ABSTRACT
The study of Islam is usually limited to the legal, philosophical, political, sociological, literary, religious and historical aspects of the tradition. When I inquired into spiritual dimensions of Islam within the larger doctrinal tradition, the superficial dichotomy between ulamå – the trained scholars – and s≠f⁄s (mystics of Islam) was the accepted model of presenting the subject. Some legitimate s≠f⁄s were masters of the inner spiritual life of Islam, while the ulamå were the true religious authorities of the Islamic tradition. In recent years, excellent scholarship by Carl Ernst, William Chittick, and Annemarie Schimmel and many others has demonstrated the false pretense in documenting constructions of antis≠f⁄ rhetoric.1 The modern period is filled with many complexities of secular versus religious thinking, science versus philosophy, western versus eastern civilizations, developed versus underdeveloped societies, male versus female, and so on, which has set a cycle of dichotomous models as the natural way of studying traditions. As a result, there is a center of authorities that has control over real knowledge and then on the periphery are opposition groups who are perceived, understood, and presented as fringe irrational esoteric minded individuals. However, many individuals who characterized the s≠f⁄ tradition in these definitions, which are transparent categories, have constructed it with modern agendas or never studied the basic concepts of s≠f⁄ knowledge.
