Ibn Arabi
There is only one true reality, God, and everything that exists is a way in which he shows himself.
Placement
Andalusian Sufi master: all beings are self-disclosures of the one divine reality – later summarized as the “unity of being” (wahdat al-wujud).
Key ideas
- Unity of being
- The perfect human
- Imagination as the place of revelation
Influence
Influenced by 2
Ibn Hazm
influenced by
Ibn Arabi studied Ibn Hazm’s works with ʿAbd al-Haqq al-Ishbili and described, in an introduction to a manuscript of Ibn Hazm, a vision in which the Prophet embraced him; how far Ibn Arabi followed Zahiri law is debated. I. Goldziher, Die Ẓâhiriten (1884; tr. The Zahiris, 1971, p. 169); A. Knysh, Ibn ʿArabi in the Later Islamic Tradition (1999), p. 40
Evidence: AI draft
Ibn Hazm › 994–1064
al-Ghazali
influenced by
Ibn Arabi took up al-Ghazali’s view that inspired unveiling (kashf) gives surer knowledge of God than rational reflection, refining how the two relate in the Meccan Revelations. Ibn Arabi, al-Futuhat al-makkiyya; W. C. Chittick, The Sufi Path of Knowledge (1989); SEP “Ibn Arabi”
Evidence: also in InPhO · InPhO
al-Ghazali › 1058–1111
Influenced 5
Mulla Sadra
influenced ✓
Mulla Sadra quoted Ibn Arabi extensively in The Four Journeys and gave his unity of being a philosophical form as the gradation of a single existence. Mulla Sadra, al-Asfar al-arbaa; S. Rizvi, Mulla Sadra and Metaphysics (2009); SEP “Mulla Sadra”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata
Mulla Sadra › c. 1572–1640
Dara Shikoh
influenced
Dara Shikoh’s Confluence of the Two Seas (1655) and his Sufi writings rest on the doctrine of the unity of being in the tradition of Ibn Arabi, which he set beside Vedantic ideas. S. Gandhi, The Emperor Who Never Was: Dara Shukoh in Mughal India (2020); Dara Shikoh, Majmaʿ al-baḥrayn, ed. and tr. M. Mahfuz-ul-Haq (1929)
Evidence: AI draft
Dara Shikoh › 1615–1659
Shah Waliullah
influenced
Shah Waliullah argued that Ibn Arabi’s unity of being and Ahmad Sirhindi’s unity of witnessing differ only in wording, in a letter known as al-Maktub al-madani. Shah Wali Allah, al-Maktub al-madani; S. A. A. Rizvi, Shah Wali-Allah and His Times (1980)
Evidence: AI draft
Shah Waliullah › 1703–1762
Seyyed Hossein Nasr
influenced ✓
Nasr devoted the third lecture of Three Muslim Sages (1964) to Ibn Arabi, presenting his unity of being as the heart of Sufi metaphysics. S. H. Nasr, Three Muslim Sages (1964)
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata
Seyyed Hossein Nasr › b. 1933
Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd
influenced
Abu Zayd’s doctoral thesis, published as The Philosophy of Interpretation (Falsafat al-tawil, 1983), studied Ibn Arabi’s theory and practice of Quranic interpretation. N. H. Abu Zayd, Falsafat al-tawil: dirasa fi tawil al-Quran inda Muhyi al-Din ibn Arabi (1983)
Evidence: AI draft
Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd › 1943–2010
Criticism
Criticized by 4
Ibn Taymiyya
criticised by
Ibn Taymiyya condemned Ibn Arabi’s Fusus al-hikam for identifying the existence of creatures with God’s existence, a view he attacked as ‘unity of existence’ (wahdat al-wujud). Ibn Taymiyya, Majmūʿ al-fatāwā II; A. Knysh, Ibn ʿArabi in the Later Islamic Tradition, 1999
Evidence: AI draft
Ibn Taymiyya › 1263–1328
Sa’d al-Din al-Taftazani
criticised by
In the Commentary on the Aims al-Taftazani rejected the identification of God with absolute being in the school of Ibn Arabi: absolute being is a concept in the mind, and if it were God, nothing else could be said to be. al-Taftazani, Sharḥ al-Maqāṣid (1383); A. Knysh, Ibn ʿArabi in the Later Islamic Tradition (1999)
Evidence: AI draft
Sa’d al-Din al-Taftazani › 1322–1390
Ahmad Sirhindi
criticised by
Sirhindi held that the “unity of being” associated with Ibn Arabi is a stage of mystical experience, surpassed by the “unity of witnessing”, in which God and the world remain distinct. Aḥmad Sirhindī, Maktūbāt; Y. Friedmann, Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi (1971); A. Schimmel, Mystical Dimensions of Islam (1975)
Evidence: AI draft
Ahmad Sirhindi › 1564–1624
Muhammad Iqbal
criticised by
After Asrar-i khudi (1915) Iqbal criticised the ‘pantheistic’ Sufism associated with Ibn Arabi as dissolving the self; how far this hits Ibn Arabi himself is debated. M. Iqbal, Asrār-i khudī (1915) and letters of 1916–17; A. Schimmel, Gabriel’s Wing, 1963
Evidence: AI draft
Muhammad Iqbal › 1877–1938
Works
Twenty-seven chapters, each devoted to a prophet as a facet of divine wisdom.
Position
Ibn Arabi, honoured as “the greatest master”, developed Islam’s most comprehensive mystical metaphysics. Only God truly is; all things are self-disclosures of the one divine reality, in which God’s names appear as in countless mirrors. The world is thus at once “He” and “not He”. The perfect human being, embodied in the prophets, unites all divine names and is the mirror in which God contemplates himself. Imagination is not mere fantasy but an intermediate realm where spiritual realities take form. Followers summed up his teaching as the “unity of being” (wahdat al-wujud), a term he never used. He shaped Sufism and the poetry of the Islamic world for centuries.
Life & context
Muhyi al-Din ibn Arabi was born in 1165 in Murcia in al-Andalus and grew up in Seville. Early visionary experiences led him to the Sufi path; as a young man, by his own account, he met Averroes in Córdoba. Around 1200 he left the West for good, made the pilgrimage to Mecca and travelled through Egypt, Anatolia and Iraq. He finally settled in Damascus, where he died in 1240.
Further main works
- The Meccan Revelations (al-Futuhat al-makkiyya, c. 1202–1238)
- The Interpreter of Desires (Tarjuman al-ashwaq, c. 1215)
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