ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī

Shihāb ad-Dīn Abū Hafs ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī ( Arabic شهاب الدين أبو حفص عمر السهروردي, DMG Shihāb ad-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī ; born January 27, 1145 in Suhraward; died September 26, 1234 in Baghdad ) was one of the most important Persian Sunni Sufis from Khorezmia and nephew of Abu an-Najib as-Suhrawardi . He worked in the Baghdad area. He expanded the Sufi order of Suhrawardiyya , which had been founded by his uncle Abu al-Najib Suhrawardi, for which he received the support of the Abbasid caliph an-Nāsir li-Dīn Allah .

Suhrawardi Mausoleum in Iraq (2017)

Life

As-Suhrawardi came from the Banū ʿAmmūya, a well-known family of religious scholars and Sufis, to which his Abū n-Nadschīb also belonged and who traced their family tree to Abū Bakr . His father had studied and taught at the Nizāmīya in Baghdad and was a judge in Suhraward. He was executed on slander when as-Suhrawardi was six months old. As-Suhrawardī came to Baghdad at a young age. He received his first religious instruction from his uncle Abū n-Nadschīb as-Suhrawardī, who was already a well-known Sufi and whom he often mentions in his main work ʿAwārif al-maʿārif . He is also said to have met with ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī . After the death of his uncle Abū n-Najīb in 1168, as-Suhrawardī worked as a preacher and led mystical meetings. He often drove his listeners into ecstasy.

The caliph an-Nāsir li-Dīn Alāh made as-Suhrawardī head of a ribāt in Baghdad in 1183 and appointed him public preacher in 1205. He also sent him on several diplomatic missions, so in 1207/08 to the Ayyubids , 1217/18 to the Khorezm Shahs and in 1221 to the court of the Rum Seljuk Kai Kobad I. In 1231 as-Suhrawardī carried out the Hajj to Mecca. He died in Baghdad at the age of 90 years and was in a Turba buried in the Sufi cemetery Maqbarat al-Wardiyya.

Works

• ʿAwārif al-maʿārif ("The gifts of knowledge"), comprehensive manual on Sufik and at the same time his main work. As-Suhrawardī wrote it before 1208 and used it as a textbook among his students from that time. According to Richard Gramlich, who translated the work into German, it is "the end point and at the same time the climax of the classic orthodox Sufi manual literature". The work was conveyed to India and Persia by students, where it was commented on several times and translated into Persian. In the Sufi orders of the Suhrawardīya and the Tschishīya it remained the most important Sufi textbook until the beginning of the 16th century. The work has also been translated into Ottoman-Turkish several times.
• Rašf an-naṣāʾiḥ al-īmānīya wa-kašf al-faḍāʾiḥ al-Yūnānīya , pamphlet for Islam against the study of Greek philosophy, dedicated to the caliph an-Nāsir li-Dīn Allāh.
• Iʿlām al-hudā wa-ʿaqīdat arbāb at-tuqā , tract, written in 1234, in which as-Suhrawardī tries to explain the theological arguments of the Ashʿarīya to the Hanbalites .
• Nuġbat al-bayān fī tafsīr al-Qurʾān , Quran commentary.
• ar-Raḥīq al-maḫtūm li-ḏawī lʿuqūl wa-l-fuhūm , treatise that deals with the various stages that the soul must go through in order to attain the correct knowledge of God. It was translated into German by Armin Eschraghi.

Shrine and mosque

His shrine is located near the middle gate (al-bab al-wastani) of the old city of Baghdad. The mosque to the shrine, the Umar Suhrawardi Mosque , is known for its minaret , which was built in the style of the Seljuks.

literature

• Carl Brockelmann : History of Arabic Literature. Leiden 1937–1949. Vol. I² pp. 569-571, Supplement Vol. I, pp. 788-790.
• Richard Gramlich : The gifts of the knowledge of ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī . Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1978. pp. 1-15.
• Angelika Hartmann : "Comments on HandUmar as-Suhrawardīs manuscripts, real and supposed autographs" in Der Islam 60 (1983) 112-142.
• Angelika Hartmann: “Sur l'édition d'un texte arabe médiéval: Le Rašf an-naṣāʾiḥ al-īmānīya wa-kašf al-faḍāʾiḥ al-yūnānīya de ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī” in Der Islam 62 (1985) 71-97.
• Angelika Hartmann: “Cosmogony and theory of the soul at ʿUmar as-Suhrawardī (st. 632/1234)” in commemorative publication Wolfgang Reuschel: Files of III. Arabist Colloquium, Leipzig. 21-22 November 1991 . Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart, 1994. pp. 135-156
• Angelika Hartmann: “al-Suhrawardī, Sh ihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar” in The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition Vol. IX, pp. 778-782.
• Erik Ohlander: Sufism in an Age of Transition: ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the Rise of the Islamic Mystical Brotherhood . Brill, Leiden, 2008.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ William C. Chittick :'AWĀREF AL-MA'ĀREF, EIR
2. ^ John Renard, "Historical dictionary of Sufism," Rowman & Littlefield, 2005. pg xxviii. excerpt: "Abu 'n-Najib' Abd al-Qahir as-Suhrawardi, Persian shaykh and author, and scholar who thought Ahmad al-Ghazali, Najm al-Din Kubra and Abu Hafs' Umar as-Suhrawardi ( limited preview in Google - book search)
3. ↑ Qamar al-Huda, "Shahab al-Din Suhrawardi" in Josef W. Meri, Jere L. Bacharach, Medieval Islamic Civilization: LZ, index Volume 2 of Medieval Islamic Civilization: An Encyclopedia, Josef W. Meri, ISBN 0-415 -96690-6 . pp 775-776: "Shahab al-Din Abu Hafs' Umar al-Suhrawardi belonged to a prominent Persian Sufi family and was responsible for officially organizing the Suhrawardi Sufi order"
4. ^ Ohlander: Sufism in an Age of Transition . 2008, pp. 66-88.
5. ^ Ohlander: Sufism in an Age of Transition . 2008, pp. 114-116.
6. ^ Ohlander: Sufism in an Age of Transition . 2008, pp. 89-112.
7. ↑ Gramlich: The gifts of knowledge . 1978, p. 1.
8. ↑ Hartmann: “al-Suhrawardī, Sh ihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar” in EI² Vol. IX, p. 780f.
9. ↑ Armin Eschraghi: The mystical path to God: ʿUmar as-Suhrawardīs writing The sealed wine (Ar-rahīq al-maḫtūm); Introduction, text and translation. Berlin: Schwarz 2011 ( Islamic Studies ; Vol. 300)
10. ↑ also: Jami 'wa-Darih al-Suhrawardi; Mosque and Mausoleum of Suhrawardi, Jami '' Umar al-Suhrawardi, 'Umar al-Suhrawardi Mosque etc.