IBN AL‘ARABI, MUHYI ADIN ABU BAKR MUHAMMAD

(1165–1240)

Ibn al-‘Arabi is one of the most important medieval mystical writers of the Sufi sect of Islam.He is sometimes called al-Shaykh al-Akbar (The Greatest Shaykh), while Muhyi a-Din, his honorific name, means “reviver of religion.” Ibn al-‘Arabi was born in Murcia, in Andalusia, and moved to Seville with his family after the Almohads conquered southern Spain. He was educated in Seville, and having been introduced to Sufi mysticism, became a wandering scholar through Spain and northern Africa for some years, seeking out Sufi masters. Making his pilgrimage (hajj) to Mecca in 1201, he is said to have fallen in love with a young Persian woman who became for him his inspiration, the physical manifestation of the beauty of God’s universe (this story may be apocryphal, since falling in love on pilgrimage was a common motif in Arabic literature).

Ibn al-‘Arabi’s monument to this woman, whom he calls by many names, is hisTarjuman al-Aschwag(The interpreter of desires), a collection of 61QASÍDAS(conventional love poems) that express allegorically his love of God through his expressions of love for the woman. The collection was misunderstood, and Ibn a-‘Arabi wrote a “Treasury of Lovers,” an explanation of the mystical allegory in his poems, to clarify their spiritual intent: The young girl represents the perfect soul, the longing for her is the longing of the soul that seeks union with God.

After his experiences in Mecca, Ibn al-‘Arabi traveled further throughout the Middle East, and finally settled in Damascus in 1223. Here he did much of his writing. More than 900 works are attributed to him, but most, of course, cannot be his. His most famous mystical treatise isal-Futūhāt al-Mikkiyya(The Meccan revelations). This is largely a prose work, though it contains many poems. Chiefly it attempts to explain the hidden, mystic meaning of much of the universe.In one chapter of this text, “The Alchemy of Happiness,” Ibn al-‘Arabi describes a trip through hell and the heavens. Another text, describing Mohammad’s night journey through the seven heavens, is Ibn al-‘Arabi’sShajarat al-Qawm(The Tree of existence). For Ibn al-‘Arabi, the Prophet’s journey is an allegory for the journey of the heart of the mystic, seeking reunion with God. Ibn al-‘Arabi’s other better known works areFuses al-Hiram(Bezels of Wisdom), in which each chapter is presented as a “bezel,” or jewel, of spiritual wisdom; andDivan, a substantial collection of some 900 poems, some mystical, a few personal.

In Ibn al-‘Arabi’s thought, the unity of all Being was essential to religion, and seeking union with the Godhead, with sheer Being, was the goal. For Ibn al-‘Arabi, all religions sought this same goal, and therefore, all faiths were ultimately one faith. His enemies cursed him for heretical pantheism (a belief in the divinity of the whole universe), but Ibn al-‘Arabi defended himself by reference to sacred and orthodox texts.

Ibn al-‘Arabi said that he was driven by God to write and that his texts were responses to God’s urging rather than his own productions. Still one of the most influential of medieval Sufis, his tomb in Damascus continues to be an important pilgrimage center for that city.

■ Ibn al-‘Arabi.The Bezels of Wisdom. Translated by R.W. J. Austin. New York: Paulist Press, 1980.

■ Ibn al-‘Arabi.The Tarjumán al-ashwáq: A Collection of Mystical Odes. Edited by Reynold A. Nicholson. London.: Theosophical Publishing House, 1978.

■ Irwin, Robert, ed.Night and Horses and the Desert: An Anthology of Classical Arabic Literature. Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press, 1999.