dervish

The Persian word darvīsh ({{lang|fa|درویش}}) is of ancient origin and descends from a Proto-Iranian word that appears in Avestan as {{nobreak|drigu-}}, "needy, mendicant", via Middle Persian driyosh. It has the same meaning as the Arabic word faqīr, meaning people whose contingency and utter dependence upon God is manifest in everything they do and every breath they take.{{cite encyclopedia |author-last=Ebrahim |author-first=Alireza |year=2018 |title=Faqr |translator-last=Gholami |translator-first=Rahim |editor1-last=Madelung |editor1-first=Wilferd |editor2-last=Daftary |editor2-first=Farhad |encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Islamica |location=Leiden and Boston |publisher=Brill Publishers |doi=10.1163/1875-9831_isla_COM_036099 |issn=1875-9823 |quote=Faqr (literally, 'poverty') is a term denoting different modalities and stages of material, psychological and spiritual want and neediness which a wayfarer on the Sufi path may adopt as a means to progress in earning God's love and compassion and of acquiring purity and mystical knowledge. The term faqr is derived from the Arabic root f-q-r, literally meaning 'to hollow out', 'to perforate', 'to make/become poor', 'to be in need' or 'to be/become needy'. Hence faqr carries a general sense of being in a state of penury or destitution.}}

Dervishes try to approach God by virtues and individual experience, rather than by religious scholarship.Jens Peter Laut Vielfalt türkischer Religionen 1996 p. 29 (German)

Many dervishes are mendicant ascetics who have taken a vow of poverty, unlike mullahs. The main reason they beg is to learn humility, but dervishes are prohibited to beg for their own good. They have to give the collected money to other poor people. Others work in common professions; Egyptian Qadiriyya – known in Turkey as Kadiri – are fishermen, for example.

Some classical writers indicate that the poverty of the dervish is not merely economic. Saadi, for instance, who himself travelled widely as a dervish, and wrote extensively about them, says in his Gulistan:

{{Quotation|Of what avail is frock, or rosary,

Or clouted garment? Keep thyself but free

From evil deeds, it will not need for thee

To wear the cap of felt: a darwesh be

In heart, and wear the cap of Tartary.chapter 2 story 16: [https://archive.org/stream/gulistnorrosega00eastgoog/gulistnorrosega00eastgoog_djvu.txt "The Gulistān; or, Rose-garden, of Shek̲h̲ Muslihu'd-dīn Sādī of Shīrāz, translated for the first time into prose and verse, with an introductory preface, and a life of the author, from the Ātish Kadah"] a story later adapted by La Fontaine for his tale 'Le songe d'un habitant du Mogol'}}

Rumi writes in Book 1 of his Masnavi:The Masnavi: Book One, translated by Jawid Mojaddedi, Oxford World's Classics Series, Oxford University Press, 2004. {{ISBN|978-0-19-955231-3}}, p. 63.

{{Quotation|Water that's poured inside will sink the boat

While water underneath keeps it afloat.

Driving wealth from his heart to keep it pure

King Solomon preferred the title 'Poor':

That sealed jar in the stormy sea out there

Floats on the waves because it's full of air,

When you've the air of dervishood inside

You'll float above the world and there abide...}}

File:Whirling dervishes, Rumi Fest 2007.jpg, Rumi Fest 2007]]

File:Dervishes Avanos.JPG

{{Main|Sufi whirling}}

The whirling dance or Sufi whirling that is proverbially associated with dervishes is best known in the West by the practices (performances) of the Mevlevi order in Turkey, and is part of a formal ceremony known as the Sama. It is, however, also practiced by other orders. The Sama is only one of the many Sufi ceremonies performed to try to reach religious ecstasy (majdhb, fana). The name Mevlevi comes from the Persian poet Rumi, who was a dervish himself. This practice, though not intended as entertainment, has become a tourist attraction in Turkey.{{cite web|last=Koentges|first=Chris|title=13 Things The Whirling Dervishes Can Teach You About Spinning Until You're Dizzy Enough To Puke|url=http://veryethnic.wordpress.com/2012/06/29/13-things-the-whirling-dervishes-can-teach-you-about-spinning-until-youre-dizzy-enough-to-puke/|publisher=The Very Ethnic Project|date=2012-06-29}}B. Ghafurov, "Todjikon", 2 vols., Dushanbe 1983-5{{Cite web |title=Rumi {{!}} Biography, Poems, & Facts {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Rumi |access-date=2022-07-18 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}

File:Dodwell Dervishes 1.jpg, by Dodwell]]

There are various orders of dervishes, almost all of which trace their origins from various Muslim saints and teachers, especially Imam Ali. Various orders and suborders have appeared and disappeared over the centuries. Dervishes spread into North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Turkey, Anatolia, the Balkans, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Iran, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan.

Other dervish groups include the Bektashis, who are connected to the janissaries, and the Senussi, who are rather orthodox in their beliefs. Other fraternities and subgroups chant verses of the Qur'an, play drums or whirl in groups, all according to their specific traditions. They practice meditation, as is the case with most of the Sufi orders in South Asia, many of whom owe allegiance to, or were influenced by, the Chishti order. Each fraternity uses its own garb and methods of acceptance and initiation, some of which may be rather severe. The form of Sufi dervishism practised during the 17th century was centered upon esotericism, patience and pacifism.Erdoan, Nezih. "Star director as symptom: reflections on the reception of Fatih Akn in the Turkish media." New Cinemas: Journal of Contemporary Film 7.1 (2009): 27–38.

File:Madhist Dervish.jpg Dervish from Sudan (1899)]]

{{main|Ansar (Sudan)}}

Various western historical writers have sometimes used the term dervish rather loosely, linking it to, among other things, the Mahdist War in Sudan and other conflicts by Islamic military leaders. In such cases, the term "dervishes" may have been used as a generic (and often pejorative) term for the opposing Islamic entity and all members of its military, political and religious institutions, including persons who would not be considered "dervishes" in the strict sense.{{citation needed|date=April 2021}}

During the Mahdist War, Muḥammad Aḥmad al-Mahdī decreed that all those who came to join him should be called anṣār, after the Prophet's earliest followers. He forbade the use of the term 'dervish' to describe his followers. Despite this, British soldiers and colonial officials continued to use the term in relation to the anṣār. While some Britons used the term to denigrate the followers of the Mahdī, it was also used with a sense of admiration in accounts by British soldiers which describe the fearlessness and bravery of the lightly armed 'dervishes'.Nusairi, Osman and Nicoll, Fergus [https://makingafricanconnections.org/s/archive/item/2027 A note on the term ansar]. Making African Connections. Retrieved December 19, 2020. Thus, the word has become closely associated with the anṣār and is often used inaccurately in relation to the Mahdi's followers, even today.

For example, a contemporary British drawing of the fighting in Sudan was entitled "The defeat of the dervishes at Toski" (see History of Sudan (1884–1898)#British response).

Various books discussing the lives of Dervishes can be found in Turkish literature. Death and the Dervish by Meša Selimović and The Dervish by Frances Kazan extensively discussed the life of a Dervish.{{Cite journal|last1=Milivojević|first1=Dragan|last2=Selimović|first2=Meša|last3=Rakić|first3=Bogdan|last4=Dickey|first4=Stephen M.|date=1997|title=Death and the Dervish|journal=World Literature Today|volume=71|issue=2|page=418|doi=10.2307/40153187|jstor=40153187|issn=0196-3570}}{{Cite book|last=Frances.|first=Kazan|title=The dervish: a novel|date=2013|publisher=Opus|isbn=978-1-62316-005-0|oclc=946706691}}

Similar works on the subject have been found in other books such as Memoirs of a Dervish: Sufis, Mystics and the Sixties by Robert Erwin.{{Cite book|last=Robert|first=Irwin|title=Memoirs of a Dervish: Sufis, Mystics and the Sixties|date=2013|publisher=Profile Books Ltd|isbn=978-1-86197-924-7|oclc=1015811956}} Majdeddin Ali Bagher Ne'matollahi has said that Sufism is a core of being and bridge between religion and science.{{cn|date=January 2024}}

Dervishes and their Sufis practices are accepted by traditional Sunni Muslims but different groups such as Deobandisand Salafis regard various practices of Dervishes as un-Islamic.Syed, Jawad; Pio, Edwina; Kamran, Tahir; Zaidi, Abbas (2016-11-09). Faith-Based Violence and Deobandi Militancy in Pakistan. Springer. {{ISBN|978-1-349-94966-3}}.

"They also criticises various practices including sama, qawwali, whirling etc. Whereas Sufis/[http://www.shattariyah.blogspot.com/p/barelvi.html Barelvi] consider their beliefs and practices as mystical practices."

File:Dervish rug.jpg|Dervish Azerbaijani rug, XIX c. Tabriz school, State Museum of Azerbaijan Carpet and Applied Art

File:Amedeo Preziosi - Turks.jpg|Ottoman Dervishes portrayed by Amedeo Preziosi in Istanbul, 1857

File:Darvish bazaar.jpg|A Qajar-era Persian dervish, seen here from an 1873 depiction of Tehran's Grand Bazaar

File:Constantinople(1878)-begging dervis.png|An Ottoman Dervish in Istanbul, 1878

File:Wrau-dervishes-damascus-cropped.jpg|Dervishes photographed by William H. Rau near Damascus, {{circa|1903}}

File:Dervish, 1913.jpg|A Palestinian Dervish in 1913

File:Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi.jpg|Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi, leader of the Sudanese Dervishes

File:Keskul GrantBowl.JPG|Sufi kashkuls were often made from a coco de mer which ordinary beggars would have difficulty to find

File:Kashkul, or Beggar’s Bowl, with Portrait of Dervishes and a Mounted Falconer, A.H. 1280.jpg|Kashkul, or Beggar's Bowl, with Portrait of Dervishes and a Mounted Falconer, A.H. 1280. Brooklyn Museum

File:Brooklyn Museum - A Gathering of Dervishes.jpg|A Gathering of Dervishes in the Mughal Empire

File:Brooklyn Museum - A Family of Dervishes.jpg|A family of Dervishes, possibly by Antoin Sevruguin (between 1876 and 1925)

File:Dodwell Dervishes 2.jpg|The dance of the dervishes, Athens

File:Friday afternoon Dervishes (8625532149).jpg|Sufi dervishes in Omdurman, Sudan

File:Mohammed Abdullah Hassan-dj.jpg|Sayyid Mohammed Abdullah Hassan, head of Darawiish

File:Sheykh_of_the_Rufai_Dervishes.jpg|A Sheikh of the Rifa'i Sufi Order

{{EB9 Poster|Dervish}}

{{NIE Poster|year=1905}}

{{Commons category|Dervishes}}

• Derviş, a variant of the spelling
• Dervish movement (Somali) of 1889-1920
• Fakir, Sufi Muslim ascetic
• Qalandariyya Sufi order

• The Tale of the Four Dervishes, 13th-century Persian story collection
• The Mongol Invasion, historical trilogy (1939-1955) by Soviet writer Vasily Yan; the connecting element is a dervish and chronicler
• Death and the Dervish, 1966 novel by Yugoslav writer Meša Selimović

{{Reflist}}

• Xavier, Merin Shobhana. The Dervishes of the North: Rumi, Whirling, and the Making of Sufism in Canada. University of Toronto Press. 2023.

{{Sufism terminology}}

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