RT Article
T1 “I Am No Foundling”: Al-Makzūn al-Sinǧārī Responds to Ibn al-Fāriḍ’s Poem of the Way
JF Arabica
VO 70
IS 6
SP 603
OP 660
A1 McAuley, Denis Enrico 1981-
LA English
YR 2023
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1873009887
AB This article is a translation and analysis of a poem by the Nuṣayrī (ʿAlawī) poet al-Makzūn al-Sinǧārī (d. 638/1240) responding to a masterpiece of Arabic Sufi poetry, the Poem of the Way by his contemporary ʿUmar b. al-Fāriḍ (d. 632/1235). Al-Makzūn uses Ibn al-Fāriḍ’s own words to paint him as a false claimant outside the genealogy of true lovers. As against Ibn al-Fāriḍ’s mysticism of identification with an immanent beloved and his focus on the holy sites, al-Makzūn posits a transcendent beloved that reflects a human image without taking human form, and a Mecca built purely on semantic associations. The poem shows that Ibn al-Fāriḍ’s alleged belief in incarnation (ḥulūl) was being debated from an early stage, and that Nuṣayrīs in this period engaged more closely with Sunni Sufi literature than often assumed. Al-Makzūn emerges as a subtle thinker and accomplished poet whose work has long been neglected.
K1 poésie arabe
K1 Soufisme
K1 Ibn al-Fāriḍ
K1 al-Makzūn al-Sinǧārī
K1 Arabic Poetry
K1 ʿAlawī
K1 Nuṣayrī
K1 Sufism
DO 10.1163/15700585-20231674