Note 157 — TALE OF THE WOLF AND THE FOX.[150]

Arab. "Súf;" hence "Súfi," = (etymologically) one who wears woollen garments, a devotee, a Santon; from σοφὸς = wise; from σαφής = pure, or from Safá = he was pure. This is not the place to enter upon such a subject as "Tasawwuf," or Sufism; that singular reaction from arid Moslem realism and materialism, that immense development of gnostic and Neo-platonic transcendentalism which is found only germinating in the Jewish and Christian creeds. The poetry of Omar-i-Khayyám, now familiar to English readers, is a fair specimen; and the student will consult the last chapter of the Dabistan "On the religion of the Sufiahs." The first Moslem Sufi was Abu Háshim of Kufah, ob. A. H. 150 = 767, and the first Convent of Sufis called "Takiyah" (Pilgrimage i. 124) was founded in Egypt by Saladin the Great.