Sufi Narratives of Intimacy: Ibn 'Arabī, Gender, and Sexuality

Islamic Civilization and Muslim Networks

by Sadiyya Shaikh

Thirteenth-century Sufi poet, mystic, and legal scholar Muhyi al-Din ibn al-'Arabi gave deep and sustained attention to gender as integral to questions of human existence and moral personhood. Reading his works through a critical feminist lens, Sa'diyya Shaikh opens fertile spaces in which new and creative encounters with gender justice in Islam can take place. Grounding her work in Islamic epistemology, Shaikh attends to the ways in which Sufi metaphysics and theology might allow for fundamental shifts in Islamic gender ethics and legal formulations, addressing wide-ranging contemporary challenges including questions of women's rights in marriage and divorce, the politics of veiling, and women's leadership of ritual prayer. Shaikh deftly deconstructs traditional binaries between the spiritual and the political, private conceptions of spiritual development and public notions of social justice, and the realms of inner refinement and those of communal virtue. Drawing on the treasured works of Sufism, Shaikh raises a number of critical questions about the nature of selfhood, subjectivity, spirituality, and society to contribute richly to the prospects of Islamic feminism as well as feminist ethics more broadly.

Genres: Islam, Religion, Nonfiction, Spirituality, Feminism, Gender

301 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 5, 2012

Reviews

[Hafsa Lodi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ibn Arabi once wrote: “There is nothing in the created universe greater in power than women. This is a secret known only by those knowledgeable about how the universe came into existence…”

We often think of Muslim feminism as a “modern” construct, but Sa’diyya Shaikh shows us that famed 12th-13th century Muslim scholar and philosopher Ibn Arabi was exemplary in preaching social justice in Islam and “dismantling the binaries” of patriarchy. Not only did he believe in the permissibility of females leading group prayers, he also believed that the “awrah” or guidelines for modesty for females were much more lenient than the rules that mandate veiling. He also highly revered fellow Sufi mystics who were females, and didn’t believe in differentiation on the basis of biology in determining one’s level of spirituality.

Drawing on Ibn Arabi’s engagement with various Quran verses and Hadith, along with this mystic “openings” or visions, this book explores how the Sufi quest for realising one’s highest potential and becoming “one” with the divine is a non-gendered quest open equally to both males and females. It also introduces basic Sufi principles along with the female Sufis who influenced Ibn Arabi’s outlook. While his ideas may have been revolutionary at the time, Shaikh recognises that he was also constrained by a 13th-century patriarchal social structure. She concludes that Muslim feminist scholarship and arguments have much to gain from Ibn Arabi, and that while many feminists take a “women’s rights-based approach” to justice, its necessary to look deeper and start deconstructing the culturally-ingrained ideas about gender differences in mainstream Islamic thought.

“The spiritual core of Islam is characterized by a fundamental belief in the equal capacity and potentiality of all human beings, a core to which Sufism inherently addresses itself. At this level, a profound confluence exists between the pervasive Islamic ethos of social justice and feminism’s appeal for human equality.”

[Habeeb Akande · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sexual intimacy, in Ibn Arabi's words, provides men and women with the possibility of spiritual realisation. Love between men and women is an inherent aspect of loving God, bringing human beings closer to the Creator. As such, sexual union in marriage, fundamentally furthers their spiritual realisation, according to thirteenth-century Sufi poet and legal scholar Muhyi al-Din ibn al-'Arabi.

The eminent writer from Islamic Spain explored women's rights in marriage and divorce, male-female relationships and sacred sensuality in the Islamic tradition. According to Ibn Arabi, men stand in a position of lack and weakness without women. He writes,

"There is nothing in the created universe greater in power than women. This is a secret known only by those knowledgable about how universe came into existence. It came through two prior principles and [the universe] is the result. The active partner in intercourse is one who seeks is poor and in need. The receiving partner in intercourse is sought or wanted. The one who is sought has the might of being needed. And desire is overpowering. It is made clear to you the position of the woman in relation to all created things and to what extent the divine presence looks upon her and by what means she manifests strength."

Sufi Narratives of Intimacy: Ibn Arabi, Gender and Sexuality by Sadiyya Shaikh is an interesting analysis on the works of the controversial medieval Muslim thinker from a contemporary woman's perspective.

[isaac dwyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an academic monograph written for a cohort of peers with a solid grounding in Islamic studies. Nonetheless the concepts and methodology Shaykh offers for encountering Ibn ‘Arabi’s philosophy are inspiring, and her translations phenomenal. Particularly evocative sections provide close readings showing that ascribing binary gendered concepts to Allah as violating the principle of tawhid (oneness of the divine), and on the spiritual reward for all bodies that come with “giving oneself” in to sex to be “deliciously overpowered”. The sawab—spiritual reward—of ecstatic sex ergo does not come from the phallocentric taking, but from mystical submission—the core Arabic meaning of the word “Islam” itself.

[Sharmain Siddiqui · Rating 4 out of 5]

timely [in my life] & historical.