Title: The Chinese Sufi Wiqāyatullāh Ma Mingxin and the Construction of his Sanctity in <i>Kitāb al-Jahrī</i>
Abstract: Abstract By contrast to the majority of the Muslim authors of Chinese origin who composed their literary works in the Chinese language, the authors of the Jahriyya Sufi order, a still active branch of the Naqshbandiyya network rooted mainly in the provinces of Gansu and Ningxia, have produced a small number of texts in the Arabic language and through this means they have recorded the conflict-ridden history of their menhuan and left behind a description of their belief-system. The main focus in this article lies on the sanctity ( wilāya ) of Ma Mingxin Wiqāyatullāh (died 1781), founder ( daozu 道祖) of the Jahriyya order, as remembered and construed by his hagiographers in general and by the author of the Kitāb al-Jahrī , Manṣūr Ma Xuezhi (end of 19 th and beginning of 20 th c.), in particular: in their construction, Mingxin’s sanctity manifests itself in miracles, predictions, exorcisms and spiritual states. The text of the K. al-Jahrī which is the most comprehensive of the hagiographical writings of the Jahriyya as well as the other works of this group (e. g. Manāqib; Rashaḥāt ) have all been transmitted in manuscript form within the Sufi order, they have been published in facsimile and been partly translated into Chinese. Hence a second focus has been laid on the codicology of the manuscript of the K. al-Jahrī , the basis of this study. Although the article mainly takes a codicological, philological and phenomenological approach to the subject of Mingxin´s sanctity, the historical background to his career as portrayed in the Chinese and Western-language studies has also been taken into consideration.