Silsilah

Baha al-Din Naqshband of Bukhara (1318-1389 CE) gave his name to the Naqshbandi order, one of the most widespread in Islam. His insistence on silent remembrance and his rejection of music, retreat and distinctive dress set the order apart from every other Sufi path of his age.

Mu'in al-Din Hasan Sijzi (d. 1236 CE) settled at Ajmer in Rajasthan and is held by the Chishti order to be its founder in India. His shrine became the most visited Muslim sanctuary in the subcontinent, though the early record of his life is thinner than his fame suggests.

Four Sufi orders shaped religious life in the Indian subcontinent: the Chishti, Naqshbandi, Qadiri and Suhrawardi. This article traces how they functioned there in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and how initiation into several orders at once weakened the identity of each.