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A Sufi Response to Political Islamism: Al-Aḥbāsh of Lebanon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2009

A. Nizar Hamzeh  and
R. Hrair Dekmejian
A. Nizar Hamzeh
Affiliation:
Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and Public AdministrationAmerican University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon.
R. Hrair Dekmejian
Affiliation:
Professor in the Department of Political ScienceUniversity of Southern California, Los Angeles, Calif. 90089-0044, U.S.A.
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Extract

The rise and spread of Islamist political movements have been topics of focal concern for scholars and analysts in recent decades. Since Richard Mitchell's seminal work on the Muslim Brotherhood, a plethora of writers have analyzed the attributes of both Sunni and Shiʿa revivalist movements and the policies of Arab regimes and the West toward the Islamist phenomenon. Yet scant attention has been paid to the reactions generated within the larger Islamic community toward the Islamist groups and their militant offshoots. One such unnoticed source of reaction to political Islamism is the nebulous confraternity of Sufi orders (ṭuruq) whose mysticism and esoteric beliefs and practices have set them apart from the exoteric revivalism and political activism of the Islamist societies, such as the Muslim Brotherhood and its many affiliates.

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , May 1996 , pp. 217 - 229
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

NOTES

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