ʿAdī ibn Musāfir

Sheikh Adi's grave in Lalish

Sheikh ʿAdī ibn Musāfir al-Hakkārī ( Arabic عدي بن مسافر الاموي, Kurdish شێخ ئادی کوڕی موسافیری ئومەوی Şêx Adî ; * between 1073 and 1078 in Bait Fār near Baalbek in Lebanon ; † 1162 or 1163 in Lalisch ), also called Sheikh (Sheikh) Adi von Baalbek , was a Yazidi head who founded one of the first Sufi orders and is considered the most important saint of the Yazidis . A shrine of his is still standing in Bait Fār today. However, he is venerated there as a Sufi saint and is not associated with Yezidism. According to another source, he came from the area of the Hakkari Mountains in what is now northern Iraq or southeastern Anatolia. According to this source, only his grandfather was from Bait Fār.

Life

ʿAdī ibn Musāfir (Abu Sufi ibn Salaf Sheikh Adi) was a descendant of the Umayyad caliph Marwan I. He spent his youth in Baghdad, where he studied with the Sufi master Hammād ad-Dabbās, who was also the teacher of ʿAbd al-Qādir al -Jīlānī was. After various trips he settled in the mountains of Hakkari in Iraq, where he met the Yazidis, stayed with them and continued his Sufi training with ʿUqail al-Manbijī, Abū l-Wafā al-Hulwānī and other sheikhs.

The Adawiyya order tradition founded by ʿAdī and named after him spread over the entire Middle East, especially to Syria and Egypt. For example, Chidr al-Mihrānī, the sheikh of the Mamluk ruler Baibars I , was a member of this order. Over time, the Kurdish tribes from the Hakkari area also joined his order.

Four writings have survived from Sheikh ʿAdī : The Sunni Doctrine of Faith ( Iʿtiqād ahl as-sunna ), The Book on the Formation of the Soul ( Kitāb fī-hi ḏikr ādāb an-nafs ), Instructions from Sheikh ʿAdī ibn Musāfir to the successor ( Waṣāyā AS-Shaykh Sheikh Adi ibn Musafir Ila l-Khalīfah ) and instructions to his pupil, the leading Sheikh, and the remaining murids ( Wasaya li-Muridi-hi AS-Shaykh al-Qa'id wa-li-Sa'ir al-murīdīn ). In terms of content, they do not deviate from traditional Islamic teaching. This agrees with the statement of the Hanbali scholar Ibn Taimiyya , who described Sheikh ʿAdī as a sincere Muslim who followed the Prophet's Sunnah .

Sheikh ʿAdī died childless in 1162/63 and was buried in Lalish. The ʿAdawīya order was continued by his nephew Abu l-Barakāt ibn Sachr ibn Musāfir . Within this order the veneration for the sheikh was so strong that one made his grave the new qibla . Because of this, the grave was desecrated in 1414 by angry Muslims and its bones desecrated. The grave was later rebuilt.

Adoration by the Yazidis

The sarcophagus of ʿAdī ibn Musāfir in Lalish

The portal to the tomb of Sheikh ʿAdī in the middle of the 19th century, color version and inscriptions at that time

Sheikh ʿAdī is seen by the Yazidis as the renewer of their religion and at the same time as the reincarnation of Melek Taus - through Ezid and Ezda - as the world eye who came to help the Yazidis in a difficult situation. From a Yazidi point of view, he is said to have been a Yazidis from birth and to have received his extraordinary spiritual abilities from Tausi Melek personally. Sheikh Adi's grandfather is said to have lived in the mountains of Hakkari until he was forced to emigrate to Syria . The Yazidis point out that in a speech with Sheikh Shems, the then head of all Yazidis, Sheikh Adi assured him that he would accept the beliefs of the Sheikh Shems family for himself.

At the grave of Sheikh Adi in Lalisch, every year from 6th to 13th October the Yazidi "Feast of the Assembly" (Jashne Jimaiye) takes place.

In a Qewl of the Yazidis it says:

“Hey birîndarê Mêrano, Siltan Şîxadiyê, Li hemû derday dermane. (Qewlê Şêxê Hesenî Siltane) "

“Oh wounded among the people, Sultan Sheikh Adi is the cure for all diseases. (Hymn of Sheikh Hasan the Sultan) "

literature

Arabic sources

Shams ad-Dīn aḏ-Ḏahabī : Siyar aʿlām al-nubalāʾ. Ed. Shuʿaib al-Arnaʾūṭ and Muḥammad Naʿīm al-Arqasūsī. Muʾassasat ar-Risāla, Beirut 1985. Vol. XX, pp. 342-344. Digitized
Al-Maqrīzī : al-Sulūk fī maʿrifat duwal al-mulūk . Ed. Saʿīd ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ al-ʿĀšūr. Cairo 1972. Vol. IV, pp. 292-294. Digitized

Secondary literature

Birgül Açikyildiz: "The Sanctuary of Shaykh ʿAdī at Lalish: Center of Pilgrimage of the Yezidis" in Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 72/2 (2009) 301-333.
Zourabi A. Aloiane: “Re-construction of Šayḫ ʿAdī b. Musāfir's biography on the basis of Arabic and Kurdish sources ”in The Arabist (Budapest) 18 (1996) 95-104.
Rudolf Frank: Sheikh ʿAdî, the great saint of the Jezîdîs . Turkish Library, Vol. 14. Berlin 1911. Digitized
John S. Guest: Survival among the Kurds. A history of the Yezidis . Kegan, London and New York, 1993. pp. 15-29.
Philip G. Kreyenbroek; Khalil Jindy Rashow: God and Sheikh Adi are perfect: sacred poems and religious narratives from the Yezidi tradition . Wiesbaden 2005.
Sebastian Maisel: Yezidis in Syria - Identity Buidling among a Double Minority . Lanham [u. a.], Lexington Books, 2017.
N. Siouffi: "Notice sur le Chéikh ʿAdi et la Secte des Yézidis" in Journal Asiatique 8/5 (1885) 78-100.
AS Tritton: Art. "ʿAdī ibn Musāfir" in The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition Vol. I, pp. 195a-196a.

supporting documents

↑ Maisel: Yezidis in Syria - Identity Buidling among a Double Minority , p. 78.
^ Peter Lamborn Wilson , Karl Schlamminger: Weaver of Tales. Persian Picture Rugs / Persian tapestries. Linked myths. Callwey, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-7667-0532-6 , pp. 30–45 ( The Devils / Die Demonen ), p. 31.
↑ See Philip G. Kreyenbroek: Yezidism - Its Background, Observances and and Textual Tradition. Lewiston et al. a. 1995. p. 28 f.
↑ Cf. Henri Laoust : Les Schismes dans l'Islam. Introduction à une étude de la religion musulmane. Paris 1983. p. 285.
↑ Cf. Irene Dulz: The Yezidis in Iraq. Between “model village” and escape. Münster 2001, p. 32.
↑ See Dulz 32.
↑ See Dulz 33.
↑ Philip G. Kreyenbroek and Khalil Jindi Rashow: God and Sheikh Adi are Perfect: Sacred Poems and Religious Narratives from the Yezidi Tradition . Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005. p. 335. Digitized

personal data
SURNAME	ʿAdī ibn Musāfir
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Sheikh Adi Ibn Mustafa; Sheikh Adi Ibn Musafir al Umawi; (Arabic)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Reformer of the Yazidi faith
DATE OF BIRTH	between 1073 and 1078
PLACE OF BIRTH	Bait Fāar near Baalbek , Lebanon
DATE OF DEATH	1162 or 1163
Place of death	Lalisch

[1] Maisel: Yezidis in Syria - Identity Buidling among a Double Minority , p. 78.

[2] Peter Lamborn Wilson , Karl Schlamminger: Weaver of Tales. Persian Picture Rugs / Persian tapestries. Linked myths. Callwey, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-7667-0532-6 , pp. 30–45 ( The Devils / Die Demonen ), p. 31.

[3] See Philip G. Kreyenbroek: Yezidism - Its Background, Observances and and Textual Tradition. Lewiston et al. a. 1995. p. 28 f.

[4] Cf. Henri Laoust : Les Schismes dans l'Islam. Introduction à une étude de la religion musulmane. Paris 1983. p. 285.

[5] Cf. Irene Dulz: The Yezidis in Iraq. Between “model village” and escape. Münster 2001, p. 32.

[6] See Dulz 32.

[7] See Dulz 33.

[8] Philip G. Kreyenbroek and Khalil Jindi Rashow: God and Sheikh Adi are Perfect: Sacred Poems and Religious Narratives from the Yezidi Tradition . Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005. p. 335. Digitized