Margaret Smith (author)
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Margaret Smith (born 1884) was a female scholar writing on early Christian and Muslim mysticism from an openminded Christian perspective. She was the first westerner to chronicle the lives of the Sufi mystic Rábi'a of Basra and compiled brief histories of other Sufi teachers and their doctrines, translating Arabic and Persian texts to English.
She counted among her mentors Thomas Walker Arnold, Alfred Guillaume, R. A. Nicholson, Louis Massignon.
Her writings were contemporary with those of Miguel Asin Y Palacios, another Christian author writing on Islam and Sufism (Ibn Arabi and "Christianised Islam") who as a giant scholar did not dwarf her; indeed in their work they complemented each other admirably.
In the 1970's four of her works - by then hard to come by - were reprinted in Amsterdam, by the Philo Press in arrangement with The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London.
- An Early Mystic of Baghdad: Al-Muhasibi, ca 781-875 A.D. Master of primitive Islamic mysticism and precursor of the great Muslim Mystics, 1935
- An Introduction to the History of Mysticism , 1930
- Rabi'a the Mystic and Her Fellow-Saints in Islam. Being the life and teachings of Rabi'a al-'Adawiyya al-Qaysiyya of Basra, Sufi saint, ca A.H. 99-185, A.D.717-801. Together with an account of the place of the women in Islam and with a survey of sources, references, a concise bibliography and indexes, 1928
- Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East. Being an account of the rise and development of Christian mysticism up to the seventh century, of the subsequent development in Islam, known as Sufism, and of the relationship between Christian and Islamic mysticism. With references, a bibliography and two indexes, 1931
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