Excerpt from Masters of the Path

Sayyid Nur Al-Din Shah Nimatullah Wali

Nur al-din Shah Nimatullah Wali, the qutb (axis) of those who realize Oneness, the best of those perfected, was one of the greatest masters and most renowned mystics of the 8th and 9th centuries A.H. (14th and 15th centuries A.D.) He bestowed fresh radiance upon the light of Sufism in his own time, keeping it burning in such a fashion that the radiance of his teaching spread to all other followers of the Spiritual Path (tariquat) of Islam. In truth, it can be stated that he was the reviver of the Spiritual Path of Muhammadan Povery (faqr-I Muhammadi) throughout all Moslem lands, especially Iran and the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent. Moreover, it was the Order that bears his name which was able, in the 12th century A.H. (approximately 18th century A.D.), to revive anew the tariquat in Iran and to quench the thirst of those in the country who were searching for mystical truth.

Shah Nimatullah was born on the 14th of Rabi al-Awwal 731 A.H. (1331 A.D.) in Aleppo, in present day Syria. His noble father, Mir ‘Abdullah, was one of the great sufi masters of his time. His mother was of the royal lineage of Fars, in southern Iran. As Shah Nimatullah has stated in one of this poems, his genealogy goes back 19 generations to the Prophet Muhammad.