The Creative Imagination of the Sufi Mystic, Ibn 'Arabi

Abstract

The 12^sup th^-13^sup th^century mystic, Ibn 'Arabi, was known as "the Greatest Master" among the Sufis. His insights into dreams, visions and prophetic processes may prove enlightening to our own more secular age. The findings of Carl Jung parallel some of the revelations of the mystic, but Ibn 'Arabi goes farther than Jung into the Active Imagination as both conscious--willed--and spontaneous, autonomous process. Through surrender and annihilation in the Divine, the mystic opens himself to receive theophanies, resulting in a life lived perpetually in awareness of Divine Presence. Union with the Divine is the aim of the mystic and Ibn 'Arabi shows us a detailed account of how that life is experienced.[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]