Junayd al-Baghdādī (d. 297/909), one of the prominent figures of early sufism, stands out as among the first sufis to systematically and analytically articulate sufi concepts during the formative period of sufism. His explanation of the experience of tawḥīd (divine unity) within a framework of self-purification (tazkiyat al-nafs), contemplation (tafakkur), annihilation (fanā’), subsistence with...
Although the question of freedom has been addressed in Islamic theology (kalām), jurisprudence (fiqh), and philosophy, in all these traditions freedom has remained fundamentally an external category. Classical Sufi thought approached this question from an entirely different perspective: for the Sufis, the primary bondage of the human being originates not in external constraints but in the...