The Relationship Between Khorasani Mysticism and Andalusian Mysticism in the Medieval Period (12th Century CE): A Historical Comparative Study of the Thought of Ibn ʿArabī and Sanāʾī

Abstract

This study aims to provide a historical and comparative explanation of the relationship between Khorasani mysticism and Andalusian mysticism in the 12th century CE, with a focus on the intellectual contributions of Sanāʾī and Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn ʿArabī. Despite the considerable geographical and cultural distance between eastern Khorasan and western al-Andalus, the mystical current in both regions emerged within the shared developments of the Islamic world, including the expansion of Sufi networks, the dynamism of scholarly centers, and the role of trade routes and pilgrimage in transmitting religious concepts. Sanāʾī, situated in the tradition of Khorasani mysticism, articulated an ethics-oriented and reformist mysticism in which religious experience, critique of political authority, and spiritual cultivation were central. In contrast, Ibn ʿArabī—shaped by the multicultural environment of al-Andalus and later the eastern Islamic lands—founded a theoretical and universal mysticism in which concepts such as waḥdat al-wujūd (unity of being), the perfect human, and the imaginal realm (ʿālam al-mithāl) assumed foundational significance. Through a comparative analysis of the shared and distinctive elements of the two mystical traditions—including the concept of love, the status of the human being, the linguistic modes of mystical expression, and the relationship between mysticism and political power—this article demonstrates that the intellectual similarities between Sanāʾī and Ibn ʿArabī are not the result of direct influence, but rather the product of broader civilizational transformations and the internal coherence of the Islamic mystical tradition. Ultimately, the article concludes that the relationship between the two traditions is one of “civilizational overlap”: Sanāʾī inaugurates the stream of ethical Khorasani mysticism, while Ibn ʿArabī constitutes the architect of theoretical mysticism in both the western and eastern Islamic worlds.