From tariqas-approval@world.std.com Tue Oct 28 21:37:27 1997 Received: from veracruz-gw.customer.itw.net (veracruz-gw.customer.ITW.NET [208.211.5.42]) by bay2.bjt.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id VAA31022 for ; Tue, 28 Oct 1997 21:37:26 -0800 Received: from europe.std.com ([199.172.62.20]) by veracruz-gw.customer.itw.net (Netscape Mail Server v2.02) with ESMTP id AAA173 for ; Wed, 29 Oct 1997 00:44:40 -0500 Received: by europe.std.com (8.7.6/BZS-8-1.0) id AAA20159; Wed, 29 Oct 1997 00:33:41 -0500 (EST) Received: from world.std.com by europe.std.com (8.7.6/BZS-8-1.0) id AAA20151; Wed, 29 Oct 1997 00:33:38 -0500 (EST) Received: from bci.burgoyne.com ([205.164.108.8]) by world.std.com (5.65c/Spike-2.0) id AA11804; Wed, 29 Oct 1997 00:33:37 -0500 Received: from kstjohn.burgoyne.com (sl3.burgoyne.com [205.164.108.42]) by bci.burgoyne.com (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id VAA22928 for ; Tue, 28 Oct 1997 21:56:19 -0700 Message-Id: <199710290456.VAA22928@bci.burgoyne.com> From: "katherine stjohn" To: Subject: sufism before islam Date: Tue, 28 Oct 1997 23:32:48 -0000 X-Msmail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1161 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: tariqas-approval@world.std.com Precedence: list Reply-To: tariqas@world.std.com Status: RO From: Lloyd Miller Subject: Sufism before Islam Date: November 25, 1997 In answer to the question about Sufism before Islam - perhaps you are familiar with the concept that Sufism is more pre-Islamic in character drawing on the inner-circle highly developed aspects of Zoroastrianism, Manicheanism, Mazdakism, Mithraism, basic Christrianity of the Qumran type or maybe a little of the spiritual depth of the Hindu/Buddhist culture? Even though our Sufi master in Iran did not really emphasize the idea - that doesn't mean he didn't believe it, he just didn't talk about it. Some of the concepts set forth in the small booklet called "The Ostad" published by Eastern Arts, P.O. Box 526362 SLC, UT 84152 might be considered pre-Islamic in nature. Lloyd Miller (Kuchek Ali Khan)