Fusus al Hikam with Ottoman Commentary

 

Translation from the Arabic into Ottoman Turkish with commentary, rendered into English by Bulent Rauf, with the help of Rosemary Brass and Hugh Tollemache.  Published by the Ibn Arabi Society.

 

Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi considered the Fusûs al-Hikam, his last major opus, to be the most important of his more than 350 books. The theme is the inner meaning of the 27 prophets mentioned in the Quran from Adam to Muhammad: the infinite wisdom which is at once unique in itself and many-faceted in its representation. The Fusûs is simultaneously an explanation of the most profound meaning of man's existence and perfectibility and an esoteric exegesis of the Quran. This translation includes extensive Ottoman commentaries, interwoven throughout the original text, to provide a tapestry of insights and subtle meanings breathtaking in their scope and subtlety.
The author of the commentary accompanying the translation writes, "Oh special people, oh people of the Fusûs, this is a private Mercy from God which is extended to you, which leads the people of purity to perfection." 

Here is what Ibn 'Arabi himself says about the journeys of the prophets and their meaning for us today: ...Now this is a sample of our share in Lot’s journey. Indeed every journey about which I am speaking is like that: I only speak of it in regard of my essence/self; I am not trying to give an exegesis of their actual story  (in the Quar’an). For these journeys are only bridges and passageways set up so that we can cross over them (or interpret them) into our own essence/selves and our own particular states. They are beneficial to us because God has set them up as a place of passage for us: ‘Everything that We recount to you of the stories of the messengers is so that We might strengthen your heart through that. For through this there has come to you the Truth and an admonishment, and a reminder to all the worlds’ (11:120). And how eloquent is His saying that ‘there has come to you through this the Truth’ and ‘a reminder’ of what is within you and in your possession that you have forgotten, so that these stories I have recounted to you will remind you of what is within you and  what I have pointed out to you!
For then you will know that you are every thing, in every thing, and from every thing. 
From: Ibn 'Arabi: Le Dévoilement des Effets du Voyage, transl. Denis Gril 1994; quoted in J.MIAS Vol 17, 1995, Book Reviews p104