living islam _ Islamic tradition

    Ibn `Arabi: Philosophy and Reason

    When the knowers of God enter the universe of spiritual meanings
    they are in the presence, Ibn `Arabi informs us, of a reality in which
    what is hidden to the rational faculty, and therefore sometimes
    deemed impossible by it, actually occurs and is witnessed. This
    world is referred to in Ibn `Arabi studies as the intermediate objective
    world of the divine creative imagination. As James Morris carefully
    points out, Ibn `Arabi draws a decisive distinction "between each
    individual's 'self-deluding imagination' and the ongoing Divine
    'Imaging' underlying all creation".
    see complete doc. in pdf.
    - expired link (before 2023-02-06) www.ibn-arabi.com/MT 20Ch 202.pdf

    Sufi Shrines of Ayodhya

    Vidya Bhushan Rawat
    Sufism, or mystical Islam, has many different strands, some eclectic and open, others conservative and orthodox. It seems that the sort of Sufism that emerged and developed in Ayodhya was, by and large, of the former variety. Many of the Sufis of Ayodhya were upholders of what is called, for want of a better term, the wujudi position, developed as a systematic doctrine by the great thirteenth century Spanish Sufi, Muhiyuddin Ibn Arabi. Ibn Arabi believed that all of existence (wujud) was of one essence and had the same source, God. God, he insisted, pervades all creation. He proclaimed the wahdat al-wujud or the 'unity of all existence'. The wujudis, because of their understanding of God and creation, were set apart from the majority of the ulama or Muslim clerics attached to the ruling establishments of their times, and for this were often persecuted. The tenth century Sufi master Mansur al-Hallaj was probably one of the greatest wujudis of all times. His ecstatic utterance, an al haq or 'I am the Truth', referring to the total absorption of the self in God, earned him the wrath of the establishment ulama, who, wrongly accusing him of claiming divinity for himself, promptly had him sent to the gallows.

    In India the wujudi Sufis, many of them who had settled in the country from Central Asia and Iran, exercised a major influence. Because of their breadth of vision, their opposition to caste differences, and their simple message of ethical monotheism, and above all, their own personal example and charismatic appeal, they made large numbers of disciples, particularly among the low castes groaning under the oppression of the Brahminical system. Scores of low castes converted to Islam at their hands, while many more, still remaining wedded to their ancestral faiths, came to develop a close link with the Sufis, seeing them as powerful beings capable of interceding with God to have their requests met.

    Response to a Misleading Article on Islam and Sufism

    [But we] interpret "Wahdat al-Wujud" to mean
    that nothing exists of itself, independent of everything else, except Allah.  Such an understanding is certainly within Islam, since everything which *isn't* Allah depends upon Allah for its existence.

     

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