisṭāmī died with mystical union and the deity is speaking through his tongue.[9] Bisṭāmī also claimed to have ascended through the seven heavens in his dream. His journey, known as the Mi'raj of Bisṭāmī, is clearly patterned on the Mi'raj of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.[9] Bisṭāmī is characterized in three different ways: a free thinking radical, a pious Sufi who is deeply concerned with following the shari'a and engaging in "devotions beyond the obligatory," and a pious individual who is presented as having a dream similar to the Mi'raj of Muhammed.[11] The Mi'raj of Bisṭāmī seems as if Bisṭāmī is going through a self journey; as he ascends through each heaven, Bisṭāmī is gaining knowledge in how he communicates with the angels (e.g. languages and gestures) and the number of angels he encounters increases.

His grandfather Surūshān was born a Zoroastrian,[12] an indication that Bastami had Persian heritage, despite the fact that his transmitted sayings are in Arabic. Very little is known about the life of Bastami, whose importance lies in his biographical tradition, since he left no written works. The early biographical reports portray him as a wanderer[13] but also as the leader of teaching circles.[14] The early biographers describe him as a mystic who dismissed excessive asceticism;[15] but who was also scrupulous about ritual purity, to the point of washing his tongue before chanting God's names.[16] He also appreciated the work of the great jurists.[17] A measure that shows how influential his image remains in posterity is the fact that he is named in the lineage (silsila) of one of the largest Sufi brotherhoods today, the Naqshbandi order.[18]

  1. ^ 'by the certified Mr. T'
  2. ^ Abdul Karim (2012). "Bayejid Bostami". In Sirajul Islam; Jamal, Ahmed A. (eds.). Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.
  3. ^ The Darvishes: Or Oriental Spiritualism By John Pair Brown, p. 141
  4. ^ Irwin, Robert, ed. (2010). The new Cambridge history of Islam, Volume 4 (1. publ. ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 72. ISBN 978-0-521-83824-5.
  5. ^ a b Walbridge, John. "Suhrawardi and Illumination" in "The Cambridge Companion to Arabic Philosophy" edited by Peter Adamson, Richard C. Taylor, Cambridge University Press, 2005. pg 206.
  6. ^ Shaked, Shaul (August 20, 1999). "Quests and Visionary Journeys in Sasanian Iran". In Assmann, Jan; Stroumsa, Guy (eds.). Transformations of the Inner Self in Ancient Religions. BRILL. p. 71. ISBN 978-90-04-11356-5. Still earlier, in the short sayings of another great Muslim mystic of Persian origin, Abū Yazīd al-Bistāmī, written down from oral transmission, we have several examples of a similar schematic movement of life.
  7. ^ Yazaki, Saeko (December 8, 2014). "Morality in Early Sufi Literature". In Ridgeon, Lloyd (ed.). The Cambridge Companion to Sufism. Cambridge University Press. p. 77. ISBN 978-1107679504. Rejection of this world is also manifest in a saying by the famous Persian Sufi Abū Yazīd al-Bistāmī (d. c. 261/875): "This world is nothing; how can one renounce it?"
  8. ^ Mojaddedi, Jawid, “al-Bisṭāmī, Abū Yazīd (Bāyazīd)”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE, Edited by: Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, Everett Rowson.
  9. ^ a b c Hermansen, Marcia K. "Early Islamic Mysticism: Sufi, Quran, Miraj, Poetic, and Theological Writings by Sells Michael.(The Classics of Western Spirituality Series) 398 pages, appendix, notes, bibliography, index. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1996. $24.95 (Paper) ISBN 0-8091-3619-8." Review of Middle East Studies 31.2 (1997): 172-173. (p.212)
  10. ^ Muslim Saints and Mystics: Episodes from the Tadhkirat al-Auliya’ (Memorial of the Saints) (Ames: Omphaloskepsis, 2000), p. 119
  11. ^ Hermansen, Marcia K. "Early Islamic Mysticism: Sufi, Quran, Miraj, Poetic, and Theological Writings by Sells Michael.(The Classics of Western Spirituality Series) 398 pages, appendix, notes, bibliography, index. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1996. $24.95 (Paper) ISBN 0-8091-3619-8." Review of Middle East Studies 31.2 (1997): 172-173. (p.213)
  12. ^ Böwering, Gerhard. "BESṬĀMĪ, BĀYAZĪD". iranicaonline.org. Encyclopaedia Iranica. Retrieved 2 April 2017.
  13. ^ Abū Nuʿaym ʿAlī b. Sahl Iṣfahānī, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ, 10 vols., Cairo 1932–8, 10:33
  14. ^ Al-Iṣfahānī, 10:34
  15. ^ Al-Iṣfahānī, 10: 36–7
  16. ^ Al-Iṣfahānī, 10:35
  17. ^ Al-Iṣfahānī, 10: 36
  18. ^ Mojaddedi, “al-Bisṭāmī, Abū Yazīd (Bāyazīd)”, Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE