Refine your search

The results of your search are listed below alongside the search terms you entered on the previous page. You can refine your search by amending any of the parameters in the form and resubmitting it.

Select all Deselect all Add selection to lightbox
Large Small
Thumbnails per page
A Dervish is someone treading a Sufi Muslim ascetic path or <i>Tariqah</i>, known (notionally) for their extreme poverty and austerity, similar to mendicant friars in Christianity or Hindu / Buddhist / Jain sadhus.
Nur ad-Dīn Abd ar-Rahmān Jāmī (Persian: نورالدین عبدالرحمن جامی‎) also known as DJāmī, Mawlanā Nūr al-Dīn 'Abd al-Rahmān or Abd-Al-Rahmān Nur-Al-Din Muhammad Dashti who is commonly known as Jami (August 18, 1414 – November 17, 1492), is known for his achievements as a scholar, mystic, writer, composer of numerous lyrics and idylls, historian, and one of the greatest Persian and Sufi poets of the 15th century. Jami was primarily an outstanding poet-theologian of the school of Ibn Arabī and a prominent Khwājagānī Sũfī. He was recognized for his eloquent tongue and ready at repartee who analyzed the idea of the metaphysics of mercy. Among his famous poetical works are: Haft Awrang, Tuhfat al-Ahrar, Layla wa -Majnun, Fatihat al-Shabab, Lawa'ih, Al-Durrah al-Fakhirah.
Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد بلخى), also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد رومی) and popularly known as Mevlānā in Turkey and Mawlānā in Iran and Afghanistan but known to the English-speaking world simply as Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273) was a 13th-century Persian Muslim poet, jurist, theologian, and Sufi mystic.<br/><br/> He was born in Balkh Province in Afghanistan at a small town located by the river Wakhsh in what is now Tajikistan. Wakhsh belonged to the larger province of Balkh, and in the year Rumi was born, his father was an appointed scholar there. Both these cities were at the time included in the greater Persian cultural sphere of Khorasan, the easternmost province of Persia and was part of the Khwarezmian Empire.<br/><br/> He lived most of his life under the Sultanate of Rum, where he produced his works and died in 1273 CE. He was buried in Konya and his shrine became a place of pilgrimage. Following his death, his followers and his son Sultan Walad founded the Mevlevi Order, also known as the Order of the Whirling Dervishes, famous for its Sufi dance known as the Sama ceremony.<br/><br/> Rumi's works are written in the New Persian language. A Persian literary renaissance (in the 8th/9th century) started in regions of Sistan, Khorāsān and Transoxiana and by the 10th/11th century, it reinforced the Persian language as the preferred literary and cultural language in the Persian Islamic world.<br/><br/> Rumi's importance is considered to transcend national and ethnic borders. His original works are widely read in their original language across the Persian-speaking world. Translations of his works are very popular in other countries. His poetry has influenced Persian literature as well as Urdu, Punjabi and other Pakistani languages written in Perso/Arabic script e.g. Pashto and Sindhi. His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. In 2007, he was described as the 'most popular poet in America' by the BBC.
Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد بلخى), also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد رومی) and popularly known as Mevlānā in Turkey and Mawlānā in Iran and Afghanistan but known to the English-speaking world simply as Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273) was a 13th-century Persian Muslim poet, jurist, theologian, and Sufi mystic.<br/><br/> He was born in Balkh Province in Afghanistan at a small town located by the river Wakhsh in what is now Tajikistan. Wakhsh belonged to the larger province of Balkh, and in the year Rumi was born, his father was an appointed scholar there. Both these cities were at the time included in the greater Persian cultural sphere of Khorasan, the easternmost province of Persia and was part of the Khwarezmian Empire.<br/><br/> He lived most of his life under the Sultanate of Rum, where he produced his works and died in 1273 CE. He was buried in Konya and his shrine became a place of pilgrimage. Following his death, his followers and his son Sultan Walad founded the Mevlevi Order, also known as the Order of the Whirling Dervishes, famous for its Sufi dance known as the Sama ceremony.<br/><br/> Rumi's works are written in the New Persian language. A Persian literary renaissance (in the 8th/9th century) started in regions of Sistan, Khorāsān and Transoxiana and by the 10th/11th century, it reinforced the Persian language as the preferred literary and cultural language in the Persian Islamic world.<br/><br/> Rumi's importance is considered to transcend national and ethnic borders. His original works are widely read in their original language across the Persian-speaking world. Translations of his works are very popular in other countries. His poetry has influenced Persian literature as well as Urdu, Punjabi and other Pakistani languages written in Perso/Arabic script e.g. Pashto and Sindhi. His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into various formats. In 2007, he was described as the 'most popular poet in America' by the BBC.
Turkey: A Turkish dervish. Photo by Jean Pascal Sebah (1872 - 6 June 1947), c. 1920-1930.<br/><br/> A dervish/darvish/darwish in Islam is a believer or religious mendicant in a Sufi fraternity (tariqah) who has chosen material poverty. Their focus is on the universal values of love and service, to try and reach God through abandoning ego. In many Sufi orders, a dervish is known practice dhikr (Islamic meditation) through physical exertions to attain an ecstatic trance.<br/><br/> In folklore, dervishes are often credited with the ability to perform miracles and ascribed supernatural powers.
Sufism or taṣawwuf (Arabic: تصوّف‎) is defined by its adherents as the inner, mystical dimension of Islam. A practitioner of this tradition is generally known as a ṣūfī (صُوفِيّ). Another name for a Sufi is Dervish.<br/><br/> Classical Sufi scholars have defined Sufism as 'a science whose objective is the reparation of the heart and turning it away from all else but God'. Alternatively, in the words of the Darqawi Sufi teacher Ahmad ibn Ajiba, 'a science through which one can know how to travel into the presence of the Divine, purify one's inner self from filth, and beautify it with a variety of praiseworthy traits'.<br/><br/> Classical Sufis were characterised by their attachment to dhikr (a practice of repeating the names of God) and asceticism. Sufism gained adherents among a number of Muslims as a reaction against the worldliness of the early Umayyad Caliphate (661-750 CE). Sufis have spanned several continents and cultures over a millennium, at first expressed through Arabic, then through Persian, Turkish and a dozen other languages. 'Orders' (ṭuruq), which are either Sunni or Shia or mixed in doctrine, trace many of their original precepts from the Prophet Muhammad through his cousin 'Alī, with the notable exception of the Naqshbandi who trace their origins through the first Caliph, Abu Bakr.
Six dervishes or Sufi adepts are depicted in varying states of dizziness and collapse after whirling to induce a mystical state. Two bearded figures stand with the aid of young novices, while two others are seated on the ground. At the lower left, a youth holds a book, while at the right, another plays the tambourine.<br/><br/> The artist is unknown but may well have been Muhammad Herati, a painter with wide influence in the last quarter of the sixteenth century.
The Mawlawi Order, or the Mevlevilik or Mevleviye are a Sufi order founded in Konya (in present-day Turkey) by the followers of Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Balkhi-Rumi, a 13th century Persian poet, Islamic jurist, and theologian. They are also known as the Whirling Dervishes due to their famous practice of whirling as a form of dhikr (remembrance of God). Vlas Mikhailovich Doroshevich, 1905.
Edward Dodwell (1767 – 13 May 1832) was an Irish painter, traveller and a writer on archaeology.<br/><br/> Dodwell travelled from 1801 to 1806 in Greece (at the time a part of the Ottoman Empire), and spent the rest of his life for the most part in Italy, at Naples, and Rome.<br/><br/> A Dervish (from Persian درویش, Darvīsh via Turkish, Somali: Daraawiish, Arabic: دولة الدراويش‎) is someone treading a Sufi Muslim ascetic path or 'Tariqah', known (notionally) for their extreme poverty and austerity, similar to mendicant friars in Christianity or Hindu/Buddhist/Jain sadhus.<br/><br/> The whirling dance or Sufi whirling that is proverbially associated with Dervishes is best known in the West by the practices of the Mevlevi order in Turkey, and is part of a formal ceremony known as the Sama. It is, however, also practiced by other orders. The Sama is only one of the many Sufi ceremonies performed to try to reach religious ecstasy (majdhb, fana).<br/><br/> The name Mevlevi comes from the Persian poet, Rumi who was a Dervish himself.
Edward Dodwell (1767 – 13 May 1832) was an Irish painter, traveller and a writer on archaeology.<br/><br/> Dodwell travelled from 1801 to 1806 in Greece (at the time a part of the Ottoman Empire), and spent the rest of his life for the most part in Italy, at Naples, and Rome.<br/><br/> A Dervish (from Persian درویش, Darvīsh via Turkish, Somali: Daraawiish, Arabic: دولة الدراويش‎) is someone treading a Sufi Muslim ascetic path or 'Tariqah', known (notionally) for their extreme poverty and austerity, similar to mendicant friars in Christianity or Hindu/Buddhist/Jain sadhus.<br/><br/> The whirling dance or Sufi whirling that is proverbially associated with Dervishes is best known in the West by the practices of the Mevlevi order in Turkey, and is part of a formal ceremony known as the Sama. It is, however, also practiced by other orders. The Sama is only one of the many Sufi ceremonies performed to try to reach religious ecstasy (majdhb, fana).<br/><br/> The name Mevlevi comes from the Persian poet, Rumi who was a Dervish himself.
Justin Perkins (1805-1869) was born on a farm in Massachusetts, and educated at Amherst and the Andover Theological Seminary. From 1833 until shortly before his death in 1869, he served as missionary to the Nestorian Christians of Qajar Iran (1794-1925) under the auspices of the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions. He was the first American missionary in Qajar Iran, as well as an eminent scholar of Syriac. He developed an alphabet for the writing of modern Syriac, which was the Nestorians' vernacular, and established a press at Urmia (spelled Oroomiah by Perkins) in western Azerbaijan to print his translations of the New Testament (1846) and the Old Testament (1852) in both liturgical and modern Syriac.<br/><br/> Urmia, sometimes spelled, Orumieh, during the majority of the Pahlavi Dynasty (1925–1979) called Rezaiyeh), is a city in Northwestern Iran and the capital of West Azerbaijan Province. The city lies on an altitude of 1,330 m above sea level on the Shahar Chay river (City River). Urmia is the 10th most populated city in Iran with a population of about 600,000. The population is predominantly Azerbaijani with significant Kurdish, Assyrian and Armenian minorities.