Talk:Zawiya (institution)

Untitled
famous zaouias are the sekiyatiya which is located not too far from the city of essaouira

Second sentence is out of place
I don't have access to the reference, but the second sentence in the intro, "A zawiya often contains a pool, and sometimes a fountain." is not particularly true and definitely not a prominent enough characteristic to be one of only two sentences introducing this topic. Any Muslim prayer space has access to water for ritual purposes, often a fountain or a hammam, but there is no particular association between zawiyas and pools (most or all of the ones I've seen didn't have a pool). The description of what kind of facilities and services a zawiya might have could be part of a different section with much more detail, where access to water for ablutions could be mentioned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Casual Builder (talk • contribs) 03:42, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Dual meanings
The term "zawiya" has multiple meanings (at least two). The meaning now primarily enshrined here is that of a Sufi institution, but the other main meaning is that of a simple type of small prayer building or mosque - this latter meaning is a usage that I suspect applies to the structure seen in this version of the page of a zawiya in Taghit, Algeria. The literal meaning of "zawiya", i.e "corner", more literally conveys to its usage to define a prayer corner or small space. As an example of this usage, the page Mohammad Al-Amin Mosque contains extensive material on the zawiya built on site. This more basic meanings needs to be distinguished somehow from the more specific meaning that the term has taken on within Sufi tradition (possibly specific to North African Sufi tradition - unclear), which diverges significantly from the more basic meaning of the word. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:19, 19 September 2023 (UTC)


 * @R Prazeres, @Onceinawhile: I've created Zawiya (prayer corner) as a stopgap to disambiguate the slight clash of meanings. This may or may not be the best solution. Having a combined article that supports both meanings may be preferrable, but the prayer corner meaning is not an 'institution', so doesn't fit here at present. Iskandar323 (talk) 08:24, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * I think this falls more into WP:DICTIONARY and should indeed be reverted (slash merged here). The topic of Zawiya (prayer space) doesn't seem to satisfy WP:NOTABILITY and the most relevant material could easily be part of an etymology section here (currently missing), which I think is the most appropriate option. Alternative meanings of zawiya can also be mentioned elsewhere where needed (like at Mosque or at specific places that are called zawiyas), but I don't think that would even come up often (see notes below).
 * The current article here also deals with some amount of regional variation already, so as long as we don't lose sight of the main focus, I think there's plenty of room to accommodate some additional explanation in the body of the article. And the current title could maybe use a better disambiguator (the "institutional" aspect isn't exactly what this topic is about), but I haven't thought of a good one off the top of my head.
 * Further notes:
 * It's common for Arabic and Persian terms to have historically and regionally variable usages (as is also true elsewhere), but we should be careful about treating linguistic variation as being different encyclopedic topics (especially from non-English languages on the English Wikipedia). I haven't seen any evidence of regular usage of this term in English references to denote specifically a small prayer space as opposed to a full mosque, and indeed in other contexts this wouldn't be called a zawiya or it would be called something else (like mescit in Turkish).
 * The only distinctive usage that is brought up at Zawiya (prayer space) is the First Encyclopedia of Islam mentioning briefly that it can still refer to a small prayer space in the "Muslim east", but the rest of that source is about the zawiyas discussed here. The other sources don't support anything further.
 * Mohammad Al-Amin Mosque isn't properly sourced, but even based on what's written there the "zawiya" appears to correspond to what's described in this article: a religious space originally associated with a local Muslim or Sufi figure (Sheikh Abu Nasr Al-Yafi). That's also what the cited source Vloeberghs 2016 repeats: "All evidence compels us to assume that the Muhammad al-Amin mosque is the contemporary continuation of what was formerly known in Beirut as the zāwiyat Abī Naṣr. In the Muslim world, a zāwiya (pl. zawāyā) is often closely related to Sufism. The venue itself can be extremely diverse in form and one can conceive of a zāwiya as anything ranging from the corner of a building to the mausoleum of a saint where people gather to worship. Many such zawāyā existed throughout Beirut at the time but most have disappeared over time." (p.131). The pages after this mention that Abu Nasr was the leader of a Sufi brotherhood, just like the founders of other zawiyas discussed here (p.133: "[...] the Muslim parcel was entrusted to Shaykh Umar Abu Nasr al-Yafi, who carried the title of naqīb al-ashraf [head of the descendants of the Prophet] and was the leader of a Sufi brotherhood known as al-khalwatīya." etc).
 * R Prazeres (talk) 17:33, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * , I've added an etymology section based on some of the material you wrote for Zawiya (prayer corner) and I've boldly merged the latter with this article, per the reasons above. The more I looked, the clearer it was that there's no separate topic there. I did not retain anything about the khalwa for now, as the cited sources don't speak of it as a separate type of institution either and the Druze example is covered at Khalwat al-Bayada. It's still an improvement to this article, in my opinion, so thanks for bringing it up and feel free to discuss further. R Prazeres (talk) 18:49, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * While they may have similar origins, if the two meanings (one often expansive Sufi complexes; the other expressly diminutive prayer spaces) are to be merged on one page, then the two meanings are going to need treating much more equally throughout the page, starting with the lead, otherwise the result is simply going to be overly reductive. I'm going to re-commandeer the other page for khalwa. Iskandar323 (talk) 19:25, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * If there are enough sources to support the definition of a khalwa as a separate building, sure, but respectfully you haven't provided such sources so far. The Encyclopedia of Islam article that you cited for Khalwa is about Khalwa (Sufism), not about a specific type of structure. So why does it need its own article? R Prazeres (talk) 19:30, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * It's definitely a distinct term, and the very impetus for teasing out these different meanings came from this rather expansive commons cat. I'll figure it out. Iskandar323 (talk) 19:37, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Fair enough, but I meant to point out more specifically that Khalwa (Sufism) already exists. There's no dispute about the term being in use generally, but not sure that it is WP:NOTABLE as a separate architectural topic. But I'll leave you to it.
 * Side note: If you keep researching this, you can also potentially look for usage of bayt al-'itikaf (بيت الاعتكف, I believe). It may or may not be a similar feature. It's mentioned in some references as a room for seclusion or secluded prayer in certain Maghrebi mosques (e.g. I added mentions of it at Bou Inania Madrasa, Mouassine Mosque). R Prazeres (talk) 19:47, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Khalwa (Sufism) is a concept and spiritual practice - I am looking at the structures that definitely exist by that name at Al-Aqsa, and possibly elsewhere, but for sure there ... it may end up being a page purely about the "Khalwas of Al-Aqsa". Iskandar323 (talk) 20:32, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Disambiguator in title
As discussed above, the disambiguator in this title may not be the best fit, so I'm opening this issue for wider discussion here.

One suggestion by Iskandar323 is to move it to "Zawiya (Sufism)". Another option I'd suggest is "Zawiya (building)", "Zawiya (religious complex)", or something like that, with minor adjustments to the article to make this clearer. Sufi orders themselves are covered at Tariqa, so that leaves this article to cover the physical spaces rather than the brotherhoods/organizations, much like the Khanqah article.

I'm a little unsatisfied with the "(Sufism)" option because at first glance it looks like this would be a concept or type of Sufism, and Sufism may also be too technical to be a good disambiguator for unfamiliar readers, in the spirit of WP:NCDAB. But I'm happy to be wrong on this. Cheers, R Prazeres (talk) 20:21, 19 September 2023 (UTC)


 * 'Sufism' is used rather a lot already across the wiki as a disambiguator, but possibly mainly for concepts, yes. 'Building' would be ok, but 'architecture' might be better - covering all manner of sins. Iskandar323 (talk) 20:35, 19 September 2023 (UTC)
 * "Architecture" sounds probably better, yeah. R Prazeres (talk) 20:39, 19 September 2023 (UTC)