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What Is Islamic Esotericism?* Liana Saif [email protected]

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What Is Islamic Esotericism?* Liana Saif Lianasaif@Hotmail.Com Introduction Correspondences 7, no. 1 (2019): 1–59 Special Issue: Islamic Esotericism What is Islamic Esotericism?* Liana Saif [email protected] Introduction In the last few years, attention to Islamic forms of esotericism has become more pronounced in the field of Western esotericism as a repercussion of the prob- lematisation of its implied regional and cultural demarcations, and also as an effect of the promotion of global perspectives. The instability of “West” and “Western” as regional and cultural categories and the question of their useful- ness have been discussed by many scholars, involving a rethinking of the para- digms of comparison between Western and Islamic esotericisms.1 However, the fruitfulness of a comparative endeavour is stipulated by a preliminary outlining of Islamic esotericism, which has not been systematically undertaken yet. There- fore, this article aims to prepare the grounds for more discerning comparative 1. Asprem, “Beyond the West,” 3–33; Granholm, “Locating the West,” 17–36; and Pasi, “Oriental Kabbalah,” 151–66. * I am grateful to Mark Sedgwick for supporting this special issue, and this article in particular, and for all the members of the European Network of the Study of Islam and Esotericism whose engagement with the ideas in this article has been constructive and illuminating. I am also indebted to Wouter Hanegraaff for making it possible for me to be involved in discus- sions and events, formal and informal, within the University of Amsterdam’s “Western Esote- ricism” program, ESSWE and related events. This has been a primary incentive for writing this article, in order for me to participate most fruitfully in the field. I would like to acknowledge Alexander Knysh and Michael Bergunder for reviewing drafts of this article, a generosity that helped me refine my arguments, methods, and sources. I would also like to extend my gratitude to Aren Roukema and Allan Kilner-Johnson for their enthusiasm for this special issue and their patience, in addition to everyone involved in the journal. I am thankful for Julian Strube’s valuable comments and invaluable support. Finally, I have received incredible encouragement from Rosalie Basten for which I am forever grateful. © 2019 Liana Saif. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Published by Correspondences: Journal for the Study of Esotericism. 1 Saif / Correspondences 7, no. 1 (2019): 1–59 approaches by setting up a theoretical framework for what can be called Islamic esotericism based on etymological and historical justifications. I propose assessing any Islamic esoteric current according to two epistemological paradigms; namely, intellectual or revelatory approaches to hidden phenomena (natural, celestial and divine), which intersect with social orientations perceived in personal and/or com- munal pieties. Special attention will be given to two periods when the concept of bāṭiniyya, translatable as esotericism, was catalysed. The first is between the tenth and thirteenth centuries, a period that witnessed a paradigm shift due to the devel- opment and institutionalisation of Sufism, which challenged intellectual and phil- osophical investigation of hidden realities, instead touting revelation as the only true way. The second is the early to mid- twentieth century when the term ésotérisme islamique emerged in the Traditionalist milieu. The chronological jump is justified here by, first, admitting that as a medievalist primarily, I have been analysing con- ceptions and the epistemes under which they were formulated as they manifest in texts from the eighth to the thirteenth centuries, but also as they were reformulated and negotiated in texts from later periods. These influential medieval conceptions had a career of reception and were reconstituted according to new social, political and intellectual developments and geographical settings. Nevertheless, this article is in the big picture an invitation to explore the various forms of Islamic esotericism in different periods and regions. It does not pretend to be a complete survey. From a genealogical perspective, the Traditionalists came up with the term “Islamic esotericism,” adopting and negotiating esoteric ideas from Islamic his- torical sources, including medieval ones. The Traditionalist conceptualisation drew on and became part of a history of reformulation and reconstitution of similar concerns revolving around bāṭin as esoteric and bāṭiniyya as esotericism that began in the medieval period. The objective of my own “interference” in this historical discourse is to begin creating a theoretically and historically legitimate platform for the study of Islamic esotericism based on a theoretical blueprint that is open for revision by the studies that it may inspire. © 2019 Liana Saif. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Published by Correspondences: Journal for the Study of Esotericism. 2 Saif / Correspondences 7, no. 1 (2019): 1–59 Before I delve into what Islamic esotericism is, I will highlight what it is not by looking at the ways that Islam has been discussed in the discourse of Western esotericism, which has successfully achieved what this article is aiming for, becom- ing a field. It is also important to do so since Islam is often the first to be called upon in the problematisation of Western esotericism as an academic construct and as a historical movement that, in various currents, embraced or reacted to the “East” generally, and Islam especially. I highlight the reduction of Islamic esotericism to a perennialist view of Sufism and Illuminationist philosophy, and then propose a perspective, preparatory to comparative endeavours, that is conscious of the areas of entanglement between Western esotericism and Islamic esotericism. I. The Globalisation of Esotericism and Islam The debate of globalising esotericism often begins with pointing out the con- spicuous absence of other cultures and societies in the narrative of Western esotericism as formulated in the seminal works of Antoine Faivre, especially Access to Western Esotericism. The cause of this is his belief that esotericism is a Western phenomenon that took formal shape in the Renaissance.2 He is wary of any notion of a universal esotericism that may result from a religionist attitude; that is the meta-empirical perspective of the believer which contrasts with the methodological agnosticism of the scholar.3 He stresses, “to be sure, there is per- haps ‘some esotericism’ in other cultural terrains (e.g. ancient Egypt, Far East, Amerindian civilisations, etc.), and the temptation to apprehend a ‘universal’ esotericism, to seek out its probable invariants is understandable.”4 Naturally then, Faivre does not say much about “Islamic esotericism” real or imagined. Nevertheless, in the bibliographical guide a small section is in- cluded entitled “esotericism and Islam” where he lists authorities on “Arab 2. Faivre, Access to Western Esotericism, 3. 3. For the application of this in the definition of esotericism see Hanegraaff, “Empirical Methods in the Study of Western Esotericism,” 99–129. 4. Faivre, Access to Western Esotericism, 17. © 2019 Liana Saif. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Published by Correspondences: Journal for the Study of Esotericism. 3 Saif / Correspondences 7, no. 1 (2019): 1–59 esotericism.” This bibliography comprises seven works by Henry Corbin, four by Mohammad Amir-Moezzi, and works by William Chittick, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Pierre Lory, Fuat Sezgin and Manfred Ullmann. The prominence of Corbin and the inclusion of Chittick and Nasr is indicative of an adherence to a “Westernist” attitude, since these authors represented in their works a form of universalism directed and influenced by Western Traditionalist and perennialist perspectives.5 This is explicit in Faivre’s discussion of “imagination and mediation,” the third out of four primary criteria of Western esotericism. Without delving into the oft-discussed problematics of his criteria, it is worth noting that Faivre references Henry Corbin’s concept of mundus imaginalis, which he describes as “an Arabic influence (Avicenna, Sohravardi, Ibn Arabi) [that] was able to exert a determinative influence here in the West.”6 The three men- tioned here are the Muslim “sweethearts” of perennial philosophy. As will be later shown, this is a persistent reduction of Islamic esotericism. Furthermore, in a note on Corbin, Faivre writes, “In this area, H. Corbin is the principal reference author. Reading his works not only allows us into Shiite esotericism, but also helps us to better understand Judeo-Christian esotericism, especially since the author himself never missed the opportunity to establish discerning connections. All of his work should be cited.”7 Despite the above-mentioned reductionism, credit must be given to Faivre’s implicit invitation to look at Islamic esotericism as the other side of the story of Western esotericism, some- thing that is often overlooked by his critics as we shall see below. Accepting Western esotericism as “a modern scholarly construct,” without denying any reality to the field,8 Wouter Hanegraaff echoes Faivre when he admits 5. Knysh, Sufism, 39; Ernst, “Traditionalism, the Perennial Philosophy, and Islamic Studies,” 176–81; Sedgwick, Against the Modern World, 157. Corbin and Chittick
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