Contemplation of the Holy Mysteries: Contemplation of the Holy Mysteries and the Rising of the Divine Lights

by Ibn ʿArabi, Pablo Beneito (Translator), Cecilia Twinch (Translator)

One of Ibn 'Arabi's first writings, composed when he was just twenty-nine, this work consists of fourteen visions interspersed with dazzling episodes regarding the nature of existence, the human relationship with reality, and true happiness. With helpful notes based on Ibn 'Arabi's own oral commentary, the work is presented for the first time in English.

Genres: Islam, Philosophy, Religion

144 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Note to arabic readers : For the original arabic version of the books, check "other editions" in the book that interests you)

Universally known by the title of "Muhyi al-Din" (The Reviver of the Religion) and "al-Shaykh al-Akbar" (The Greatest Shaykh) Ibn 'Arabī (Arabic: ابن عربي‎) (July 28, 1165 - November 10, 1240) was an Arab Sufi Muslim mystic and philosopher. His full name was Abū 'Abdullāh Muḥammad ibn 'Alī ibn Muḥammad ibn al-`Arabī al-Hāṭimī al-Ṭā'ī (أبو عبد الله محمد بن علي بن محمد بن العربي الحاتمي الطائي).

Muhammad ibn al-Arabi and his family moved to Seville when he was eight years old. In 1200 CE, at the age of thirty-five, he left Iberia for good, intending to make the hajj to Mecca. He lived in Mecca for some three years, where he began writing his Al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya (The Meccan Illuminations). In 1204, he left Mecca for Anatolia with Majd al-Dīn Isḥāq, whose son Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qunawī (1210-1274) would be his most influential disciple.

In 1223, he settled in Damascus, where he lived the last seventeen years of his life. He died at the age of 76 on 22 Rabi' II 638 AH/November 10, 1240CE, and his tomb in Damascus is still an important place of pilgrimage.

A vastly prolific writer, Ibn 'Arabī is generally known as the prime exponent of the idea later known as Waḥdat al-Wujūd (literally Unity of Being), though he did not use this term in his writings. His emphasis was on the true potential of the human being and the path to realising that potential and becoming the perfect or complete man (al-insān al-kāmil).

Some 800 works are attributed to Ibn 'Arabā, although only some have been authenticated. Recent research suggests that over 100 of his works have survived in manuscript form, although most printed versions have not yet been critically edited and include many errors.

Reviews

[Rex]

I've benefited from Ibn Arabi's philosophical writing, but how can one critique or rate a book of this kind—a concatenation of private mystical insights expressed as terse symbolic discourse? Instead, here are a few quotes I jotted down because they seemed worth returning to:

Then He said to me, “Do you see how excellent this darkness is, how intense its brightness and how clear its light! This darkness is the place from which the lights rise, the source from which the fountains of secrets spring forth and the [original] matter of the elements. From this darkness I have brought you into being, to it I make your return and I shall not remove you from it.” (II)

Then He said to me, “Silence is your essential reality.” “Silence is nothing other than you, although it does not belong to you.” (V)

Persist for all eternity and you will see nothing but yourself in every station. Quicker than the blinking of an eye you will ascend through stations you have never glimpsed and to which you will never return, but they will remain in you without surpassing your capacity. (VI)

Then He said to me, “Everything you have seen is created and everything created is incomplete. Ascend until you do not see creation.” I ascended. I threw myself into the sea of perplexity and He left me swimming in it. (IX)

Then He said to me, “Enter the pavilion and its fire will revert to light. Enter the flames and it will turn into Paradise. Do not enter a place except through Me and do not seek anything but me.” (XIV)

[Muhammad · Rating 5 out of 5]

"If you could evaluate your worth you would limit yourself and, in reality, you have no limits; so how could your worth be evaluated? Since you are incapable of appreciating your own worth - which is proper - follow good form and do not seek to know My worth, for you could never succeed in evaluating it, even if you were the most noble being in My eternal knowledge."

"The limit of your knowledge depends on the capacity I have given you; therefore you only know yourself."

"The looks fall short, the intellects are perplexed, the hearts blind, the knowers lost in a desert of bewilderment, and the understandings, plunged into stupefaction, and incapable of grasping the least secret of the revelation of My Grandeur. How then could they encompass it? Your knowledge is scattered dust. Your qualities are nothing. Your reality is only a metaphor in a corner of My being."

ašhadu ʾan lā ʾilāha ʾilla -llāhu, wa-ʾašhadu ʾanna muḥammadan rasūlu -llāhi. Maktub indeed!

[H.l. Duran · Rating 5 out of 5]

awesome

[Dina Kaidir · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are books and then there are Ibn al-`Arabi books. In a word...awesome :)