It’s Not Just Academic!
Author : Carl W Ernst
Publisher : Sage, Rs 1,195
That Sufism is an active part of not just subcontinental but also global Islam is not common knowledge, which is why this book is important, says Anubhav Pradhan
Prime amongst my limited talents is the unenviable ability to read under almost any circumstance. Standing, travelling, walking, I can hold onto a book and still not lose my bearings. Friends who see me deep in a tome thus often caution of a bad, sad end in a roadside ditch, but so far, I continue to be an unharmed testament to the tenacity of compulsive reading. Besides, the habit brings some happy results. Reading this book, Carl Ernst’s It’s Not Just Academic! Essays on Sufism and Islamic Studies, over four months all over Delhi provided not only many occasions to connect dots in the city’s spatial fabric, but also brought a very pertinent query from a fellow passenger in the underground metro on the relevance of Sufism. “Is Sufism still practised,” asked Shounak Das, advocate in the Supreme Court, “Is it still like a cult?”
“Yes,” I said, and referred to the great Chisti triumvirate in what is now South Delhi. Sufis continues to attract followers, not simply tourists — people still do believe in it. A very curious local example, marginally referred to by Ernst as well, is of the Peer Baba of Sultan Garhi, a royal tomb now worshipped as a holy mazar. Sufism is an active part of not just subcontinental but also global Islam, evolving with the times and pulling more believers into its fold. But clearly, this is not common knowledge. I know all of the above as part litterateur, part historian, so do many of my betters in academics — and a substantial population of believers. But, as Das’s question suggests, this is still not common knowledge.
That is why this book is an important landmark for our times. Collating some two dozen of Ernst’s best essays over the past three decades or so, It’s Not Just Academic! is informative, accessible, and even entertaining in a way few such volumes are. Islam has been maligned much in the recent past, and has witnessed extreme forms of radicalisation, but the essays in this book will provide measured correctives to many who have been victims to these essentialist stereotypes. They present multiple narratives on and critiques of alternative traditions, entrenched as well as new, of Islamic selfhoods within the broad rubric of Sufi mysticism, theology, and aesthetics.
The essays are presented in five sections, ‘General and Critical Issues in Islamic Studies’, ‘Early Sufism’, ‘Sufism, Art, and Literature’, ‘Contemporary Sufism’, and ‘Persianate Themes’. From teaching the Quran in university classrooms to stages of love in Sufism, from the spirit of Islamic calligraphy to the technological transformations of contemporary Sufism, the breadth and depth of Ernst’s concerns here will appear comprehensive to many readers. Importantly, Ernst dismantles here the golden age theory — which he himself had subscribed to in earlier writings — as an Orientalist misreading: Instead of entering a phase of supposed decline from the 17th Century, Sufism took various localised forms not necessarily within the familiar framework of classic Arabic and Persian iterations. Similarly, Ernst’s comments on the challenges of teaching Sufism and Islam in heterogeneous classrooms in today’s increasingly polarised environment are instructive and insightful. They show us a way out of the quagmire of communal standpoints much of our pedagogy in India tends to be lost in.
The book is not an easy read though, and readers must not be beguiled by its invitingly refreshing title. Even though the subjects Ernst deals with are, for the most, of common, civilisational interest and though the writing style is, on the whole, accessible, the detailing and discussion might appear forbiddingly esoteric to many uninitiated readers. Not in more than half a dozen essays was I able to understand Ernst in a single reading, and even now I feel I must go back and read again and again what I have already laboured on for quite some time. Of course, this is precisely how one acquires training and becomes knowledgeable in an unknown domain.
Readers may also find themselves strangely thrilled by the revelations of prophets, masters, and mystics, such as: “God did not give him up to His creation, for he is He, as I am He, and ‘He is He’.” Yet, the kind of close and careful reading which this book necessarily demands does not really qualify as leisurely pursuit. Those looking for a quick, simple digest on Sufism may well have to bypass the book, but others, with even a little interest in these matters or the willingness to know and learn more, should keep this book as a beacon of beauty and wisdom.
The reviewer is a doctoral candidate with the Department of English, Jamia Millia Islamia. Views are personal