9 - Doctrines and Practices

Summary

Ahmad-i Jam’s gnosticism, as Shafiʿi Kadkani said, has a “unique flavor” (taʿm-i wizha). Ahmad’s progeny attempted to describe his gnostic (ʿirfan) and religious concepts in their books, namely, Hadiqat al-haqiqa and Khulasat al-maqamat (both still valued at Jam). However, a Sufi methodology (suluk or tariq) attributable to Ahmad was not articulated. With novel or revived Sufi concepts wafting through Khurasan in the eighth/fourteenth and ninth/fifteenth centuries, the doctrines and practices of the Sufis of Jam shifted. The Khwajagan-Naqshbandiyya offered them fresh and exciting mystical theories and models.Examined closely here are dhikr (recollection of God), khalwat (seclusion), samaʿ (auditory stimulation), and rabita (bonding one’s heart with the shaykh’s heart), which remain popular ʿirfan exercises. A case study of ʿAziz-Allah Jami, who was drawn to the Naqshbandiyya, demonstrates how Jamis borrowed and adapted, but remained faithful to their saint by focusing their devotion on Ahmad-i Jam. By focusing on Ahmad, sometimes through the practice of rabita, the fissiparous Sufi components of the cult avoided conflict over doctrines. Jami Sufis were a “broad church,” bound together by love for Ahmad of Jam.