Dervishes along the Silk Roads: Between Past and Present

This book highlights aspects of the spiritual culture within Islam that flourished along the 'Silk Roads' – the term coined by Ferdinand von Richthofen in 1877 to describe the web of caravan routes that connected China, South and Central Asia, the Middle East and Europe. The movement of goods and of people was accompanied by the circulation of ideas, bringing about a vivid exchange in the cultural sphere – sufism, or tasawwuf, was one such idea. Focusing on this theme, these conference proceedings draw attention to the multiple dimensions embraced by tasawwuf, both in its temporal (i.e. historical, ethnographical and social) context, as well as its atemporal one (i.e. concerning spirituality and the ways this is conveyed and transmitted, both in the past and in the present).