The Formation of the Sudanese Mahdist State: Ceremony and Symbols of Authority: 1882-1898
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Description
This book is the first analysis of the Sudanese Mahdiyya from a socio-political perspective that treats how relationships of authority were enunciated through symbol and ceremony. The book focuses on how the Mahdi and his second-in-command and ultimate successor, the Khalifa Abdallahi, used symbols, ceremony and ritual to articulate their power, authority and legitimacy first within the context of resistance to the imperial Turco-Egyptian forces that had been occupying the Nilotic Sudan since 1821, and then within the context of establishing an Islamic state. This study examines five key elements from a historical perspective: the importance of Islamic mysticism as manifested in Sufi brotherhoods in the articulation of power in the Sudan; ceremony as handmaids of power and legitimacy; charismatic leadership; the routinization of charisma and the formation of a religious state purportedly based upon the first Islamic community in the seventh century C.E.
ISBN
978-90-04-19107-5
Publication Date
12-17-2010
Publisher
Brill
City
Leiden, Netherlands
Keywords
Islam, Sudan, Politics, History, Islam and politics, Islamic law
Disciplines
History | History of Religion | Islamic World and Near East History
Recommended Citation
Searcy, Kim, "The Formation of the Sudanese Mahdist State: Ceremony and Symbols of Authority: 1882-1898" (2010). Faculty Books. 267.
https://ecommons.luc.edu/facultybooks/267
