B
Bb Samms
Khvja Muammad Bb Samms
(d. c. 7346/13346; 755/1354 is also
given) was a Central Asian f of the
Khvjagn tradition (the arqa-yi
Khvjagn, lit., way of masters, goes back
to Abd al-Khliq Ghijduwn, d. 575/
1179, and was the precursor of the Naqsh-
bandiyya, the widespread f order,
whose eponymous founder was Bah
al-Dn Naqshband, d. 791/1389). He was
born in Samms (other forms of the name
are also cited), a village situated between
Romitan and Varakhsha, on the western
rim of the oasis of Bukhara (about twenty
kilometres from Bukhara); his shrine is
located there. He is known especially as
a link in the chain of transmitters (silsila)
that connects Bah al-Dn Naqshband to
Abd al-Khliq-i Ghijduwn. This silsila
runs as follows: Bah al-Dn Amr
Kull Bb Samms Al Rmtan is used in a source devoted to him (Kshif,
Azzn Mamd Anjr-Faghnav Rashat, 1:76).
rif Rvgar Abd al-Khliq. All these
men came from villages in the Bukharan
oasis, but not the city itself. Dates given
for them in the hagiographic sources are
unreliable. This chain, constructed in the
ninth/fifteenth century in the circles claim-
ing spiritual descent from Bah al-Dn, is
recorded first in the hagiographies devoted
to that figure. Earlier sources are much less
interested in silsila constructions and give
other filiations. Thus, in a work devoted
to the life and sayings of Al Rmtan,
his son Ibrhm is cited as his main suc-
cessor, and Bb Samms is not even
mentioned, whereas later Naqshband
sources claim that Bb Samms was
the sole successor to Rmtan. Likewise,
in the hagiographic accounts of the life
and sayings of Bah al-Dn, the latter is
accepted as a (spiritual) son (Kshif,
Rashat, 1:74) by Bb Samms, and
his training is entrusted to Amr Kull;
for Amr Kull, the same formula, of
being accepted as a (spiritual) son,
This places Bb Samms within that
branch of the early Khwjagn who broke
26 bakhtvar khn
with the first pattern of succession, which
was a lateral one (each of a given shaykhs
close disciples taking leadership of the
community until that generation had died
out) and favoured a filial one. At the
same time, this branch adopted the prac-
tice of the vocal dhikr (ritual commemo-
ration of God), whereas the other branch
maintained the silent dhikr as the only
valid form of commemorating God. It
has been argued that it was Bah al-Dn
who succeeded in bringing the various
branches of the Khvjagn tradition
several local spiritual communities
together into a larger organisation.
No writings, few sayings, and only
a handful of anecdotes are attributed
to Bb Samms, and he is important
chiefly because he is seen as a necessary
transmitter in the later silsila constructions
for Bah al-Dn and as a means to bypass
Amr Kull in the chain of transmitters.
There was a need to bypass Amr Kull
in later silsila constructions because Kull
kept practising the vocal dhikr whereas
Bah al-Dn and his group did not. The
most important way to achieve this was
the claim that Bah al-Dn received
training directly from the spirit of Abd
al-Khliq.
Bb Samms can be seen as falling
in the four successors pattern; he is
reported to have had three successors in
addition to Amr Kull, one of whom was
his son Khvja Mamd.
Bibliography
Sources
Muammad b. Nim al-Khwrazm
al-Arzang, Manqib-i Azzn, Tashkent,
MS Institut Vostokovedeniia Akademii
Nauk Respubliki Uzbekistan (IVANRUz)-1,
858/I (Osnovnoi fond); Al b. usayn
al-Wi al-Kshif, Rashat ayn al-ayt,
ed. Al Aghar Muniyn, 2 vols.,
Tehran 1977; al al-Dn b. Mubrak
(attrib.), Ans al-libn wa-uddat al-slikn, ed.
Ibrhm ar Ughl, Tehran 1371sh/1992;
Shihb al-Dn, Maqmt-i Amr Kull, lith.,
Bukhara 1328/1910, trans. O. M. Yastrebova
in Mudrost sufiev (St Petersburg 2001),
28270.
Studies
Hamid Algar, Bb Samms, EIr; Devin
DeWeese, Khojagani origins and the cri-
tique of Sufism. The rhetoric of communal
uniqueness in the Manqib of Khoja Al
Azzn Rmtan, in Frederick de Jong and
Bernd Radtke (eds.), Islamic mysticism contested.
Thirteen centuries of controversies and polemics
(Leiden 1999), 492519; Devin DeWeese,
The legitimation of Bah ad-Dn Naqsh-
band, Asiatische Studien/tudes Asiatiques 60/2
(2006), 261305; Devin DeWeese, Succes-
sion protocols and the early Khwajagani
schism in the Maslak al-rifn, JIS 22/1
(2011), 135; Jrgen Paul, Solitude within
society. Early Khwjagn attitudes toward
spiritual and social life, Princeton Papers 15
(2006), 13763; Necdet Tosun, Baheddn
Nakbend. Hayat, grleri, tarkati, Istanbul
2002; Necdet Tosun, Semms, TDVIA
(Istanbul 2009), 36:498bc.
Jrgen Paul
Bakhtvar Khn
Bakhtvar Khn was a Kashmiri
eunuch who entered the service of
Awrangzb in 1065/1654. He served
as a secretary and confidante assisting
the princelater, the emperor lamgr
(r. 10681118/16581707)in his mili-
tary and political endeavours. As a partisan
of Awrangzb in the war to succeed Shh
Jhn (r. 103768/162758), he pursued
Dr Shikh after the battle of Smgah
(1068/1658); served as whisk-bearer dur-
ing Awrangzbs second and more elabo-
rate coronation, in 1069/1659; was titled
Khn, in 1069/1659; and, received the
imperial rank (manab) of 1000/150, in