One of the central linages in Turkish Sufism was the Ottoman pro-
moted Bektashi Order, closely connected to the Janissary corps.
 Nowadays the tradition is often labeled as a
‘popular Sufism’
, without
any discussion of what that concept means and the contradictions be-
tween folk religion and Sufism in general. This article concerns the
question of what constitutes popular Sufism and how it is expressed
within the Bektashi tradition. The first part analyzes the trends and
religio-sociological components of Sufism and folk culture in the ear-
ly Bektashi hagiographic text, Velayetname, and in the younger
Bektashi textbook, Makalat. The second part consists of a discussion
of what Sufi components the modern Albanian Bektashi Order has
 preserved and to what extent this Order still is a Sufi order and not just
an Islamic folk religion.