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The avowed aim of the sanusi was to restore the prestine beauty of Islam,as enshrined in the holy Quran and the prophetic sunnah;they prohibited music,dancing,singing,tobacco and even coffee.Yet like other Sufi orders it had certain devotional peculiarities.For instance in Dhikr (innovation of God,s name),they had certain formulae to be repeated upto a given number for different categories of the 'Ikhwan'.It would be interesting to note here that the adherents of the sanusiyyah order were divided into three categories:
1.AHL AL TABARRUK (people seeking spiritual blessings):These people were not formal members of the sanusiyyah order but attended the zawiyahs to tend only tabarruk or spiritual blessings.They used to repeat the given formulae three hundred times.
2.AHL AL IRADAH (People of devotion) : They were formal members of the sanusiyyah order and would repeat the given formulae twelve thousand times.
3.AHL AL TAJRID (people of abstraction): They were the people who had moulded their lives according to the Divine pleasure and scaled the heights of spiritual self-satisfaction.They repeated the formulae twenty- four thousand times.
(ref:Al Anwar al qudsiyyah)
Muhammaad Ibne Ali Ali al Sanusi and his followers never levelled heretic charges against other schools of thoughts or Sufi orders,rather they viewed the difference of opinion from a rational angle.For instance,criticising the "Uwaysiyyah order",the grand sanusi says: "Some groups of this order have gone wrong in matters of behaviour because of their limited knowledge of 'Hal' (intense feeling of ecstacy).They follow their own desires with no learned people and spiritual guides to educate them on proper lines.They are like the man who enters a dark room without a lamp.May God protect them and lead them on the straight path."
Similarly he differs with the followers of the 'Qalandariyyah' order who believes that to undergo austerities and to practises the precepts of the sharia is not necessary for religious experience.Disagreeing with this point of view,The Grand Sanusi remarks: "This Tariqa or order can hardly lead to salvation,because Satan has too many devices by dint of which he seduces the followers of this Tariqa...."
Besides the rational criticism on the points of difference,he totally rejected all the self-torturing practices of some medieval mystics such as swallowing glass pieces and hanging in wells while doing Dhikr (salate maakoos).
Cont.....(with thanks to Mahmood Ahmad Ghazi....the sanusiyyah movement of north Africa")