The Tijaniyya in Kemalist Turkey and the West
A brief summary of the Tijani Sufi order’s spread in Anatolia, as well as in Europe and America
This is a translated excerpt of the Algerian scholar Shaykh Abd al-Bāqī Miftāh’s book "Shedding Light upon Shaykh Ahmad al-Tijani and his Followers"
When the Tijani Tariqa began to spread widely in Egypt and Tunisia after its greatest mufti — Shaykh Ibrahim Riyāhī — entered it in 1216 AH (1801 CE), several Beys and Turkish rulers along with their families also adopted it. When they returned to Turkey, they began to call to it in their communities. Due to the meeting of Turkish pilgrims with Tijanis while on Hajj and the relocation of several Tijani muqaddams to Turkey, the tariqa began to spread and grow there, particularly in the region of Anatolia (Asia Minor).
The followers of the Tijaniyya in Turkey were at the forefront of those defending the Islamic religion, [Muslim] culture, and the Arabic language, and their shaykhs were among the leaders of the resistance against westernization movements, atheism, and social deviance. Concerning this subject, Bernard Lewis says in his book “The Middle East and the West,” quoting Shaykh Yusuf Qardawi’s treatise “The Islamic Solution: an Obligation and Necessity” :
“Even in Turkey, in a highly westernized and secular society, militant religious movements emerged in opposition to the Kemalist revolution. The heads of these movements were the dervish brotherhoods; the religious scholars were not among them, because they were official employees [under state control]. During the life of Kemal Atatürk, the Naqshabandi Sufi movement was the spearhead of the religious opposition. Quite a few of its members led armed revolutions, the most important of which being in the southeastern region in 1925 CE and in Menemen (İzmir province) in 1930. More recently, the Tijani movement and the Nūri movement are the two movements which preach and call against the Kemalist revolution, though they have not—as of yet—carried weapons...”
(Translated from the Arabic, as I do not have access to Lewis’ English text)
The Tijani Islamic opposition reached its zenith in Turkey at the beginning of the 1950s. News of it is widely reported in the newspapers of that time, such that the famous [Egyptian] thinker Abbās Mahmūd al-Aqqād wrote an article about the subject in which he said:
“It has been reported by Anatolian news sources that followers of the Tijani tariqa are serious about restoring the Islamic character of the Turkish government. They track down all traces of Mustafa Kamāl [Atatürk] and wipe them out and destroy them completely, such as statues in squares and public places. They are the ones that entered the gallery of the Grand National Assembly and made the call to prayer in Arabic [which had been made illegal].
Some of [these sources] said that the defeat of the party founded by Mustafa Kemal and his successor, İsmet İnönü, is due to the efforts of this group and the concerted efforts of its preachers in defaming that party in the parliamentary elections that established the current government in its place.
It is not far-fetched that the Tijanis, as has been reported by several journalists, aspire to renew the Ottoman Caliphate, or establish another caliphate like it. The thing that caught our attention was the powerful influence of this order in Asia Minor, despite having been founded—as mentioned above—in the Far Maghreb. It is not possible for the followers of any tariqa to undertake such a bold move without sincere reliance on a large number of the people of that country.
It is said that one of the shaykhs of this tariqa—one Muhammad al-Mukhtār bin Abdur-Rahmān al-Shinqītī—gave the oath of the Tijaniyya to the ruler of Egypt Muhammad Sa’īd Pāshā. [It is said that] he would travel between the Sultan of Darfur in Sudan and the Ottoman Sultan Abd al-Majīd in Istanbul, as he was one of the "People of the Step" (I.e. those saints miraculously able to travel great distances instantaneously). The entry of the Tijaniyya into the Turkish lands occurred at his hand. It is reported that he accumulated great wealth as a result of his profitable trade ventures, and then gave it all away and withdrew from worldly affairs, devoting himself solely to the spiritual path. He thus directed all his spiritual energy towards calling [to the Tijaniyya] in the central regions of Sudan particularly.”
It is also reported that an Algerian called Muhammad al-Ubaīdī arrived in Istanbul in the year 1314 AH (1897 CE) and established a Tijani zawiya there. Furthermore, it is said that the Shaykh Muhammad Abd al-Mālik bin al-Alamī al-Sā’ihi—who established the first Tijani zawiya in Medina in 1353 AH (1934 CE)—visited Mardin in Turkey. There, a large group of Turks took [the tariqa] from him, and he established a zawiya for them.
In Europe and America, Tijani migrants from Africa and Turkey have begun calling to Islam and the tariqa, especially in France, Italy, and Britain. In Paris alone, there are at least nine places where people gather for the dhikr and [spiritual] study (as of 2009). The widest spread of their dawah in the West currently is amongst Black Americans, and in recent years, a number of zawiyas have been established in Chicago, Washington, New York, and elsewhere.
In Italy currently, a group of Italian intellectuals have converted to Islam and the Tijani tariqa, and they call to it under the leadership of their muqaddam, Dr. Abd al-Samad Yahya [Urizzi] al-Tijani, who in turn studied under Shaykh Muhammad al-Hāfiz al-Tijani in Egypt after embracing Islam in 1974. He then took knowledge from other shaykhs of the Tijaniyya, including the great muqaddam Shaykh Idrīs al-Irāqi in Fez...
Perhaps this wide propagation is what led one of their Algerian poets to say concerning the Tijani Tariqa:
“His is a way of grace and favor; Possessing books timeless and universal
Its proliferation has extended throughout the five continents; Such that no land is without the dhikr (remembrance)
London, Paris, Washington, and Rome; Beijing—there is even dhikr in the Kremlin!
Speak of the great ones who are disciples of [this tariqa]; Shaykhs and rulers, and those of great worth.
They testified to the Truth, saying, "[This tariqa] is a vast measure; It is Truth, healing, knowledge, and wisdom.”
Dr. Abd al-Azīz bin Abdullāh says at the end of the third volume of his “Encyclopedia of Islamic Sufism”:
“I visited Paris in 1955, and found that the French capitol alone had fourteen Tijani zawiyas under the supervision of the muqaddam Shaykh al-Arabi al-Hashtūkī. One of my relatives told me that he visited Washington DC in the 1940s, and heard the recitation of the wazīfa (the core Tijani litany) in one of the alleyways of the American capitol. He entered and found it was a Tijani zawiya.”
Dr. Abd al-Azīz bin Abdullāh is one of the most famous muqaddams of the Tijaniyya in Morocco and is counted among the great scholars of the Islamic world. He has held senior positions in higher education, lectured in more than twenty universities on three continents, and has authored some hundred works.
(All translations—including any possible errors therein—are my own. Any good or benefit found in this piece is from God alone)
Addendum: Excerpt from the paper "An ‘African’ Tarika in Anatolia: Notes on the Tijaniyya in Early Republican Turkey"
By Dr. Cathlene Dollar from the University of Cape Town:
“Estimates of Turkish membership of the Tijaniyya following its introduction vary widely. Marmorstein estimates membership anywhere from 8,000 to as many as 100,000, while Lewis estimates approximately 40,000…
The recitation of the call to prayer in Arabic was among the religious practices outlawed in 1925 in the name of the ‘Turkification’ of Islam. Throughout the 1940s, several Tijanis toured Turkey solely with the purpose of publicly reciting the call to prayer in Arabic as part of what they believed to be a holy struggle against the secular state. In 1948, the state modified the ban on the Arabic call to prayer to allow for its recitation only on religious holidays. In 1949, Tijaniyya members Muhiddin Ertuğrul and Osman Yaz recited the call to prayer in Arabic in front of the Grand National Assembly in Ankara during a legislative session to protest against the remaining ban...
In 1951, reports of the defacement and decapitation of statues of Atatürk began to appear in Turkish news sources... Later that same year, Kamal Pilavoğlu, along with several hundred members of the Tijaniyya, was arrested and put on trial in Ankara, accused of being responsible for the decapitations. Widespread protests accompanied his trial; thousands of Pilavoğlu’s followers occupied the streets outside the courthouse or came into the courtroom and interrupted the trial in a fit of protest...
The example of the Tijaniyya in Turkey is of particular interest due to its North African origins, its global span, and its outspoken rejection of the ‘Turkification’ of Islam in the republic. Other Sufi movements in Turkey mainly adapted to the nationalist rhetoric of the new republic and promoted an anti-Kemalism based on a nostalgic, neo-Ottoman vision of Turkish history, which can be seen as an ‘Islamic’ version of Turkish nationalism. In contrast, the Tijaniyya maintained a more genuinely global, antinationalist vision of Islamic identity.”
Read Dr. Dollar’s full paper here.
