Rabia al-Adawiya

Rabia (717–801 C.E.) is widely considered to be the most important of the early Sufi poets. The defining work on her life and writing was written over 50 years ago by Margaret Smith, a small treatise written as a Master's Thesis.

Much of the poetry that is attributed to her is of unknown origin.

One of the many myths that swirl around her life is that she was freed of slavery because her master saw her praying and surrounded by light, realized she was a saint, and feared for his life if he kept her as a slave.

One day, she was seen running through the streets of Basra carrying a torch in one hand and a bucket of water in the other. When asked what she was doing, she said "I want to put out the fires of Hell, and burn down the rewards of Paradise. They block the way to God. I do not want to worship from fear of punishment or for the promise of reward, but simply for the love of God."

While she apparently received many marriage offers, she remained celibate, and died in old age an ascetic, her only care from the disciples who followed her.

Her name is also transliterated as Rabi'a and Rābiʻa al-ʻAdawiyya al-Quaysiyya of Basra.