![]() ![]() Lings was born in Burnage, Manchester in 1909 to a Protestant family. He is best known as the author of a very popular and positively reviewed biography, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources, first published in 1983 and still in print. Martin Lings was an English writer and scholar, a student and follower of Frithjof Schuon, and Shakespearean scholar. It has also been published in Sarajevo in Bosnian, and is available in Braille. It is now accepted as the authoritative statement on the subject of Sufism and it has been translated into French, German, Italian and Spanish. A reviewer wrote 'Should the book appear in paperback, I would use it for undergraduate and graduate courses on Islamic civilization', and in fact What is Sufism? has become a set book in colleges and universities on both sides of the Atlantic. He is thus able to give a wealth of answers to the main question 'What is Sufism?', each answer being from a different angle but all going to the root of the matter. What do Sufis believe? What do they aim at? What do they do? Unlike other writers on the subject, Martin Lings treats all the three questions with equal justice. His illuminating answer to 'What is Sufism?' gives a taste of the very subject matter itself. His explanation derives from a profound understanding of Sufism, and extends to many aspects which are usually neglected. Martin Lings provides an excellent and authoritative introduction to the mystical movement of the Sufis based on his lifelong interest in Islamic culture. ![]()
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