Note 15 — Chapter VIII

It is not clear whether above is meant a hermit, or a monk of a distinct order. Monachism is not sanctioned by the strict rule of Islam, but it appears to be the natural spontaneous growth of Asia. In the first year of the Hejira (A. D. 622) forty-five citizens of Mecca associated with forty-five inhabitants of Medina in a sort of confraternity, and pledged themselves to community of property, and to a regular daily performance of religious practices in a spirit of penitence and mortification: they were called Sufis, of whom hereafter. Abu bekr and Alí formed and presided over similar congregations. The latter conferred the presidency of it, under the mysterious name of Khiláfet, upon Hassan Baśrí (mentioned in vol. II. p. 389, note 1). Some of their successors deviated from the rules of this first establishment, and, in the course of time, a multitude of monastic orders were founded, each headed by a chief called Pir or Shaikh. One of the most celebrated orders was that founded in the year of the Hejira 37 (A. D. 657) by Uweis Karní, a native of Karn, in Yemen. The most distinguished in the Ottoman empire are thirty-two in number, founded between the years of the Hejira 149 and 1164 (A. D. 776 and 1750). Three of them descend from the congregation of Abu bekr, and the rest from that of Alí.—(See Tableau général de l’Empire othoman, tome IVme, 1re partie, par d’Ohsson, p. 617 et. seq.)