The text presented here offers a unique insight into the eventful life of one
of the greatest spiritual authorities of North Africa, the Sufi sheikh and
scholar Abū al-‘Abbās Aḥmad ibn Aḥmad Zarrūq al-Burnusī al-Fāsī (d.
846-899/1442-93). Aḥmad Zarrūq was a leading authority and the author
of numerous major works on Taṣawwuf, Hadith, jurisprudence and other
subjects. He is widely believed to have been the Mujaddid, or Renewer of
the Muslim Umma, of the ninth hijrī century. May Allah be well pleased
with him.
Sheikh Zarrūq kept a kunnāsh or notebook in which he recorded both
important aspects of his personal and scholarly life and also his own brief
notes and reflections on many diverse subjects. ‘Memoirs of a Sufi Master’
contains a fluent English translation of those portions of the text which concern
the Sheikh’s outward life, his spiritual life, and his teachers and companions.
Also included are an introduction and a full scholarly commentary by Sidi
Ahmad Ali providing detailed and wide-ranging background information,
much of it never previously published except in Arabic.