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XLIX.—SUFI′ISM, OR MYSTICISM.
The term Súfí is said to be derived from the Arabic Súf, "wool," on account of the woollen garments worn by the Eastern ascetics; or from the Persian Sáf, "pure," with reference to the Sufiistic effort to attain to metaphysical purity ; or from the Greek, σοφια, "wisdom," i. e. the true wisdom, or knowledge.
Tasawwaf, or Sufíism, appears to be. but the Muslim adaptation of the doctrines of the Vedanta school, which we also find in the writings of the old academies of Greece, and which Sir William Jones thought Plato learned from the sages of the East.
The Súfís are divided into innumerable sects; but although they differ in name, and in some of their customs, they are all agreed in the principal tenets, especially those which inculcate the absolute necessity of blind submission to an inspired teacher, or Murshid. They
