One of the most fascinating and practically rewarding sections of Ibn ‘Arabi’s Meccan Illuminations is chapters 51-59 in the opening Section of that immense work, where he takes up the recurrent challenges of discernment raised by the constant interplay, in everyone’s inner life, of inspiration, intuition, random thoughts and inclinations, temptations, faith, reasoning, revelation, and the eventual contributions of all of these elements to right action and spiritual growth. After a brief overview of those chapters, we will turn to the discussion of a few key translated passages illustrating these themes.
Professor James Morris (Boston College) has taught Islamic and comparative religious studies at the Universities of Exeter, Princeton, Oberlin, and the Sorbonne, and lectures widely on Sufism, the Islamic humanities, Islamic philosophy, the Qur’an, and Shiite thought. Recent books include Ostad Elahi’s Knowing the Spirit (2007); The Reflective Heart: Discovering Spiritual Intelligence in Ibn ‘Arabi’s ‘Meccan Illuminations’ (2005); Orientations: Islamic Thought in a World Civilisation (2004); and Ibn ‘Arabi’s The Meccan Revelations (Pir Press, 2003).