Relationality With the Dead in Chinese Sufism

Relics’ Agency and Self-Annihilation in the Afterlives of Two Jahriyya Shaykhs

Bibliographic Data

ID13628654
AuthorsTommaso Previato (0009-0007-8956-5831, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, corresponding author)
Year2025
Pages302228241308931-302228241308931
Publication date2025-01-08
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueOMEGA - Journal of Death and Dying (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0030-2228 • E-ISSN: 1541-3764
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/00302228241308931
PMID39773109
OpenAlexW4406155889
LanguageEN
References cited36

This paper interrogates what place do dead exemplars and saintly relics occupy in the ritual repertoire of Jahriyya Sufism - a mystical revivalist movement that emerged in mid-18 th century Northwest China as a sectarian offshoot of the Yemeni Naqshbandi tradition. Since its inception, the Jahriyya played a leading role in the Muslim uprisings against the Qing dynasty (1644-1912). The paper proposes a model of relationality with the dead where mortuary practices are not aimed solely at memorializing the shaykhs who fell as martyrs in the uprisings, but, most importantly, at aiding Sufi initiates in their inner-directed effort to transcend egoistic desires and eventually uncover God's qualities within themselves - a practice that in classical Sufism is called fanā' fir-Allah (lit. "self-annihilation in God")

Aesthetics · Agency (philosophy · Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Cartography · China · Epistemology · Fell · Geography · Islam · Literature · Mysticism · Sufism · Theology · Asian Studies and History · Eurasian Exchange Networks · History · Islamic Studies and History · Philosophy

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