He is perhaps best known for his collections of humorous Mulla Nasrudin stories. Shah made extensive use of traditional teaching stories and parables, texts that contained multiple layers of meaning designed to trigger insight and self-reflection in the reader. Emphasising that Sufism was not static but always adapted itself to the current time, place and people, he framed his teaching in Western psychological terms.
In his writings, Shah presented Sufism as a universal form of wisdom that predated Islam.
A similar organisation, the Institute for the Study of Human Knowledge (ISHK), exists in the United States, under the directorship of Stanford University psychology professor Robert Ornstein, whom Shah appointed as his deputy in the U.S. In 1965, Shah founded the Institute for Cultural Research, a London-based educational charity devoted to the study of human behaviour and culture. His most seminal work was The Sufis, which appeared in 1964 and was well received internationally. In 1960 he established a publishing house, Octagon Press, producing translations of Sufi classics as well as titles of his own. His early writings centred on magic and witchcraft. Idries Shah (Persian: ادریس شاه), also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi (Arabic: سيد إدريس هاشمي), was an author and teacher in the Sufi tradition who wrote over three dozen critically acclaimed books on topics ranging from psychology and spirituality to travelogues and culture studies.īorn in India, the descendant of a family of Afghan nobles, Shah grew up mainly in England.
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