Idries Shah

Idries Shah (इदरीस शाह, ادريس شاه, ; 16 June 1924 – 23 November 1996), also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi (Arabic: سيد إدريس هاشمي) and by the pen name Arkon Daraul, was an Afghan author, thinker and teacher in the Sufi tradition.

Shah wrote over three dozen books on topics ranging from psychology and spirituality to travelogues and culture studies.

Born in British India, the descendant of a family of Afghan nobles on his father's side and a Scottish mother, Shah grew up mainly in England.

His early writings centred on magic and witchcraft.

After his family moved from London to Oxford in 1940 to escape The Blitz (German bombing), he spent two or three years at the City of Oxford High School for Boys.

In 1945, he accompanied his father to Uruguay as secretary to his father's halal meat mission.

He returned to England in October 1946, following allegations of improper business dealings.

Towards the end of the 1950s, Shah established contact with Wiccan circles in London and then acted as a secretary and companion to Gerald Gardner, the founder of modern Wicca, for some time.

In those days, Shah used to hold court for anyone interested in Sufism at a table in the Cosmo restaurant in Swiss Cottage (North London) every Tuesday evening.

Shah married the Parsi-Zoroastrian Cynthia (Kashfi) Kabraji, daughter of Indian poet Fredoon Kabraji, in 1958; they had a daughter, Saira Shah, in 1964, followed by twins – a son, Tahir Shah, and another daughter, Safia Shah – in 1966.

In 1960 he established a publishing house, Octagon Press, producing translations of Sufi classics as well as titles of his own.

In 1960, Shah founded his publishing house, Octagon Press; one of its first titles was Gardner's biography – Gerald Gardner, Witch.

The book was attributed to one of Gardner's followers, Jack L. Bracelin, but had in fact been written by Shah.

According to Wiccan Frederic Lamond, Bracelin's name was used because Shah "did not want to confuse his Sufi students by being seen to take an interest in another esoteric tradition."

Lamond said that Shah seemed to have become somewhat disillusioned with Gardner, and had told him one day, when he was visiting for tea:"When I was interviewing Gerald, I sometimes wished I was a News of the World reporter. What marvellous material for an exposé! And yet I have it on good authority that this group will be the cornerstone of the religion of the coming age. But rationally, rationally I can't see it!"

His seminal work was The Sufis, which appeared in 1964 and was well received internationally.

In 1965, Shah founded the Institute for Cultural Research, a London-based educational charity devoted to the study of human behaviour and culture.

A similar organisation, the Institute for the Study of Human Knowledge (ISHK), was established in the United States under the directorship of Stanford University psychology professor Robert Ornstein, whom Shah appointed as his deputy in the U.S.

In his writings, Shah presented Sufism as a universal form of wisdom that predated Islam.

Emphasizing that Sufism was not static but always adapted itself to the current time, place and people, he framed his teaching in Western psychological terms.

Shah made extensive use of traditional teaching stories and parables, texts that contained multiple layers of meaning designed to trigger insight and self-reflection in the reader.

He is perhaps best known for his collections of humorous Mulla Nasrudin stories.

Shah was at times criticized by orientalists who questioned his credentials and background.

His role in the controversy surrounding a new translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, published by his friend Robert Graves and his older brother Omar Ali-Shah, came in for particular scrutiny.

However, he also had many notable defenders, chief among them the novelist Doris Lessing.

Shah came to be recognized as a spokesman for Sufism in the West and lectured as a visiting professor at a number of Western universities.

His works have played a significant part in presenting Sufism as a form of spiritual wisdom approachable by individuals and not necessarily attached to any specific religion.

Idries Shah was born in Simla, Punjab Province, British India, to an Afghan-Indian father of Pashtun descent; Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah, a writer and diplomat, and a Scottish mother; Saira Elizabeth Luiza Shah.

His family on the paternal side were Musavi Sayyids.

Their ancestral home was near the Paghman Gardens of Kabul, Afghanistan.

His paternal grandfather, Sayed Amjad Ali Shah, was the nawab of Sardhana in the North-Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, a hereditary title the family had gained thanks to the services an earlier ancestor, Jan-Fishan Khan, had rendered to the British.

Shah mainly grew up in the vicinity of London.

According to L. F. Rushbrook Williams, Shah began accompanying his father in his travels from a very young age, and although they both travelled widely and often, they always returned to England, where the family made their home for many years.

Through these travels, which were often part of Ikbal Ali Shah's Sufi work, Shah was able to meet and spend time with prominent statesmen and distinguished personalities in both East and West.

Williams writes,

Such an upbringing presented to a young man of marked intelligence, such as Idries Shah soon proved himself to possess, many opportunities to acquire a truly international outlook, a broad vision, and an acquaintance with people and places that any professional diplomat of more advanced age and longer experience might well envy.

But a career of diplomacy did not attract Idries Shah...

Shah described his own unconventional upbringing in a 1971 BBC interview with Pat Williams.

He described how his father and his extended family and friends always tried to expose the children to a "multiplicity of impacts" and a wide range of contacts and experiences with the intention of producing a well-rounded person.

Shah described this as "the Sufi approach" to education.