Fażlullāh Tabrīzī

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Fażlu l-Lāh Astar-Ābādī (Persian: فضل‌الله استرآبادی‎), also known as Fażlullāh Tabrīzī Astarābādī[1][2] by a pseudonym al-Ḥurūfī[1] and a pen name Nāimī, was an Iranian[3][4] mystic who founded the Ḥurūfī movement. The basic belief of the Ḥurūfiyyah was that the God was incarnated in the body of Fażlullāh and that he would appear as Mahdī when the Last Day was near in order to save Muslims, Christians and Jews.[5][6] His followers first came from the village of Toqchi near Isfahan and from there, the fame of his small community spread throughout Khorasan, ʿErāq, Azerbaijan and Shirvan.[7] The center of Fażlullāh Nāimī's influence was Baku and most of his followers came from Shirvan.[8] Among his followers was the famous Ḥurūfī poet Seyyed Imadaddin Nasimi, one of the greatest Turkic mystical poets of the late 14th and early 15th centuries

Sahib-i ta'vil: the Master of Esoteric Interpretation[edit]

According to Encyclopedia of Islam, one of the key tenets of Ḥurūfism is that Allah reveals himself in the Word and that words (ḥurūf) are composed of sounds that are associated with letters. The total number of letters (and their numerical value according to the abjad) is the total of all emanating and creating possibilities of God and is God himself made manifest.

Dreams of Fażlullāh[edit]

Fażlullāh made his way to Isfahan in central Iran. Unused to walking, he suffered a leg injury by the time he arrived. Here he found a variety of religious seekers many of whom shunned contacts with wider society and often flouted religious convention. However, Fażlullāh never joined any of these groups. He began to experience a series of dreams which he came to regard as prophetic. He then made Hajj to Mecca before moving to Kunya Urgench, the capital of Khwarazm. He decided to make another Hajj, but only got as far as Luristan when he had a dream in which a man told him to go to Mashhad. Concluding the man was ‘Alī ar-Riḍā (d. 818) — who is buried in Mashhad — he made a detour to ar-Riḍā's shrine before completing a second Hajj and returning to Urgench. Here he practiced sufi religious practices and continued to have a number of dreams. In one Jesus told him that four sufis — Ibrahim Bin Adham, Bayazid Bistami, Al-Tustari and Bahlul — were the most sincere religious seekers in the history of Islam. In another, Muhammad appeared to him explaining to an old man that dream interpretation was very hard as the surface identities of characters in dreams were stand-ins for others and that dreams involved far deeper meanings than their apparent concern. Then Prophet Muhammad turned to Fażlullāh and said that true dream interpretation was like a rare star that becomes visible every 30,000 years and encompasses seven thousand worlds. He told Fażlullāh that he could see it if he stood under an orange tree, This Fażlullāh did and saw seven stars one of which was bigger than the rest. And the luminous star emitted a ray of light which entered his right eye conveying a special intuitive knowledge to him. This fealt like a pearly light which enabled him to understand the hadith. After this dream Fażlullāh claimed he could understand dreams and the language of birds. His followers called himsahib-i ta'vil — the master of esoteric interpretation following this. He rapidly attracted a crowd of people seeking explanations of dreams drawn from all walks of life. However, he preferred the company of religious aescetics and eventually decided to leave Urgench.

Amongst the Sarbadars[edit]

Main article: Sarbadars
Fażlullāh then moved to the region of Sabzavar in North east Iran, where a significant proportion of the local population were involved in apocalyptical religion. From 1136 to 1381 this region was under the rule of theSarbadars, a diverse collection of noble families who did not follow a dynastic principle, with many people affiliated to a religious group known as the Shaykiyya. This sect advised its followers to prepare arms ready for a great cosmic war that would be followed by the appearance of the Messiah. There is some evidence that he was here in 1360 and that he made the prediction that ‘Alī Mu'ayyad would expel the Shaykiyyah, but that the latter would return within a year. Fifteen years later darwīsh Ruknu d-Dīn was expelled, only to return in triumph within the year. There are a number of stories relating to Fazlallah in this region, but he was to leave in 1365 traveling first to Yazd and then onto Isfahan

Sojourn in Isfahan[edit]

Fażlullāh made himself at home in a mosque in the suburb of Tuqchi where he attracted two kinds of visitors: firstly, religious seekers seeking a guide and secondly those who wanted him to interpret dreams for more worldly reasons. Fażlullāh would accept no money for his interpretations and led an ascetic life, going without sleep spending the night in prayer and weeping continually to control his carnal desires. The Sufi Mu'in al-Din Shahrastani visited him and asked him about his understanding of a true man of God. He replied quoting Junayd Baghdadi that it is someone who is silent on the outside so that his inner reality can speak through him. Shahrastani became one of his prominent followers alongside men like Nasrallah Nafaji whose Khwab-namah "Book of Dreams" became one of the main biographical sources about Fażlullāh's life. These followers formed a tight-knit community around him sharing a hermit like life style and a deep brotherly love that led them to think of themselves as sharing the same soul. These sincere followers claimed the receivedKaramat, spirtitual gifts like special knowledge about sacred texts like the Bible and the Qur'an, an understanding of hidden matters and clear interpretations of the sayings and deeds of Muhammad and his immediate entourage. meanwhile a steady stream of the social elite, such as scholars, ministers military and administrative officers as well as all kinds of wealthy people would ask his advice. Giving advice to such people as Mawlana Zayn ad-Dīn Rajayī and the Amir Farrukh Gunbadi Fażlullāh's reputation spread throughout the provinces of Khurasan, Azerbaijan and Shirvan. Eventually he decided to move to Tabriz.

Imprisonment and execution[edit]

For his spread of Hurūfism, circa 1394/1395, Fażlullāh Nā'imī was captured and imprisoned in Alinja, near Nakhchivan.[11] He was subsequently sentenced for his heresies by the religious leaders and executed at the orders of Miran Shah, the son of Tamerlane.[12]
His shrine is at Alinja.

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Fażlullāh was born in Astarābād, Iran, circa 1339/1340, to a family of judges. According to the traditional Ḥurūfī biography, Fażlullāh Astarābādī was born in a household that traced its descent to the seventh Shī‘ah Imam, Musa al-Kazim.[7][9] Fażlullāh's predecessor, in eighth or ninth generation, was Muhammad al-Yamanī, from the family which originated in Yemen, the center of heterodox Islam at the time.[1] Fażlullāh's family was from the Shāfi‘ī school of Sunni Islam — however, this did not figure greatly in his religious development.
When his father died when he was still a child, Fażlullāh inherited his position and appeared at the courthouse on horse back everyday, acting as a figurehead while his assistants carried out the work of the court. At the age of eighteen he had an extraordinary religious experience when a nomadic dervish recited a verse by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi:
Why are you afraid of death when you have the essence of eternity?
How can the grave contain you when you have the light of God?
Fażlullāh fell into a trance and when he inquired as to the verses meaning his religious teacher told him that to understand it one would have to devote their life to religious pursuits and then one could experience the meaning rather than knowing it intellectually. After a year of trying to maintain his duties as a judge during the day while engaged in solitary prayer in a graveyard at night, he abandoned his family, possessions and security to become an itinerant religious seeker. As he left Astarābād, he exchanged his clothes for the felt clothing of a shepherd he met. From then on he always wore this shirt as a symbol of having abandoned worldly connections and comforts.

Works[edit]

Fażlullāh composed his works in Standard Persian as well as the Persian dialect of Astarābād. His most significant work which establishes the foundation of Ḥurūfism is titled Javidan-namah "Eternal Book".[7] Two recensions were made of the Javidan-namah. The one which is designated as Kabīr "Great" is in the Astarābādī Persian dialect and the one that is entitled Ṣaghīr "Small" is in standard Persian. Another book in the Astarābādī Persian dialect is the Nawm-namah, giving an account of the dreams of Fażlullāh at various times in his life.[7] A prose work, entitled Mahabbat-namah in the Astarābād Persian dialect was imitated by Turkish Ḥurūfīs.[7] He also composed a book of poetry in standard Persian and gave it the title Arsh-namah.[7] In addition to this book, he also composed another small collection of poetry in standard Persian using the pen name Nāimī.[7] From his poetic works, it is evident that he knew Arabic, Persian and his native language,[10] the Gurgan dialect. He was well-versed in Persian literature, and that he was capable of composing poetry in the classical style.

See also[edit]

ASTARĀBĀDĪ, FAŻLALLĀH ŠEHĀB-AL-DĪN B. BAHĀʾ-AL-DĪN (or B. ABŪ MOḤAMMAD) (d. 796/1394), founder of the Ḥorūfī religion that achieved some prominence in Timurid Iran before coming to exert a decisive influence on the Bektāšī order of dervishes in Turkey. He is sometimes designated as Fażlallāh Ḥorūfī or Fażlallāh Tabrīzī, the latter designation deriving presumably from his several periods of residence in Tabrīz. Among his followers he was known first asṣāḥeb-e taʾwīl (the master of interpretation, both of dreams and of the inner meaning of Islamic ritual) and then, after advancing claims to divinity, as rabb al-ʿālamīn (the Lord of the Worlds). In his poetry he used the taḵalloṣ Naʿīmī.
According to all Ḥorūfī sources, Fażlallāh was born in Astarābād in 740/1339-40, where his father was chief qāżī. His family claimed ʿAlid descent, by way of Imam Mūsā al-Kāẓem. From earliest childhood he showed an inclination to devoutness and asceticism, being particularly fastidious that all he ate should be ḥalāl. When his father died, he assumed the duties of qāżī, despite his extreme youth, and it was while he was returning home one day from his judicial duties that he heard someone in the bazaar reciting this verse of Rūmī: “Why fret over death, when you have the essence of eternity? / How can the grave contain you, when you have the light of God?” Inquiring about the meaning of this verse, he was advised that it could be understood only experientially, through following the well-known practices of Sufism. He therefore redoubled his pious zeal, engaging in ḏekr with particular vigor. The effectiveness of this practice enabled him to transpose all aspiration to the spiritual world, made visible to him in a series of intense and luminous dreams, and gradually to cast off all worldly attachment.
When he was about eighteen, Fażlallāh donned the felt garments of a shepherd and set out on the ḥaǰǰ. Returning from Mecca, he went to Ḵᵛārazm and stayed there for a period of unknown duration before leaving again on the ḥaǰǰ. While traveling through Fārs, he was confronted with an apparition of the Imam ʿAlī al-Reżā, who commanded him to change direction and travel to Mašhad. This he did, and he remained for some time at the shrine of the imam in communion with his spirit before resuming the journey to Mecca. (The statement in Mīrzā Maḵdūm’s al-Nawāqeż le bayān al-rawāfeż quoted in ʿAbbās ʿAzzāwī, Tārīḵ al-ʿErāq bayn eḥtelālayn, Baghdad, 1373/1953, I, p. 249, that Fażlallāh spent twenty years at the shrine of ʿAlī in Naǰaf is to be discounted).
After completing his second ḥaǰǰ, Fażlallāh again returned to Ḵᵛārazm and had there a number of dreams that seemed to foretell greatness and a mission that would bring to an end his life of private devotion. In one of these dreams, he saw himself in the garden of his former house at Astarābād that he now perceived to be the “seat of sincerity” (maqʿad ṣedq) mentioned in Koran 55:55. Also in the garden was the prophet Solomon, calling for his celebrated hoopoe. The hoopoe appeared, bearing with it a raven. On the orders of Solomon, the feathers of the raven were plucked and thrown over the wall of the garden; the featherless bird was then entrusted to Fażlallāh. According to Fażlallāh’s interpretation, Solomon represented God, the hoopoe, the spirit (rūh¡), and the raven, the soul (nafs). In another dream, still more fraught with indications of greatness, Fażlallāh saw a bright star rising in the east, a ray from which pierced his right eye until gradually the whole orb was absorbed in his eye. A voice informed him, “this is a star that rises once every few centuries” (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” pp. 10-12; Gölpınarlı, Katalog, pp. 5-6.).
An interest in dreams and their interpretation, an element constant throughout his life, dominated the first and orthodox stage of his religious activity. It was through the ability to interpret dreams, both his own and those of others, that he now began to acquire a following, first in Ḵᵛārazm, where Darvīš ʿAlī, Darvīš Bāyazīd, and Moḥammad Nānvā gave him their allegiance, and then, on a wider scale, in Ṭoqčī, a northern suburb of Isfahan. Together with his followers, who now included a Sufi called Moʿīn-al-dīn Šahrestānī, he took up residence in the mosque of Ṭoqčī and established an ascetic and pious community whose members came to be known asdarvīšān-e ḥalālḵᵛor o rāstgūy (ḥalāl-eating and truth-speaking dervishes). They never accepted charity, making their livelihood with the manufacture and sale of caps, they held their property in common and were generous to the poor. Their pious way of life, as well as Fażlallāh’s skill in the interpretation of dreams, drew the notables of Isfahan to seek out Fażlallāh in Ṭoqčī, and the fame of his small community spread throughout Khorasan, ʿErāq, Azerbaijan and Šīrvān (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” pp. 12-14; Gölpınarlı, Katalog, pp. 6-8).
Fażlallāh’s career took a decisive turn when he left Ṭoqčī for Tabrīz, probably early in 775/1373. There he gained access to the Jalayerid court, and enrolled among his following the minister Zakarīyā, Shaikh Ḵᵛāǰa Ṣāḥeb Ṣadr, and Sultan Oways b. Ḥasan himself. To the last of these he gave a dervish felt hat imbued with his baraka(blessing). The devotion of the Jalayerid nobility to Fażlallāh seems to have been based purely on his skill in the interpretation of dreams, but it was also in Tabrīz at this time that he began his progressive dissociation from Islamic orthodoxy. It is said that in late Šaʿbān or early Ramażān, 775/February, 1374, he received a comprehensive revelation of esoteric knowledge that embraced the truths (ḥaqāʾeq) and stations (maqāmāt) of the prophets, the inner meaning of the Islamic rites of worship, and the symbolic sense of the letters of the Perso-Arabic alphabet, numerologically determined. This experience left him in a state of bewilderment for three days and nights, until he heard a voice intoning the cryptic verse, “at the moment wherein time became separated the world was fully delivered from torment,” and proclaiming Fażlallāh “the Lord of the Age and the Sultan of the Prophets” (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 20). The event is alluded to by ʿAlī al-Aʿlā as a manifestation of the divine essence in the person of Fażlallāh (see lines from Korsī-nāma quoted in Kīā, Wāža-nāma, pp. 289-90).
It appears that Fażlallāh left Tabrīz for Ṭoqčī again without making a public proclamation of his new-found eminence. He retired to a cave, and did not emerge until he was informed that an aged follower, Darvīš Mosāfer, was on the point of death. Darvīš Mosāfer told him that the time had come for him openly to declare his teaching and for “the manifestation of divine glory” (ẓohūr-e kebrīāʾ), adducing as proof a dream that Fażlallāh had seen while in Tabrīz. Fażlallāh agreed, and gathered around him his first eight morīds: Faḵr-al-dīn, Jalāl Borūǰerdī, Fażlallāh Ḵorāsānī, Ḥosayn, Mīr Abdāl Eṣfahānī, ʿAlī al-Aʿlā, and two unnamed persons, one from Nāʾīn and the other from the Dašt-e Qepčāq (Gölpınarlı, Katalog, p. 7; a slightly different list is given by Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 38, although like Golpınarlı he quotes the Korsī-nāma of ʿAlī al-Aʿlā). Precisely what is meant by the termẓohūr-e kebrīāʾ is uncertain: it may have been a claim to mahdihood (see Šībī, al-Fekr al-šīʿī, p. 181), a claim to divinity, or both simultaneously, notwithstanding the logical contradiction between the two. The exact sequence and dating of events in also unclear, since, again according to the Korsī-nāma (quoted in Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 22), the “descent of the essence of beings into the luminous consciousness of Fażlallāh, the Lord of the Worlds” took place in Tabrīz in 788/1386. It was in the same year that Fażlallāh began writing the Jāvīdān-nāma, a work regarded by Ḥorūfīs as sacred, but no clear correlation is made between theẓohūr-e kebrīāʾ and the beginning of the composition of the Jāvīdān-nāma.
Fażlallāh was back in Ṭoqčī in 790/ 1388, and at some point visited Gīlān and Dāmḡān, but he seems to have spent most of the last part of his life in Baku (Bākūya). There are several references to Baku in the Jāvīdān-nāma, and it is certain that he was there six months before his arrest and execution in Ḏu’l-qaʿda, 796/September, 1394. He is said to have had foreknowledge of the exact time, place, and manner of his execution, and even of the physical particulars of his executioner (Bašārat-nāma of Rafīʿī quoted by Gölpınarlı, Katalog, p. 11), so that what befell him was fully expected. Returning to Baku from a visit to a certain Qāżī Bāyazīd in Šamāḵī, he was arrested by a party of soldiers coming from Astarābād and imprisoned in the castle at Alenǰa(q) (or Alanǰaq?) near Naḵǰavān on the command of Mīrānšāh, son of Tīmūr, on 1 Ḏu’l-qaʿda 796/28 August 1394. He was executed six days later (Gölpınarlı, Katalog, p. 8).
The precise reasons for his arrest and execution are not known. According to the account of Ebn Ḥaǰar (Saḵāwī, al-Żawʾ al-lāmeʿ VI, p. 173), Fażlallāh had written to Tīmūr, summoning him to belief in Horufism. Far from agreeing to do so, he gave orders to Mīrānšāh for the arrest and execution of Fażlallāh. There is no indication in Ḥorūfī sources that Fażlallāh ever communicated with Tīmūr, although he may have wished in general to promote his religion through contact with rulers. We have already seen how he gained the allegiance of Sultan Oways in Tabrīz before theẓohūr-e kebrīāʾ; and he is recorded to have dreamed that he was once praying in the presence of Tīmūr (Jāvīdān-nāma, quoted by Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 23). Another dream attests that he hoped to win influence among the Golden Horde by marrying the daughter of its ruler, Ṭoqtameš Khan (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 24). According to Maqrīzī (Saḵāwī, al-Żawʾ al-lāmeʿ VI, p. 174), Fażlallāh’s execution was preceded by meetings of the ʿolamāʾ held in Gīlān and Samarkand to discuss his heretical doctrines; these meetings ended invariably in a demand for his death. The occurrence of such assemblies is not confirmed by the Ḥorūfī sources; mention is made only of a certain Shaikh Ebrāhīm who gave a fatwā authorizing his execution (Ḵᵛāb-nāma, quoted by Gölpınarlı, Katalog, p. 8). It has been suggested that one of Fażlallāh’s writings, the ʿArš-nāma, in which he identifies the divine throne with the human frame, was the immediate cause for his execution (Kašf al-ẓonūn II, col. 1132). This is plausible, but not attested by any contemporary or near-contemporary sources. It is in any event unnecessary to look for specific religious causes for the death of Fażlallāh; his claim to be a divine incarnation and to have abrogated the major part of Islamic law was enough to place him beyond the bounds of Islam. It seems that he was also contemplating the use of violent means for the propagation of his religion. Fażlallāh is quoted by ʿAlī al-Aʿlā as saying: “The decisive proof, other than these words of mine, is none other than the trenchant sword” (quoted by Šībī, al-Fekr al-šīʿī, p. 182 n. 18). He also dreamed once that he had one hundred and forty sons, each armed with two replicas of Ḏu’l-feqār, the celebrated sword of ʿAlī (Jāvīdān-nāma, quoted by Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 24). In ordering the execution of Fażlallāh, Tīmūr may, then, have been motivated either by religious considerations, or by the simple desire to rid Azerbaijan of potentially rebellious elements on the eve of his campaign against the Ottoman Sultan Bāyazīd.
According to Ebn Ḥaǰar, Mīrānšāh beheaded Fażlallāh with his own hand. The headless corpse was dragged around the bazaar before being turned over to Fażlallāh’s followers for burial. Six years after his death, a structure was erected over the grave by one Sayyed Mūsā; it also came to shelter the body of ʿAlī al-Aʿlā. The site of execution (maqtalgāh) became a pseudo-Kaʿba for the Ḥorūfīs; they came to it on pilgrimage in the month of Ḏu’l-qaʿda, and circumambulated it twenty-eight times. Another custom established in imitation of the ḥaǰǰ rites was the casting of twenty-one stones, on three successive days, at a tower in the castle of Alenǰaq associated with the memory of Mīrānšāh. The executioner of Fażlallāh was designated by the Ḥorūfīs as Daǰǰāl (Antichrist) and, mockingly, as “mārānšāh” (king of the snakes), and his death in battle at the hands of Qarā Yūsof, the Qarā Qoyunlū ruler, in 809/1406 was a cause of great rejoicing among them. Belief in the “second coming” (reǰʿa) of Fażlallāh was strong, and it was even suggested that he had in some way become reincarnated in Qarā Yūsof. (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” pp. 25-28).
Works. The most important book left by Fażlallāh was the Jāvīdān-nāma, a prose work written in the dialect of Astarābād that sets forth the distinctive doctrines of Horufism: the numerologically determined significance of the letters of the Perso-Arabic alphabet, and the substantial manifestation of the divine essence in the human physiognomy. Two recensions were made of the Jāvīdān-nāma: one designated as kabīr in the dialect of Astarābād, and the other as ṣaḡīr in standard Persian. More a supplement to the Jāvīdān-nāma than an independent work is theNawm-nāma, an account of the dreams Fażlallāh had at various times in his life, as well as those submitted to him by others for interpretation. The Nawm-nāma is also in Astarābādī dialect, as is the Maḥabbat-nāma, a prose work that was imitated by Turkish Ḥorūfīs. Finally, among the works of Fażlallāh, mention may be made of the ʿArš-nāma, a maṯnawī written in standard Persian.
Fażlallāh also has a small collection of poetry in standard Persian, using the pen-name Naʿīmī, and is said to have written a treatise on feqh for ʿEzz-al-dīn Šāh Šoǰāʿ while in Tabrīz.
Manuscripts of his writings are listed in: E. Blochet, Cat. Bib. Nat. I, p. 127. E. G. Browne, A Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the University of Cambridge, Cambridge, 1896, pp. 69-86. W. Eilers and W. Heinz, Persische Handschriften, Vezeichnis der orientalischen Handschriften in Deutschland 14, I, Wiesbaden, 1968, p. 228. Gölpınarlı, Hurufilik Metinleri Kataloğu, passim.
Descendants and followers. The sons, daughters, and grandchildren of Fażlallāh are listed in the Resāla-ye maʿādīya of Sayyed Šarīf. He had three sons—Amīr Nūrallāh (put to death in Betlīs some time after the execution of Fażlallāh). Kalīmallāh and Salāmallāh (both of whom died of the plague), and four daughters—Fāṭema Ḵātūn, Bībī Ḵātūn, Omm-al-ketāb, and Fāteḥat-al-ketāb (the last two also fell victim to the plague; see A. Gölpınarlı, “Faḍl Allah Astarābādī,” EI2 II, p. 735). A nephew of Fażlallāh, Ḵᵛāǰa ʿAżod-al-dīn, was arrested in Herat in 830/1427 after the attempt on the life of Šāhroḵ (see Ḥabīb al-sīar [Tehran] III, p. 617). According to theMaḥram-nāma of Sayyed Esḥāq Astarābādī, Fażlallāh appointed his wife, known as Kalematallāh Hīa ’l-ʿolyā to be his successor (qāʾem-maqām) and executor (wašī), but this is doubtful, and unconfirmed by other Ḥorūfī texts, which anyhow identify Kalematallāh as one of Fażlallāh’s daughters (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” p. 32). According to Ḥāfeẓ Ḥosayn Karbalāʾī Tabrīzī (Rawżāt al-ǰanān wa ǰannāt al-ǰenān, ed. J. Solṭān-al-qorrāʾī, Tehran, 1344 Š./1965, I, pp. 478-81 ), an unnamed daughter of Fażlallāh, aided by a certain Mawlānā Yūsof, established a Ḥorūfī community in the village of Ḵānaqāh near Tabrīz and gained influence over Jahānšāh, the Qarā Qoyunlū ruler (r. 841-72/1438-67). Pressed by the ʿolamāʾ, he consented to her execution, and about five hundred of her followers were also slaughtered. Maḥammad-ʿAlī Tarbīat (Dānešmandān-e Āḏarbāyǰān, Tehran, 1314 Š./1935, pp. 386-88) identifies this ill-fated daughter as Kalematallāh.
We have already listed the eight followers that joined Fażlallāh in Ṭoqčī. A further list of fifteen followers is contained in the Bayān al-wāqeʿ of Mīr Šarīf, himself a disciple. Among the names included there we may mention Sayyed Kamāl Hāšemī, the scribe of the Jāvīdān-nāma; Amīr Sayyed Nasīmī, the celebrated Turkish poet flayed alive in Aleppo in about 810/1407; Sayyed Esḥāq Astarābādī, known as the “moršed of Khorasan,” the author of several important works, Torāb-nāma,Taḥqīq-nāma, and—according to Gölpınarlı—Kᵛāb-nāma; and Amīr Sayyed ʿAlī, commonly known as ʿAlī al-Aʿlā, who was the chief successor of Fażlallāh and carried Horufism to Anatolia. Mīr Šarīf adds that Fażlallāh had four hundredsayyeds among his followers who accompanied him at all times (Ritter, “Die Anfänge,” pp. 34-39; Gölpınarlı, Katalog, p. 14). Another list, that given by Fereštazāda ʿAbd-al-Maǰīd (quoted in Tarbīat, Dānešmandān-e Āḏarbāyǰān, p. 387), contains nine names; four among them were the close confidants (maḥram-e asrār) of Fażlallāh—Maǰd-al-dīn, Maḥmūd, Kamāl Hāšemī and Mawlānā Abu’l-Ḥasan. Aḥmad Lor, who attempted to assassinate Šāhroḵ, is said to have been amorīd of Fażlallāh (Ḥabīb al-sīar III, p. 615), but this may mean simply that he was a follower of Horufism, not necessarily that he was acquainted with Fażlallāh.
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