Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
December 8, 2025
Shadab Ali Khan
Muhammad Iqbal's philosophy presents love (ishq) and intellect (aql) as complementary forces that together shape the human self (khudi) and enable spiritual and moral freedom. Intellect is analytical, cautious, and useful for knowing things, but love provides the spiritual and emotional depth needed for a closer relationship with God. Love is intuitive, passionate, and self-transcendent, fueling courage, sacrifice, and divine connection. While both faculties work in tandem, Iqbal asserts the primacy of love in spiritual awakening; reason alone cannot lead to transformative action. True selfhood and moral leadership emerge when love leads and intellect follows, a balance central to Iqbal's vision for humanity's revival.
Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
December 9, 2024
Cyrine Kortas
D. H. Lawrence's novel Women in Love can be read through the lens of Sufi mysticism, revealing love as a transformative spiritual journey. The character of Birkin embodies Lawrence's "New Man" archetype—a radical departure from traditional masculinity that collapsed after World War I—striving for an authentic integration of body, mind, and spirit. Lawrence's use of symbolism and imagery resonates with Sufi concepts such as the unity of the universe and the mystical path to knowledge. The novel explores spiritual fulfillment within a context of societal disintegration, positioning it as a modernist work that envisions a harmonious, spiritually grounded love as a means of transcendence.
Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
May 7, 2016
Muhammad Sabri
This article examines whether mystical experience can be expressed through language and, if so, what kind of language can articulate the inner space of human experience to reach the heart of ultimate reality. It explores what form of consciousness can bring the light of God into the empirical world and how to formulate a subjective mystical consciousness in expressing spiritual experience. The article also addresses the status of non-subjective phenomenal consciousness in Islamic epistemology. To answer these questions, it presents two contemporary analytic philosophers from different traditions: Ludwig Wittgenstein and Mehdi Ha'iri Yazdi.
Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
December 8, 2023
Lukman Hakim Rohim
This article interprets Suhrawardī's Sufistic romance Ghurbah al-Gharbiyah through Ricoeur's hermeneutics and Corbin's epistemology of Sufistic imagination. The authors argue that the novel, part of the Ḥay bin Yaqẓān trilogy, uses symbols—the city of Qairawan (imprisonment), the Hudhud bird (enlightenment), and Mount Sinai (liberation and meeting with the 'Light of all Lights')—to depict human alienation in the world. Three phases of Sufistic consciousness are identified: alienation, enlightenment, and liberation. The work is presented as a representation of Suhrawardī's creative imagination inspired by prophetic experiences including Muhammad's Ascension, Solomon's Hudhud bird, and Moses' Mount Sinai.
Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
May 7, 2016
Yunasril Ali
Ibn Taymiyyah, commonly regarded as an anti-reformist Salafi figure opposed to Sufism, also inspired modernist Muslims and exhibited Sufi tendencies. This paper argues that his criticism of certain types of Sufism (nazharī-falsafī) stemmed from terminological confusion and differing paradigms. Toward the end of his life, he moved away from scholarly discourse into deep spiritual devotion (taqarrub) and achieved the mystical state of annihilation (fanā), which the authors interpret as a development of his religious consciousness rather than a contradiction.
Kanz Philosophia: A Journal for Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism
May 7, 2016
Hadi Vakili
The paper examines whether neuro-psychological theory can explain religious experience. It divides religious experience into three types: Erlebnis (RErl, mystical), Erfahrung (RErf, transformative), and ideological (RIT). Focusing on neuro-psychologist M. A. Persinger's work, it reports that mystical experience (RErl) is associated with the right hemisphere of the brain, while religious ideology (RIT) relates to the left hemisphere. Persinger suggests that understanding the neuro-cognitive processes of religious experience could allow copying them for clinical use to treat depression. The paper compares people practicing religious meditation with non-practitioners and reviews PET scanning results from schizophrenic and epileptic patients, noting that neurologically, pain and religious experience both arise from brain processes.