veiled4allah: William Shakespeare, Sufi?

The influence of William Shakespeare on western culture has made him arguably Britain's greatest export. Now it is being claimed that his work resembles the teachings of the Islamic Sufi sect. The argument will be put forward next month at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre in London. It comes as part of a week of events focusing on Islam to address concerns raised by the 'war on terror' and improve understanding of the links between Islam and British culture.

While it has been suggested that Shakespeare dabbled with espionage and Catholic political activism, the new theory will attempt to persuade Shakespeare scholars that the playwright was a member of a religious or spiritual order which can best be compared to the philosophy of Sufism.

The respected academic Dr Martin Lings will put forward this thesis in his lecture on 23 November. 'Shakespeare would have delighted in Sufism,' said Lings, who is 96 and an adherent of Sufism. 'We can see he obviously knew a lot about some kind of equivalent sect or order.'

Lings argues that the guiding principles of Sufi thought are evident in Shakespeare's writing. The plays, he believes, depict a struggle between the dawning modernist world and the traditional, mystical value system. And, like the Sufis, the playwright is firmly on the side of tradition and spiritualism.

'It was the end of the Middle Ages and the birth of atheism,' he says. 'It was the beginning of the ideas of enlightenment and the beginning really of the modern era. Shakespeare is the last outpost of tradition.'