Sufism for Non-Sufis?: Ibn 'Ata' Allah Al-Sakandari's Taj Al-'Arus - Hardcover

by Sherman A. Jackson (Author)

Few forms of classical Islam are more controversial among modern Muslims than the spiritual discipline known as Sufism. Yet, in the face of the modern Muslim tendency to limit Islam's deployment to the emphatically political, few expressions of the religion could be more central to its spiritual vitality in the modern world. In his translation and analysis of Ibn 'Ata' Allah al-Sakandari's Taj al-'Arus, Sherman A. Jackson demonstrates that violent, lax, or rigid readings of the texts of Islam are just as much a result of the state of spiritual health, awareness, and fortitude of those who read and deploy them as they are of the substance of the Qur'an, Sunna, and the teachings of Islam's sages.

Author Biography

Sherman A. Jackson is the King Faisal Chair of Islamic Thought and Culture, Professor of Religion, Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity, University of Southern California. A native of Philadelphia, he has taught at numerous universities in the US and has also taught abroad. He is an internationally recognized authority on Islamic law and theology and contemporary Islam in America. He has been named one of the 500 most influential Muslims in the world by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre, as well as one of the top 10 experts on Islam in the United States by the Religion Newswriters Association's ReligionLink .