colonialism, under which the Muslims suffered from an identity crisis. For
the majority of Muslims, interaction with theWest during the colonial period
was too great a culture shock to bear. Political power, their greatest support,
had gone. Now they needed something to pin their hopes on. In this state of
helplessness, the Khanqahs, Zawiyas (shrines) came to their rescue. In the
hope of finding solace in spirituality, they thronged to these shrines and Sufi
pirs. The pirs gave them incantations to recite on a rosary; and this was
supposed to solve all of their problems.
Doubtless, not all of these Sufis were genuine, but they gave Muslims
some hope of getting out of the morass they were floundering in after losing
political power. This trading on false hopes worked and Sufism was again
revived in a new garb. Some of the shrines have now amassed so much wealth
that they are running their ownTV channels, one of these being QTV from
Pakistan, where Sufi shrines abound.
People believed that they would bring about a spiritual revolution, but
no such thing happened. No such revolution can be brought about by just
reviving certain rituals. Spiritual revival can be effected only through a re-
awakening of the spirit by means of intellectual development.
One reason for attaching importance to these Sufi orders was that the
people associated with them engaged in missionary activities and they also
played a role in bringing about puritanical reforms or spiritual revival, albeit
more in form than in spirit.Their organizations served as a base for reformers
to make efforts to purify religious practices in order to revive the faith. Most
revivalists have Sufi affiliations. To cite one example, the great jihad at the
beginning of the 19th century in northern Nigeria was led by Usman dan
Fodio, who was a Qadri. In many other areas, Sufi orders were associated
with reform movements and jihad campaigns against colonialists.
