Born on July 29, 1938, in Tehran, Iran, to an Iranian father and American mother, she grew up in Los Angeles and Washington D.C.
Bakhtiar has a BA in History from Chatham College, MA in Philosophy and Counseling Psychology and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of New Mexico.
Bakhtiar is a Licensed Professional Psychotherapist in the State of Illinois. She also taught courses on Islam at the University of Chicago. She is co-author of A Sense of Unity: The Sufi Tradition in Persian Architecture (University of Chicago Press) and author of SUFI Expressions of the Mystic Quest (Thames and Hudson), as well as a three volume work, God’s Will Be Done, on Moral Healing and some 15 other books on various aspects of Islam.
She is the leading authority on spiritual chivalry, most clearly expressed in the Sufi Enneagram, also known as the Greater Struggle. She has also translated over 30 books on Islam and the Islamic movement into English.
Bakhtiar is presently Director of the Institute of Traditional Psychology and Resident Scholar at Kazi Publication.
Coming from a prominent family and a mixed Iranian-American background as well as her true desire to learn and her pure natural genius have given Bakhtiar the enormous privilege to become a well-known author.
Source: Tehran Times