Pir (Sufism)

Pir Dastgir Sahib, who is venerated in an elaborately designed shrine in Srinagar , North India . Indian miniature painting in Mughal style, late 18th century

Pīr ( Persian پير, 'Old, wise man') is the honorable title of a spiritual master in Sufism in the Turkish, Kurdish and Persian-speaking countries . The distribution area of the title extends from the Balkans, Anatolia , the Iranian highlands , southern Central Asia including the Pamir Mountains to southern India. Sufi missionaries addressed as Pīr also reached South Africa.

A Pīr can be the founder of a Sufi order ( Tariqa ), which is often posthumously viewed as the patron saint. The Persian title corresponds to the sheikh in Arabic and, among other things, to baba in Turkish. Regionally, Pīr and Murschid (teachers of the Murīden ) are equated or differentiated from one another. In Pakistan a distinction can be made between the Murschid as the spiritual teacher and the Pīr as a revered saint. Another word for the holy Pīr is wali .

In the Islamic folk religion in Bangladesh , the holy Satya Pir is venerated. Another saint in Bangladesh who is venerated by Muslims and Hindus alike is Manik Pir. The beginnings of this cult are probably in the 15th / 16th centuries. Century. Wandering street singers glorify him in folk songs ( manik pirer gan ). Pīrs were a major factor in the Islamization of Bengal in the 18th and 19th centuries. Century.

Among the Yazidis , a distinction is made between sheiks and pires, because sheiks and pires form two different classes in the Yazidis' religious class system, which is hereditarily linked to families.

Examples

literature

Pīr. In: The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition . Volume 8, 1995, pp. 306f

Individual evidence

^ Adrian C. Mayer: "Pīr" and "Murshid": An Aspect of Religious Leadership in West Pakistan. In: Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 3, No. 2, January 1967, pp. 160-169, here p. 161
↑ Satya Pir. Banglapedia
^ Syed Jamil Ahmed: Performing and Supplicating Mānik. Pīr: Infrapolitics in the Domain of Popular Islam. In: TDR (1988-) , Vol. 53, No. 2, Sommer, 2009, pp. 51-76
↑ Subhajyoti Ray: Transformations on the Bengal Frontier: Jalpaiguri, 1765-1948. Routledge Shorton, London 2002, p. 52

[1] Adrian C. Mayer: "Pīr" and "Murshid": An Aspect of Religious Leadership in West Pakistan. In: Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 3, No. 2, January 1967, pp. 160-169, here p. 161

[2] Satya Pir. Banglapedia

[3] Syed Jamil Ahmed: Performing and Supplicating Mānik. Pīr: Infrapolitics in the Domain of Popular Islam. In: TDR (1988-) , Vol. 53, No. 2, Sommer, 2009, pp. 51-76

[4] Subhajyoti Ray: Transformations on the Bengal Frontier: Jalpaiguri, 1765-1948. Routledge Shorton, London 2002, p. 52