Shi'ite Sufi Masters against Islamic Fundamentalism in 19th-Century Persia
THE RISE OF THE NI‘MATULLĀHĪ ORDER SHI‘ITE SUFI MASTERS AGAINST ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM IN 19TH-CENTURY PERSIA REZA TABANDEH
This insightful study is an astute and sensitive portrayal of one of the world’s most important repositories of esoteric Islam, the Niʿmatullahi Sufi order. Drawing upon an impressive range of sources, many still in manuscript form, Reza Tabandeh paints a compelling and fascinating portrait of the history and spiritual traditions of this Shiʿi community of mystics.
– Oliver Scharbrodt, University of Birmingham.
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IRANIAN STUDIES
By bringing sensory studies to the study of Persian literature and culture, Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses: Sensory Readings of Persian Literature and Culture inaugurates a new chapter for Iranian and M. Mehdi Khorrami is Professor Emeritus of Persian Studies at New York University. studies. Thisessays, volume a diverse set of He is the author of aPersian number of monographs, andoffers book chapters on the rhetorical and aesthetic dynamics of Persian modernist writing and contemporary readings across periods, genres and forms throughout Persian prison literature. Persian literary history, demonstrating the value of Amir Moosavi is an assistant Professor in the Department of English at Rutgers UniversityNewark. His teaching, research and writing focus Persian and Arabic literatures. sensory studies asonanmodern approach to Persian cultural This book makes a significant and original contribution to the disciplines Little production, literary or otherwise. Therelated. book’s chapters scholarship exits on the topic. − Claudia Yaghoobi, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill conceptualize sensory aesthetics in the context of Persian literature and suggest ways in which studies can […] the essays offer ground-breaking studies that demonstrate how Persian sensory literature and other areas of cultural production can be understood beyond the well-worn framework beSensory used to reimagine andproposed enrich inexisting to of socio-political context. readings such as those this book approaches expand Persian literature and art beyond the confines of area studies and open the possibility literature. volume sheds light on the scope of for comparative literaryPersian studies across languages The and cultures. − Samad Alavi, University of Oslo Persianate sensoria over the long, rich history of Persian letters. In doing so, it also offers a new model for a comparative approach to the study of Persian literary works through the larger field of sensory studies.
This aptly-titled collected volume, Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses: Sensory Readings in Persian Literature and Culture, marks a momentous and welcome shift away from the conventional socio-political and allegorical LEIDEN UNIVERSITY PRESS readings of Persian literature. Ranging in their focus from www.lup.nl the Classical to modern literary and cultural production, the nine chapters, complemented with a refined introduction, chart new paths for a more nuanced appreciation of the Iranian literary and cultural traditions. Reza Tabandeh received his PhD in Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter. He is currently a researcher on Islam and Sufism at Brock University, Canada.
– Shafique Virani, University of Toronto.
A valuable and accessible work on the revival of Sufism in 19th century Iran. Tabandeh illustrates successfully the precarious efforts of Ni‘matullahi Sufis to carve out their space in the religious landscape of Iranian Twelver Shiism.
Sensory Readings of Persian Literature and Culture
By bringing sensory studies to the study of Persian literature and culture, Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses: Sensory Readings of Persian Literature and Culture inaugurates a new chapter for Iranian and Persian studies. This volume offers a diverse set of readings across periods, genres and forms throughout Persian literary history, demonstrating the value of sensory studies as an approach to Persian cultural production, literary or otherwise. The book’s chapters conceptualize sensory aesthetics in the context of Persian literature and suggest ways in which sensory studies can be used to reimagine and enrich existing approaches to Persian literature. The volume sheds light on the scope of Persianate sensoria over the long, rich history of Persian letters. In doing so, it also offers a new model for a comparative approach to the study of Persian literary works through the larger field of sensory studies.
IRANIAN STUDIES SERIES Publication date June 2021 NUR 717, 718 ISBN 9789087283674 epdf 9789400604124 Language English Price € 59.50 £ 52.- $ 72.Format Paperback illustrated 156 x 234 mm Page extent 320 pages Cover design Tarek Atrissi Imprint LUP Academic
– Nasrin Rahimieh, University of California, Irvine.
Shams of Tabriz, that enigmatic master of poet Rumi, is supposed to have said of himself: ‘You will see my state if your ears turn into eyes.’ In this book we see not only the mutuality and interdependence of the mind and the senses, not just the vocal, the visual and the tactile, or the sounds and smells of our world, but an entire universe in constant acts of making and remaking of the mental and material worlds we live in. Such a collection, rare as it may be in comprehending Persian culture and its amazingly rich literature, occupies a central niche of understanding, at once unique and essential, to all that makes and unmakes us in the diverse mental and sensuous worlds we live in. – Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, University of Maryland.
LOSING OUR MINDS, COMING TO OUR SENSES SENSORY READINGS OF PERSIAN LITERATURE AND CULTURE M. MEHDI KHORRAMI AND AMIR MOOSAVI (EDS)
M. Mehdi Khorrami and Amir Moosavi (eds)
Reza Tabandeh
How were the Ni‘matullāhī masters successful in reviving Ni‘matullāhī Sufism in Shi‘ite Persia? This book investigates the revival of the Ni‘matullāhī Sufi order after the death of the last Indian Ni‘matullāhī master, Riḍā ‘Alī Shāh (d. 1214/1799) in the Deccan. After the fall of Safavids, the revival movement of Ni‘matullāhī order began with the arrival in Persia of the enthusiastic Indian Sufi master, Ma‘ṣūm ‘Alī Shāh, during the last quarter of the eighteenth century. Later, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Persian masters of the Ni‘matullāhī Order were able to solidify the order’s place in the mystical and theological milieu of Persia. Ma‘ṣūm ‘Alī Shāh and his disciples soon spread their mystical and ecstatic beliefs all over Persia. They succeeded in converting a large mass of Persians to Sufi teachings, despite the opposition and persecution they faced from Shi‘ite clerics, who were politically and socially the most influential class in Persia. The book demonstrates that Ḥusayn ‘Alī Shāh, Majdhūb ‘Alī Shāh, and Mast ‘Alī Shāh were able to consolidate the social and theological role of the Ni‘matullāhī order by reinterpreting and articulating classical Sufi teachings in the light of Persian Shi‘ite mystical theology.
Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses
Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses
The Rise of the Ni‘matullāhī Order
M. Mehdi Khorrami and Amir Moosavi (eds) The Rise of the Ni‘matullāhī Order
UNIVERSITY PRESS nl
Reza Tabandeh
M. Mehdi Khorrami is Professor Emeritus of Persian Studies at New York University. Amir Moosavi is an assistant professor in the Department of English at Rutgers University-Newark.
IRANIAN STUDIES SERIES Publication date July 2021 NUR 635 ISBN 9789087283681 epdf 9789400604148 Language English Price € 59.50 £ 52.- $ 72.Format Paperback illustrated 156 x 234 mm Page extent 280 pages Cover design Tarek Atrissi Imprint LUP Academic
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