The Sufi and the Friar: A Mystical Encounter of Two Men of God in the Abode of Islam

This book explores the profound spiritual encounter between Serge de Beaurecueil (1917-2005), a twentieth-century French Dominican friar and Christian mystic, and the eleventh-century Hanbali Sufi master Khwaja ‘Abdullah Ansari of Herat (1006-1089). De Beaurecueil lived much of his Christian discipleship in Cairo and Afghanistan, where he became the foremost expert on the life and thought of Ansari. His mystical conversation and scholarly engagement with Ansari, his experience of Islamic hospitality, and the transformation of his own practical spirituality or praxis mystica through his experience of dwelling in the abode of Islam provide us with not only a magnificent and luminous meditation on the hidden and abiding presence of God among Muslims but also a contemplation on the quandary of genuine engagement with and openness to the religious other.