02.3.qxd
8/14/02
2:44 PM
Page 63
The Spectrum of Islam
63
the Sufis show the greatest attachment to the Sharı¯‘ah, whose inner significance they seek to reach. And they must of necessity follow one of its schools. It is meaningless to ask, as many Western scholars and especially anthropologists have done, whether a particular Muslim is a Sunni or a Sufi, or for that matter a Shı¯‘ite or a Sufi. A Sunni or a Shı¯‘ite can be a Sufi or not a Sufi, but the situation is not one of alternatives, because these dimensions of the religion are not situated on the same level of reality. That is why the presence of Sufism has never been a cause for division in traditional Islamic society. In contrast, it has been a cause of integration and the return to that inner unity whose attainment is the goal of Islam. The first division in the structure of the religion must, in fact, be sought not in the difference between Sharı¯‘ite Islam and Sufism, but in the separation of Sunnism and Shı¯‘ism from each other in the first century of Islamic history. The Sunni-Shı¯‘ite division is the most important in the formal structure of Islam, although even this division does not destroy the unity of Islam and both share the unifying elements already mentioned. Moreover, Sufism, representing the inner dimension of the religion, transcends this dichotomy. Not only are there Sunnis as well as Shı¯‘ites who are Sufis, but Shı¯‘ism and Sufism also share together the original inner message of the Prophet and the power of spiritual and initiatic guidance (wala ¯yah/wila ¯yah), so that the situation is somewhat more complex than stated. But for the present discussion it suffices to say that Sufism, or the T.arı¯qah, belongs to the inner dimension of Islam and transcends Sharı¯‘ite differences, and Sunnism and Shı¯‘ism mark a division within Islam on the formal and legal level. While on the subject of Sufism, it must be recalled here that Sufism has had the greatest role in the spread of