Bāyazīd Bistāmī

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Mausoleum and mosque in Bastam / Semnan Province

Bāyazīd Bistāmī , actually Abū Yazīd Taifūr ibn ʿĪsā al-Bistāmī ( Persian ابو يزيد طيفور پور عيسى پور آدم پور سروشان بسطامى, DMG Abū Yazīd Ṭeifūr-Pūr-e 'Īsā-Pūr-e Ādam-Pūr-e Sorūšān-e Basṭāmī * 803 in Bastam , Semnan Province , Iran ; † 875 ) was a Persian Islamic mystic of Sufism .

Life

Bāyazīd's grandfather was a Zoroastrian from Persia who converted to Islam. According to early Islamic biographies, Bāyazīd lived in strict asceticism and meditation. As with many other Sufis, starvation and poverty were an important part of his spiritual path. Besides Ibrahim ibn Adham , he is the only known early Sufi of whom a celibate life has been recorded. Bāyazīd did not write any books, the essence of his teaching is passed down through his disciples.

Bāyazīd was the first Sufi to believe that he had achieved his own dissolution ( fana ). He peeled himself out of his ego and reached isolation. At times he has achieved unity between the beloved, the lover and love. Orientalists see here an influence from Indian teachings, especially from the Indian philosopher Shankara . Contemporary Sufis doubted this success and regretted Bāyazīd for his error, including Junaid and al-Hallādj . They said that Bāyazīd only came to the threshold of fana and stood there.

The grave tower ( gumbad ) of his mausoleum in Bastam is a particularly characteristic example of a tower type from the 11th to 14th centuries.

Bāyazīd as an intoxicated figure

In many popular texts, Bāyazīd, as an intoxicated Sufi, forms the opposite pole to the sober Sufi, who is represented by his contemporary Junaid . Both figures belong to a tradition of interpretation that was founded in the 11th century with al-Hudschwiri's Sufi handbook Kashf al-mahjub . The intoxication ( sukr ) of Bāyazīd in this context does not only mean drunkenness or drug intoxication, but can also be understood as passionate, loving ecstasy. Bāyazīd's uncontrolled intoxication is discussed in these texts as a functioning but inferior form of approaching God, while the sober way of Junaid is presented as the superior variant. It is unclear how closely Bāyazid's life corresponds to these anecdotes, most likely that the Sufi was chosen for this role by later writers both for his remarkable ecstatic ability and for his high-level failed union with God.

Works

  • Sufi Bayezid Bastâmi: "Light on Light": Sayings and instructions. Verlag Heilbronn, Heilbronn 1990, ISBN 3-923000-51-0

literature

  • Ulrich Holbein : I went to God without myself : | I went to God without myself. Life pictures of funny dervishes. Synergia Verlag, 2014, ISBN 978-3-944615-16-5 pp. 42– 102
  • Ulrich Holbein: Narratorium . 255 images of life. Ammann Verlag , Zurich 2008, ISBN 978-3-250-10523-7 . Pp. 117-120.
  • Ulrich Holbein (ed.): I went to Allah without myself in: This sea has no banks . Classic Sufi mysticism. Marix Verlag, Wiesbaden 2009, ISBN 978-3-86539-207-7 . Pp. 263-315
  • Adel Theodor Khoury : Bistami (Abu Yazid al-Bistami). In: Adel Theodor Khoury, Ludwig Hagemann, Peter Heine: Islam-Lexikon. History - idea - design. Herder, Freiburg / Basel / Vienna 1991, Volume 1, pp. 129 ff.
  • Louis Massignon: Essai sur les origines du lexique technique de la mystique musulmane. 2nd Edition. Paris 1968, pp. 273-286. (1st edition 1922)
  • Hellmut Ritter : The sayings of Bayezid Bistami. A preliminary sketch . In: West-Eastern Treatises. Rudolf Tschudi presented by friends and students on his 70th birthday. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden 1954, pp. 231-243.

Web links

Commons : Bayazid Bastami  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ al-Qushayri, Abu 'l-Qasim (2007). Alexander D. Knysh ; Muhammad Eissa, ed.Al-Qushayri's Epistle on Sufism: Al-Risala al-qushayriyya fi ʿilm al-tasawwuf. Alexander D. Knysh (trans.) (1st ed.). Garnet Pub., Reading UK, ISBN 978-1-85964-186-6 , p. 32.
  2. ↑ a b c Eliade, Mircea: History of Religious Ideas , Volume III / 1. Herder, Freiburg 1983, pp. 126-127.
  3. ^ Valerie J. Hoffman: Eating and fasting for God in Sufi tradition . In: Journal of the American Academy of Religion , 1995, p. 470.
  4. ^ Tor Andræ: In the Garden of Myrtles: Studies in Early Islamic Mysticism . State University of New York Press, Albany 1987, p. 46.
  5. ↑ Robert Hillenbrand : The Flanged Tower at Bastam. In: Ders .: Studies in Medieval Islamic Architecture. Volume 2. The Pindar Press, London 2006, p. 379
  6. ↑ Jawid A. Mojaddedi: Getting Drunk with Abu Yazīd or Staying Sober with Junayd: The Creation of a Popular Typology of Sufism . In: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , University of London, Vol. 66, No. 1 (2003), p. 1
  7. ^ Matthew Long: Intoxication . In: John Andrew Morrow (Ed.): Islamic Images and Ideas: Essays on Sacred Symbolism . Pp. 75-100.
  8. ↑ Jawid A. Mojaddedi: Getting Drunk with Abu Yazīd or Staying Sober with Junayd: The Creation of a Popular Typology of Sufism . In: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , University of London Vol. 66, No. 1 (2003), pp. 12-13.
personal data
SURNAME Bistāmī, Bāyazīd
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bistami, Abu Yazid; Bistami, Bayezid
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Persian Islamic Mystic (Sufi)
DATE OF BIRTH 803
PLACE OF BIRTH Bistam , Iran
DATE OF DEATH 875