Revealed Grace : The Juristic Sufism of Ahmad Sirhindi

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Revealed Grace :
The Juristic Sufism of Ahmad Sirhindi,
Selection of the Letters of
Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi Naqshbandi Mujaddidi,
*[A5+] Large Paperback - 343 pages,
by Arthur F. Buehler,
Published by Fons Vitae.

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Description :

Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi (Mujaddid Alf-e-Sani), rahmatullahi 'alayhi, is considered one of the founding figures of the renowned Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi lineage. In this book, Shaykh Sirhindi's principal teachings, originally written in Persian, are translated into English and explained in detail. Offering access to the spiritual experiences and contemplative practices of a great 16th-century Sufi, this account demonstrates why there are so few other texts that have continued to impact Muslims in the eastern Islamic world.

Reviews :

1]. Buehler has achieved a groundbreaking translation of a substantial portion of Sirhindi’s Letters, a mystical and philosophical masterpiece that has to date remained largely inaccessible to a Western audience. The work, masterfully introduced and meticulously annotated, is academically rigorous while yet taking seriously the author’s contemplative experiences, mapping the inner and cosmic landscape against which they emerge._{— Marcia Hermansen, Director, Islamic World Studies Program, Loyola University}.

2]. The Letters of Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi are widely recognized as a remarkable and influential storehouse of Sufi experience and reflection. Arthur Buehler’s meticulous translation and explanation of these important yet difficult texts is a major contribution to the study of Islamic mysticism._{— Carl W. Ernst, William R. Kenan, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill}.

3]. This selection of letters furnishes the contemporary reader with an unusually rare glimpse into the formidably vast, yet finely textured, lifeworld of a towering figure in the history of Sufism, one whose teachings resonated far beyond the South Asian ambit in which they were initially nurtured.
Undeterred by the notoriously elliptical Indo-Persian prose of the Maktubat, Arthur Buehler’s judiciously selected and skillfully rendered translations make an important contribution to our understanding of this acclaimed “Renewer of the Second Millennium,” a contribution which in the spirit of Ahmad Sirhindi himself cannot but lead one to reconsider much of what has come before. _{— Erik S. Ohlander, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne}.

Table of Contents :

---Dedication,

---Translator’s Preface:
------Disclaimers and Confessions,
------Degrees of Traductor Traittore,
------The Language Barrier,
------The Time Barrier : Beyond Language,
------Other Books on al-Sirhindi and Use of Previous Translations,
------What is in and what is not in this translation,
------Kudos for Translators,
------Acknowledgements.

---Introduction,
------Contextualising the long 16th Century in India,
------Preconceived Perceptions of Pious People,
------Who was Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi ?
------Ahmad Sirhindi as the Renewer of the Second Millennium,
------Dimensions of Ahmad Sirhindi's Universe,
------The Microcosm,
------The Mujaddidi Path,
------Shari'at in Sirhindis' Juristic Sufism,
------The Collected Letters,
------Pointers for reading this translation.

Chapter [I]: Shari'at, Sunnat, and Jurists 63,
---The basics of faith: Letter 2.67, page 63,
---Shariat: Letter 2.46, page 81,
---The seven levels of the Sunnat: Letter 2.54, page 90,
---Islam and other religious communities: Letter 2.55, page 97,
---Is there a place beyond the shari'at? Letter 1.172, page 105,
---Differences between sufis and jurists: Letter 3.39, page 108,
---Similarities between sufis and jurists: Letter 3.32, page 109.

Chapter [II]: Contemplative experience 115,
---One of Sirhindi’s early contemplative experiences: Letter 1.11, page 115,
---Sirhindi’s further contemplative development: Letter 1.13, page 124,
---Types of certainty and stations on the sufi path: Letter 1.18, page 126,
---Sirhindi’s culminating contemplative experience: Letter 1.290, page 135,
---Realizing unity with God: Letter 1.291, page 159.

Chapter [III]: Aspects of the Sufi path 169,
---Getting beyond the ego-self : Letter 1.52, page 169,
---Encouraging a youth to the sufi path: Letter 1.73, page 172,
---The expanse of the heart: Letter 3.45, page 178,
---Shadows versus the Essence: Letter 2.42, page 180,
---The sufi path: Letter 2.71, page 195,
---Reprimanding a beginner: Letter 2.77, page 197,
---Types of seekers on the path: Letter 1.292, page 201,
---The end is included in the beginning: Letter 1.200, page 208,
---Evaluating spiritual rank: Letter 1.293, page 212,
---Those who think they are further along than they are: Letter 1.220, page 218,
---Naqshbandi Cosmology: Letter 1.257, page 224,
---Sirhindi interpreting verses of Sharafuddin Maneri: Letter 3.33, page 227.

Chapter [IV]: Sufi treatise 1:
---Letter 1.260, page 233.

Chapter [V]: Sufi treatise 2:
---Letter 1.287, page 266.

---Selected Bibliography, page 301.

The Author : Arthur F. Buehler is a senior lecturer in the Department of Religious Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. He is senior editor of the Journal of the History of Sufism. He is also the author of Sufi Heirs of the Prophet ; The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of the Mediating Sufi Shaykh (Pir Jamaat Ali Shah).