The Safaviyya (Persian: صفویه) was a Sufi order founded by the Kurdish^[1][2][3] mystic Sheikh Safi-ad-din Ardabili (1252–1334). It held a prominent place in the society and politics of northwestern Iran in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, but today it is best known for having given rise to the Safavid dynasty.

Safī al-Din grew up in Ardabil but left it, for lack of adequate teachers, and travelled to Shiraz and then Gilan. In Gilan, he became the disciple of Sheikh Zahid, leader of the Zahidī Sufi order. He eventually became Sheikh Zahid's chief disciple and married his daughter. Upon Sheikh Zahid's death, the Zahidiyya came under Safī al-Din's leadership and was renamed the Safaviyya.

Safī al-Din's importance is attested in two letters by Rashid al-Din. In one, Rashid al-Din pledges an annual offering of foodstuffs. In the other, Rashid al-Din writes to his son, the governor of Ardabil, advising him to show proper consideration to the sheikh.^[4]

After Safī al-Din's death, leadership of the order passed to his son Sadr al-Dīn Mūsā, and subsequently passed down from father to son. In the mid-fifteenth century, the Safaviyya changed in character and became militant under Shaykh Junayd and Shaykh Haydar, launching jihads against the Christians of Georgia. Haydar's grandson, Ismail, further altered the nature of the order when he founded the Safavid empire in 1501 and proclaimed Twelver Shi'ism the state religion.

See also[link]

• Safavid dynasty family tree
• Safvat as-safa
• Safavid dynasty
• Msha'sha'iya, a rival Shi'a sect

References[link]

v t e Sufism and Tariqa Ideas Qutb Wali Abdal Fakir Dervish Tazkiah Baqaa Fanaa Haal Keramat Haqiqa Ihsan Irfan Kashf Lataif Manzil Marifa Nafs Noor Sufi cosmology Sufi metaphysics Sufi philosophy Sufi poetry Sufi psychology Sulook Yaqeen Silsila Practices Anasheed Dhikr Haḍra Muraqaba Qawwali Sama Whirling Ziyarat Sufi orders Azeemia Akbarī Alians Ba 'Alawī Bayramī Bektashī Chishtī Galibī Gulshanī Ḥurūfī Idrīsī Jelvetī Jerrahī Khalwatī Kubrāwī Madarī Malāmatī Mawlāwī Mourīdī Naqshbandī Naqshbandi Uwaisī Khalidiyya Nasuhī Ni'matullāhī Nuqtawī Qadirī Qalāndārī Rifa'ī Safāvī Shadhilī Suhrawardī Sunbulī Tijanī Ussakī Uwaisī Zahedī Notable early Sufi saints and mystics Abdul-Qadir Gilanī Abul-Khayr Ahmad Ghazālī Ahmed Yasāvī Al-Ghazālī Al-Hallaj al-Misrī Al-Qāsim al-Qunawī Amīr Kulal Ardabilī Ata Allah Attar Balım Sultan Baha ūd-Dīn Naqshband Bande Nawāz Baqī Billah Bastamī Bhita'ī Bulleh Shah Shah Waliullah Dehlāvī Farīd ūd-Dīn Fozail Gālib Gharīb Nawāz Ghujdawanī Ghulam Farīd Sheik Edebali Gül Baba Hajji Bayram Hajji Bektash Hazrat Mai Safoora Qadiriyya Haddad Hamadānī Hansvī Harabatī Baba Hasan Basri Mahmud Hudayī Hujwirī ibn ʿArabī Jābir ibn Hayyān Jahangasht Jamī Jan-e-Jānāān Jazoulī Junayd Baġdādī Kākī Kaliyarī Karkhī Kharaqanī Kubrā Nāimī Najib al-Suhrawardī Nasīmī Mansur Al-Hallaj Ni'matullāh Nizām ūd-Dīn Nurī Otman Baba Pir Sultan Qutb ūd-Dīn Haydār Rabbānī Rabia Basri Razī Rifa'ī Rukn-e-Alam Rūmī Ibrahim ibn Adham Saadī Salman al-Farisī Sanai Mevlana Halid-i Bagdadi Sarı Saltuk Semnanī Shadhilī Shahāb al-Dīn Suhrawardī Shams Tabrizī Shiblī Shirazī Sultan Walad Surkh Bukhari Taj al-Dīn Gilanī Umar al-Suhrawardī Uwais al-Qarni Yunus Emre Magtymguly Pyragy Zakariya Zarruq Notable modern Sufi saints Auliya Azeemi Nagpuri Meher Ali Sheikh Muhammad Uthman Sirajuddin Qadeer Piya Muhammad Maliki Gohar Shahi Tahir ul-Qadri Tahir Allauddin Taqi Usmani Abdal Hakim Murad Nazim Al-Haqqani Hisham Kabbani Nuh Keller Nooruddeen Durkee Abdalqadir as-Sufi Zaheen Ghulam Mustafa Reshad Feild Ahmad al-Alawi Ashraf Ali Thanvi Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Abd al-Rahman al-Shaghouri Omar Shah Haeri Raza Khan Syed Shujaat Pir Zulfiqar Abdullah Naqshbandi Sufi Barkat Ali Hafiz Qamaruddin Saheb Qibla Fultali Feisal Abdul Rauf Osman Nuri Topbaş Sufi studies Aguéli Almqvist Burckhardt Chittick Corbin Ernst Frager Guénon Hixon Lindbom Lings Nasr Schimmel Sells Shah Schuon Topics in Sufism Art Fiction History Music Poetry Shrines Texts Portal

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Farrukh Yassar Shirvanshah of Shirvan (1465–1500).

Reign[link]

In 1488 Shaykh Haydar of Safaviyya moved through Shirvan towards Derbend, supposedly to wage jihad against Circassians, but instead laid siege to Derbent. Farrukh Yassar was not able to mount defense and asked Sultan Yagub of Kara Koyunlu to the rescue. United forces were able to defeat Safavid kizilbash forces and Shaykh Haydar was murdered.

Shah Ismail I was able to take revenge 12 years later where his force met Farrukh Yassar with a cavalry force of 20,000 near castly of Gulistan in Shamakha. Farrukh Yassar was killed with most of Shirvan nobility. His son Ibrahim Shaykhshah ruled Shirvan from 1502 to 1524.

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