Shah Ni'matullah Wali

Founder of the Ni'matullahi order and a Sufi poet. His full name is Shah Ni'mat Allah-i Wali Muhammad b. 'Abd Allah al-Husayni al-Kirmani; because he was a sayyid and lived long in Kerman, he is known as Shah Ni'mat Allah-i Kirmani.

He was born in Aleppo on 14 Rabi' al-Awwal 731 (26 December 1330), into a sayyid family whose lineage goes back to Isma'il b. Ja'far al-Sadiq. In his youth he was sent to study in Shiraz, his mother's homeland; there he became a student of Sayyid Jalal al-Din Rukn al-Din Shirazi and 'Adud al-Din al-Iji.

At about the age of twenty-four, during the pilgrimage, he met 'Abd Allah b. As'ad al-Yafi'i, founder of the Yafi'iyya order, and soon became his disciple. He stayed with him in Mecca for about seven years; during this time he learned more fully from his shaykh the ideas of Ibn 'Arabi, which he had first come to know through his teacher Rukn al-Din Shirazi. After completing his spiritual journey and receiving deputyship he went to Egypt and withdrew into seclusion in a cave on Mount Muqattam in Cairo, where Kaygusuz Abdal also lived. In the three years he spent in Cairo he became acquainted with the Qalandari disposition; he also learned the hidden sciences from Sayyid Husayn Akhlati, the shaykh of Badr al-Din Simawi.

He then toured the cities of Syria, Iraq, Iran and Azerbaijan. In Ardabil he learned from Sadr al-Din Ardabili, whom he met there, the understanding of seclusion of Ibrahim Zahid Gilani; he also acquired love for the Prophet's family from these masters. Probably after 765 (1364) he went to Central Asia as a Yafi'i shaykh and settled in Shahrisabz near Samarkand, where he spent his life mostly in seclusion. He is said to have played a great part in the conversion of the Turkmens to Islam and their turn to Sufism; this renown is reflected in the lines of one of his poems: “Hundreds of thousands of Turks are within me / Wherever I go, I go like a sultan.”

When his renown among the Turkmen tribes was reported to Timur as political ambition, Timur, who had at first treated him with respect, asked him to leave Transoxiana. He went first to Tus and then to Herat, where he married the daughter of Hamza 'Imad al-Din, son of Amir Husayni Harawi. Later he crossed into Iran and settled in Kuhbanan near Kerman. Since his only son Khalil Allah-i Kirmani was born in Kuhbanan in 775 (1374), he must have gone to Iran before that date; on this basis the source says he stayed about ten years in Central Asia. In later years he recalled with longing the days he had spent in Turkestan.

From Kuhbanan he went to Yazd and, after staying there about four years, settled in Kerman. During the rule in Fars of Mirza Iskandar, who held him in great respect (1409-1413), he went to Shiraz, probably at his invitation, and gained many disciples there, among them Sayyid Sharif al-Jurjani. On returning from Shiraz he settled in Mahan, 34 km southeast of Kerman.

He spent the last twenty-odd years of a life that exceeded 100 years guiding disciples in the lodge he opened in Mahan, and died there on 22 Rajab 834 (5 April 1431). His son Shah Khalil Allah-i Kirmani succeeded him. 'Abd al-'Aziz b. Shir Malik Wa'izi, Sun' Allah Ni'matullahi and 'Abd al-Razzaq Kirmani each wrote a hagiography of him; Jean Aubin published these works with an introduction.

His Circle of Influence — The order's chain reaches Abu Madyan al-Maghribi through 'Abd Allah al-Yafi'i. Outside Iran, the Ni'matullahiyya spread above all in the Indian subcontinent through the activity of his son Shah Khalil Allah and his grandson Sayyid Nur Allah. Sayyid Nur Allah had gone to the Deccan in his grandfather's lifetime at the invitation of the Deccan sultan Ahmad Shah Bahmani and married the ruler's daughter. Shah Khalil Allah too went to the Deccan, leaving his son Shams al-Din as deputy in the Mahan lodge, and died there (860/1456). In India the order was continued by Muhibb Allah and his son Mir Shah Kamal al-Din (d. 914/1508); the family kept its power until 934 (1527), when the Bahmanids fell. In Iran the order was spread by Mir Shams al-Din and his grandsons; Shah Isma'il's appointment of Mir Nizam al-Din 'Abd al-Baqi, of his line, as sadr shows the respect felt for the family. From the fifteenth century onward the Ni'matullahis were also active in Ottoman lands: Jalalzada Mustafa Chelebi lists them among the dervish groups that welcomed Suleyman the Magnificent at Edirne in 949 (1542); Evliya Chelebi names them among the futuwwa groups and records that Shah Ni'mat Allah's crown was green with twelve gores; Paul Rycaut states that they came to Ottoman lands in the time of Sultan Mehmed Chelebi (1413-1421). His name is also among the masters invoked in Bektashi prayers. Towards the end of the eighteenth century Ma'sum 'Ali Shah Dakani, regarded as the order's second founder, tried to revive it in Iran; after the death of Majdhub 'Ali Shah (1238/1823) the order split into the Kawthariyya, Safi 'Ali Shahiyya, Shamsiyya, Gunabadiyya and Munis 'Ali Shahiyya branches. The last two remain active today in Iran, the United States of America and some European countries.

His Poetry and Sufi Line — He is a Sufi who commented in his treatises on the views of Ibn 'Arabi, whom he studied in depth through al-Yafi'i, and of Fakhr al-Din 'Iraqi. The source states that the order arose, both at its beginning and in its later stages, from the blending of many Sufi dispositions. His divan of about 12,000 couplets, comprising odes, ghazals, strophic poems, poems in praise of the Prophet, mathnawis, quatrains and single verses, has also been read for taking omens, like the divan of Hafiz of Shiraz; it contains some Turkish words and macaronic Turkish-Persian couplets.

His Works — The sources record that he had 500 works. 114 of his works, most of treatise length and devoted to commentary on the views of Ibn 'Arabi and Fakhr al-Din 'Iraqi, have been described with their locations in Iranian libraries, their editions and their contents; seventy of them were published by Javad Nurbakhsh in seven volumes as Rasa'il-i Janab-i Shah Ni'mat Allah-i Wali-yi Kirmani. His Divan has had many editions.

His Tomb and Complex — His tomb, begun by one of his followers, the Bahmanid ruler of the Deccan Ahmad Shah I, was completed in 840 (1436) in the reign of Ahmad Shah's brother 'Ala' al-Din Ahmad Shah II. With additions made under the Safavids and Qajars the tomb grew into a large complex and is today one of the most important places of visitation in Iran.