Repentance and the Return to God , livre ebook

State University of New York Press - Atif Khalil

Découvre YouScribe en t'inscrivant gratuitement

Je m'inscris

Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne
En savoir plus

174 pages

English

Vous pourrez modifier la taille du texte de cet ouvrage

Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne
En savoir plus

A propos
Informations
Extrait

Description

This book offers the first extensive treatment in a European language of tawba in Islam. Conventionally translated as "repentance," tawba includes the broader sense of returning to God. Khalil examines this wider notion in the early period of Sufism with a particular focus on the formative years of the tradition between Muḥāsibī and Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī. Beginning with an extensive survey of the semantic field of the term as outlined in Arabic lexicography, Khalil offers a detailed analysis of the concept in Muslim scripture. He then examines tawba as a complex psychological process involving interior conversion and a complete, unwavering commitment to the spiritual life. The ideas of a number of prominent figures from the first few centuries of Islam are used to illuminate the historical development of tawba and its role in early praxis-oriented Sufism.

Acknowledgments
Introduction

Part I. The Semantics of Tawba

1. Is Tawba "Repentance"? A Lexical and Semantic Survey

2. The Internal Structure and Semantic Field of Tawba in the Qur'ān

Part II. Early Sufi Approaches to Tawba

3. Tawba as Interior Conversion

4. The States, Stations and Early Sufi Apothegmata

5. Four Approaches to Tawba

6. Tawba in the Writings of al-Ḥārith al-Muḥāsibī

7. Tawba in the Nourishment of Hearts of Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī

Conclusion
Bibliography
Index

Sujets

Theology

Islam

Informations

Publié par	State University of New York Press
Date de parution	21 septembre 2018
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781438469133
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,1648€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

Repentance
and the Return to God
Repentance
and the Return to God

Tawba in Early Sufism
Atif Khalil
Cover photo © Museum Associates / LACMA / “A Sufi in a Landscape” (Iran, Isfahan, circa 1650–1660)
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2018 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Khalil, Atif, author.
Title: Repentance and the return to God : tawba in early Sufism / Atif Khalil.
Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017021794 (print) | LCCN 2017022192 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438469133 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438469119 (hardcover : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Repentance—Islam. | Sufism—Doctrines.
Classification: LCC BP166.79 (ebook) | LCC BP166.79 .K43 2018 (print) | DDC 297.4/46—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017021794
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
I am the Prophet of Repentance.
—ḥadīth
Repentance is that you be unto God a face without a back, Just as you were previously unto Him a back without a face.
—Ibrāhīm al-Daqqāq
Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.
—Oscar Wilde
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
P ART I T HE S EMANTICS OF T AWBA
1 Is Tawba “Repentance”? A Lexical and Semantic Survey
2 The Internal Structure and Semantic Field of Tawba in the Qurʾān
P ART II E ARLY S UFI A PPROACHES TO T AWBA
3 Tawba as Interior Conversion
4 The States, Stations, and Early Sufi Apothegmata
5 Four Early Approaches to Tawba
6 Tawba in the Writings of al-Ḥārith al-Muḥāsibī
7 Tawba in the Nourishment of Hearts of Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
This monograph grew out of a PhD dissertation completed at the University of Toronto’s Department of Religious Studies under the able supervision of Professor Todd Lawson. It is only fitting that I begin by thanking him for his guidance and unfailing support throughout my doctoral years, since it was under his tutelage that I began to explore the world of early Sufism and the idea of this study first conceived. To the committee members—Professors Amir Harrak, Walid Saleh, and Maria Subtelny—I am grateful for the generous feedback offered at various stages of the writing process. The wealth of knowledge and critical insight shared by Professor Ahmet Karamustafa, the external examiner and one of the foremost experts in the field of early Sufism, proved particularly invaluable. The late Professor Michael Marmura, also on the committee, deserves special mention for playing a formative role in my intellectual maturation by nurturing an interest in Islamic philosophy and theology that stretches back almost two decades. To this day I carry vivid memories of the pre-Islamic poetry he would recite off the cuff in his seminars, hypnotically carrying us back to an almost mythical age of warriors and poets. Other teachers from whom I benefitted include Professors Deborah Black, William Chittick, James DiCenso, Lloyd Gerson, Timothy Gianotti, Sebastian Günther, Wael Hallaq, Jane McAullife, Thomas McIntire, Seyyed H. Nasr, Robert Sinkewicz, and the late Willard Oxtoby. It was a privilege to have worked with such a distinguished group of scholars, all of whom contributed to my intellectual development in more ways than the present work reveals.
I must also express my thanks to Shaikh Mahmoud al-Hoda and his Shadhili disciples in Aleppo for graciously welcoming me into their community in the summer of 2004. It was with them that I closely read some of the textual material that became the basis of this book. As Syria fragments into political and sectarian infighting, one can only hope that the more inward, contemplative, and compassionate approach to Islam offered by Shaikh Mahmoud, his disciples, and other likeminded inheritors of the Sufi tradition in the region, will serve to heal the wounds of the traumas inflicted by war in the years to come.
This book would not have been possible without the enduring support of my parents, Ahmed and Shaheen Khalil. My father in particular was a constant source of encouragement as we shared many stimulating late-night conversations about Sufism, tawba , and the conversion-narratives of early figures central to Muslim piety. He is now an avid reader and admirer of Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, whose Urdu translation of the Nourishment of Hearts has become something of his own nourishment. I credit the intellectual curiosities that took me down the road of academia to the influence of his probing mind. To Saima, Amir, Tariq, Nimra bhabi, ummy, Shadi, Amber, the Ahmads, Rehmans, and Kalims, I thank for the joy and laughter they brought to my frequent visits to Toronto, Montreal and Calgary.
I must also thank the University of Lethbridge’s Department of Religious Studies as well as our superb Administrative Assistant Bev Garnett for graciously welcoming me into the Department in 2007, tolerating my Nag Champa incense addiction, and for providing an amicable and stimulating atmosphere that has made teaching and scholarship exciting in the prairies of southern Alberta.
To my close friend Professor Mohammed Rustom I am grateful for reading and commenting on earlier drafts of this piece. He saved me from many embarrassing errors and oversights. To Professor Yusuf Mullick, I must express the same appreciation. Nancy Ellegate at SUNY, the news of whose untimely death came as the final edits of this manuscript were being completed, deserves special mention: her editorial advice and sagacious suggestions were much appreciated.
Last but not least, I cannot forget the close friends and teachers whose encouragement and support contributed to the completion of a study that has long been in gestation. Among them, I must mention the names of S.H. Ali, the late C. Bruchet, the Fereigs, Rabbi A. Glazer, Rev. V. Grandfield, H.T. Ibrahim, Shaikh Muhammad al-Kabir, Dr. Z. Mian, J. Richmond, A. Qurayshi, Professor S. Sheikh, T. al-Tayeb, and Dr. Eric Winkel. Finally, to Br. Camil Xerri I remain forever indebted for opening up to me the world of Islam’s sapiential tradition. Others whose names have not been mentioned have not been forgotten—absent in form, they are present in spirit.

A shorter, edited version of chapter 7 originally appeared in the Oxford Journal of Islamic Studies as “ Tawba in the Sufi Psychology of Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (d. 996 CE),” 23, no. 3 (2012): 294–324. An excerpt from chapter 3 also appeared in the Journal of Sufi Studies as “A Note on Interior Conversion in Early Sufism and Ibrāhīm b. Adham’s Entry into the Way,” 5 (2016): 189–198.
Introduction
It can be argued that the consciousness of sin is as old as human consciousness itself. From the first glimmerings of human history, human beings—as homo religiosi —have exhibited an acute awareness of their transgressions against a moral or supernatural order, and often suffered, as a consequence, under a distressing self-condemnation. Whether one considers the ancient Egyptians, the Aztec communities of America, the Hebrew prophets of Israel, or the Vedic Hindus of the Indus Peninsula, the sense of sin has gone hand in hand with the larger existential dramas of human existence. 1
Yet, alongside this awareness of sin, humans have also sought ways to mend the ruptures created with the supernatural world as a result of their misdeeds, and to protect themselves from the consequences of their own actions. The fact that some believed these consequences appeared in the form of divine retribution, and others as a karmic response due to the violation of dharma, is ultimately of secondary importance. At the heart of this sense of sin there often lay a belief in a cosmic law of cause and effect, a belief that without some mitigating or atoning factor, one was condemned to face the consequences of one’s transgressions, and that if those consequences did not appear in this life, they would in the next. The consciousness of sin was therefore almost always accompanied by measures, introduced by tradition, to protect the sinner from his own moral and sacrilegious crimes. Historically, these measures ranged from such responses as priestly sacrificial rites, elaborate purification rituals, the invocation of certain litanies or formulas, to extreme forms of self-mortification and even self-immolation.
In the Abrahamic religions, the cornerstone of these restorative strategies lay in “repentance.” Although many of the common presumptions about the nature of the concept derive from Christian theology—indeed the term itself, as we shall see, is of a peculiarly Christian origin—it is still possible to speak of repentance within Judaism and Islam provided certain preliminary qualifications are made. Keeping in mind that we should remain cautious of artificially imposing the categories of one religious tradition onto another, even when the other tradition belongs to the same family of faiths, only an extreme reductionism would prevent one from acknowledging the presence of repentance outside of a Christian context. If, however, one understands the concept in the broadest sense as a religious mechanism to cancel, redress, or atone for one’s previous wrongs or past misdoings, then we can indeed speak of repentance not only in the Abrahamic faiths, but also across the spectrum of world religions. 2 But this, as noted, requires that one not inadvertently impos