Islamic Mysticism and Abu Talib al-Makki: The Role of the Heart

摘要

The present work is the first scholarly monograph to appear in a European language on Abu Talib al-Makki. Based on the authors University of Edinburgh doctoral dissertation, the study is a welcome addition to R. Gramlich's multivolume German translation of the 10th century authors Qut al-qulub, J. Renard's English translation of its chapter on knowledge, and a number of articles and unpublished theses. Yazaki's work is divided into nine chapters. It begins with an assessment of what we are able to determine about the life of Makkl on the basis largely of medieval biographical literature. She explores the numerous works that have been ascribed to Makkl, concluding that while some of the attributions seem to be clearly spurious, of the works he did compose, none seem to have survived with the exception of the Qut. (In her list of the nine modern editions of the Qut [p. 7], the 1996 Cairo edition published by Dar al-Rashad and edited by Dr. 'Abd al-Mun'im, seems to have escaped her). As for the 'Ilm al-qulub, of which there are two extant manuscripts, she concurs with the conclusions of Purjavadi and Karamustafa, that while it is deeply infused by Makki's own insights, it was not authored by his own pen (cf. Yazaki's full-length article on this subject in Ambica 59 [2012], pp. 1-35).