Adab in the Works of Hakim Tirmizi

The term 'adab' derived from an unknown origin, was applied at first in mukhazram poetry and especially in Prophetic traditions and very soon received a wide range of applications in Arabic. That kind of 'adab' which is connected with Sufism, from the dawn of Islam to the middle 2nd/8th century was not more than 'religious adab'. Until the time that Hasan Basrī, Ibrāhīm Adham and his colleagues strengthened the pillars of Sufism in Muslim world and that was since 3rd century which 'mystical adab' gradually had been complied in some specific works. By 'mystical adab' we mean that kind which we called behavioral, ritual and social adab. In the works of Tirmizi such as Ādāb al-Murīdīn and others, he discussed of social acts and attitudes of a mystic and his/her spiritual situations, while it is not ever easy to separate them. Ordering and arranging the stages of internal wayfaring and mystical conduct is not rare in works of him, but is not still so systematized and classified. Of the important issues in 'mystical adab' by Tirmizi, is the stages of deception of man and how he is transferred from position of competency and abstemiousness to this-worldly desires; the theme which is beautifully expressed in graduation and besides social and psychological analyses. In works like al-Manhiyyāt, what should be done is expressed through what should not be done. In some others such as al-Riyāza and adab al-Nafs, the discussion is the fact that human soul should receive adab instructions and through the challenge of soul and man, Tirmizi conducts to the issue of behavioral- religious adab.