For the Shabbat of Parshat Devarim
אם־יהיו
חטאיכם כשנים כשלג
ילבינו
אם־יאדימו כתולע כצמר
יהיו:
Though Your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white
as snow;
though they be red like crimson, they shall become like wool
Yeshaya
1:18
In our Tariqa, I tend to use the term “Sufi”when speaking specifically of Islam and to use “Jewish-Sufi” when referring specifically to either: (i) the Mediaeval Egyptian movement spearheaded by the Maimonides family, and (ii) our own revival and renewal of that movement’s principles in contemporary Judaism. The term “Jewish-Sufi” was actually first coined by Professor Paul Fenton, who maintains a (much appreciated) supportive and advisory interest in Tariqa Eliyahu’s development.
Defining
“sufism” is something of an impossible task. The term has been used and misused in so many
ways both within Islam, with respect to Jewish-Sufis, and with respect to Secular or Universalist
Sufism. The term “sufism”
is actually the invention of British
Orientalists and dates from the late 18th century, and was most
often used by the Orientalists to
describe Islamic mysticism. Ali Ibn Ahmad Bushanji (10th century C.E.) claimed: “Tasawwuf (Sufism) is a name without a reality, but it used to be a
reality without a name.”
Apart from endless discussion on the nature
of “sufism”, there is also
disagreement about the exact meaning of the
word tasawwuf itself, but the most commonly accepted claim is that
it is derived from “suf”: the Arabic word
for wool.
The ascetics,hermits, and mystics of the Near East had worn rough
garments made of this material for
centuries as a kind of
uniform and as a statement of their dedicated status. The
root of the practice, according to Jews
and Christians, was the wooly or hairy clothing worn by Prophet
Elijah, the Prophet Elisha, and their disciples known as the “Sons of the
Prophets”.
It should
come as no surprise then to learn that
the wearing of rough woollen (or cotton) garments was a highly promoted custom of the Mediaeval Egyptian Pietists. Though he was the esteemed “high-class” Nagid
of all Egyptian Jewry, Rabbenu Abraham ben Ha Rambam wore these very garments
himself. We can be sure his descendents in the movement also did.
Along with all the leading writers of the movement he also
related these garments to (i) the initiation of Elisha by Elijah; and (ii) to
the (Islamic) sufi “khirqa” used
as an initiation symbol and as a kind of
uniform. As they frequently stated, they
believed that Sufi practices had preserved the ritual initiatory rites and customs of our Elijan Jewish Ascetics long after they had been forgotten in Judaism
itself.
ooo0ooo
In this week's haftara, we are reminded that ethical and religious integrity are more important than outward displays of piety. It seems to me that Rabbenu Abraham shared the same views on purely superficial religious activity as those we see in Haftara Devarim. Rabbi Fishbane writes:
“The adoption of a woolen garment was
among the earliest characteristics of early Jewish pietism in Egypt and perhaps
beyond, even before it coalesced into an organized movement. In a rebuke of
self-styled pietists, who imitate true devotees by adopting the outer trappings
of the movement, the Nagid dismissed the mere adoption of the woolen cloak, the
habitus by which pietists had already become known by this time. “It is
a grave error for one to imagine about himself, or for someone else to imagine
about him, that he is a hasid ̣ because he avoids marriage or practices fasting
or eats little or wears wool (sụ̄f),
while at the same time being remiss in the commandments or transgresses
prohibitions.” *1
On the Jewish-Sufi symbolism of the mantle of Elijah, Rabbenu
Abraham Maimuni writes :
“When Elijah passed by Elisha before
[the latter] became his loyal follower, he found him plowing ... Elijah cast
his cloak over him as a sign—a joyful annunciation—that his habit and raiment (labsuhu
wa-ziyyuhu) and the rest of his path would be like his, and a joyful
annunciation that his own perfection would be transferred to him and that he
would attain to what he himself had attained. And you are aware of the [custom]
among the Sufis of Islam, among whom—due to the sins of Israel!—some of the
ways of the ancient saints of Israel are to be found, while such is not
found—or only in small numbers—among our contemporaries, according to which the
master places the ragged cloak over the aspirant (talbīs al-shaikh al-khirqah li’l-murīd), when the latter wants to join his path and travel with
him. “He takes from Your words” (Deut. 33:3).”*2
Rabbi
Wincelberg renders that passage from the Kifaya as
follows:
“When Eliyahu threw his mantle over
Elisha,it was an allusion that Elisha should emulate him in his clothing,in
his style,and the rest of his behavior...that
his spiritual completeness would be conveyed
to Elisha, and that Elisha would
reach his level of prophecy. You
know that, due to our sins, the Sufis have copied this custom from our early
hasidim: the elder covers an aspirant
with his tattered garment when the
aspirant wishes to embark on the
way of the elder...In recent
times,this custom has disappeared from us,or nearly so, yet we copy their
customs by wearing a baqir and the
like.”*3
Hegyon
HaLev
The Haftarah for Parshat Devarim (Yeshayahu
1:1-27) reminds us that the outward
observance of rituals is abhorant if one is
lacking in correct ethical behaviour. Similarly, though Rabbenu Abraham
praised the wearing of the sufi
”uniform” of rough and humble woolen
garments— he made the same
distinction as Isaiah the prophet.
Significantly the Rambam had also criticised those Jewish-Sufis whose wearing of woollen garments was for mere show in his “Eight Chapters”.
Annmarie Schimmel makes the following pointed statement:
“From the very beginning,the [Islamic] mystics strictly
distinguished between the true Sufi, the mutasawwif,who aspires at
reaching a higher spiritual level, and the
mustawif the man who
pretends to be a mystic...and that it is
impossible to become a true sufi if one is
not born that way for ‘the patched frock must have been sewn in
pre-eternity. ’ (Fariduddin Attar) ”
Diverging somewhat from this view, the Egyptian
pietists believed that such “superficial sufis” were capable of transforming their
merely outward dress and practices into
the “real thing”—with the application of patience, goodwill, guidance from more experienced
practitioners, and emulation of the “true” hasidim.
oooOooo
In
Tariqa Eliyahu, we wish to emulate Elisha and be clothed in the prophetic Mantle of Eliyahu. This is a pre-eminently spiritual concept for
us.
Our Tariqa does not have a contemporary Sheikh or Pir (at least,not currently). I am just the "Administrator" of Tariqa Eliyahu.....responsible for directing the development of our principles and practices in this,our twenty-first century renewal. Though I was (literally and ritually) clothed in the "mantle of Elijah" as a Carmelite monk in the 1970's before my conversion, our tariqa's silsila is an Uwaysi one and our community root (as it were) is Eliyahu HaNabi.
At some point, we may develop a physical khirqa practice...but ultimately, the initiation we seek is the gilui Eliyahu that Rabbenu Abraham describes when he calls the casting of Elijah’s mantle an “allusion”.
Though he,
and many of the Jewish-Sufis of his
group in Cairo wore woolen garments and
also practiced the initiatory symbolism
of the khirqa of Elijah: the
important message is that such practices were symbols of the movement’s focus on prophetic enlightenment—All Jewish-Sufis of the school of Rabbenu Abraham are in the silsila
of Eliyahu HaNabi....our own Tariqa
Eliyahu wishes to make that spiritual and Uwaysi connection
explicit.
May
we always remember that it is what we do that is most important—not what we wear—because
in our prayers and devotions on the
Jewish-Sufi path: “What is essential is invisible to the
eye.”
Shabbat Shalom
Nachman Davies
Safed August 9 2024
NOTES
*1 Elisha Russ-Fishbane: Judaism, Sufism, and the Pietists of
Medieval Egypt, page 127, (Oxford
University Press 2015).
*2 Abraham b. Moses Maimonides. The High Ways to Perfection of Abraham Maimonides, vol.2
page 264 , (ed. and tr. S. Rosenblatt; New York, Columbia University Press,
1927)
*3 Wincelberg.Y, The Guide to Serving G-d, page 355;
(Feldheim, Jerusalem,2008)
*4 Schimmel, A. Mystical Dimensions of
Islam Page 20 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975).