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Journal of the American Academy of Religion 2005 73(3):705-730; doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfi076
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© The Author 2005. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the American Academy of Religion. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oupjournals.org

Imamate and Love: The Discourse of the Divine in Islamic Mysticism

‘Abd al-Hakeem Carney

Ph.D. student at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, London NW6 7EQ, UK

In the Christian tradition, Charles Williams championed the idea of a "romantic theology," where romantic love becomes a means of understanding and gaining knowledge of God. Dante was the main inspiration for this work, for whom the figure of Beatrice became a theophany and vision of God. The idea of a romantic theology is not new to the Islamic tradition, with thinkers such as Ibn ‘Arabi exploring the meaning of love in the context of an overall theology of Divine love. This article seeks to explore the way that some Islamic mystics (particularly the theosophists Ibn ‘Arabi and Shaykh Ahmad al-’Ahsa’i) have grappled with this question, and how in the Shi’a context the theophanic function of beauty becomes a means of approach to the Hidden Imam.


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