Theoretical Extremes of the Study of Mystic Man in Modern Iran: Review Article

摘要

Highlighting certain fallacies in a recent anthropological study of three branches of the Ni''matu''llhī Sufi Order in modern Iran, this review article tries to cast light on the little-understood relationship between legalistic Islam and Persian Sufism. It also attempts to clarify the connection (or rather, lack thereof) between Sufism and the Pahlavi state and the current Islamist regime, while discussing the subtle distinction between and ''irfn in the mystical philosophies of Shi''ite Islam. Some of the vicissitudes of three decades (1978-2008) of suppression and persecution of Sufis by the fundamentalist Shi''ite state in Iran are also chronicled.