The Humble I

Knowing, Doing, Becoming

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December 28, 2014

40 Day Spiritual Retreat: Does It Have a Basis in Islam?

In Islam, is there any significance to the period of forty days? Why do certain people insist on going into spiritual retreats for this length of time? Some allude to the verse: And when We appointed for Moses forty nights [Qur’an 2:51], saying that it points to the importance and justification of a forty day spiritual retreat. What,… Continue reading

correctives & clarifications, sufism, suluk & spirituality

‘uzlah, Ibn Ata’illah, Ibn Taymiyyah on spiritual seclusion, Imam Malik, is forty days retreat an innovation?, khalwah, Sahl al-Tustari, shari’ah & tariqah, significance of forty days in Islam, spiritual retreat, spiritual solitude

About Me

My name is Surkheel Sharif (aka Abu Aaliyah). Born and raised in London, England, I began my more formal, but gradual studies of the Islamic sciences around the late 1980s (just a few years after having quit my degree in Astrophysics). I also gained an MA in Islamic Studies from Birkbeck College, University of London, in 2009.

I’ve translated a few Islamic works from Arabic into English; one of them, a short text on Muslim spirituality, called The Exquisite Pearl (2000). I have also authored a few books, including: More Fish Please & the Earth’s Complaint (2011); Fussing Over the 15th of Sha’ban & the Golden Rule of Differing (2011); A Muslim’s Guide to Modernity (2025); and Salafism Reconsidered (forthcoming)

I am the founder and current Director of the Jawziyyah Institute (est. 1999): a non-profit organisation dedicated to cultivating an Islam true to its time-honoured tradition, relevant to its current context, and of benefit to wider society.

khalwah

40 Day Spiritual Retreat: Does It Have a Basis in Islam?