'Those who believe are more intense in love': Ibn al-'Arabi and the Paradoxes of Love

Pablo writes: This presentation analyses the content of Ibn ʻArabī’s lesser-known work, Kitāb Manzil al-manāzil al-fahwāniyya (“The Mansion that Gathers [the Keys to All] the Mansions in Which Direct Speech Descends”), which is devoted to Quranic hermeneutics and structured on symbolic principles derived from the science of numbers and the abjad alphanumeric system. It explores the author's unique correlation between the 114 ‘mansions’ or ‘stations’ and the 114 suras of the Quran, classifying them into 19 major mansions based on the introductory text of each sura. Conceived as a journey of ascension (miʻrāj) through the Quran's 'citadels', this book is intimately related to chapter 22 of Ibn ʻArabī’s major work, al-Futūḥāt al-makkiyya. In this presentation, I intend to address some of the implicit, yet unexplored, questions raised in this book. I propose that Ibn ʻArabī employed strategic ambiguity in his writing, using misleading elements and deliberate omissions to avoid undue attention. Pablo Beneito is a Professor of Translation and Interpretation at the University of Murcia. He has served as an Invited Professor at institutions such as the École Pratique des Hautes Études (Sorbonne) and the University of Kyoto (ASAFAS), among others. In his study of Ibn Arabi’s thought, Pablo has extensively researched, edited, and translated several of his works and other texts related to him. His English-language publications include Contemplation of the Holy Mysteries (co-authored with Cecilia Twinch); Kashf al-ma‘nâ, The Secret of God’s Most Beautiful Names (forthcoming with Anqa Publishing), and both The Seven Days of the Heart and Patterns of Contemplation (co-authored with Stephen Hirtenstein). Since 2011, he has been coordinating the activities of MIAS-Latina. Starting in 2014, he took on the role of Editor for El Azufre Rojo: Revista de Estudios sobre Ibn Arabi published by EDITUM at the University of Murcia, and he curated the "Jayal: Creative Imagination" exhibition at Casa Árabe in Madrid and Córdoba from 2016 to 2017.

Mohammed Rustom is Associate Professor of Islamic Studies at Carleton University. He is the author of the award-winning book The Triumph of Mercy: Philosophy and Scripture in Mulla Sadra and Assistant Editor of The Study Quran: A New Translation with Notes and Commentary (Editor-in-Chief, Seyyed Hossein Nasr)

Marlene DuBois is Professor of English at the State University of New York at Suffolk County Community College. Her research interests are in comparative religion, Sufism, and mythic narratives.

Dr. Dakake researches and publishes on Islamic intellectual history, Quranic studies, Shi`ite and Sufi traditions, and women's spirituality and religious experience. She is one of the general editors and contributing authors of the The Study Quran (HarperOne, 2015), which comprises a translation and verse-by-verse commentary on the Qur'anic text that draws upon the rich and varied tradition of Muslim commentary on their own scripture. Her most recent publication, The Routledge Companion to the Qur'an (September 2021), is a co-edited volume with 40 articles on the Qur'an's history, content, style, and interpretation written by leading contemporary scholars working from different methodological perspectives. She is currently completing a monograph, Toward an Islamic Theory of Religion, and has begun work on a partial translation of a Persian Qur'an commentary written by the 20th century Iranian female scholar, Nusrat Amin.

The philosophical concepts at the heart of this presentation include Wujud, the Plural, and Ambiguity. I begin by examining Ibn Arabi's notion of belief as 'tying knots in the heart,' parallel to his understanding of the nature of Wujud and Barzakh. The aim is a fresh thinking about pluralism, grounded in Sufi metaphysics — a metaphysics focused on what Shahab Ahmed elsewhere describes as 'the multivalent experiential condition of hayra [paradoxical perplexity].' Without hastily asserting Ibn Arabi's pluralistic views of other traditions or religions, I dwell on what we today can learn from Ibn Arabi’s nuanced understanding of Being. This insight could offer us new perspectives for addressing the global rise of exclusivism and rigid, unambiguous identifications. The approach involves the philosophical application of Ibn Arabi's teachings on the essential delimitation of all doctrinal positions to current issues. Situated in the cultural and social realities of the subcontinent, I also highlight the historical application of these core Akbarian concepts in the diverse religious and spiritual expressions of subcontinental Sufis. Bharatwaj Iyer is a PhD student and a Senior Research Fellow at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay focusing on Heidegger and the phenomenological tradition. He is on the education team at MIAS, where he has served for over two years. He recently published "The Transimmanence of the Real: Ontological Pluralism in the School of Ibn ʻArabī" edited by Pablo Benito in Religions. A forthcoming article, "You are a Puzzle-lock: A Phenomenological Analysis of Perplexity," in Philosophy East and West examines the Urdu poem Tum ek Gorakh Dhanda ho from a Heideggerian perspective. His academic and activist interests are political pluralism and rising extremism.

Although Ibn ʿArabī (d. 638/1240) is known as “the greatest master” (al-shaykh al-akbar), little is known about his practical teachings and his approach to the master-disciple relationship. Apart from scattered accounts of his own companionship with various masters, Ibn ʿArabī dedicates very few books or chapters to the rules of spiritual education. Therefore, the Shaykh al-akbar’s views on the matter remain largely to be determined. An understudied work could contribute to fill this gap: the K. al-Ajwiba al-ʿarabiyya fī sharḥ al-naṣāʾiḥ al-yusūfiyya. It contains a detailed expression of Ibn ʿArabī’s conception of spiritual education, illustrated by numerous details and anecdotes that bring into light the practical and pedagogical implications of his doctrines. This talk will propose a brief overview of the treatise, its originality, and the principles of spiritual education that are defined in it. A particular focus will be given to the notion of “imaginary master”, central to both the pedagogical doctrine of Ibn ʿArabī and the nature of the K. al-Ajwiba al-ʿarabiyya. The talk will delve into how the imaginary master is presented as the necessary interface between the disciple and the master, and how it shapes the whole process of spiritual education.

Love is mysterious and many splendored—the source of our greatest joys and deepest sorrows; easy to talk and sing about, but impossible to define. "One who defines love has not known it, and one who has not tasted it by drinking it down, has not known it," writes Ibn al-'Arabi. While Rumi is more associated with love in the contemporary imagination, love is equally central to the writings and tradition of the great Andalusian writer, thinker, and spiritual teacher, Ibn Al-'Arabi (d. 1240), known as al-Shaykh al-Akbar (The Greatest Master). Through an examination of his commentaries on two verses of the Qur'an (2:165 and 45:23), and exploration of the paradoxes and seeming contradictions therein, this workshop will explore how love is key to understanding Ibn Al-'Arabi’s vast and kaleidoscopic oeuvre, and how these writings and perspectives can, in turn, help us better understand the undefinable nature of love and longing. For Ibn Al-'Arabi, love is more than a feeling, it is the fundamental nature of consciousness, God, and reality itself.

Love is mysterious and many splendored—the source of our greatest joys and deepest sorrows; easy to talk and sing about, but impossible to define. "One who defines love has not known it, and one who has not tasted it by drinking it down, has not known it," writes Ibn al-'Arabi. While Rumi is more associated with love in the contemporary imagination, love is equally central to the writings and tradition of the great Andalusian writer, thinker, and spiritual teacher, Ibn Al-'Arabi (d. 1240), known as al-Shaykh al-Akbar (The Greatest Master). Through an examination of his commentaries on two verses of the Qur'an (2:165 and 45:23), and exploration of the paradoxes and seeming contradictions therein, this workshop will explore how love is key to understanding Ibn Al-'Arabi’s vast and kaleidoscopic oeuvre, and how these writings and perspectives can, in turn, help us better understand the undefinable nature of love and longing. For Ibn Al-'Arabi, love is more than a feeling, it is the fundamental nature of consciousness, God, and reality itself.

"Ghouls, ifrits and a panoply of other jinn have long haunted Muslim cultures and societies. These also include demonic doubles (qarīn, pl. quranā'): the little-studied and much-feared denizens of the hearts and blood of humans. Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn 'Arabī (d. 1240) wrote on jinn in substantial detail, uncovering the physiognomy, culture and behaviour of this unseen species. Akbarians believed that the good God assigned each human with an evil double. Ibn 'Arabī’s reasoning as to why this was the case mirrors his attempts to expound the problem of evil in Islamic religious philosophy. No other Sufi, Ibn 'Arabī claimed, has ever managed to get to the heart of this matter before him. As well as offering the reader knowledge and safety from evil, Ibn 'Arabī’s writings on jinnealogy tackle the even larger issues of spiritual ascension, predestination and the human relationship to the Divine." Dunja Rašić earned her Ph.D in Islamic Studies at the Free University Berlin. Her primary research field is medieval intellectual history, with a focus on Akbarian cosmology, philosophical Sufism and the Islamic philosophy of language.

Mahmud Erol Kılıç is a Professor of Sufi Studies. His numerous books, articles and translations have focused on Ibn 'Arabi and the Ibn 'Arabi school of thought as well as Sufism in Anatolia. He has been the ambassador of the Republic of Turkey to the Republic of Indonesia, and was the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Union of the OIC Member States (PUIC) based in Tehran. Prof. Kılıç currently serves as the Director General of the Research Center for Islamic History, Art and Culture. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Society.