Factors affecting The Poetry of Asceticism in The Abbasid Era

عوامل شعر الزهد في العصر العباسي

Abstract

Asceticism is a lifestyle characterized by abstinence from sensual pleasures, often for the purpose of pursuing spiritual goals.

Ascetics may withdraw from the world for their practices or continue to be part of their society, but typically adopt a frugal lifestyle, characterized by the renunciation of material possessions and physical pleasures, and also spend time fasting while concentrating on the practice of religion or reflection upon spiritual matters.

The Arabic word for asceticism is Zuhd. The Holy Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) and his followers practiced asceticism. However, contemporary mainstream Islam has not had a tradition of asceticism, but its Sufi groups have cherished an ascetic tradition for many centuries.

Factors affecting the poetry of asceticism in the Abbasid era:

We can determine the reasons for the activity of this poetic art in this era, and these reasons are preceded by the political struggle that witnessed this era, which led to sacrifices and tragedies that led many people to retire from life and look at it with contempt. In everything, which created a poor class that suffered conflict and tasted the taste of calamities, which led many of them to asceticism and the tendency to retire, worship and celibacy, and before this and all of that, the basis that worked on the emergence of this art was the second aspect of the Abbasid life, which was represented by interest in religious life and its sciences and foremost. The sciences of the Noble Qur’an are the eternal book that preserved the nation and imprinted the poem with an Islamic character based on asceticism, worship and a sublime life.