Product Details

• Format: Color, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Wellspring Media
• VHS Release Date: January 1, 1998
• Run Time: 30 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• ASIN: B000009PUZ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #320,464 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Moslems are required to pray five times a day, so Sufis "pray without ceasing," narrator Huston Smith reports in this 25-minute documentary of the Islamic sect, which takes an already rigorous faith to its extreme. In their quest to erase the self completely, the Sufis added tonal singing and a whirling dance, both forbidden in traditional Moslem practice. Noted spiritual filmmaker Elda Hartley captures images of the hypnotic group chants and the spiral dances imitating the solar system with a mesmerizing intensity. Religious author Smith (The World's Religions) delivers poetic, if sometimes stilted, prose guiding the viewer through Iran, North Africa, and India, from mosques through dusty streets and into ancient ruins. Shot in the early 1970s, the documentary is a bit dated in some respects (including political), but the intimate footage and Smith's insider information makes it timeless regarding the basics of Sufi. --Kimberly Heinrichs

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Look to the message and not at the messenger, April 6, 2005

By 

Nora R. Hope "Knowledge without ethics is vanity" (PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mystic's Journey: Islamic Mysticism - Sufi [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Elsa Hartley and Huston Smith have providied us all with stunningly beautiful images and gems of wisdom on all their jointly made films. Sufism still has not had a better film made about it, even though this one is rather dusty. Good stuff.

Please, especially ladies in the audience, do not fall in love with Huston Smith. He is happily married. Instead, remember that he is a *messenger* of the great *messages* of the world's religions. You most likely are falling for the wisdom, not (only) the wise man.