Zoom Webinar Link

Abstract

Abū al-Mawāhib Aḥmad b. ʿAlī al-Shinnāwī (d. 1028/1619) was an eminent Egyptian scholar and Sufi master whose intellectual and spiritual trajectory epitomizes the dynamic interconnections among the Islamic centers of Egypt, North Africa, the Ḥijāz, and India in the early modern period. Trained in Egypt under leading jurists and theologians such as al-Ramlī, al-Bakrī, al-ʿAbbādī, and Ḥasan al-Danjīhī (a student of al-Suyūṭī), al-Shinnāwī combined rigorous study in the religious sciences with initiation into major Sufi orders of Egypt and North Africa, situating himself within both scholarly and mystical networks. His relocation to the Ḥijāz marked a turning point in his career, as he encountered scholars and Sufis from the Indian subcontinent and received further authorizations in Indian Sufi lineages, expanding his transregional connections. In Medina, where he resided until his death, al-Shinnāwī studied with the influential Ṣibghat Allāh, who, at his request, translated the Persian Sufi treatise al-Jawāhir al-khams into Arabic. Al-Shinnāwī subsequently composed two major commentaries on this work, along with numerous writings in jurisprudence, ḥadīth, and Sufism. By integrating Egyptian and Indian Sufi lineages within the scholarly milieu of the Ḥijāz, al-Shinnāwī emerged as a pivotal figure embodying the “junction of the two seas.” His position in Medina enabled him to bridge distinct mystical traditions and transmit them to later generations, leaving a lasting impact on Sufi thought and practice across the Islamic world.

Bio

Naser Dumairieh is Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies at Ibn Haldun University, Istanbul. He obtained his PhD in Islamic Studies from McGill University. His areas of research include Islamic philosophy, theology, Sufism, Arabic Manuscripts, and knowledge transmission, with a particular focus on the intellectual and spiritual life of the Ḥijāz. His publications include Intellectual Life in the Ḥijāz before Wahhabism: Ibrāhīm al-Kūrānī’s (d. 1101/1690) Theology of Sufism (Brill, 2021) and Sufis and Their Lodges in the Ottoman Ḥijāz (Brill, 2023).

Download Program