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ḎAHABĪYA, a Sufi order of Shiʿite allegiance, ultimately derived from the Kobrawīya order, founded in the mid-12th century by Najm-al-Dīn Kobrā (d. 617/1220). It is found today almost exclusively in Shiraz and Azerbaijan. Despite the relatively meager number of its adepts, it is significant as the sole surviving branch of…

DAHAE i. The name. ii. The people. i. The Name Already in 1912 the Old Persian ethnonym Daha­- (Gk. Dáoi, Dáai; Lat. Dahae) had been connected by Sten Konow with Khotanese daha- “man, male,” an etymology that is all the more plausible as it is com­mon throughout the world for…

DAHAN-E ḠOLĀMĀN or, according to Walther Hinz (p. 374 n. 1), Dahana-ye Ḡolāmān “Gateway of the slaves,” site located 2 km straight south of the village of Qaḷʿa-ye Now (New fortress, QN) ca. 30 km southeast of Zābol in Sīstān, in the Persian part of the endorrheic basin originally formed…

DAHBĪDĪYA, a hereditary line of Naqšbandī Sufis centered on the shrine at Dahbīd, a village about 11 km. from Samarqand. The first Dahbīdī Shaikh was Maḵdūm-e Aʿẓam Sayyed Aḥmad Ḵᵛājagī Kāšānī (d. 949/1542), a native of Kāšān near Farḡāna, who claimed descent from Imam ʿAlī al-Reżā. Maḵdūm-e Aʿẓam, was buried…

DAHM YAZAD, the Middle Persian name of the Zoroastrian divinity (also known as Dahmān Āfrīn and Dahmān) who is the spirit or force inherent in the Avestan benediction called Dahma Vaŋuhi Āfriti, or Dahma Āfriti. This benediction invokes blessings on the house of the just man, the ašavan, and is…

DAHRĪ (< Ar.-Pers. dahr “time, eternity”), a theo­logical term referring either to an atheist or to an adherent of the doctrine that the universe had no beginning in time. i. In Middle Persian literature. ii. In the Islamic period.   i. In Middle Persian Literature Dahrī, in the sense of...

DAHYU (OIr. dahyu-), attested in Avestan dax́iiu-, daŋ́hu- “country” (often with reference to the people inhabiting it; cf. AirWb., cot. 706; Hoffmann, pp. 599­-600 n. 14; idem and Narten, pp. 54-55) and in Old Persian dahyu- “country, province” (pl. “nations”; Gershevitch, p. 160). The term is likely to be con­nected…

DĀITYĀ, (VAŊHVĪ) (lit., “the (good) Dāityā”; Mid. Pers. Weh Dāitī), the name of a river connected with the religious “law” (Av. dāta-, Mid. and NPers. dād), frequently identified in scholarly literature with the Oxus or with rivers of the northeastern region (Geiger, pp. 32-33). In the Avesta, however, Vaŋhvī Dāityā…

*DAIVA, Old Iranian noun (Av. daēuua-, OPers. daiva-) corresponding to the title devá- of the Indian gods and thus reflecting the Indo-European heritage (*deiu̯ó-), though the category of divinities to which it referred seems to have dropped completely out of the Iranian religious tradition and even to have become demonized….

DAIVADĀNA (lit., “temple of the daivas,”), Old Persian term that appears in the “daiva inscrip­tion” of Xerxes (486-65 b.c.e.) at Persepolis (XPh 37­-38; Kent, Old Persian, p. 151): pasāva vašnā Auramazdāha adam avam daivadānam viyakanam “Afterwards, by the favor of Ahura-mazdā, I destroyed that temple of the daivas.” The name…

DAJJĀL (the great deceiver), in Islamic tradition the maleficent figure gifted with supernatural powers whose advent and brief, though quasi-universal, rule will be among the signs heralding the approach of the resurrection. The Dajjāl may be thought of as the Antichrist, for he is often styled al-masīḥ al-dajjāl and it…

DAKANĪ, REŻĀ-ʿALĪŠĀH, also known as Shah ʿAlī-Reżā (1094-1204/1683-1799), leader (qoṭb, lit., “pole”) in the years 1154-1214/1741-99 of the Neʿmat-­Allāhī Sufi order in Hyderabad (Deccan), India. Noth­ing is known of his background, except that he was a disciple of Šams-al-Dīn Dakanī, who initiated him into the order. He is best known…

DAKANĪ, SAYYED MĪR ʿABD-AL-ḤAMĪD MAʿṢŪM-ʿALISĀH (ca. 1151-1211 or 1212/ca. 1738-97), the “renewer” (mojadded) of the Neʿmat-Allāhī Sufi order in Persia and thus the initiatory ancestor of all present­-day Neʿmat-Allāhīs. He was born in Hyderabad (Deccan) to an aristocratic family that, like most of the governing elite of the province, was…