Tag Archive for: Islam

Introduction to Islamic Metaphysics: A Contemporary Sufi Treatise on the Secrets of the Divine Name – Yousef Casewit

Abstract:

“In this masterful treatise of Sufi spirituality and metaphysics, Shaykh Mohamed Faouzi al-Karkari maps out the mystical journey to God as an initiatic progression through seven degrees of realization, or readings, of the divine Name Allāh. These seven degrees encapsulate what it means to read in the Name of the Lord, letter by letter, syllable by syllable, until the Hu, Lahu, Lillāh, ilāh, Allāh, Alif, and the Treasure-Dot are inwardly realized in the heart of the wayfarer. The Shaykh guides the reader from secret to secret, or reading to reading, devoting ten subchapters to each degree of the divine Name. Written with both metaphysical rigor and poetic elegance, the book comprises seventy short chapters that correspond to the seventy veils of Light and darkness between God and creation. Throughout the book, he emphasizes the centrality of directly witnessing the Divine Light, the indispensability of a living spiritual master, the dynamic between transcendence and immanence, the purification of the heart, and wholehearted commitment to practicing the Sunna and continuous invocation as a means of attaining direct knowledge of God. Describing the fruit of wayfaring, the Shaykh proclaims: “[It is] a matter of sheer fruitional experience, tasted only by those who plunge the depths of the kernel of the heart..”

Rumijeve poeme oslovljavaju najbitnije obzire ljudskog postojanja (Preporod 51.23, 2021)

Rumijeve Poeme Oslovljavaju Najbitnije Obzire Ljudskog Postojanja (Preporod 51.23, 2021)Download

Beauty and Tradition with Professor Seyyed Hossein Nasr

The Semantics of Gratitude (Shukr) in the Qurʾān – Joseph E. B. Lumbard College of Islamic Studies, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Doha, Qatar

Abstract:

Since the publication of Toshihiko Izutsu’s The Structure of Ethical Terms in the Qurʾan in 1959, scholars of Islam have recognized that gratitude (shukr) is central to the ethicoreligious worldview conveyed by the Qurʾān. Izutsu further developed this analysis in God and Man in the Qurʾan and Ethico-Religious concepts in the Qurʾan. Ida Zilio-Grade enhances our understanding by providing linguistic analysis of shukr, and Atif Khalil examines the understanding of shukr in Sufi texts. This paper draws the connections between these three approaches. It expands upon Zilio-Grade’s linguistic analysis by examining the root sh-k-r and analyzing the differences between the uses of shākir (thankful) and shakūr (ever-grateful) when used in relation to the human being and when used in relation to God. It then demonstrates that expanding the analysis of contextual semantic fields employed by Izutsu to include intertextual semantic fields reveals how shukr is related to the cognitive faculties of the human being. The paper concludes by examining how authors such as a-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111), al-Tilimsānī (d. 773/1291), and Aḥmad al-Tijānī (d. 1230/1815) addressed the paradoxes to which this Qurʾānic presentation of shukr gives rise.

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ISLAM, YOGA AND MEDITATION (from Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies) – Patrick DSilva

Abstract:

“How have Muslims responded to, engaged with and developed original versions of yoga and meditation? This chapter provides a brief historical overview with an emphasis on Muslim communities in South Asia, especially during the Mughal period. This first part of the chapter establishes the basic framework for understanding the earliest surviving texts demonstrating Muslim engagement with yoga in South Asia, as well as the most important texts and individuals who stand out as key examples of how this engagement develops over subsequent centuries. This chapter also pays special attention to the translation and circulation of a set of Śaivite divination techniques centred on the breath known as Śiva-svarodaya (sometimes svara-yoga or svara-jñāna) from Sanskrit and Hindi into Persian and Arabic as ilm-i dam/ilm al-dam (‘the science of the breath’).1 The second part examines meditation, with an emphasis on the Sufi rituals known as dhikr, the ‘remembrance’ of God. The third section analyses contemporary concerns and controversies regarding Muslims and yoga“

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Islam, Fundamentalism, and the Betrayal of Tradition, Revised and Expanded Essays by Western Muslim Scholars, Edited by: Joseph E. B. Lumbard

Abstract:

“Anyone, whether he or she be a Muslim, a follower of another religion, ormore generally anyone who is seriously interested in the relation between Is-lam and the West and Islam in the West, cannot but be attracted to this volume, which is the fruit of the thought of some of the best minds of the younger generation of Muslim scholars, who are at the same time part of Western society,bearing upon some of the most momentous issues of the day. These are issues which affect the lives of everyone, young and old, issues which everyone inthe Islamic world and the West who has the necessary capability and vision must seek to address and solve for the sake of all of God’s creatures wherever they might be, for as the Qur´ān asserts, to God belong both the East and the West.”

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APPROACHES TO PROXIMITY AND DISTANCE IN EARLY SUFISM – Mohammed Rustom

Abstract:

“There is a famous tradition in Islam in which an unknown man, fully clad in white and evincing no signs of travel, approaches the Prophet Muhammad and begins to ask him several questions. Prior to his last question,  which has to do with eschatology, the man asks the Prophet to define three  terms: Islam, Iman, ihsan, meaning “submission,” “faith,” and “doing what is beautiful” respectively. The Prophet tells his interlocutor that”

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