Sufism and Islamic Reform in Egypt: The Battle for Islamic Tradition.

• Author: Najjar, Fauzi M.

By JULIAN JOHANSEN. Oxford: THE CLARENDON PRESS, 1996. Pp. 325. $80.

In this neatly produced and scholarly volume, Julian Johansen, formerly a Junior Research Fellow at St. Edmund, Oxford, and now a trainee solicitor, expounds the thought and reformist ideas of Shaykh Muhammad Zaki Ibrahim, leader of the Ashira Muhammadiyya and its core of initiates, who form the Muhammadiyya Shadhiliyya Sufi order (tariqa). Special attention is given to the controversies between Sufi orders in Egypt and their critics. In the introduction, he points out the complexities that challenge the researcher into Sufism, simply because it is essentially a deep inner experience, and words cannot do it justice. The derivation and origin of the term "sufism" remains ambiguous.

In chapter one, the author gives a brief account of reformist thought in Egypt, as a "background against which to examine present-day concerns." He focuses on Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, Muhammad Abduh, and Muhammad Tawfiq al-Bakri. The three share, in different degrees, the tendency to combine reformist ambitions and mystical inclinations. He then goes on to define the Ashira as an informal grouping of non-initiates, who attend Friday prayer in one of its thirty mosques. Within the Ashira there is the core of initiates who are closer to the leader, and are distinguished by their costumes (white gowns). A brief overview of the life of the leader sketches his distinguished lineage, great knowledge and learning, and high profile in the religious establishment. The claim by his biographers that Shaykh Muhammad is a mujaddid of the caliber of Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111) betrays their zealous adoration of their leader. Yet his serious commitment to reform, and his outspokenness in advocating it, which had gotten him into conflict with the Supreme Council of the Sufi orders, seem to be the source of his "greatness."

Shaykh Muhammad Zaki Ibrahim is the grand-nephew of Shaykh Mahmud Abu Ilyan (b. 1840), the first member of the family to inherit the leadership of the Nasiriyya Shadhiliyya. Shaykh Aba Ilyan was regarded as the mujaddid of the Sufis of his age. He was a man of physical strength and authority, generous and helpful. Some of his attributes were compared to those of the Prophet. He even was reputed to have performed miracles, or actions beyond human power. These biographical notes are drawn mainly from the Handbook of the Tariqa Muhammadiyya, al-Dalil. All members of the Order are depicted as...