The crisis of religious authority, identity polarization, and informational disruption in the contemporary public sphere indicate a tension between religious truth claims and the demands of deliberate rationality within plural societies. Abdolkarim Soroush’s thought offers a conceptual distinction between religion as a transcendent reality and religious knowledge as a historical construction,...
Digital qur’anic exegesis emerges at the intersection of classical interpretive traditions and the fast-paced, fragmented, and algorithm-driven logic of online media. This transformation not only reshapes how tafsir is delivered but also shifts the reader’s epistemological experience from the presence of meaning (ḥuḍūr) toward the dominance of representation (ḥuṣūlī). This study aims to...
The contemporary global mental health crisis—marked by rising rates of depression, chronic stress, and social disconnection—calls for approaches that integrate biological, psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions of human well-being. This study revisits the biopsychological framework of Abū Zayd al-Balkhī (850–934 CE), articulated in Maṣāliḥ al-Abdān wa al-Anfus, to assess its relevance...
This article undertakes a comparative study of Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd’s conceptions of the soul through the framework of Aristotle’s four causes: material, formal, efficient, and final. Both thinkers draw deeply from Aristotelian psychology, yet their approaches diverge due to different metaphysical and theological commitments. Ibn Sīnā, shaped by Neoplatonic currents, presents the soul as an...
A religious experience in the neuroscience view is interpreted as a symptom of neurological disorders of the brain. The neuroscience view is one of the various views that deny the reality of religious experience. Through empirical research instruments, neuroscientists have found that the soul is identical to the brain, which means that every activity can be measured through the brain. This has...
In this paper, the similarities between the Gnostic and Islamic mystic beliefs about “Knowledge” (Ma‘refat) will be considered. The aim is to answer the question of whether they share a common view of divine knowledge. For this purpose, first Gnosticism and its ideas will be clarified. Second, a brief history of Islamic Mysticism will be presented. Then, in light of the evolution path of such...
Most Islamic theologians and sufi orders always have a different view of discovering the truth of God. On the contrary,in the view of Ibn Taymiyya, between Islamic theology and mysticism both strive to deliver people to understand the existence of God, they are so willing to do good and leave the bad. Efforts to do good and leave the bad that bring human beings intothe perfection of the soul....
This essay endeavors to look closely at the mystical theological anthropology of Hamzah Fansuri, the first and one of the greatest Sufi writers in the Malay world. Mystical anthropology is arguably the underlying theme of all Fansuri’s poems and he develops this mystical discourse on the theomorphic dignity of every human person, together with the dynamic of return to God, by using some quite...
Abstract : Attār is one to be accounted amongst the greatest sufi poets of Persia sufis in the history of Sufism who has notable contibution to the esoteric Islam (Sufism). He packed his mystical teachings in the form of poetry and verse, -to be more interactive and expressive- though his teachings are not different with his predecessors, particularly of those who inspired by the principle of...
Abstract : Knowledge of the universe is one of the three necessary types of knowledge, i.e.: knowledge of God, knowledge of the Soul and knowledge of the universe. Most of the time we refer to it as (Mabdaa) or the Origin; how the world is created. Or what is known in theology as Creation ex nihilo: where creatures are distinct from their creator who is the First Cause, or in illuminative...
Abstrak : Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi terkenal dengan karyanya yang banyak dan meliputi hampir setiap subjek, termasuk teologi, kosmologi, hukum, filsafat dan ilmu-ilmu mistis, sekitar 350 karya. Apa yang kurang dikenal adalah kenyataan bahwa ia juga seorang penyair luar biasa dan berbakat, dengan beberapa ribu puisi. Jika ia menjelaskan secara detail fenomenologi dan penafsiran ontologis pengalaman...
Abstrak : “Dimensi esoterik dan eksoterik agama” adalah masalah filosofis-teologis yang berkonteks oksidental. “Pengalaman Religius” dan “Sophia Perennis” adalah dua teori yang diperdebatkan dalam isu ini. Esensi agama, menurut teori yang pertama, terletak pada pengalaman yang membuat pemiliknya terlihat religius (beragama) dan eksoterisnya mencakup seperangkat keyakinan yang berawal pada...
Abstrak : Para mistikus melampaui tahap-tahap (derajat kesempurnaan mistik) dan maqam spiritual dalam perjalanan mereka menuju Allah yang sulit dimengerti oleh non-mistikus. Karena itu, sebagian besar kalangan reflektif berusaha mengandalkan prinsip-prinsip intelektual dan teoritis mereka untuk memperoleh penjelasan atas pengalaman mistis dan ekstasi. Namun, keberhasilan penjelasannya sepenuhnya...
Abstract : The term monism or wahdah al-wujūd has a long story in Islamic Mysticism or Sufism. It is such that is considered to be the soul of Sufism, an sich. It means that without wahdah al-wujūd, there would be no further discussion on Islamic Mysticism. Besides, the theory of wahdah al-wujūd is rooted in Shi’ite Islam, yet never found in the theology of Ash’arian or any other Sunni tradition....
Abstrak : Isu imanensi dan transendensi sangat penting dalam pemikiran keagamaan. Salah satu alasan mengapa masalah ini tidak pernah terselesaikan adalah bahwa ia memiliki banyak makna dan muncul dalam konteks yang berbeda. Pandangan yang menekankan imanensi dalam satu konteks mungkin menekankan transendensi pada konteks lain. Arti keduanya pun sangat tergantung pada asumsi metafisik mereka yang...
One of the fundamental problems of Theoretical Mysticism is the explanation of the world as being something other than God after having accepted the Unity of Existence. This paper seeks to present, after having explained certain necessary premises, the theory of manifestation as one that can explain and analyze multiplicity. In this article we especially seek to solidify the relation of such...
It is obvious that the use of these various terms does not result in a miscellany of ideas such as it occurs in many New Age theories. In perennialists’ writings we have come to realize that this is not an attempt to mix traditions together, but is instead an attempt to utilize existing terminology when it is appropriate. The paper has focused at studying the anthropology of perfection in...
Even though most men are occupied with gaining a livelihood and providing for their daily needs and show no concern for spiritual matters there lies within the nature of man an innate urge to seek the ultimate Real. In certain individuals, this force which is dormant and potential becomes awakened and manifest itself openly, thus leading to a series of spiritual perfections.
One of the most elemental discussions in ‘irfân nadzâri (theoretical mysticism), in the section where its adherents discuss ontology, is the debate surrounding the degrees of God’s manifestation. The reason for this is that in the mystic’s view real existence, or the reality of existence, is the existence of the Truth (i.e. God) who manifests Himself in the degrees and mirrors that are the...
The point is that in the Roman Catholic tradition, faith life moves around Sacraments. Any religious experience will be evaluated whether it enhances the devotion to the Sacraments, or it derails the person from the Sacraments. The authenticity will be judged based on the inner direction that lows out as a result of the religious experience.
History of philosophy is built upon rigid discrimination between various human experiences. Human experiences are divided mainly into two major experiences: Perceptual and intelectual. Perceptual experience is deined by empiricism as an aposteriori experience of empirical sensations. Meanwhile, rationalism claims that the only acceptable experience is apriori experience of intelectual object...
In the old days, theology was almost a purely internal religious matter. Ilmu Kalam or Islamic Theology – although this term does not fully signify the meaning of Ilmu Kalam; has been focusing mainly on “internal religious issues” namely; on God and His attributes, on prophethood and the characteristics of prophecy and the resurrection and other issues related to beliefs. But as time goes by...