Née d’un questionnement épistémologique sur la manière dont les concepts véhiculés par la recherche découpent le réel et sur la place de la subjectivité en sciences des religions, cette thèse analyse la vision de la mystique musulmane selon Louis Massignon (1883-1962). Elle met en lumière la posture herméneutique de ce chercheur qui, après avoir démontré l’origine qur’ānique du soufisme, fait de la figure d’al-Ḥallāj (m. 309/922), le paradigme de la sainteté en islām. L’analyse montre que sa vision de la réalité étudiée est tributaire de sa propre spiritualité : il perçoit la mystique authentique comme une voie d’ascèse, de purification par la souffrance. Au cœur de l’union mystique, le mystique devient le témoin de Dieu. A cette voie, il oppose celle d’Ibn ʿArabī (m. 638/1240) et perçoit l’influence du néoplatonisme comme une altération de la pureté ascétique primitive. La voie la plus pure est une mystique de l’annihilation (fanā’) au sein de laquelle l’être humain serait indigne d’endosser les attributs divins et de connaître l’état de subsistance (baqā’). Sa quête, mue par des questionnements existentiels, illustre la difficile conciliation entre la quête du vrai et la quête de la Vérité. Cette étude montre combien la subjectivité du ou de la chercheur.e sert la recherche et l’entrave à la fois. Elle suggère, afin de construire les conditions du comprendre qu’il importe de prendre conscience de la particularité de sa posture herméneutique, d’énoncer son intention, d’interroger ses catégories conceptuelles, de maintenir une distance critique à son sujet, de réfléchir sur sa pratique, afin que la subjectivité ne déforme pas le réel, mais l’éclaire et le révèle. / Born from epistemological questions about the way in which the concepts conveyed by research cut out the real and about the place of subjectivity in the academic study of religion, this thesis analyzes Louis Massignon’s (1883-1962) vision of Muslim mysticism and provides the following key results: In a context in which mysticism is attracting increasing interest and in which the study of religion and of Islam more specifically are becoming institutionalized, this orientalist thinker, contemporary of both French and British colonial expansion, experimented with various tensions between scholarly and political logics, between academism and civilizing mission. Biographical sources make it possible to trace an itinerary that originated in Paris, continued in Cairo, and led him to Baghdad, the city where Ḥusayn b. Manṣūr al-Ḥallāj, to whom Massignon dedicated his doctoral dissertation, had died in 309/922. Interesting himself particularly in the lexical dimension of Sufism, he demonstrated, by means of an interiorist method of reading texts, its Qur’anic origin and its fundamentally Islamic character. These contextual and biographical analyses shed light on the specificity of Massignon’s hermeneutic posture vis-à-vis Muslim mysticism. It is as an interpreter inspired by a Christian vision of holiness that he approaches the figure of al-Ḥallāj and makes the latter the paradigm of holiness in Islām. This research brings to light how this Christian scholar’s spirituality influenced his vision of his field of study. The ḥallājian mystic - the purest in his eyes - is conceived as on a path of asceticism, of purification through suffering. At the heart of the transforming and personalizing union, this mystic becomes the witness of God. The mystic can only join with God in atonement, love, and sacrifice. Massignon’s vision thus opposes that of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 638/1240), which he reproaches for suppressing the radicality of transcendence. The Islām of theophanies is, in his eyes, pantheism; he refuses all mediation and perceives the influence of Neoplatonism as an alteration of primitive ascetic purity. If authentic mysticism is, in according to him, a mystique of aridity, of annihilation (fanā’) , it is because in his eyes, the absolute smallness of the human being is matched only by divine omnipotence: the inconsistency of the human being makes them unworthy to endorse the divine attributes and to know the state of subsistence (baqā’ ). This study analyzes, finally, how Massignon’s existential questions affect the way he looks at the reality he is studying. His effort illustrates the difficult reconciliation between the (scientific) quest for the true and the (metaphysical) quest for the Truth. Through this case study, this research demonstrates how the subjectivity of the researcher supports research and hinders it at the same time. The study ultimately establishes why it is important to become aware of the peculiarity of one’s hermeneutical situation, to state one’s intention, to question one’s conceptual categories, to maintain a critical distance from one’s work, and to wonder about one’s practice in a reflexive way: these precautions help build the condition of a more just understanding, so that subjectivity no longer deforms reality, but illuminates and reveals it.

This thesis sets out to provide what is perceived as the nature of Islam and background that inform the interpretation of the two novels ofMariama Ba as well as that of selected works by fellow Muslim writer, N awal El-Saadawi. Although the question of gender is carefully addressed, the principal viewpoint is Islamic theocratic rather than purely feminist. This study surveys the struggle of these two women writers to claim public space in a dominant patriarchal society. It examines the socio-political conditions affecting women in the Arab peninsula before the rise of Islam, also called Jahiliyyah, from Islam's inception (622 AD). It notes that the principle of equality of all the believers was established by the injunction in the Qur'an, and endorsed by Muhammad, the Prophet, after whose death, manipulation of the sacred texts, especially of the Hadiths, took place. This led to opposition to gender equality; while fitna (civil war) in Medina, led the Prophet to re-institute the hijablveil, in order to protect women from being sexually harassed. The significance of the hijab is then explored, and Fatima Mernissi's text Women and Islam (1987; 1992) is used as seminal to the argument that the hijab was not instituted to put a barrier between men and women. The question of how the Islamic tradition succeeded in transforming the Muslim woman into a submissive, marginal creature, one who once buried herself behind a veil, is considered in the light of feminist theory and practice in both the Third and Arab worlds as well as in terms of the postcolonial notion of 'writing back'. The works of Ba and El-Saadawi, chosen for discussion in this thesis, examine these common issues, and underscore the entitlement of women to equality. The proposition, that Muslim women talk/write back, is epitomized in Ramatoulaye's forceful wordsuttered after thirty years of silence and harassment: 'This time I shall speak out' (So Long a Letter, 1980; 1989: 58). This study also shows that both Ba and El-Saadawi (by employing the journalisme-verite approach) move beyond gender and cultural issues to explore the universal nature of man and woman, and that in accordance with Muslim theocracy, these writers ultimately advocate the notion of redemption through humanity, coincidentally expressed in the Wolofproverb: 'Man, man is his own remedy!' (Scarlet Song, 1981; 1994: 165). Furthermore, within the context of these concerns, a few speculative remarks on the likely future ofMuslim women in the Arab and African world are made, arguing that had Ba's life not been cut short so tragically, it is reasonable to suppose that she would, like ElSaadawi, have continued to advocate a holistic, healthy Muslim society, in which the humane treatment of women would prevail. Finally, in terms of the title Beyond the veil: Muslim women write back, an attempt has been made to show how both Ba and El-Saadawi strive by 'writing back' to move 'beyond' the veil, speaking out on behalf of fellow Muslim women in Africa. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 1999. / gm2014 / English / unrestricted

In this paper I research healing rituals in Morocco, their functioning and their socio-cultural context. The main attention is focused on night possession ritual (lila) of three mystical brotherho- ods - sufi tariqas ʿIsāwa, Hamadsha, and the Gnāwa brotherhood. Most of the members of the lat- ter are descendants of former black slaves, and their culture has a strong heritage of "black" Africa's cults - especially a very specific way of "working" with spirits. The essence of lila ritual lies in the (not always explicitly admitted) harmonization of relation with the possessing spirit. This possession is a kind of a cultural metaphor for signifying a number of mental and psychosomatic problems, which stem from tensions, created by socio-cultural pat- terns in Muslim society (above all the husband-father dominance in the family). During my fieldwork research in Morocco (2016) I collected ethnographic material from the rituals of the three above mentioned brotherhoods, which I present in my thesis and which I compare with substantial secondary literature for each of the brotherhoods. What becomes apparent is how these brotherhoods influence each other in terms of the pantheon of invoked spirits or in terms of musical and kinetic forms of the ritual. A research question resounds throughout the thesis:...

In this paper I give biographical sketches of a thirteen century Egyptian poet, best known as al- Busiri, the original composer of Kasidatul Burdah in Arabic and the Swahili translator of the said epic best known as Sheikh Muhammad Mshela, from Shela in Lamu, Kenya. Kasidatul Burdah (The Mantle Ode) or Kasida ya Burudai, in Swahili, is the most famous qasida in the Muslim world. I transcribed this qasida from Arabic to Roman script and analysed it (wa Mutiso 1996). My intention is to show how these poets share the same world view concerning Sufism and Islamic culture in particular

Katika makala hii nitazungumzia tarehe na kazi za al-Busiri mshairi wa kisufii maarufu katika fasihi ya kiislamu na ambaye baadhi ya kazi zake zimetarjumiwa kwa Kiswahili. Mojawapo ya kazi hizi ni Kasida ya Hamziyyah, ambayo ni maarufu sana hususa kwa Kiswahili cha zamani kiitwacho Kingozi. Kazi yake ya pili mashuhuri sana ni Kasida ya Burudai, kasida ambayo ndiyo maarufu zaidi katika ulimwengu wa kiislamu. Mshairi huyu ingawa ni mashuhuri, ni mgeni sana kwa wasomi wengi wa fasihi ya Kiswahili.

Abdullah Shah (1680-1757) was the birth name of the boy who would later become one of the most eminent Sufi poets of South Asia, and the master of Sufi lyrics in Punjabi—Bulleh Shah. Living during times of strife and major conflict between the Sikhs and the crumbling Mughal Empire, Bulleh Shah wrote poetry with an underlying humanist and tolerant philosophy that challenged the turmoil of his times. Blind to the bounds of religion and caste in an increasingly divided India, Bullah’s spiritual philosophy and his message of equality found voice in his kafis—a genre of poetry indigenous to the Indian subcontinent that can be seen as a form of folk ballad. This project offers translations of 15 kafis from his identifiable corpus, preceded by a substantial introductionFurthermore, the project is accompanied. Each kafi is presented in three translations—literal, functional, and oral. The selected kafis draw on the three dominant themes in his work—Ishq, rebellion, and freedom. Scans of the original kafis in Shahmuki script Punjabi have been provided. Furthermore, the project is accompanied by an interpretive composition of the translated kafi “What Times, What Strange Times,” which was a collaboration between the author of the thesis, Akshaya Tucker, and Jacob Scharfman.

This thesis follows Quṭb al‐Dīn al‐Shīrāzī (d. 1311), a brilliant and influential polymath, through the eighty years of his long life and focuses on him navigating changing environments in the Persianate Mongol world (i.e., the second half of the thirteenth century to the early decades of the fourteenth century). In order to retrace his life, this study draws extensively on contemporary chronicles, biographical dictionaries, autobiographies, hagiographies, and some of his own manuscripts to illuminate parts of his life unknown before. Through that, this thesis illustrates Quṭb al‐Dīn al‐Shīrāzī’s intellectual, political, and religious networks, with special attention to his patrons. Moreover, even though his fame in the modern world is primarily due to his astronomical treatises as part of the Maragha school, my thesis demonstrates his investment in medicine, Sufism, and religious sciences, including jurisprudence, Qurʼān interpretations, and ḥadīth studies. Hence, Quṭb al-Dīn is an example of an intellectual in the Ilkhanid realm who developed informal networks transcending political, linguistic, and genre boundaries, that spanned an area from the western fringes of Anatolia to Khorasan, through bustling late medieval metropolises such as Shiraz, Sivas, Konya, Baghdad, Cairo, Tabriz, and Maragha.

Principe spirituel pour Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn ʿArabī (1165-1240) et archétype universel pour Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), le Féminin est au centre de cette recherche où il sera étudié sous l’angle de l’expérience mystique dont il est un médian incontournable. L’accent sera mis surtout sur le rapport entre le Féminin comme principe ou archétype et l’expérience mystique tel qu’ils s’articulent chez nos deux penseurs tant dans leur vécu personnel que sur le plan de leurs élaborations théoriques. Elle consiste, pour éviter tout anachronisme, davantage en un dialogue d’idées qu’une comparaison de la pensée du maitre soufi andalou avec celle du psychanalyste moderne suisse. C’est à ce premier niveau d’analyse, où le Féminin et le Masculin forment une androgynie primordiale, que leurs pensées se rejoignent de manière significative. Les deux penseurs reconnaissant au Féminin en particulier une fonction transcendantale qui s’accomplit à travers une prédisposition à l’établissement d’une relation avec le monde subtil de l’Esprit qui s’enracine soit dans une tradition religieuse donnée, l’islam dans le cas d’Ibn ʿArabī, ou d’une analyse thérapeutique aux allures néanmoins mystiques dans le cas de Jung. L’expérience du Féminin chez nos deux penseurs révèle un rapport différencié quant à la nature et à la forme de l’expérience spirituelle qui est son support d’expression. Leurs conceptions se distinguent aussi sur la question de Dieu (transcendant ou immanent) dont la rencontre est perçue comme la finalité vers laquelle tend la dynamique transformatrice de la personnalité qu’implique ce cheminement initiatique qu’induit la rencontre du Féminin spirituel. Avant de réaliser cette ultime et unificatrice rencontre, il faut d’abord rencontrer et entrer en relation avec ce Féminin comme figure d’une altérité intérieure et extérieure en vue de dépasser le dualisme primaire où les humains sont embourbés tant individuellement que collectivement. C’est sur ce point en particulier que l’étude montre des convergences signifiantes, qui révèlent, d’un côté, le lien transversal qu’il y a entre le soufisme et la psychologie analytique et de l’autre les aspects implicites d‘une psychologie des profondeurs nichant en arrière-plan de la mystique akbarienne. Cette ébauche de dialogue, opérée dans une approche interdisciplinaire, révèle certes des postures épistémologiques très différentes, mais aussi une convergence de vue tacite jusque-là et que la méthode de la phénoménologie herméneutique retenue pour ce travail de maitrise a éclairé d’un nouveau jour. C’est dans cet esprit qu’elle peut ouvrir de nouvelles pistes de réflexion à nos sociétés contemporaines prises avec une crise de sens et de perte de repères identitaires inquiétante. Le sous-bassement de cette crise est une vision dualiste de la femme et de l’homme, et corollairement d’une division binaire entre nature et culture, au lieu de saisir leur nécessaire et paradoxale complémentarité qui doit se réaliser en premier lieu en chaque être humain. / A spiritual principle for Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn ʿArabī (1165-1240) and a universal archetype for Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), the Feminine is at the center of this research, where it will be studied from the perspective of the mystical experience of which it is an inescapable mediator. The emphasis will be on the relationship between the Feminine as a principle or archetype and the mystical experience as articulated by our two thinkers in their personal experience as well as in their theoretical elaborations. It consists, to avoid any anachronism, more of a dialogue of ideas than a comparison of the thought of the Andalusian Sufi master with that of the modern Swiss psychoanalyst. It is at this first level of analysis, where the Feminine and the Masculine form a primordial androgyny that their thoughts meet in a significant way. Both thinkers in fact recognize in the Feminine a transcendental function that is fulfilled through a predisposition to establish a relationship with the subtle world of Spirit that is rooted either in a given religious tradition-Islam in the case of Ibn ʿArabī or of a therapeutic analysis with nonetheless mystical overtones in the case of Jung. The experience of the Feminine in our two thinkers reveals a differentiated relationship as to the nature and form of the spiritual experience that is its medium of expression. Their conceptions also differ on the question of God (transcendent or immanent) whose meeting is perceived as the finality towards which tends the transforming dynamics of the personality that implies this initiatory path that induces the meeting of the spiritual Feminine. Before realizing this ultimate and unifying encounter, one must first meet and relate to this Feminine figure of inner and outer otherness in order to overcome the primary dualism in which humans are mired both individually and collectively. It is on this point in particular that the study shows significant convergences, which reveal, on the one hand, the link between Sufism and analytical psychology; and on the other hand, the "deep psychological" aspects of Akbarian mysticism. This draft dialogue, carried out in an interdisciplinary approach, certainly reveals very different epistemological postures, but also a convergence of views implicit until then and which the method of hermeneutic phenomenology chosen for this master's thesis has shed new light on. It is in this spirit that it can open up new avenues of reflection for our contemporary societies caught up in a disturbing crisis of meaning and loss of identity markers. The underpinning of this crisis is a dualistic vision of woman and man, and consequently of a binary division between nature and culture, instead of grasping their necessary and paradoxical complementarity which must be realized first and foremost in each human being.

This research examines the effects of a daily, ritualistic, intentional practice of Sufi meditation Tamarzok, Sufi Zikr and art making in the life of a female art therapist graduate student, in a transitional professional and developmental stage of life. The general psychology and art therapy literature were examined to look at contemporary understanding in the integration of spirituality and art in mental health. A lack of information in the art therapy literature prompted the interest in the development of this study to respond to this inquiry. This art-centered research informed by a heuristic, phenomenological, dialectical inquiry of self-examination, encompassed the practice of Sufi Zikr and Sufi meditation Tamarkoz as understood from the perspective of the Sufi Order Maktab Tarighat Oveyssi Shahmaghsoudi School of Islamic Sufism, followed by art making as a way of documenting and contextualizing the qualities of the internal and external emotional landscapes to uncover themes and broaden self-knowledge in the support and enhancement of growth and well-being. The data was analyzed by looking at emergent themes. Conclusions drawn aligned the combined practices of art making and spirituality to that of a relational home where the Self and all parts of the psyche can coexist and contextualized for meanings to emerge and healing to take place. The findings of this inquiry were in overall alignment with the reviewed art therapy literature; gaps in the reviewed literature were noted in the exploration of the somatic component of the practice of art making as it relates to healing. Further research is warranted to expand and explore the data and the uncovered areas.

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