Radical Sufi who held that the ritual duties of Islam can be performed in a spiritual sense with just as much validity as if they were performed outwardly. He held that the spirit of the Sufi can become united with the divine Spirit, so that the Sufi becomes God's direct spokesperson; he therefore once declared "I am the Truth." In 922 he was flogged, mutilated, crucified (exposed on a gibbet), decapitated, and burned after a long trial before religious scholars.
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