Sufi and New Age Sensibilities in Post-Revolutionary Egypt

Although the Arab Spring could be perceived as a failure on a macrostructural and political level, several important social changes occurred in Egypt. Notions of piety and religious authority are among those social aspects that shifted during this rupture and the affective toll it took on the social movement instigators. This paper highlights shifts in the perception and practice of Islam since 2011 among Egyptian youth and argues that a transformative understanding of religion is underway as a result of the revolutionary event. I focus on those who turned to Sufi scholars and sometimes nontraditional sources of knowledge like those from yogic practices. This research is based on interview and ethnographic data from 2018 to 2023.      

Traditional Sufi paths (tariqas) existed in Egypt for centuries and have been popular among the lower classes. What has been notably different in recent years is the increasing interest in Sufism among the upper-middle-class youth, especially those in their twenties and thirties. What is also different is that some who call themselves Sufi are not on the traditional Sufi path and subscribe to a form of Sufism that can be described as New Age. 

            During the Covid-19 pandemic, I was able to join online sessions of both forms of Sufism. One interlocutor invited me to sessions led by a traditionally trained Azhar scholar with an affiliation to one of the known tariqas registered in Egypt. The session followed a familiar traditional format. First, the shaykh read passages from a book, sometimes about perfecting Islamic rituals and other times about Prophet Muhammad’s life, usually written by a medieval Sufi scholar. He then explained the passages and held a question-and-answer session. Once no one had any other questions, the shaykh led a virtual dhikr circle, reciting words of remembrance of God and praise of Prophet Muhammad that are proscribed in the teachings of the tariqa to which he belongs, words rooted in tradition. 

Another interlocutor, one of two Sufi New Age practitioners with whom I spoke in 2023, invited me to online sessions she leads. Sonia is an Egyptian-American Muslim who resides in the US, and when the uprising began, she went to Egypt annually to reconnect with her country of origin and be of service to those who needed it. She received training in energy healing, breathwork and meditation in the US. She was one of the first people to bring together Sufi practices, namely repetition of specific names of Allah like al-Nur (the Light), meditation and other New Age sciences and practices to Egypt as early as 2012. 

Sonia invited me to online sessions she held at the beginning of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in October 2023. She began by greeting each of the six women in the virtual room, some of whom appeared to be non-Muslim and almost all of whom kept their cameras on. The mood was already somber as Sonia began to speak in her soft, calming voice, talking gently about the pain and suffering in the world and how it is important to remember to send love to all and to remember the “one,” the “universe.” She then recited the opening chapter of the Qur’an and a few chapters before delving into breathwork. Sonia recited a name of Allah, al-Nur, slowly, methodically, then asked us to focus on the name and our breath. She then fell silent for a few minutes to allow us to reflect on the mantra, the name, with our eyes closed, alone with our thoughts but as one, as a unit, with our group onscreen. 

This latter form of Sufism, while popular among this class of Egyptians, is not without its detractors. For example, businessman Basim told me that many of his friends had turned to Sufism as a fad. “You want a nice Islam that makes you feel fuzzy inside?” he asked rhetorically. “You go [to a Sufi circle] in the morning and make dhikr [litanies of remembrance of God] and then drink [alcohol] and date and travel to Las Vegas and do as you please… then come back and ask God for forgiveness, and all is well again.” This is what Sufism offers many of the youth now, he argued. Of course, not all Sufis are like this, Basim qualified, but many of them are. Fear of God is minimal, while trust in His mercy is infinite to the point where people do not think they will be held accountable for their sins. 

Basim feels that these New Age-inspired practices and beliefs are devoid of any semblance of Islam; they are but a mélange of Eastern practices that pull on the Islamic tradition selectively for marketing purposes and appeal to Muslims and non-Muslims alike. There is no learned religious scholar with a reliable knowledge-based curriculum and no claims to knowledge of esoteric Prophetic practices. There is also no expectation that practitioners will uphold shari‘a and its dictates.   

Skepticism about Sufism in Egypt, such as Basim’s, was common, but after the revolution, even my interlocutors who once deeply mistrusted the mystic path became tolerant of it. Hasan, for example, told me that he has always disagreed with Sufis, but he now accepts Sufism, because it became a place of recourse for many young people who potentially could leave Islam altogether. “When I hear now that a friend of mine took a different path,” Hasan explained, “I say, good, at least he has not become atheist… I will not deny it: if someone asks me if [Sufism] is right or wrong, I will say it is wrong … Does it represent religion? No, it does not. But in the end … at least this person still has a religious core” and has not fallen into atheism or any of the other “risks prevalent in the Islamic world today.” In a moment of deep despair and disappointment, when some people were losing faith in God or the religion they grew up practicing, Sufism became a place and space of last recourse after 2011.