Abstract
This chapter introduces the three central concerns of the project, namely: what is the nature of charismatic power in this context, why is it considered contentious by some in the wider community, and what can this study contribute to global understanding amidst the virulently contentious debates about the role of religion in the contemporary geo-political landscape? It provides a brief historical background of Islam in China and outlines a series of challenges for Islamic leadership in China and in the world at large. These include questions of unity, orthodoxy, personal quality (suzhi), and stability. It then provides a discussion of the theoretical approaches to the study of charisma and Sufi charisma specifically.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
It should be noted that there are apparently two different styles for ‘seeking the Way’ in the Qadiriyya. One is to leave the family, practise austerities, and remain celibate (the gongbei systems that I studied acted this way). The other group marries, does not leave the family, and practises austerities (at home); this group is a minority and I had no contact with groups of this sort. The Gaoshan Gongbei in the Dongxiang acts in this way (Ma 1983, 2008).
- 2.
While I stress here the importance of charismatic embodiment in the case of the Qadiriyya, I do not deny that varying degrees of charismatic cultivation would exist in both systems of succession (by descent and by mystical recognition). It would however require a comparative study to determine to what degree and in what ways ‘charismatic’ cultivation differed amongst different Chinese Sufi orders.
- 3.
Unlike the Jahriyya who practised a more ‘transformationist’ and ‘militant’ Islam, the Qadiriyya sought resolution between the dictates of Chinese society and their practice of Islam through ‘ascetic withdrawal from the world’ (Gladney 1996, pp. 61–62).
- 4.
Bashir has argued that in describing Sufi solidarities, ‘network’ is a better term than ‘order’ because of its relative neutrality: ‘In my view, the use of order has led scholars to misapprehend the type of internal cohesion and discipline than can be attributed to the Sufi communities in question. Resisting this usage opens up the space to try to understand Sufi networks on their own terms, as examples of a form of sociality contingent on the particulars of the histories of Islamic societies’ (Bashir 2013, p. 11). While I note this important point, to sustain consistency and clarity between the work of others in this field and my own, I have decided to use ‘order’ throughout my discussion.
- 5.
While these are the four main Sufi orders, there are ‘myriad smaller menhuan and sub-branches due to ideological, political, geographical and historical differences’ (Gladney 2004, p. 128).
- 6.
Though not unusual elsewhere in the Muslim world, Lipman notes that the idea of ‘hereditary succession to religious, social and political authority fell on particularly fertile ground in China […] As a unique blend of Chinese and Sufi forms, the menhuan combined the appeal of prophetic descent with Chinese notions of family structure and socioeconomic competition’ (Lipman 1997, pp. 70–71).
- 7.
Matthew Erie has noted that Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani followed the Hanbali school of Sunni Islam, while the Qadiriyya in China followed the Hanafi school (Erie 2016, p. 136).
- 8.
The practice of dhikr amongst Qadiriyya has also varied, ranging from the ecstatic ‘loud’ and shaking versions to the silent (such as Qadiriyya in China).
- 9.
Nearly every Sufi order throughout the world, whether identifying as Sunni or Shi’a, traces its lineage to the Prophet Muhammad through Ali ibn Abi Talib (599–661 CE) , the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet.
- 10.
In Shi’ism, Ali is seen as an intermediary between man and God and necessary for salvation. He had exclusive, divine right to the Caliphate. Moreover, Ali and the imams who ‘descend from him are beings of superhuman virtue possessing miraculous gifts and absolute spiritual and temporal authority’ (Glassé 1989, p. 34).
- 11.
Amongst all of my informants, xinjiao referred to the Yihewani and Salafiyya movements, while laojiao referred to the Sufi orders or Gedimu.
- 12.
Lipman has translated zhen as both ‘True’ and ‘Real’ (Lipman 2016, p. xvii). In a translation of Wang Daiyu’s Zhengjiao zhenquan published in 2017, Sachiko Murata consistently translates zhen as ‘Real’ rather than ‘True’, translating the work as ‘The Real Commentary on the True Teaching’ (Murata 2017, p. 1).
- 13.
In the process of legitimating and familiarising Islam to Muslims and non-Muslims in the Chinese world during the Qing Dynasty, several Chinese Muslim scholars found deep resonance with this Confucian discourse of self-cultivation. These texts became known as the Han Kitab. Notable scholars included Wang Daiyu (mid-seventeenth century), Ma Zhu (late seventeenth century), Liu Zhi (early eighteenth century), Yuan Guozuo (late eighteenth century), and Ma Dexin (mid-nineteenth century) (Lipman 2016, p. 5). Liu Zhi , in his introduction to The Nature and Principle of Islam first published in 1704, said ‘I suddenly came to understand that the Islamic classics have by and large the same purport as Confucius and Mencius’ (Murata et al. 2009, p. 73). The broad theme of self-cultivation that was so central to Confucianism found direct parallels in the Islamic tradition. The purpose of the syncretic works of Wang Daiyu (1573–ca. 1619) and Liu Zhi (born ca. 1617; date of death unknown) was both to make Islam known to non-Muslims in the Chinese context and to write for their ‘co-religionists, who did not have sufficient acquaintance with the Islamic languages to master Islamic thinking’ (Murata and Chittick 2000, p. 4). In these works, Islam is depicted in a completely non-Islamic idiom—in Chinese. As Murata has noted, ‘Anyone who reads these texts with a knowledge of the Chinese ambiance of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries can see that they are part of the ongoing discussion and debate among Chinese intellectuals concerning the nature of the quest for human perfection’ (Murata and Chittick 2000, p. 6).
- 14.
Ma Hucheng was the former Vice Minister of United Front Work Department of the Gansu Provincial Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (Huang 2016, p. 19).
- 15.
This is not to imply that what is unseen is necessarily untrue. Rather, I follow Lambek, who argues for a shift in the study of religion from Platonic binaries to the Aristotelian focus on the idea of phronesis (moral practice or judgement). Rather than the anthropological study of religion being reconstituted as ‘either the study of faulty beliefs about supernatural realms or an idealised mimetic identification with (and appropriation of) the knowledge and practices of our subjects’, Lambek argues that, under-scored by Aristotelian notions of morality and practice, it should be ‘an investigation of the historically situated, socially constituted imagination and realisation of meaningful ends, practical means, authoritative voice, dignified and virtuous agency, and reasoned as well as passionate submission’ (Lambek 2000, p. 318). Following Aristotle provides the opportunity to take an alternative route, ‘one which enables us to see the particular conjunction of contemplative thought, reasoned action (praxis), and creative production (poiesis) characteristic of any given social setting’ (Lambek 2000, p. 309).
- 16.
Buehler more frequently uses the term fayd to reference this spiritual force (Buehler 1998, p. 117). However in the local context of this study, baraka or baileketi in pinyin was the word used and thus why I use it throughout.
- 17.
In her book ‘Arguing Sainthood’, Katherine Ewing offers another account of the Sufi saint in the context of Pakistan. Her focus however is rather different to that of Werbner. Drawing on the history of religious politics in the region, Arabic and Persian textual sources, and theories from psychoanalysis, she offers a sophisticated and complex exploration of how competing ideologies are experienced at the individual level of the spiritual master. She argues that the subject of the master becomes the site of ‘conflicting desires and multiple subjective modalities […] oblivious to its own inconsistencies’ (Ewing 1997, p. 35). It is a very nuanced work and in the context of this study serves as a reminder of the multiple, complex, and potentially contradictory factors involved in the generation of Sufi charisma.
References
Abu-Manneh, B. 2000. The Wali Nejib Pasha and the Qadiri Order in Iraq. Journal of the History of Sufism 1–2: 115 [Zarcone, T. and Buehler, A., editors. Simurg Press].
Abun-Nasr, J.M. 2007. Muslim Communities of Grace: The Sufi Brotherhoods in Islamic Religious Life. New York: Columbia University Press.
Ahmed, A. 2011. Millennium and Charisma Among Pathans: A Critical Essay in Social Anthropology. London: Routledge.
Anagnost, A. 2004. The Corporeal Politics of Quality (Suzhi). Public Culture 16(2): 189–208.
Armijo-Hussein, J. 2006. Islamic Education in China. Harvard Asia Quarterly 10(1).
Bashir, S. 2013. Sufi Bodies: Religion and Society in Medieval Islam. New York: Columbia University Press.
Bourdieu, P. 1990. The Logic of Practice. Cambridge/Oxford: Polity Press/B. Blackwell.
Bourdieu, P., and L.J.D. Wacquant. 1992. An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Bruinessen, M. v. 2000. The Qadiriyya and the Lineages of Qadiri Shaykhs Among the Kurds. Journal of the History of Sufism 1–2: 131 [Zarcone, T. and Buehler, A., editors. Simurg Press].
Buehler, A. 1998. Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of the Mediating Sufi Shaykh. Columbia: University of South Carolina.
Buehler, A. 2000. The Indo-Pakistani Qadiriyya - An Overview. Journal of the History of Sufism 1–2: 339 [Zarcone, T. and Buchler, A., editors. Simurg Press].
Carrithers, M., S. Collins, and S. Lukes. 1985. The Category of the Person: Anthropology, Philosophy, History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Chen, C. 1986. Neo-Confucian Terms Explained: The Pei-hsi Tzu-i. New York: Columbia University Press.
Cruise O’Brien, D. 1988. Charisma and Brotherhood in African Islam. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Csordas, T.J. 1990. Embodiment as a Paradigm for Anthropology. Ethos 18(1): 5–47.
Dillon, M. 1999. China’s Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement and Sects. London: Curzon Press.
Ding, M. 2009. Xibei Sufei zhuyi menhuan xingcheng yu zuzhi xingtai yanjiu (A Study on the System and Organisation of Sufi Schools (Menhuan) in the Northwest). Journal of Beifang Ethnic University 5.
Eisenstadt, S.N. 2003. Comparative Civilizations and Multiple Modernities. Leiden: Brill.
Erie, M. 2016. China and Islam: The Prophet, the Party, and Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Esposito, J.L. 1998. Islam and Politics. Contemporary Issues in the Middle East. 4th ed. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press.
Ewing, K.P. 1997. Arguing Sainthood: Modernity, Psychoanalysis, and Islam. Durham: Duke University Press.
Feuchtwang, S. 2010. The Anthropology of Religion, Charisma, and Ghosts: Chinese Lessons for Adequate Theory. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
Feuchtwang, S., and M. Wang. 2001. Grassroots Charisma: Four Local Leaders in China. London: Routledge.
Feuchtwang, S., and M. Wang. 2008. Suggestions for a Redefinition of Charisma. Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 12(2): 90–105.
Gammer, M. 2000. The Qadiriyya in the Northern Caucasus. Journal of the History of Sufism 1–2: 275 [Zarcone, T. and Buehler, A., editors. Simurg Press].
Gao, Z. 1991. Xibei Musilin shehui wenti yanjiu (Research into the Question of Muslim Society in the Northwest). Lanzhou: Gansu Minorities Publishers.
Geertz, C. 1968. Islam Observed; Religious Development in Morocco and Indonesia. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Gillette, M.B. 2000. Between Mecca and Beijing: Modernization and Consumption Among Urban Chinese Muslims. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Gladney, D.C. 1995. Islam. Journal of Asian Studies 54(2): 371–377.
Gladney, D.C. 1996. Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Gladney, D.C. 1999. The Salafiyya Movement in Northwest China: Islamic Fundamentalism Among the Muslim Chinese? In Muslim Diversity: Local Islam in Global Contexts, ed. L.O. Surrey: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
Gladney, D.C. 2003. Islam in China: Accommodation or Separatism. Religion in China Today: The China Quarterly Special Issues New Series 3: 451–467.
Gladney, D.C. 2004. Dislocating China: Reflections on Muslims, Minorities, and Other Subaltern Subjects. London: C. Hurst.
Glassé, C. 1989. The Concise Encyclopedia of Islam. London: Stacey International.
Ha, B., and J. Ma. 2014. The Master-Disciple Relationship and the Spiritual Connotation of Chinese Sufism. Northwestern Journal of Ethnology (3).
Han, Z. 2009. Zhongguo yisilan Sufei zhuyi yanjiu xueshu zhuzuo zongshu (Reviewing Chinese Studies on Sufism for 30 Years from 1978 to 2008). Journal of Beifang Ethnic University 4: 20.
Hassan, R. 2001. Imagining Religion: Self-Images of Islam in the Late Twentieth Century. Asian Studies Review 25(2): 131–151.
Hille, M.-P., B. Horlemann, and P. Nietupski, eds. 2015. Muslims in Amdo Tibetan Society: Multidisciplinary Approaches. Studies in Modern Tibetan Culture. Lanham: Lexington Books.
Ho, W.-Y. 2016. Islam and China’s Hong Kong: Ethnic Identity, Muslim Networks and the New Silk Road. Routledge Contemporary China Series. London: Routledge.
Huang, P.Z. 2016. Yearbook of Chinese Theology 2015. Leiden: Brill.
Israeli, R. 2002. Islam in China: Religion, Ethnicity, Culture, and Politics. Lanham: Lexington Books.
Jin, Y. 2008. Islam. Chinese Religions and Beliefs - A Series of Contemporary Studies in China, vol. 1. Beijing: China Minorities Publications.
Kipnis, A. 2006. Suzhi: A Keyword Approach. The China Quarterly 186: 295–313.
Kugle, S. 2012. Sufis and Saints Mysticism, Corporeality, and Sacred Power in Islam. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Lambek, M. 2000. The Anthropology of Religion and the Quarrel Between Poetry and Philosophy. Current Anthropology 41(3): 309–320.
Li, W., and M. Jing. 2011. Gansu Linxia Menhuan Diaocha (Survey of Menhuan in Linxia, Gansu Province). Beijing: China Social Sciences Publishing House.
Lipman, J. 1996. Hyphenated Chinese: Sino-Muslim Identity in Modern China. In Remapping China: Fissures in Historical Terrain, ed. by G. Hershatter, E. Honig, J. Lipman, and R. Stross. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Lipman, J. 1997. Familiar Strangers: A History of Muslims in Northwest China. Studies on Ethnic Groups in China. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
Lipman, J., ed. 2016. Islamic Thought in China: Sino-Muslim Intellectual Evolution from the 17th to the 21st Century. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Lizzio, K. 2007. Ritual and Charisma in Naqshbandi Sufi Mysticism. Anpere E-Journal for the Anthropological Study of Religion, 1–37. http://www.anpere.net/2007/3.pdf.
Ma, T. 1983. Zhongguo Yisilan Jiaopai yu Menhuan Zhidu Shilue (A History of Muslim Factions and the Menhuan System in China). Yinchuan: Ningxia People’s Publishing Society.
Ma, Q. 2006. Huizu lishi yu wenhua ji minzuxue yanjiu (Research on the History and Ethnology of the Hui People). Beijing: Central University of Nationalities Publishing House.
Ma, Y. 2008. Gadelinye Menhuan Chujiaren Zhidu Tanxi (A Discussion of the Monk System of the Qadiriyya Menhuan). Journal of the Second Northwest University for Nationalities, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Central University for Nationalities, Beijing, China 1.
Ma, G. 2010. Sufei Yujingxia de Musilin Funu Yanjiu (Study of Muslim Women in the Sufi Context). Ph.D. thesis, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou. http://www.cnki.net.
Ma, H. 2011. The Historical and Present Situation of Islamic Menhuan in China. In Muslims and a Harmonious Society: Selected Papers from a Three-Conference Series on Muslim Minorities in Northwest China : Gansu Province, 2008, Shaanxi Province, 2009, Xinjiang Autonomous Region, 2009. Arlington, VA: Institute for Global Engagement.
Ma, C., and Ma, W. 2014. Gadilinye, Wenquantang and Salar: Fieldwork on Northwest Islamic Mysticism. Journal of Beifang University of Nationalities (3).
Marcus, M. 1985. The Saint Has Been Stolen: Sanctity and Social Change in a Tribe of Eastern Morocco. American Ethnologist 12 (3): 455–467.
Mauss, M. 1979. Body Techniques. In Sociology and Psychology. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Merleau-Ponty, M. 1962. Phenomenology of Perception. New York: Humanities Press.
Mian, W. 1997. Zhongguo huizu yisilan zongjiao zhidu gailun (A Survey of China’s Hui People and Islamic Religious System). Ningxia People’s Publishing Society.
Murata, S. 2017. The First Islamic Classic in Chinese: Wang Daiyu’s “Real Commentary on the True Teaching”. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Murata, S., and W.C. Chittick. 2000. Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light: Wang Tai-yu’s Great Learning of the Pure and Real and Liu Chih’s Displaying the Concealment of the Real Realm. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Murata, S., W.C. Chittick, and W. Tu. 2009. The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi: Islamic Thought in Confucian Terms. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center for the Harvard-Yenching Institute.
Oakes, T. 1998. Tourism and Modernity in China. London: Taylor & Francis.
Pinto, P. 2010. The Anthropologist and the Initiated: Reflections on the Ethnography of Mystical Experience Among the Sufis of Aleppo, Syria. Social Compass Journal 57 (4): 464–478.
Qi, D. 1982. Qingzhen Genyuan (Origins of Islam). Unknown.
Rey, T. 2007. Bourdieu on Religion: Imposing Faith and Legitimacy. London, Oakville: Equinox Publishing.
RT. 2016. Radical Islam Spreading to Inland China – Senior Official. https://www.rt.com/news/368473-radical-islam-inland-china/.
RT. 2017. China Bans ‘Abnormal’ Beards & Veils to Curb Extremism in Muslim Region. https://www.rt.com/news/382891-china-xinjiang-bans-beards-veils/.
Saniotis, A. 2008. Enchanted Landscapes: Sensuous Awareness as Mystical Practice Among Sufis in North India. Australian Journal of Anthropology 19 (1): 17–26.
Stewart, A. 2017. Chinese Muslims and the Global Ummah: Islamic Revival and Ethnic Identity Among the Hui of Qinghai Province. London: Routledge.
Tontini, R. 2016. Muslim Sanzijing: Shifts and Continuities in the Definition of Islam in China. Leiden: Brill.
Turner, V. 2011. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-structure. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers.
Wang, H. 2009. Linxia Da Gongbei Menhuan xingcheng yu zuzhi yunxing moshi yanjiu (Organization and Formation of Da Gongbei Menhuan in Linxia). Masters, Northwest Minorities University. http://www.cnki.net/KCMS/detail/detail.aspx?QueryID=0&CurRec=19&recid=&filename=LXSK198806009&dbname=CJFD7993&dbcode=CJFQ.
Wang, J. 2014. The Opposition of a Leading Akhund to Shi’a and Sufi Shaykhs in Mid-Nineteenth Century China. Cross-Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review 3: 518–541.
Wang, J. 2016. Islam and State Policy in Contemporary China. Studies in Religion 45 (4): 566–580.
Weber, M. 1968. Economy and Society; An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. New York: Bedminster Press.
Weber, M., and W. Runciman. 1978. Max Weber: Selections in Translation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Werbner, P. 2003. Pilgrims of Love: The Anthropology of a Global Sufi Cult. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Werbner, P., and H. Basu. 1998. Embodying Charisma: Modernity, Locality, and Performance of Emotion in Sufi Cults. London: Routledge.
Yang, H. 1992. Huizu renwu zhi (Biographies of Notable Hui). Yinchuan: Ningxia People’s Publishing Society.
Yang, F. 2012. Religion in China: Survival and Revival Under Communist Rule. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Yu, Z., and X. Lei. 2001. Zhongguo huizu jinshi lu (A Record of the Chinese Hui). Yinchuan: Ningxia People’s Publishing Society.
Zang, X. 2016. Handbook on Ethnic Minorities in China. Handbooks of Research on Contemporary China. Northampton: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cone, T. (2018). Introduction: Islam, Sufism, and China. In: Cultivating Charismatic Power. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74763-7_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74763-7_1
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-74762-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-74763-7
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)