The way and the paths of the righteous in the Memorial of God's Friends by Farid Ad-Din ʻAttar

Abstract

A research project on hagiographic narrative in Persian literature and culture is now in progress in the Laboratory of Oriental Studies and Comparative Linguistics SASH. Currently, research is centered on studying the frst full-scale collection of sacred biographies, Memorial of God's Friends by Farid ad-Din ʻAttar, and on preparing a commented translation of the book into Russian. The article provides an outline of the main directions of study (narrative patterns at the formative period of Persian hagiographic writing; the sainthood narrative and its impact beyond the genre) and serves as an introduction to the sample translations from ʻAttar's compendium published in this issue of the journal.