A GLOSSARY OF SUFI TECHNICAL TERMS

Compiled by Abd al-Razzaq al-Qashani
Translated from the Arabic by Nabil Safwat
Revised and edited by David Pendlebury
Includes facsimile of original Arabic text.

Octagon Press, London, 1991

This is the first accessible English translation from the Arabic of a book that has been required reading in Sufi circles for more than six centuries.

Nabil Safwat and David Pendlebury worked on the project for more than three years at the behest of the Sufi Trust.

It is as if in our travels a party of us came upon the remains of a camp fire. Some of us might simply wish to examine it minutely, to discover what manner of people had used it -- where they came from, where they were going and when. Others, on observing that some of the ashes were still warm, might be more inclined -- and might even have the requisite know-how -- to stir through the embers in order to kindle a flame which would form the basis of another campfire, which was no longer 'theirs, then' but 'ours, now'.
--From A Glossary of Sufi Technical Terms © 1991 by The Sufi Trust.