ABSTRACT
Focusing on the mystical centres and networks in Baghdād and Nīshāpūr, this chapter is a follow up from the previous one. The sources surveyed expose details of the spiritual landscape in these centres during the ninth–tenth centuries. They also shed light on the transition in Ṣūfī history after the death of the central masters there: al-Junayd in Baghdād and Abū Saʿīd al-Ḥīrī in Nīshāpūr. This transition entailed two monumental events: he inclusion of the mystical school of Nīshāpūr within the school of Baghdād and the shift of Islamic mysticism from local centres into a global mystical movement known as Ṣūfism. At the heart of the chapter is a narrative concerning the pilgrimage of Ibn al-Munāzil, a malāmatī from Nīshāpūr. Surprisingly, it is al-Shiblī, a renowned Ṣūfī of the Baghdādī school, who instructs Ibn Munāzil in the correct way to perform the ḥajj. The didactic exchange between the two throws light on that historical moment when the two centres amalgamated. This transition heralded also the emergence of the literary genre known as Ṣūfī compilations (or manuals), which portray Ṣūfism as an all-inclusive Islamic mystical system.
