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(1733) Among the Most Striking of the Many Parallels

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(1733) Among the Most Striking of the Many Parallels (1733) Among the most striking of the many parallels which exist between the works of St. John of the Cross and those of the Sufis is the undeniably close resemblance between Living Flame of Love by St. John of the Cross and Niche for Lights (Mishkat al-Anwar) by al-Ghazzali. So close is said resemblance that even Fr. Bruno de Jesus-Marie, generally inclined to minimize the possibility of Sufi influence in the works of St. John of the Cross, admits: "It is possible that (St.) John (of the Cross) may have had (a copy of) the Mishkat in his hands."(106) In this work we will deal with the parallels between these two great works. St. John of the Cross was basically a poet, while al- Ghazzali was basically a philosopher and theologian. Though some praise the Spiritual Canticle from the literary point of view, while others praise The Revival of Religious Sciences and Incoherence of the Philosophers from the point of view of philosophy and scholastic theology, there is no doubt that Living Flame of Love and Niche for Lights are among the most succinct, esoteric and initiatory works of these two great religious geniuses. It has been said that: "No one can understand Spanish (Christian) Mysticism who does not know Old Castile." Like nearly all Spanish Christian Mystics, St. John of the Cross (1724) was of Old Castile. Unlike Ste. Teresa of Avila and Fr. Luis de Leon, two other great Castilian mystics of the 16th century, St. John of the Cross was not of Jewish origin, neither was he a Morisco (at least not on his father’s side), but rather he was on his father’s side, of the old nobility of Castile, which means that his father was of Celtic and Visigothic stock, "Old Christian on all four sides", to use the expression current in the 16th century, though his mother was a Morisca. He was born Juan de Yepes in 1542 in the village of Fontiveros, not far from Avila, the city of mysticism par excellence. His father, Gonzalo de Yepes, was one of the poverty-stricken aristocrats so common in the history of Spain, and the childhood of the future saint was marked by great poverty. Thanks to his noble origin, piety and intelligence the Church saw to it that he received a fine education. Juan de Yepes early felt his mystical, esoteric vocation. On graduating from the University of Salamanca he joined the Carmelite Order, and became one of the Descalced Carmelites. The name "Carmelite" is derived from Mount Carmel in the Holy Land, and thus the Carmelite Order was originally an Eastern Order which came to the West with retreating Crusaders. Though the Carmelite Order, unlike the Dominicans and the Jesuits, was not founded by a Spaniard nor originated in Spain, yet the (1725) Carmelite Order has come to be the most Spanish, or Castilian of all Catholic Orders. This most Spanish or most Castilian of all Roman Catholic Orders is in a great many ways a return to the old pre-Benedictine Eastern and Celtic monasticism. The Spanish word carmen, used mainly, indeed almost exclusively in Andalusia, means, roughly, "flower garden", or "enclosed flower garden", and is derived from the Hispano-Arabic al-qarm, which means "vineyard". In Spain the Carmelite Monasteries or Convents came to be called "Carmens", because of the similarity of this word to "Carmel", and thus the Carmelite Order in Spain is frequently called "Of the Carmen" Our Lady of Mount Carmel, or the Virgin (Mary) of Mount Carmel, Patroness of the Carmelite order, in Spain is almost always called "Nuestra Senora del Carmen", i.e., "Our Lady of the Carmen" or, more frequently "Virgen del Carmen", .e., "Virgen of the Carmen". This is why so many Spanish girls are named "Maria del Carmen", generally shortened to "Mari Carmen" or simply "Carmen". The peculiar Spanishness or Castilianness of this is recognized in this Carlist quatrain: Where are you going, Virgin of the Carmen With the lighted candle? In search of king don Carlos For the Patria is lost. (1729) St. John of the Cross died in 1591, when he was not yet 50 years old. Certainly the most fruitful years of the life of St. John of the Cross were the six years he spent in Granada, where he wrote all or nearly all his great works. The Castilian nightingale sang most sweetly when he flew from the oaks of Castile to the olive trees of Andalusia. At that time a very large part of the population of Granada was composed of "Moriscos", i.e., descendants of Hispano-Muslims not yet fully assimilated into the "Old Christian" population. In effect, while in Granada St. John of the Cross was literally surrounded by Moriscos and by the monuments of the Hispano-Muslim past. Very near the convent in the Calle (Street) Elvira which St. John of the Cross frequented in order to hear confessions and say Mass lived a Morisco woman of more than 80 years famous among both Moriscos and Old Christians for her learning and wisdom. We do not know her personal name; all sources call her simply "La Mora de Ubeda" (the Moorish Woman of Ubeda), whom we have mentioned earlier. We do know that although she always showed great respect for the Christian Religion, she made no secret of the fact that she remained a Muslim. She had an extensive personal library and was a faithful follower of the doctrine of (1730) al-Ghazzali. Since St. John of the Cross was a man of great energy and intellectual curiosity and had been accustomed to dealing with Moriscos since his childhood in Medina del Campo (near Valladolid), it is difficult to believe that he had no contact with the Mora de Ubeda. Therefore, of all the great figures of Sufism it is al-Ghazzali who has the firmest and best documented connections with St. John of the Cross. The great Arabist Fr. Miguel Asin Palacios demonstrated convincingly the influence of the great Hispano-Muslim Sufi ibn Abbad of Ronda in Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross. There is a firm if oblique relation between al-Ghazzali and ibn Abbad. Al- Ghazzali considered al-Hallaj to be among the greatest of mystics and esoterics, "among the fewest of the few", while ibn Abbad belonged to the Shadhiliyyah School or Order of Sufism, one of whose leading figures was al-Hallaj. Abul Abbas al-Mursi, (note that "Mursi" means "from Murcia", so Abul Abbas al-Mursi was a Murcian, as was ibn Arabi al-Mursi) who introduced said school or Order to North Africa and Spain, claimed to an initiate of an unbroken chain of spiritual masters (a sort of Apostolic Succession) begun by Hasan ibn Ali, Second Shi'ite Imam, and, presumably, including al-Hallaj. As we have said before, this (1731) Shadhiliyyah connection gives St. John of the Cross a firm if oblique relation to Hasan ibn Ali, Second Shi'a Imam, and to Hussein ibn Ali, Third Shi'a Imam. Louis Massignon and Louis Gardet have compared al-Hallaj's teachings with those of St. John of the Cross, i.e., "Two natures (God and man) in a single spirit and love of God", and found them to be identical.(107) By way of ibn Abbad of Ronda and the Shadhiliyyah School or Order to which he belonged, St. John of the Cross was an initiate in a line of spiritual masters which began with Hasan ibn Ali, Second Imam and included al-Hallaj. St. John of the Cross was also connected to al-Hallaj by way of al-Ghazzali. We shall have more to say of this Order in a different context. There are a number of close parallels between the Shadhiliyya school of Sufism, of which ibn Abbad of Ronda was one of its greatest exponents and the Descalced Carmelite School of Christian Mystcism, of which St. John of the Cross was the founder. This is one of the many firm if oblique connections between St. John of the Cross on one hand and the great Shi'a philosophers and theologians of Safavi Persia as well as Hasan ibn Ali, Second Imam, Hussein ibn Ali, Third Imam, and al-Hallaj. Obviously St. John of the Cross could not have been influenced by these Safavi Shi'a sages, as he is about a century earlier than they. However, (1731) there are obvious connections between them. A full discussion of this would lead us beyond the limits of the present work. One of the principle works of St. John of the Cross is Ascent of Mount Carmel, while two of the principle works of al-Ghazzali are Ascent to the Court of Sanctity and Ascent of the Pilgrims. There is a very close parallel between a few passages of Alchemy of Happiness by al-Ghazzali and certain passages of the prose commentary of Ascent of Mount Carmel. Says al-Ghazzali: "His (man's) five senses are like five doors which open onto the external world; but, more marvelous that this, in his heart is a window opening onto the invisible world of spirits. In the sleeping states, when the doors of the senses are closed, this window opens and man receives impressions from the invisible world and sometimes foreknowledge of future events. His heart then becomes like a mirror which reflects that which is drawn in the Book of Fate. But, even when sleeping, thoughts of temporal things cloud and tarnish this mirrorr, so that the impression it reflects is not clear.
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