Sachiko Murata et al: Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light, 2000

amazon.com:

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light investigates, for the first time in a Western language, the manner in which the Muslim scholars of China adapted the Chinese tradition to their own needs during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The book surveys the 1400-year history of Islam in China and explores why the four books translated from Islamic languages into Chinese before the twentieth century were all Persian Sufi texts. The author also looks carefully at the two most important Muslim authors of books in the Chinese language, Wang Tai-yu and Liu Chih. Murata shows how they assimilated Confucian social teachings and Neo-Confucian metaphysics, as well as Buddhism and Taoism, into Islamic thought. She presents full translations of Wang's Great Learning of the Pure and Real–a text on the principles of Islam–and Liu Chih's Displaying the Concealment of the Real Realm, which in turn is a translation from Persian of Lawa'ih', a famous Sufi text by Jami. A new translation of Jami's Lawa'ih' from the Persian by William C. Chittick is juxtaposed with Liu Chih's work, revealing the latter's techniques in adapting the text to the Chinese language and Chinese thought.

review:

Wonderful study of this little known corner of the Islamic world. First the author covers the history of Islam in china and the development of a Chinese/Islamic identity that was completely unique both to Islam and to the Chinese world around them.

Secondly a study of Chinese Sufi text and translation. A wonderful work which examines how Islam was understood by Chinese Muslims and how it was practiced.

–-

An original work that fills an unknown gap of Islam in China. Excellent, also includes a translation of Jami's Lawaih.