Passion Before Me, My Fate Behind

Passion Before Me, My Fate Behind

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pp. i-ii

Passion Before Me, My Fate Behind

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pp. iii-iv

Contents

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pp. v-vi

Preface

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pp. vii-x

From the beginning, mystical perceptions of life have been part of the Islamic world, and by the ninth century CE, they began to appear in Arabic poetry. Many medieval and modern readers have viewed this poetry as verse accounts of Sufi doctrine refl ecting a mystic’s endeavors to describe an experience of...

Acknowledgments

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pp. xi-xii

This study has taken shape over a number of years, building on the eff orts of many others. Earlier works on Ibn al-Fāriḍ , especially those by R.A. Nicholson, A.J. Arberry, C.A. Nallino, and H.H. Ḥ ilmī, are foundational, to which may be added a number of more recent studies, including those of Issa Boullata...

Plan of the Work

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pp. xiii-xiv

This study begins with a concise biography of Ibn al-Fāriḍ based largely on accounts from his students and supplemented from the hagiography written on him by his grandson. This is followed by an overview of Islamic mysticism...

On Translation, Transliteration, Pronunciation, and Time

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pp. xv-xvi

Most of the Arabic poems cited in this study have been regarded as classical works for centuries, and so they deserve a reasonable poetic counterpart in English. When translating this verse, I have been concerned not only with form and content, but...

Introduction

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pp. 1-30

˜Umar Ibn al-Fāriḍ is the most famous Arab poet within Islamic mysticism. He was a master of the Arabic poetic tradition, composing verse in a number of forms including the quatrain, the...

Chapter 1: Mystical Improvisations

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pp. 31-62

In most of his moments of inspiration, the Shaykh was always perplexed, eyes fixed, hearing no one who spoke, nor even seeing them. Sometimes he would be standing, sometimes sitting, sometimes he would lie down on his side, and sometimes he...

Chapter 2: Love’s Secrets

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pp. 63-102

From the start, love and poetry have been intimate companions with Islamic mysticism. The love between God and humanity is an essential element of the Sufi tradition, and this relationship, with its many permutations, is central to Arabic...

Chapter 3: Joined at the Crossroads

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pp. 103-142

The Arabic ghazal shares many characteristics with the nasīb, the opening section of the qaṣīdah, or ode. The nostalgic mood, descriptions of the lover’s sickness and emaciation, the poet’s friends and foes, his steadfast keeping of his secret, all

Chapter 4: The Beloved’s Wine

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pp. 143-176

Mystical themes resonate throughout Ibn al-Fāriḍ ’s verse, but especially in his wine odes. From its inception Arabic verse on wine carried spiritual and sacramental associations, which...

Chapter 5: Poem of the Sufi Way in “T”–Major

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pp. 177-242

Ibn al-Fāriḍ ’s Naẓ m al-Sulūk is a landmark in Arabic mystical poetry. For centuries, Sufi s had drawn inspiration from the larger Arabic poetic tradition, yet no one before Ibn al-Fāriḍ had ever made such a grand poetic presentation of...

Conclusion: The Poetry of Recollection

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pp. 243-252

Within the commentary tradition on Ibn al-Fāriḍ ’s poetry, al-Farghānī, al-Tilimsānī (690/1291), al-Nābulusī (1143/1731), and others declare the poet’s verse to be the product of divine inspiration. Many commentators cite the account by...

Notes

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pp. 253-292

Bibliography

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pp. 293-306

Index

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pp. 307-314

Back Cover

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pp. B-1-