Sulūk

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Sulūk (Arab., ‘journey’). Among the Sūfīs, the mystic's progress on the way to God. It is a deliberate quest, beginning with one's initiation into a Sūfī order, followed, under the guidance of a shaikh, by the methodical purification of the self through stages or stations (maqāmat). The Sūfī orders have their own individual programmes of stations for the sālik, the one who pursues this journey.