These dancers can twirl dozens of times per minute without moving an inch from their spot. The al-Kharrat family is one of the most reputed in Damascus for Sufi whirling, boasting 20 dervish dancers ...

“As soon as he started to grow, he saw us all whirling, his uncles and cousins. When he first started to walk when he was about one year old, he started to whirl. I started to teach him how to move ...

KONYA, Turkey — Each year, thousands of people travel to the Turkish city of Konya to attend a weeklong series of events and ceremonies that mark the death of the 13th-century Islamic poet, scholar ...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A group of young Afghans – both women and men – is coming together in the country’s war-torn capital to practice a mystical Sufi Islamic dance. The group’s founder says she ...

One of the world's few female whirling dervishes, Rana Gorgani has opened up Sufism to a wider audience, and is now making surprising spiritual connections over Zoom thanks to the pandemic.

I’ve always wanted to see whirling dervishes perform the mystical Sufi ceremony known as a sema, in which their series of mesmerizing turns help them, and the audience, reach a state of nirvana. But ...

Sufi whirling is actually an ancient technique of meditation, in which the person is physically active. Practitioners of this say that, fundamentally, our existence means to revolve, since everything ...

Since my childhood, not a day went by when I did not hear the mention of Moulana Jalaluddin Rumi’s name with a lot of love and respect from my parents, teachers and friends, and it was natural that ...

Fahima Mirzaie performs a Sema dance (Sufi Whirling) in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 20, 2020. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib) KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A group of young Afghans -- both women and men -- is ...