central figure for various Sufi orders in Western
Europe and the United States who were attracted to
his Sufi music and dance performances.
One of the first Sufi groups to be established in
the West was that of £aΩrat Inàyàt Khàn (1882–
1927), an Indian Pìr of the Chishtiyya order who
traveled to the United States, England, and Ger-
many in 1910. During his travels he attracted a
number of Western disciples. He started publishing
books in English about Sufism in 1914, and two
years later he settled in London and founded the
first Sufi order in Western Europe. Also important
for the development of this Westernized Sufism
were the writings of such dominant figures as Idries
Shah (an Indian with a Scottish mother), who pub-
lished The Sufisin 1964, and Reshad Feild, who
wrote The Last Barrierin 1976. These books be-
came very popular and were translated into other
Western languages. Although the authors were
influential and famous in the arena of Westernized
Sufism, they were almost never leaders of Sufi
orders. Westernized Sufism was generally presented
as something that can be separated from Islam. The
followers were almost always non-Muslim Wester-
ners who understood Sufism more as a kind of phi-
losophy or universal religion than as a religious
practice of Islam, although it was often combined
with forms of music, dance, and meditation.
Today the best-known and most widespread
association of trans-Islamic Sufism is the Western
Sufi movement founded by Pìr £aΩrat Inàyat Khàn.
The group has branches in France, Germany, the
Netherlands, the United States, and several other
countries. Today the association is led by the Pìr’s
son, Vilàyàt Inàyàt Khàn. Followers believe in the
wisdom of uniting different religious forms of mys-
tical expression and in the mystical relationship
between God, man, and creation. Within the Sufi
movement, special techniques and steps of mystical
learning, spiritual healing, and spiritual symbology
exist (Jironet 2002).
Sufi orders in the West
With the immigration of workers from Muslim
countries starting in the 1960s, Islam became
established in Western European countries. Sufi
orders were built by labor migrants from Morocco,
India, Sudan, and other countries. In the beginning,
they were not noticed much by Westerners because
the existence of something other than orthodox
Islamic practice was not known. Today these
orders are ethnically closed groups which do not
differ in any significant aspect from their counter-
parts in the Islamic world or in non-Muslim coun-
tries outside the West. A Punjabi immigrant in
western europe 773Britain, for example, may belong to a British
branch of the same order that his family belongs to
in the Punjab. The Punjabi order supports the expa-
triate in Britain with spiritual guidance and mate-
rial assistance. The Punjabi shaykh or his khalìfa
(Arabic, successor, here the second in the hierarchy)
travels to Britain often, and the British immigrant
goes regularly on a pilgrimage to his shaykh or his
shrine. Often the children of immigrants are sent by
their parents to the order in their country of origin
for a traditional education. Attempts to establish
independent branches of such ethnic traditional
Sufi orders have often failed because of the power
of different groups in the country of origin (Geaves
2000).
Traditional Sufi orders are found especially in
Britain and France where workers emigrated from
countries with vivid Sufi traditions. All followers
share the same ethnic background and special
devotional practices of their order such as the dhikr
ceremony and pilgrimage to the shrine of a dead
shaykh. Many orders also celebrate the birthday of
the Prophet Mu™ammad with a procession in the
streets in some European cities. In Germany such
Sufi groups are rare because the majority of immi-
grants come from Turkey where Sufi orders have
been forbidden since 1925. But today there are so-
called laic Sufi orders (for example, Süleymanciler)
without a living shaykh but with ceremonial prac-
tices, such as dhikr and recitation of the silsila, of
the founder of the group.Western Sufi Orders
There are also Sufi orders that are trans-ethnic
and Islamic. Two groups are worth mentioning
because they are widespread in Western Europe.
One of the most prominent Western Sufi orders is
the Naqshbandì order of the Cypriot Shaykh
Mu™ammad NàΩim ≠âdil al-Qubrußìal-£aqqànì.
Shaykh NàΩim made his first visit to Europe in- Twenty years later more than three thousand
people attended the London mosque each night
where he led prayers during Ramadan. Today he
has followers all over the Islamic world and in the
West. Although the practices of the order do not
differ much from other Naqshbandìorders, the
Western followers of NàΩim differ from other
traditional Sufi orders because the majority are
women and from the spiritual left. The Western
order is ethnically mixed, so Muslim-born and con-
verts pray together. The order has established an
independent identity in the West. The weekly dhikr
and the visits from Shaykh NàΩim, who travels
throughout the world, are the center of the social
activities of the order.