Sufism and Saint Veneration in Contemporary Bangladesh: The Maijbhandaris of Chittagong

Sufism and Saint Veneration in Contemporary Bangladesh
Copyright
Contents
List of illustrations
Preface
Transliteration and writing conventions
Abbreviations
1 Introduction
	1.1 Approaching Maijbhandar
	1.2 Shrines in Chittagong
	1.3 Maijbhandar: a shrine complex and religious movement
	1.4 Historical outline
2 Structure and religious practice
	2.1 Structure of the Maijbhandari movement
	2.2 Religious practice in Maijbhandar
3 Theological and hagiological writings
	3.1 Love ('išq, prem)
	3.2 Light (nūr)
	3.3 Stations (maqāmāt)
	3.4 Manifest (zāhir) and concealed (bātin), šarī'a and tarīqa
	3.5 Unity (tawhīd)
	3.6 Spiritual sovereignty (wilāya)
	3.7 The Maijbhandari tarīqa
4 Hagiographies
	4.1 Muslim hagiography in Bengal
	4.2 Maijbhandari hagiographies
	4.3 Hagiographies about founding Saint Ġawt al-A'zam Ahmadullah Maijbhandari (1829-1906)
	4.4 Hagiographies about the second great Maijbhandari saint, Gholam Rahman alias Bābā Bhāndārī (1865-1937)
	4.5 Shahanshah Ziaul Haq Maijbhandari (1928-88)
	4.6 Syed Shafiul Bashar (1919-2001)
	4.7 Analysis
5 Maijbhandari songs
	5.1 Origins and basic properties
	5.2 Performance situations
	5.3 Debates on audition (samā')
	5.4 Musical performance
	5.5 Classifications of Maijbhandari songs
	5.6 Language and communicative design
	5.7 Motifs of Maijbhandari songs
	5.8 Conclusion
6 Songs in contemporary Maijbhandari interpretations
	6.1 Boat journeys and sandhābhāsā
	6.2 Lovers as Radha and Krishna
	6.3 Symbolical changes of sex
	6.4 The avatāra concept
7 Contextualising Maijbhandar
	7.1 ‘Syncretism’, ‘little tradition’, ‘discursive fields’
	7.2 Correlating Maijbhandar with Islam and other religions
	7.3 Lack of structural fixity: a sketch of the discursive field of Maijbhandar
	7.4 How does Maijbhandar work? An interpretation
8 Conclusion: a note on Bengali Islam
	8.1 The configuration of shrine and pīr veneration in Bengal
	8.2 Medieval Bengali Islamic literature: documentation rather than mediation
	8.3 On Bengali Islam
Appendix I: translations of selected Maijbhandari songs
Appendix II: glossary of terms
Bibliography
Index