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Miguel Asín Palacios (5 July 1871 – 12 August 1944) was a Spanish scholar of Islamic studies and the Arabic language, and a Roman Catholic priest. He is primarily known for suggesting Muslim sources for ideas and motifs present in Dante's Divine Comedy, which he discusses in his book La Escatología musulmana en la Divina Comedia (1919). He wrote on medieval Islam, extensively on al-Ghazali (Latin: Algazel). A major book El Islam cristianizado (1931) presents a study of Sufism through the works of Muhyiddin ibn 'Arabi (Sp: Mohidín Abenarabe) of Murcia in Andalusia (medieval Al-Andalus). Asín also published other comparative articles regarding certain Islamic influences on Christianity and on mysticism in Spain.

Life

Miguel Asín Palacios was born in Zaragoza, Aragón, on 5 July 1871, into the modest commercial family of Don Pablo Asín and Doña Filomena Palacios. His older brother Luis, his younger sister Dolores, and he were little children when their father died of pneumonia. His mother the young widow continued in business with help and made ends meet with decorum but not as well as before. He attended the Colegio de El Salvador instructed by Jesuits in Zaragoza, where he began to make lifelong friendships. He entered the Seminario Conciliar, singing his first Mass at San Cayetano in Zaragoza in 1895.

At the Universidad de Zaragoza Asín had met and begun study under the Arabist Professor Julián Ribera y Tarragó. In 1896 at Madrid he defended his thesis on the Persian theologian Ghazali (1058–1111) before Francisco Codera Zaidín and Marcelino Menéndez y Pelayo. All three professors guided his subsequent studies. Asín then developed his study of Al-Ghazali, and published it in 1901. He also wrote on Mohidin Abenarabe, who is often called the leading figure in Islamic mysticism. Thus Asín was running parallel with a then European-wide effort to understand Muslim inner spirituality.

Professor Codera then retired from his chair in the Arabic Language at the Universidad de Madrid in order to create room there for Asín; Ribera in Zaragoza allowed Asín to leave to assume this Madrid cátedra in 1903. Professor Asín lived in the same well-connected boarding house as Codera, and was well received in the university. By 1905 Professor Ribera had also come to Madrid; together with Asín they soon founded the journal Cultura Española (1906–1909). Asín attended international conferences in Algeria (1905) and Copenhagen (1908), where he engaged other Arabists and academics in Islamic studies. In Madrid he continued to prosper, eventually being admitted to the royal court where he gained the friendship of Alfonso XIII. He was elected a foreign member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1921.

Asín, is known for his academic work concerning the medieval Muslim-Christian interface of theology, mysticism, and religious practice, with a focus on Spain. His was a form of intellectual history. Among the figures studied were Al-Ghazali, Ibn 'Arabi, Averroës (Ibn Rushd), Ibn Masarra, and Ibn Hazm, as well as the rabbi Maimonides (all from Al-Andalus except al-Ghazali). Asín did comparative work vis-à-vis Islam respecting Ramon Lull, Thomas Aquinas, Dante Alighieri, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, and Blaise Pascal.

Asín's manner of approach was to stick to a theme, to keep circling over it, each time adding to the understanding. His method of work involved meticulous planning, by first conceiving the order of presentation in detail, then straight ahead, without a rough draft ("sin borrador"), redacted with each reference note on its proper page.

In 1932 the journal Al-Andalus began publication under the direction of Asín Palacios; it was technically equipped to satisfy a readership of academic specialists. Asín himself was a frequent contributor. In the universities, a new generation of Spanish Arabists was emerging, such as Emilio García Gómez, influenced by Asín. In 1936 Asín was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The Spanish Civil War began in July 1936, and caught Asín Palacios while in San Sebastián in the Basque country visiting his nephew and family. The horrors of this struggle remain very painful to contemplate with regard to both sides; over six thousand priests were assassinated by factions of the Second Spanish Republic. Asín was in personal danger, yet that September nationalist forces captured San Sebastián. During the war he taught Latin and managed to obtain photocopies of Arabic texts. After the trauma of Civil War, Asín was able to return to Madrid and resume his professorship at the university. There he continued his duties and his work on his multi-volume study of Al-Ghazali.

Don Miguel Asín Palacios had intense black eyes, fine hands; photographs did not seem to capture his personality or expressions. He was well dressed ("entre cardenal y torero"). Not ambitious but for the tranquility in which to work, he was a good and generous friend. His colleagues recognized in him an enduring innocence, so that he was "not knowing" in the mixed turbulence of the world. He projected a brightness ("diafanidad"); his mind had developed to become a great work of refinement. A pious priest, an admirer of John Henry Newman, "a child of 73 years" when he died.

He died on 12 August 1944 in San Sebastián. His passing prompted many scholars to review his work.

Works

Following early publications on Al-Ghazali and Ibn 'Arabi as noted above, Asín Palacios discussed, edited and rendered into Spanish translation many Arabic writings, and composed books and essays on related themes, including an occasional piece in Latin, French, or Italian.

Aquinas and Averroës

Asín Palacios researched Muslim influence on Tomás d'Aquino (c. 1225-1274), which would most likely come from the philosopher Ibn Rushd of Córdoba (1126–1198), whether as protagonist or antagonist. Ibn Rushd came to be written Averroës in Latin. The result was the 1904 article, "El Averroísmo teológico de Santo Tomás de Aquino" by Asín, the professor from Zaragoza newly arrived in Madrid.

With respect to Greek philosophy, particularly Aristotle, Asín infers that the religio-philosophic world inhabited by Averroës is analogous to that of Aquinas, and also to that of ben Maimon or Maimonides (1135–1204) the Jewish philosopher and talmudist, also from Córdoba. Asín understood that it was with piety that Averroës used reason to interpret his Islamic faith, and probes this issue for the sake of clearly distinguishing Averroës from several of the not-so-pious Latin "Averroístas". Asín also refers to medieval voluntarism (called asaries in Islam), in order to contrast and distinguish the similar rationalisms held by Averroës and by Aquinas. Yet, many Thomists did not then accept without great controversy Asín's point of view.

Ibn Masarra

In his 1914 book, Abenmasarra y su escuela. Orígenes de la filosofía hispano-musulmana, Asín opens by describing the evolution of Islamic philosophy and cosmology at the center of Islamic civilization in the East, in comparison with its later emergence in Al-Andalus (Muslim Iberia). A brief biography of Ibn Masarra (883-931) follows. There Asín posits the continuation of pre-existing Iberian culture among Hispanic natives who, following its conquest, converted to Islam. Because of AbeMnmasarra's father's client status (to his Berber mawla), Asín infers that he was such a Muslim 'Spaniard' (muwallad). Asín describes his affinity to Greek philosophy, i.e., neoplatonism, then notes the accusations of heresy against him, and that he early concealed his teachings. At the time the Umayyad Emir Abdullah ibn Muhammad al-Umawi challenged by political unrest, and armed rebels such as 'Umar ibn Hafsun, showed little tolerance for religious dissenters such as Abenmasarra. Ibn Masarra felt compelled to flee, traveling to Qairawan and Mecca. He eventually returned to Córdoba under the tolerant rule of the Umayyad caliph Abd ar-Rahman III (r.889/91-961), where he founded a School with elements of Sufism.

Due to a lack of extant works by Ibn Masarra of Córdoba available to Asín, his book treats the general context of the School and teachings of early Muslim mystics in al-Andalus. Asín discusses the Batini, the Mutazili, the Shi'a, the Sufi, the Greco-Roman mystic Plotinus (205-270), and Pseudo-Empedocles in particular. Mentioned several times by Asín is a perspective he favored: eastern Christianity's early influence on the young religion before Islam's arrival in the west. Asín infers that Ibn Masarra's school influenced Ibn al-Arif (1088–1141) of Almería. This Ibn al-'Arif became the focus of an emerging Sufi circle later called the muridin. His followers spread out over al-Andalus, but they became too strong in the opinion of the governing power; they were variously suppressed by the Almoravids who then ruled al-Andalus from Marrakech. Asín then discusses the influence of the school on Jewish figures of al-Andalus, for example, Judah ha-Levi (c. 1085-c. 1140), and in particular on Solomon ibn Gabirol (c. 1021-1058), known in Latin as Avicebron. Ibn Gabirol wrote in Arabic the book Fons Vitae which still survives. It apparently shows clear neo-Platonic references to the school of Ibn Masarra.

Asín points to the impact of these Muslim and Jewish thinkers of Spain regarding medieval Christian theology, for example, the long drawn-out struggle between the Aristotilean ideas of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) and those of Duns Scotus (1266–1308). Asín's dogged research, on the persistent influence of Ibn Masarra's school of mystical philosophy, leads him to follow its tracks eventually to Ibn 'Arabi (1165–1240), as well as to Ramon Lull (1233–1315) and to Roger Bacon (c. 1214-c. 1294). Later another scholar would find evidence that may link the school of Ibn Masarra to the philosopher of light and mystic of Iran, Suhrawardi (c. 1155-1191). Asín's 1914 Abenmasarra y su escuela established a lasting influence on subsequent scholarship.

Dante Alighieri

Perhaps Asín Palacios is best remembered for his 1919 book, La Escatologia Musulmana en la Divina Comedia, which sparked lively and extended discussions among Dante scholars. Asíin here suggests Islamic sources for the theological landscapes used by the Italian poet Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) in his work La Divina Commedia, written c.1308 to 1320. Specifically, Asín compares the Muslim religious literature surrounding the night journey of Muhammad (from Mecca to Jerusalem and thence up with the prophets through the seven heavens), with Dante's story describing his spiritual journey in which he meets various inhabitants of the afterlife and records their fate.

Accordingly, Asín (I) discusses in detail the above night journey in Muslim literature, (II) compares it to episodes in the inferno, the purgatorio, and the paradiso of La Divina Commedia, (III) investigates Muslim influence on corresponding Christian literature predating the poem, and (IV) conjectures how Dante could have known directly of the Muslim literature in translation.

Prior to Asín's La Escatologia it was assumed that Dante drew from the long poem the Aeneid by the ancient Roman poet Virgil for the inspiration to create the memorable scenes of the afterlife. In his Divina Comedia, Dante himself plays the leading role; he is guided by the deceased poet Virgil as they travel through the Inferno and the Purgatorio. Asín remarks that the addition of the Muslim sources in no way detracts from Dante's achievement, and that Dante remains a luminous figure and his poem retains its exalted place in world literature.

Asín's book inspired a wide and energetic reaction, both positive and negative, as well as further research and academic exchanges. Eventually two scholars, an Italian and a Spaniard, independently uncovered an until-then buried Arabic source, the 11th-century Kitab al-Mi'raj , which describes Muhammad's night journey. This work was translated into Spanish as La Escala de Mahoma by a scribe (Abrahim Alfaquim) of the Spanish king Alfonso X el Sabio in 1264.

Information also surfaced about another translation of it into Latin, Liber scalae Machometi, which has been traced to the Italian milieu of the poet, Dante Alighieri. Evidently Dante's mentor Brunetto Latini met the Latin translator of the Kitab al-Mi'raj while both were staying at the court of king Alfonso X el Sabio in Castilla. Although this missing link was not available to Asín, he had based his work on several similar accounts of Muhammad's ladder then circulating among the literary or pious Muslims of Al-Andalus.

Ibn Hazm

The importance of Ibn Hazm of Córdoba (994–1064) to the Muslim culture of Spain was earlier recognized by Asín. He had outlined Ibn Hazm's influence on medieval Islam, and had published a study with translation which addressed his ethical thought, followed by a volume concerning Ibn Hazm's views on religious history. During his career, Ibn Hazm became a remarkable figure, not least for the wide scope of his abilities, e.g., producing significant writings as a theologian, as a jurist, and as a poet.

From 1927 to 1932, Asín published a 5-volume study, Abenházam de Córdoba y su historia crítica de las ideas religiosas . Asín's first volume presents a biography, including his life as a jurist/politician and his trail through the world of intellect; Asín here gives a critique of the writings of the medieval Spanish Muslim, focusing on Ibn Hazm as a theologian and as an early historian of religions. The remaining four volumes comprise an incomplete yet lengthy translation of Ibn Hazm's Fisal, a very long work on the history of religious ideas, its Arabic title being Kitab al-Fisal fi al-milal wa-al-ahwa' wa-al-nihal .

Ibn Hazm's Fisal has six parts: 1. non-Muslim religions (in Asín's volumes II-III), 2. Muslim sects (Asín's III-IV), 3. Muslim faith and theology (IV), 4. several constitutional questions regarding Islamic government (V), 5. Muslim heresies (V), 6. theology in 29 questions (V). In part 1 of the Fisal, Ibn Hazm gives a polemical description of Christian scriptures and trinitarian doctrine, its putative errors and contradictions, showing familiarity with the texts. He also comments on Judaism, Zarathustra, Brahmans, sophists, atheists, and polytheists. According to Asín, many subsequent anti-Christian polemics by Muslims more or less followed part I of Ibn Hazm's Fisal. Asín, in his "Disertación preliminar" to the Fisal, compares the late emergence of comparative religious history in Christian Europe with its relative early start in Islam, noting the geographical proximity of Islam to a variety of differing religions. For example, an early Islamic work that discusses Buddhism appeared in the 9th century. Yet Asín more than once refers to Ibn Hazm as the first historian of religions.

Asín Palacio's biography shows Ibn Hazm as once vizier to the declining Umayyad caliphs before retiring to his study. During the course of his career Ibn Hazm had become a Muslim jurist of the Zahiri (or "literalist") school of law. His legal treatise on fiqh, Ibtal, is referenced by Asín and regards the Zahiri rejection of the heuristic use of analogy, learned opinion, social equity, juristic authority, and 'spirit' of the law, as unacceptable legal method. Late in his Fisal, as a jurist Ibn Hazm addresses possible rebellion against an unjust Imam; the distinction is made between not obeying an unjust order and taking action to overthrow an unjust ruler. Ibn Hazm enters another controversy, opining that women may be given inspiration by God, referring to the "mujer de Abraham" (i.e., Sarah) and to the "madre de Jesús" María (like Mahoma visited by the "ángel Gabriel"). After publication of Asín's 5-volume study, additional writings of Ibn Hazm were discovered in the library of the Fatih Mosque in Istanbul, including legal responsa, to which Asin devoted an article.

Ibn 'Arabi

Another work by Asín, which became well known to scholars of Islam, addresses the life and the sufi philosophy of Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi (1165–1240) of the Iberian city of Murcia. Asín Palacios had already written a number of studies and translations of Ibn 'Arabi, the revered (and controversial) mystic, but his major work was El Islam cristianizado. Estudio del sufismo a través de las obras de Abenarabi de Murcia (Madrid 1931). Following an introduction that proposes that Sufism emerged from the influence of Christian monasticism on Islam, the book presents three parts: first, a short life of Ibn 'Arabi ; second, commentaries that approach the complexity of his voluminous writings, his mystical teachings, his place in sufism, and his subsequent influence ; third, selections translated from seven of Ibn 'Arabi's works, including the Meccan Fotuhat .

Asín's brief biography describes Ibn 'Arabi's youthful 'conversion' to an inward path and first teachers, his adolescent meeting with Averroës, three of his visionary encounters with the 'maestro de verde' Jádir, and his travels visiting various sufis in al-Maghreb (e.g., Fes, and Túnez). In 1201 Ibn 'Arabi traveled further east across North Africa in pursuit of his spiritual journey, to Meca, Bagdad, Mosul, Cairo, Conia, Medina, Jerusalén, Alepo, and Damasco, where he died and where his tomb now draws pilgrims.

Ibn 'Arabi was prolific teacher, leaving us a vast corpus of written works. Asín functioned as a western pioneer in Sufi studies, particularly with respect to the difficult and demanding Ibn 'Arabi, the Shaykh al-Akbar. Not surprisingly Asín assumes the viewpoint of a spiritually involved Christian academic; he sees in the works of Ibn 'Arabi many similarities with his own religion's mystics and doctrines. Consequently, Asín brings his specific, spiritually-informed consciousness to his discussion of the principles and practices taught by Ibn 'Arabi. According to Prof. Alexander Knysh, Asín was one of the earlier western scholars of Ibn 'Arabi, a motivated European clergyman who was:

"concerned with detecting the underlying affinities between Christian and Islamic theology with a view to advancing an Islamo-Christian dialogue. Such Christian scholars treated Ibn 'Arabi, if not exactly as a crypto-Christian, then at least as a freethinker open to other religious confessions, especially Christianity. However, a scrutiny of Ibn 'Arabi's attitude toward other confessions, reveals little direct indebtedness to, or sympathy for, Christian doctrines."

Asín Palacios begins his second part by discussing the Sufi spiritual journey, its methods and discipline, and its various supporting societies. Here, Asín describes the distinct approaches found or developed by Ibn 'Arabi. For example, Asín mentions the purgative preparation required by Ibn 'Arabi regarding the four deaths, i.e., white, death to hunger; red, dying to passion; black, to endure suffering; green, to enter poverty. While some see adjacent virtues clearly when young, and others take first a hard path of trials and of sorrows ... eventually to meet a challenging paradox and become humbled in the wilderness; yet each soul may mercifully receive a spiritual transformation, to become ultimately possessed by divine love in a felicitous vision of unity. Ibn 'Arabi has described several varieties of sacred experience, including one in which, having known an awareness of unity with the Divine, a soul may return to the former daily life, yet nonetheless remaining aware also of the fruit of mystical events, conscious both of the "I and the not I", the commonplace and the transcendent. Here Asín apparently "avoided any analysis of Ibn 'Arabi's metaphysics."

In his introduction, Asín observes that while Christian Spain later became deeply influenced by Muslim mysticism, previously the oriental Church had equally influenced early Islam. Islam then arrived in the far west, the Maghreb al-Aksa and Andalusia, where Ibn 'Arabi would be born. From the perspective of religious studies, it might be said that Asín Palacios here presents us with a multidimensional, polyphonic text for comparative religion. In his other works on Sufi practice, Asín mentions precursors of Ibn 'Arabi in al-Andalus (i.e., the school of Ibn Masarra), as well as those who drew on his teachings afterwards (for example, the tariqah of the Sadilies ). Asín refers to the many parallels between al-Ghazali and Ibn 'Arabi, both well-known and still studied teachers.

Varia

Among the many articles of Asín Palacios are studies concerning the following subjects:

• Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) and his notion of placing a wager concerning the chances of reward or punishment after death, with respect to similar ideas in Al-Ghazali;
• Alumbrados, dissident religious groups organized in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries, similarities compared with the Sadili school (tariqah).

• Ramon Lull (1233–1315), mystic who sought to convert Islam to Christianity, whose ideas Asín discussed in his book on Ibn Masarra, and also with respect to Ibn 'Arabi;
• Ibn al-Arif (12th century) de Almería, influenced by Ibn Masarra, mentioned by Ibn 'Arabi; arif meaning "contemplation", although his practice was associated with quietist tendencies;
• Ibn Bajjah (1106–1138) of Zaragoza, known in Latin as Avempace, particularly with regard to Aristotle's impact on European and Arab philosophy.

Although Asín carefully followed the leads he found, nonetheless he continually seemed to remain grounded to his core area of research: the mutual influence of the distinctive civilizations of Islam and of Christianity during the centuries of Muslim rule in Spain, and thereafter, and the multilateral implications. Here is the transliteration of Asín's name to reflect its Arabic pronunciation: Asīn Balāthīus.

Al-Ghazali

In the 1930s, Asín began yet another study of Al-Ghazali (1058–1111), which is entitled, La espiritualidad de Algazal y su sentido cristiano. Asín expressly declared that the work was limited to a Christian interpretation of the celebrated Muslim and his work. His investigation focuses on themes of spiritual practice from the forty volume magnum opus of al-Ghazali, the Ihya 'Ulum ad-Din .

British scholar A. J. Arberry in 1942 called Asín's multivolume study "by far the most important monograph on Ghazali so far written," but adversely noted the importation of foreign religious sentiments into Asín's work on the Muslim theologian. Yet Asín, noting the multiple interpenetration of the two rival faiths, felt justified in his course.

After addressing Al-Ghazali the person, including a short biography, Asín analyses the teachings of his Ihya in four parts:

• first, his purgative ascetics, for example, how to overcome sensuality, idle talk, anger and hatred, envy, worldliness, greed, glory, hypocrisy, pride, vanity, and spiritual illusion (in volume I);
• second, his path to unity, for example, penance, patience, gratitude, hope and fear, voluntary poverty, renunciation of the world, trusting in God, and love of God (vol. II);
• third, his way to perfection, for example, the life plan, purity and sincerity, conscience, meditation, and the religious song (vol. III);
• fourth, al-Ghazali's mystical doctrine, to which Asín also provides a Christian interpretation (also in vol. III).

In Asín's concluding volume IV, he translates selections from works by Al-Ghazali (21 titles other than the Ihya) and provides a brief analysis of each.

John of the Cross

In 1933 Asín published in the first issue of the journal Al-Andalus an article about San Juan de la Cruz (1542–1591) and a doctrine he shared with spiritual Islam. This work can be seen to be equally about the saint's suggested forerunner, a Muslim mystic from Ronda, Ibn Abbad al-Rundi (1332–1389); and also about Ibn Abbad's own sources in the Sadili school (tariqah).

The shared doctrine concerns the soul on the path toward union with the Divine. God, being unreachably transcendent, the soul's only approach is to renounce everything but God. Thereby the soul enters a desolation in which he (or she) lives only for God, yet the desolation may become too severe, causing the soul to despair, so that the merciful Deity grants him (or her) inspiration, followed by a phase of elation; afterwards the soul returns to the way through desolation in order to move closer to God. The doctrine shared teaches that the soul passing through these alternating states of "night" (contraction, due to despair) and "day" (inspired expansion) may relinquish the charismata of God's inspiring favors, i.e., the "day", so as to pass more quickly beyond the difficult rhythm of "night" and "day". Thereafter the soul finds repose, wherein to enter the transforming union. Asín analyses the technical vocabulary used by the sadilis and by San Juan de la Cruz in order to further establish the connection.

While not disputing these similarities as discussed by Asín, a subsequent scholar, José Nieto, remained critical of any implied linkage between the earlier teachings of the Sadili sufis and San Juan de la Cruz. To the contrary, the suggestion is that this 'shared mystical doctrine' functions at such a level of generality that it will arise spontaneously.

Teresa of Ávila

In a posthumously published article, Asín discusses Santa Teresa de Ávila (1515–1582). The similes and analogies she employed to communicate the experiences of her spiritual life are discovered by Asín to parallel those previously employed by mystics of Islam. In this instance the image used is of seven dwelling places or castles, one inside the other. Asín mentions the Tanwir of the sadili Ibn 'Ata Allah; the Tayrid of Ahmad al-Gazali (brother of Algazel); and, the anonymous Nawadir compiled by Ahmad al-Qalyubi, with its seven concentric castles. Asín draws out other mutualities in the matrix of symbols, for example, the Divinity being in the central dwelling.

Luce López-Baralt further explores this association of images, tracing the parallel to a 9th-century Islamic mystic of Baghdad, Abu-l-Hasan al-Nuri (died 907), whose Maqamat al-qulub describes seven castles, one inside the other, through which the soul travels toward God. After quoting a passage in which Sta. Teresa describes her spontaneous acquaintance with the castle image, López-Baralt infers that Sta. Teresa's acquisition of the Islamic parallel was indirect, probably from a popular allusion that lay dormant within her for years, resurfacing later to help her communicate her mystical experiences. Following other similar studies, Catherine Swietlicki took a new but related direction, discussing Saint Teresa's Jewish heritage, and her mysticism as filtered through the mutual presence of three faiths. The Catholic writings of Santa Teresa de Ávila, widely recognized and revered, may accordingly be understood to reflect as well a generality of shared values among the Judaic, Christian, and Islamic faiths during those blessed periods of convivencia in medieval Spain.

Perspectives

The works of Asín Palacios are widely admired, notwithstanding criticism that his viewpoint was of a Christian priest while involved in the academic field of Islamic studies. In his own country, the labors of the Spanish Arabists, to which he contributed greatly, has over the generations worked to favorably alter the view shared by many Spaniards concerning the Muslim period of their history. His spiritual insights into Islamic mysticism illuminated formerly obscure figures and hidden connections. Perhaps, too, along with Louis Massignon and others, it can be said that the Professor Rev. Miguel Asín Palacios was instrumental in the open recognition by the Catholic Church of Islam as a legacy of Abraham, articulated in the Nostra aetate document of Vatican II (1962–1965).

Selected publications by Asín

Books

• Algazel, dogmática, moral y ascética (Zaragoza: Tip. y Lib. de Comas Hermanos 1901), with prologue by Menéndez y Pelayo at vii-xxxix.
• Abenmasarra y su escuela. Orígenes de la filosofía hispano-musulmana (Madrid 1914, Impressa Ibérica 1917); reprint Hiperión, 1991.
• Logia et Agrapha Domini Jesu Apud Moslemicos Scriptores, Asceticos Praesertim, Usitata.(Paris 1916).
• La Escatologia musulmana en la "Divina Comedia", (Madrid: Real Academia Española 1919; Editoria Plutarco, Madrid 1931); in the second edition (Escuelas de Estudios Árabes de Madrid y Granada, 1943), the text (468 pages) is followed by his Historia y crítica de una polémica of 1924, augmented (143 pages); third edition (Madrid: Instituto Hispano. Árabe de Cultura 1961); reprint 1984, by Hiperión.
• Dante y el Islam (Madrid 1927), preliminary note by Emilio García Gómez who edited this shorter version.
• Abenhazam de Córdoba y su Historia crítica de las ideas religiosas (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, & Madrid: Revista de Archivos 1927-1932), 5 volumes; reprinted by Ediciones Turner, Madrid, 1984 (five volumes).
• El justo medio de la creencia. Compendio de teología dogmática de Algazel. Traducción española (Madrid: Mestre 1929).
• El Islam cristianizado. Estudio del sufismo a través de las obras de Abenárabi de Murcia (Madrid: Editorial Plutarco 1931); reprint 1981, 1990 by Ediciones Hiperión, Madrid, 543 pages. Arabic translation by 'Abd al-Rahman Badawi: Ibn 'Arabi, hayatuhu wa-madhhabuh (al-Qahirah: Maktabat al-Anjlu al-Misriyah 1965). French translation: L'Islam christianisé: Etude sur le Soufisme d'Ibn 'Arabi de Murcie (Paris: Guy Trédaniel 1982). An abridgement : Amor humano, amor divino: Ibn Arabi (Córdoba: Ediciones El Amendro 1990).
• Vidas de santones andaluces, la "Epistola de la santidad" de Ibn 'Arabi de Murcia (Madrid 1933), a translation of the Ruh al-Quds. Cf. R.W.J.Austin's own translation of Ibn 'Arabi: Sufis of Andalusia. The Ruh al-Quds & al-Durrat at-Fakhirah (1971, 2002), at 18.
• La Espiritualidad de Algazel y su sentido cristiano (Madrid-Granada: Escuela de Estudios Árabes, & Madrid: Imprenta de Estanislao Maestre 1934-1941), 4 volumes.

Collected articles

• Huellas del Islam. Sto. Tomas de Aquino, Turmeda, Pascal, S. Juan de la Cruz (Madrid: España-Calpe, 1941), 307 pages. A collection of five articles, the fifth being on revelation in Islam and the Christian Scholastics.
• Obras escogidas (3 volumes, Madrid 1946-1948). Collection from books and articles.
• Sadilies y Alumbrados (Madrid: Ediciones Hiperión, 1989), 452 pages. The posthumously published articles, with a critical introduction by Luce López-Baralt at ix-lxviii.
• Tres estudios sobre pensamiento y místico hispano-musulmán (Madrid: Ediciones Hiperión, 1991). A collection of: Ibn Masarra (1914), Abu-l-Abbas (1931), San Juan de la Cruz (1933).

Articles

• "Mohidin" in Homenaje a Menéndez y Pelayo (Madrid: Suárez 1899) at II: 217-256.
• "El filósofo zaragozano Avempace" in Revista de Aragón, numbers 7, & 8 (1900), numbers 10, & 11 (1901).
• "Bosquejo de un diccionario téchnico de filosofía y teología musulmana" in Revista de Aragón, III: 50-56, 385-392 (Zaragoza 1902); V: 179-189, 264-275, 343-359 (Zaragoza 1903).
• "El averroísmo teológico de Santo Tomas de Aquino" in Homenaje a D. Francisco Cadera (Zaragoza 1904), at pages 271-331.
• "El Lulismo exagerado" in Cultura Española (Madrid 1906), at 533.
• "La psicología de éxtasis en dos grandes místicos musulmanes, Algazel y Mohidin Abenarabi" in Cultura Española I: 209-235 (1906).
• "Sens du mot Tehafot dans les oeuvres d'el-Gazali et d'Averroes" in Revue Africaine nos. 261 & 262 (Algeria 1906).
• "La moral gnómica de Abenhazam" in Cultura Española XIII: 41-61 (Madrid 1909).
• "La mystique d'Al-Gazzali" in Melanges de la Faculte oriental de Beyrouth VII (Beirut 1914).
• "Logia et agrapha Domini Jesu apud moslemicos scriptores, asceticos praeserim, usitata" in Patrología Orientalis (Paris: Didot), XIII/3: 335-431 (1916, 1919); reprint: Editions Brepols, Turnhout (Belgium), 1974; under the Latin name of Michaël Asin et Palacios.
• "Los precedentes musulmanes del Pari de Pascal" in Boletin de la Biblioteca Menéndez y Pelayo (Santander), II: 171-232 (1920).
• "Influencias evangélicas en la literatura religiosa del Islam" in A Volume of Oriental Studies edited by Thomas Arnold and Reynold Nicholson (Cambridge Univ. 1922).
• "La escatología musulmana en la Divina Comedia, Historia y crítica de una polémica" appearing concurrently in Boletín de la Real Academia Española (Madrid 1924), Il Giornale Dantesco (Florence 1924), Litteris (Lund, Sweden 1924); "Influence musulmane dans Divine Comedie, Histoire et critique d'une polemique" in Revue de littérature comparée (Paris 1924).
• "Una sinopsis de la ciencia de los fundamentos jurídicos según Algazel" in Anuario de Historia del Derecho Español 2:13-26 (1925).
• "El místico murciano Abenarabe" in Boletín de la Academia de la Historia (1925–1928).
• "El místico Abu-l Abbas Ibn al-'Arif de Almeria y su Mahasin Al-Mayalis" in Boletín de la Universidad de Madrid III: 441-458 (1931).
• "Un precursor hispano musulmán de San Juan de la Cruz" in Al-Andalus I: 7-79 (Madrid-Granada 1933).
• "Por qué lucharon a nuestro lado los musulmanes marroquies" in Boletín de la Universidad Central (Madrid 1940), written in 1937.
• "Ibn-Al-Sid de Badajoz y su Libro de los cercos" in Al-Andalus V: 45-154 (Madrid-Granada 1940).
• "La Carta de Adiós de Avempace" in Al-Andalus VIII: 1-87 (Madrid-Granada 1943).
• "Sadilies y alumbrados" in Al-Andalus IX-XVI (Madrid-Granada 1944-1951).
• "El símil de los castillos y moradas en la mística islámica y en Santa Teresa" in Al-Andalus XI: 263-274 (Madrid-Granada 1946).

Books and articles in English

• Asín Palacios, Islam and the "Divine Comedy", translated and abridged by Harold Sunderland (London: John Murray, 1926); reprint 1968, Frank Cass, London.
• Asín Palacios, The mystical philosophy of Ibn Masarra and his followers, translated by Elmer H. Douglas and Howard W. Yoder (Leiden: E.J.Brill 1978).
• Asín Palacios, Saint John of the Cross and Islam, translated by Elmer H. Douglas and Howard W Yoder, (New York: Vantage 1981).
  • Commentary: Alfred Guillaume, article (1921); Thomas Walker Arnold, article (1921); Arthur Jeffery, article (1945); Francesco Gabrieli, article (1953); James T. Monroe, book (1970); Luce López-Baralt, continuation: book (1985 t:1992); Catherine Swietlicki, continuation: book (1986); Luce López-Baralt, continuation: article (2000).

Selected commentary

Articles

• Menéndez y Pelayo, his prologue to Asín's Algazel (1901), at vii-xxxix.
• Louis Massignon, "Les recherches d'Asín Palacios sur Dante" in Revue du Monde Musulman XXXVI (Paris 1919); reprinted in Opera Minora I: 57-81 (Beirut 1963).
• Julián Ribera y Tarragó, "El arabista español" (Real Academia Española, 1919); reprinted in Ribera, Disertaciones y Opusculos (Madrid: Imprenta de Estanislao Maestre 1928) at I: 457-488.
• Giuseppe Gabrieli, "Intorno alle fonti orientali della Divina Comedia" in Arcadia III (Roma 1919); "Dante e l'Islam" in Scritti vari pubblicati in occassione del VI centario della morte di Dante Alighieri (Varallo Sessia, 1921).
• A. Nallino, article in Revista degli Studi Orientali (Roma 1921) at VIII/4.
• Alfred Guillaume, "Mohammedan Eschatology in the Divine Comedy" in Theology (London, June 1921).
• Thomas Walker Arnold, conference lecture given at the University of London, in Contemporary Review (London, August 1921).
• Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín, 1871-1944. Esquema de una biografia" in Al-Andalus, IX: 267-291 (1944); a bibliography by Pedro Longas follows at 293-319.
• es:Ángel González Palencia, "Necrologia: Don Miguel Asín Palacios" in Arbor II/4-5: 179-206 (1944).
• Henri Terrasse, "Necrologie. Miguel Asín Palacios" in Hesperis XXXII/19: 11-14 (Rabat 1945).
• Louis Gardet, "Hommage a Don Miguel Asín Palacios" in Ibla 229-243 (Tunes 1945).
• Arthur Jeffery, "Miguel Asín" in The Muslim World 35: 273-280 (1945).
• Giorgio Levi della Vida, "Nuova luce sulle fonti islamiche della Divina Commedia" in Al-Andalus XIV: 376-407 (1949).
• Francesco Gabrieli, "New Light on Dante and Islam" in East and West IV/3: 173-180 (Roma 1953).
• Enrico Cerulli, "Dante e l'Islam" in Al-Andalus XXI: 229-253 (1956).
• Wunderli, "Zu Auseinander-setzungen. Uber die muselmanische Quellen der Divina Commedia. Versuch einer kritischen Bibliographie" in Romanistiches Jahrbuch, XV: 19-50 (1964).
• Ignazio M. L. Sa'ade, "Adwa' 'ala al-mustasriq al ispani Asín Balaziyus wa-l hiwar bayna al Masihiyya wa-l Islam" in Al-Masarra (Lebanon, February 1968).
• Rafael Lapesa, "En el centario del nacimiento de Don Miguel Asín, I, linguista" in Al-Andalus XXXIV: 451-460 (1969), and in Boletin de la Real Academa Española 51: 393-402 (1971).
• Mikel de Epalza, "Massignon et Asín Palacios: une longue amitie et deux aproches differentes de l'Islam" in Cahiers de l'Herne 13: 157-169 (Paris 1970).
• Luce López-Baralt, her critical introduction to Asín's Sadilies y Alumbrados (1989), at ix-lxviii.
• Julia Bolton Holloway, "The Road through Roncesvalles: Alfonsine formation of Brunetto Latini and Dante--Diplomacy and Literature," pp. 109–123, e.g., at 109, 112, 123, in Robert I. Burns, editor, Emperor of Culture. Alfonso X the Learned of Castile and his thirteenth-century Renaissance (University of Pennsylvania 1990).
• Rafael Ramón Guerrero, "Miguel Asín Palacios y la filosofía musulmana" in Revista Española de Filosofía Medieval 2: 7-17 (1995).
• Andrea Celli, "Miguel Asín Palacios, Juan de la Cruz e la cultura arabo-ispanica" in Rivista di Storia e Letteratura Religiosa, XLIII (2007).

Books

• Rafael Lapesa and Emilio García Gómez, En el centario del nacimiento de don Miguel Asín (Madrid: CSIC 1969).
• James T. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship. Sixteenth century to the present (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1970), at Chapter VII, "Philosophy: Miguel Asín Palacios" at 174-195.
• José Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios. Mística cristiana y mística musulmana (Madrid: Ediciones Hiperión 1992), 213 pages.
• Andrea Celli, Figure della relazione: il Medioevo in Asín Palacios e nell'arabismo spagnolo (Roma: Carocci 2005).
  • Gérman Sepúlveda, Influencia del Islam en la Divina Comedia (Santiago de Chile: Instituto Chileno-Arabe de Cultura 1965).

Continuations

• Jose López Ortiz, Derecho musulmán (Barcelona 1932). Augustinian.
• Ramón Menéndez Pidal, Poesía Árabe y Poesía Europea (Buenos Aires 1941, 1943, 1946); España, Eslabón entre la Christiandad y el Islam (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe 1956, 1968). Professor, University of Madrid.
• Isidro de las Cagigas, Minorías étnico-religiosas de la edad media española, I Los mozárabes (Madrid 1947-1948, 2 volumes), II Los mudéjares (Madrid 1948-1949, 2 volumes). Historian, Spanish diplomat.
• Enrico Cerulli, Il "Libro della Scala" e la questione delle fonti arabo-spagnole della Divina Commedia (Vaticano 1949); Nuove ricerche sul "Libro della Scala" e la conoscenza dell'Islam in Occidente (Vacticano 1972). Italian governor in Ethiopia, ambassador to Iran.
• José Muñoz Sendino, La escala de Mahoma, traducción del árabe al castillano, latín y francés, ordenada por Alfonso X el sabio (Madrid 1949), text independently discovered and published concurrently with Cerulli above.
• Jaime Oliver Asín, Historia del nombre "Madrid" (Madrid 1952). Nephew of Miguel Asín Palacios.
• A. Huici Miranda, Colección de crónicas árabes de la Reconquista (Tetuán 1952-1955) 4 volumes.
• Juan Vernet Ginés, Los musulmanes españoles (Barcelona 1961). Professor, University of Barcelona.
• Darío Cabanelas Rodríguez, Juan de Segovia y el problemo islámico (Madrid 1952); El morisco granadino Alonso de Castillo (Granada 1965); Ibn Sida de Murcia, el mayor lexicógrafo de Al-Andalus (1966). Franciscan.
• Miguel Cruz Hernández, Filosofía hispano-musulmana (Madrid 1957), 2 volumes. Professor, University of Salamanca.
• Cristóbal Cuevas, El pensamiento del Islam. Contenido e Historia. Influencia en la Mística española (Madrid: Ediciones Istmo 1972), 328 pages, at Parte II "Influencias Islámicas en la Mística Española" pages 217-312.
• Salvador Gómez Nogales, La política como único ciencia religiosa en al-Farabi (Madrid: Instituto Hispano-Arabi 1980).
• Luce López-Baralt, San Juan de la Cruz y el Islam (Colegio de México and Universidad de Puerto Rico 1985; Madrid: Hiperión 1990). Professor, Universidad de Puerto Rico.
• Luce López-Baralt, Huellas del Islam en la literatura española (Madrid: Ediciones Hiperión 1985, 1989); translated by Andrew Hurley as Islam in Spanish Literature (Leiden: E.J.Brill 1992).
• Catherine Swietlicki, Spanish Christian Cabala: The Works of Luis de León, Santa Teresa de Jesús, and San Juan de la Cruz (Columbia: University of Missouri Press 1986). Professor, University of Wisconsin–Madison.
• Maria Corti, Percorsi dell'invenzione. Il linguaggio poetico e Dante (Torino 1993). Professor, University of Pavia.
• Luce López-Baralt, "Saint John of the Cross and Ibn 'Arabi: The Heart or Qalb as the Translucid and Ever-Changing Mirror of God" in Journal of the Muhyiddin ibn 'Arabi Society, XXVIII: 57-90 (2000). Professor, Universidad de Puerto Rico.

Journal

The Instituto Miguel Asín Palacios continues to publish the journal Al-Qantara. Revista de Estudios Árabes, in conjunction with the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC). Volume one of Al-Qantara was issued in 1980 at Madrid. This journal is a continuation of the journal Al-Andalus (1933–1978) which began under the direction of Professor Asín.

See also

• The Divine Comedy
• Ibn 'Arabi
• Al-Ghazali
• Ibn Hazm
• Emilio García Gómez
• Luce López-Baralt
• James T. Monroe

References

1. Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín (1871-1944) Esquema de una biografía" in Al-Andalus 9: 266-291, 269 (1944).
2. Asín would later write the long introduction to the jubilación for Prof. Ribera, Disertaciones y Opúsculos (Madrid: Imprenta de Estanislao Maestre 1928), 2 volumes, at I: xv-cxvi.
3. Emilio García Gómez, "Homenaje a Don Francisco Codera: 1836-1917" in Al Andalus at 15: 263-274 (1950).
4. José Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios. Mística cristiana y mística musulmana (Madrid: Ediciones Hiperión 1992) at 19-25, 66.
5. James T. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (Leiden: Brill 1970, Reprint, Cambridge: ILEX Editions/Harvard UP 2021) at 176.
6. This boarding house was well known for its residents and visitors, past (e.g., Sanz del Rio) and current. The tertulia (discussion group) of Menéndez y Pelayo met there, as did a variety of politicians and their supporters, and the young Duque de Alba (hence Asín's entrée to royalty). Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín" in Al-Andalus 9:266-291 at 274-275 (1944).
7. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship at 175-178, 129.
8. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 25-27, 68.
9. "Miguel Asin y Palacios (1871 - 1944)". Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 7 May 2020.
10. Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín" in Al-Andalus 9:266-291 at 284, 287 (1944).
11. See the Continuations section below.
12. "Book of Members, 1780-2010: Chapter A" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 25 April 2011.
13. "Remembering those martyred by socialism during the Spanish Civil War". 9 January 2022.
14. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 34-35.
15. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship at 192.
16. Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín" in Al-Andalus 9:266-291 at 284-285 (1944).
17. García Gómez affectionately commented that Asín sometimes would appear "un poco en la luna". "Don Miguel Asín (1873-1944) Esquema de una biografía" in Al-Andalus 9:266-291 at 289 (1944). One may conjecture whether Prof. García Gómez tended to type his teacher.
18. Emilio García Gómez, "Don Miguel Asín (1873-1944) Esquema de una biografía" in Al-Andalus 9:266-291 at 287-289 (1944).
19. See bibliography below.
20. See "Selected Publications" section below. For descriptions of different critiques of Asín's works generally, see Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 147-175; also the "Selected Commentary" section, infra.
21. Originally published in Homenaje a D. Francisco Codera en su jubilación del profesorado. Estudios de erudición oriental (Zaragoza: Escar 1904) at 271-331; reprinted in the collection of Asín's articles, Huellas del Islam (1941), at 11-72.
22. Asín Palacios, "El Averroísmo" (1904), in Huellas del Islam (1941), e.g., cf., section III at 49, also VI at 63-64.
23. Asín, "El Averroísmo" (1904), in Huellas del Islam (1941), III at 43, 45-46, especially 49; see also II at 21, and again V at 60.
24. Earlier Asín quoted rather extensively from Averroës, his Kitab al-Tahafut (ed. Cairo A.H.1303), and the Kitab al-falsafat Ibn Rusd (ed. Cairo AH.1313), which contains two works including Fasl al-maqal (Doctrina decisiva). Asín, "El Averroísmo" (1904) in Huellas (1941), II at 21-41.
25. "El Averroísmo" (1904), in Huellas del Islam (1941), IV at 52, V at 57-60. Duns Scotus (1266-1308) was an advocate of voluntarism.
26. Asín understood that Santo Tomás and Ibn Rusd, rather than legendary enemies, shared a similar task that encumbered their age, i.e., to reconcile faith and reason. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 104-107, 104.
27. P. Chalmeta Gendrón, "Asín Palacios, Miguel" in Gran Enciclopedia Rialp (1991) GER. As a medieval tactician, St. Thomas did write his De Unitate Intellectus Contra Averroistas , translated as On the Unity of the Intellect against the Averroists (Marquette Univ. 1968); cf., Etienne Gilson, The Spirit of Mediaeval Philosophy (New York: Scribners 1936) at 176-178, 182-183. Nonetheless, what Asín presents here may be considered a modernist view point through a wide-angle lens, a philosophical anthropology.
28. Translated by Douglas and Yoder as The Mystical Philosophy of Ibn Masarra and his Followers (Leiden: E. J. Brill 1978).
29. For Asín's Abenmasarra (1914) in general, see: Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 107-114; James Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (1970) at 180-182; and the somewhat sceptical Claude Addas, Quest for the Red Sulphur (1993) at 57-59.
30. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978), Chapters I and II .
31. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978), Chap. III : at 30 (continuity of thought), at 30-31 (father's client status), at 32 (his early ideas ).
32. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978), Chap. III: at 33-34 ('Umar ibn Hafsun), 33-35 (political oppression).
33. J. Spencer Trimingham, The Sufi Orders in Islam (Oxford University 1971) at 46:

    "In Spain, although there was a brief flowering associated with Ibn Masarra (AD 883-931) and his pupils, Sufism could not thrive openly in the atmosphere of intolerance and suspicion that prevailed there.

34. Ibn Masarra's books were later burned in public during the year 951. Claude Addas, "Andalusi Mysticism and the rise of Ibn 'Arabi" at 909-933, 918, in The Legacy of Muslims Spain (Leiden: Brill 1992).
35. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978), Chap. III : at 35-38 (ostracism by pressure from the Córdoba faqih), 36-37 (travels), 38-41 (Ibn Masarra's return to Córdoba and his "tariqah"), 41 (his books). The Umayyad Abd ar-Rahman III (891-961) (r.912-961) in 929 became the first Caliph of Córdoba.
36. Using newly discovered sources, Ibn Masarra is called a "Neoplatonist philosopher" of the Qur'an by Ahmet Karamustafa in his Sufism. The formative period (University of California 2007), at 72; Asín heads the long list of his references at note 63 (pp.80-81).
37. In 1914 Asín thought that not a single work of Ibn Masarra nor any fragments survived . Asín inferred his school's original teachings based on, for example, medieval biographers (al-Faradi, al-Dabbi, Ibn Khaqan, and al-Maqqari ), two Iberian commentators (Ibn Hazm, and Sa'id of Toledo) , and on the writings of his followers (in particular Ibn 'Arabi) and of his adversaries.
38. Subsequently, two manuscripts of Ibn Masarra have been located (Kitab al-huruf , & Kitab al-tabsira ); very recently both have been translated into Spanish by Pilar Garrido. Cf., P. Garrido, "The Science of Letters in Ibn Massara" in Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Society 47: 47-61, at 48. Asín knew of these titles only from references to them by others, for example, Ibn Hazm.
39. These works of Ibn Masarra are discussed by Claude Addas, "Andalusi Mysticism and the Rise of Ibn 'Arabi" at 909-933, 916-918, in The Legacy of Muslim Spain (Leiden: E. J. Brill 1992), edited by Salma Khadra Jayyusi.
40. Asín's theory that the pseudo-Empedocles was a source for Ibn Masarra's teachings has been challenged. Cf., Claude Addas, her Ibn 'Arabi ou La quéte du Soufre Rouge (Paris: Editions Gallimard 1989), translated by Peter Kingsley as Quest for the Red Sulphur. The Life of Ibn 'Arabi (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society 1993) at 57-58, and the article by the Ismaili scholar Samuel Miklos Stern, cited there at note 113. Elsewhere Addas states, "he possible influence exerted by Eastern mystics on Ibn Masarra a more decisive influence, in my view, than any pseudo-Empedocles might have had." Addas, "Andalusi Mysiticism and the rise of Ibn 'Arabi" at 909-933, 914, 918, in The Legacy of Muslim Spain (Leiden: Brill 1992).
41. But compare the pseudo-Empedocles named by Shem Tob Falaquera (1225-1290) in discussing Ibn Gabirol (1021-1058), cited by Isaac Husik in his A History of Medieval Jewish Philosophy (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society 1941), at 60-61, 64.
42. Asín, Abenmasarra y su escuela (1914), translated as The Mystical Philosophy of Ibn Masarra and his Followers (1978), for example, at 2-3, 12-13, 28, 88-89, 91 (and in Asín's prior works referenced at 12, footnote 25).
43. Confirmation of Asín's perspective appears to be given in a later book by the scholar Margaret Smith, Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East (London: Sheldon Press 1931; reprint Oneworld 1995) at Chap.VI, 103-124.
44. Cf., R.C.Zaehner, Hindu and Muslim Mysticism (Univ.of London 1960; reprints: Schocken 1969, Oneworld 1994) at 86-87, 92, 112.
45. Asín's inference is based on an admitted dearth of 10th-century sources but indirectly on later Muslims of al-Andalus, i.e., on Ibn 'Arabi, whose own early writings drew heavily on the circle formed by Ibn al'Arif. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978) at VIII:122-123.
46. One muridin shaikh managed to set up a rival government in the Algarves. This Abu 'l-Qasim "demonstrated how easily spiritual power can aspire to mundane power when he rose from his rabat , , and subjected before he was killed in 546/1151." Trimingham, The Sufi Orders in Islam (1971) at 46.
47. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978) at VIII:121-123 (Ibn al-'Arif and his circle). The Berber Almoravids deported Ibn al-'Arif to Marrakech, where he was accused of heterodoxy and died in 1141. His follower Ibn Qasi managed to escape, to organize adepts into a militia under the mystic name muridin, and to prosecute a sustained revolt. Ibid. at VIII:122.
48. Cf., Isaak Heinemann, editor, "Jehuda Halevi: Kusari", in Three Jewish Philosophers (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America c. 1946; reprint by Atheneum 1969).
49. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978) at VIII:130-131 (ibn Gabirol, aka Avicebron) and 129 (Judah ha-Levi).
50. Cf., Isaac Husik, A History of Medieval Jewish Philosophy (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society 1941) at 59-79 (Solomon ibn Gabirol), and 150-183 (Judah Halevi).
51. Fons Vitae being the book's well-known title in its Latin translation, meaning "Fountain of Life".
52. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978) at VIII:130-131. Regarding Ibn Gabirol, Asín cites to the near contemporary writings of Shem-Tob b. Joseph Falaquera, and also references to 19th-century scholarship by David Kaufmann, Studien über Salomon Ibn Gabirol (Budapest 1899) at 52-58, and Solomon Munk, Mélanges de Philosophie Juive et Arabe (Paris 1859) at 241 . Munk made the then surprising discovery that it was Ibn Gabirol who wrote the Fons Vitae. Asín (1914, 1978) at VIII:130.
53. Husik, A History of Medieval Jewish Philosophy (1941) at 60, 63-64.
54. The Mystical Philosophy at VIII:144-145.
55. Ibn 'Arabi wrote that Ibn Masarra was "one of the greatest masters of the Way in terms of knowledge, spiritual state and revelation." Claude Addas, Quest for Red Sulphur. The Life of Ibn 'Arabi (Cambridge: Islamic Text Society 1993) at 58, citing the Futuhat of Ibn 'Arabi at I: 147.
56. Asín, The Mystical Philosophy (1914, 1978) at 73-82, 123-143, 173-183 (Ibn 'Arabi); at 136-144, 173-183 (Ramon Lull); at 134-137, 144 (Roger Bacon). Asín quoted from Bacon's Opus majus as edited by Jebb, at 26: "Philosophy comes through the influence of divine illumination." Bacon later refers to "the Muslims" and, at 46, to the "illumination" taught by the Persian philosopher Ibn Sina . The Mystical Philosophy at VIII:136 n.48.
57. Independently, Henry Corbin in his L'imagination créatrice dans le Soufisme d'Ibn 'Arabi (Paris: Flammarion 1958), translated as Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn 'Arabi (Princeton Univ. 1969), "saw" connections, through the alam al-mithal and perhaps via Ibn 'Arabi, between the school of Ibn Masarra and the mystical philosophy of Muslim Iran, for example, Suhrawardi's Ishraq . Corbin (1958, 1969) at 25-26, 48-49; cf., 367-368. Corbin cites Asín here, and elsewhere.
58. Cf., Shahab al-Din Suhrawardi, The Mystical & Visionary Treatises of Suhrawardi, translated with an introduction by W. M. Thackston, Jr. (London: The Octagon Press 1982).
59. "It would be impossible to overestimate the importance of this work, which has exerted a decisive and lasting influence on the whole approach taken toward Andalusi Sufism by orientalists." . Claude Addas, "Andalusi Mysticism and the Rise of Ibn 'Arabi" at 909-933, 912, in The Legacy of Muslim Spain (Leiden: E. J. Brill 1992), edited by Salma Khadra Jayyusi. Regarding Asín, the sometimes mistaken yet respected 'pioneer', cf., 912-913, 919-920. She discusses Ibn Masarra at 911-919.
60. . See below under "Selected Publications" for details on its editions.
61. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 118-120, 150-160.
62. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (1970) at 182-184.
63. Dante's admiration for Islamic philosophy was clear from his "favorable" placement of the philosophers Ibn Rushd (Averroës) and Ibn Sina (Avicenna) in the poem. Cf., Frederick Copleston, A History of Philosophy, vol. 2, Mediaeval Philosophy at Part 1: 225-226; and at Part 2: 161 (Westminster MD: Newman Press 1950; reprint by Doubleday/Image 1962).
64. Asín refers to his own precursors regarding Dante, for example, Bruno Nardi. Asín, La Escatologia Musulmana en la Divina Comedia (Madrid-Granada: Escuelas de Estudios Árabes, segunda edición, 1943) at 4; & 397-399, 452.
65. R. W. B. Lewis, Dante (New York: Viking 2001), p. 101 (1308 or 1309 start), p. 189 (1320 finish).
66. The Mi'raj or night journey is briefly mentioned in the Qur'an at the sura so named (XVII, 1-2), and perhaps alluded to twice more (LIII,1; LXXXIV, 19).
67. The Mi'raj is described authoritatively in Hadith, for example, of Sahih Muslim, whose text in English can be found in Early Muslim Mysticism edited by Michael A. Sells (Paulist Press 1996) at 49-53.
68. The Mi'raj is also described by Ibn Ishaq (A.H. 85-151) in his "biography" of the prophet, in Alfred Guillaume (ed.), The Life of Muhammad. A translation of Ishaq's "Sirat Rasul Allah" (Oxford University 1955) at 181-187.
69. Geo Widengren, Muhammad, the Apostle of God, and his Ascension (Uppsala 1955), for example, at 96-114.
70. Dante, The Divine Comedy (New York: New American Library 1954), translated by John Ciardi.
71. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part I, 9-120, and also Appendix I, 425-443.
72. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part II/3-5: 133-175.
73. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part II/6: 175-191.
74. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part II/7-9: 192-266.
75. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part III: 271-353.
76. Asín, Escatologia (2d ed., 1943) at Part IV: 355-421.
77. In Virgil's Aeneid, Book VI, lines 301-447, the hero Aeneas enters the underworld, and later visits his deceased father Anchises (lines 910-972), who shows Aeneas a vision of the future, and of Rome (lines 973-1219).
78. Dante, The Inferno (New York: New American Library 1954; reprint Mentor Books), Canto 1, lines 61-84 (Dante meets Virgil, who acts as his guide).
79. Dante, Purgatorio (New York: New American Library 1954; reprint Mentor), Canto XXX, lines 46-56 (his guide Virgil disappears), lines 55-75 (replaced by Beatrice).
80. R. W. B. Lewis, Dante (New York: Viking 2001), pp. 102-104 (Virgil and Beatrice, as guides); 113-114 (Virgil's role), regarding the Divine Comedy.
81. Asín Palacios, La Escatologia Musulmana en la Divina Comedia (2d ed., 1943), for example, at 420 (el "inspirado" florentino que por "su poema inmortal" alcanzó "enamorados de la belleza de su arte exquisito").
82. See "Commentary" section, regarding: Massignon, G. Gabrieli, Guillaume, Arnold, Levi della Vida, Cerulli, Muñoz Sendino, F. Gabrieli.
83. See also Asín's response to his critics, "Historia y crítica de una polémica" (1924).
84. Cf., Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 150-160.
85. José Muñoz Sendino, La Escala de Mahoma, tradución del árabe al castellano, latín y francés, ordenada por Alfonso X el sabio (Madrid 1949). Muñoz Sendino also wrote the prólogo to La escala de Mahoma (Madrid 1949).
86. Concurrent work by Enrico Cerulli, Il "Libro della Scala" e la questione della fonti arabo-spagnole della Divina Commedia (Vatican 1949).
87. Regarding the translations made by this royal scriptorium of Alfonso X (r.1252-1284), cf., Escuela de Traductores (in English).
88. Francesco Gabrieli, "New lignt on Dante and Islam", in East & West, IV: 173-180 (Rome 1953) at 175-176. This article includes a review of the prior scholarship of Cerulli and Muñoz Sendino.
89. Gérman Sepúlveda, Influencia del Islam en la Divina Comedia (Santiago de Chile: Instituto Chileno-Arabe de Cultura 1965).
90. As reported, in 2000 Maria Corti discussed Dante's Italian mentor Brunetto Latini (1220-1294), that he met Bonaventura de Siena, thought to be the Latin translator of the Kitab al-Mi'raj, at the court of Alfonso X of Spain. Cf., Dante e l'Islam Archived 2014-07-14 at the Wayback Machine (Italian interview with Maria Corti, April 2000). Latini's trip was probably circa 1259; he returned to Tuscany in 1266. Dante wrote La Divina Commedia much later, in his last years, 1308-1321. Prof. Corti comments on our 'surprise' if Latini had given Dante a copy of the translation.
91. Cf., Ramón Menéndez Pidal, España, eslabón entre la Cristiandad y el Islam (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe 1956, 2d ed. 1968) at 59-60, where he further corroborates this connection.
92. Cf., Julia Bolton Holloway, "The Road through Roncesvalles: Alfonsine formation of Brunetto Latini and Dante--Diplomacy and Literature," 109-123, e.g., at 109, 112, 123, in Robert I. Burns, editor, Emperor of Culture. Alfonso X the Learned of Castile and his thirteenth-century Renaissance (University of Pennsylvania 1990).
93. Asín Palacios, La Escatologia Musulmana en la Divina Comedia (2d ed., 1943), especially in Part I at chapters 2 & 3, and translations in the first Appendix. Regarding Ibn 'Arabi: his derivative work, at 76-77, 79-84, 181-184; Asín's comparison of him with Dante, at 399-412, 417-418; and Asín's epilogue, at 418-421.
94. Asín, Discursos leídos ante la Real Acadamia de la Historia en la receptión publica del señor D. Miguel Asín Palacios el día 18 de mayo de 1924 (Madrid 1924). Cited by Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (1970) at 186.
95. Asín, Los caracteres y la conducta, tratado de moral práctica por Abenházam de Córdoba (Madrid 1916), an ethical study by Asín, which translates Ibn Hazm's Akhlaq.
96. Asín, El Cordobés Abenházam, primer historador de las ideas religiosas (Madrid: Estanislao Maestre 1924).
97. Ibn Hazm was then a leading Zahiri jurist, whose influence was lasting. Cf., Knut S. Vikor, Between God and Sultan. A History of Islamic Law (Oxford University 2005) at 117-119.
98. His poetry appears in annotated translations by Asín's former student, Emilio García Gómez, in his El collar de la poloma, tratato sobre el amor y los amantes de Ibn Hazm de Córdoba (Madrid 1952).
99. Also the English translation of A. R. Nykl, The Dove's Neck-Ring (Paris 1931).
100. Such medieval Arabic poetry influenced the troubadours. Ramón Menéndez Pidal, España, Eslabón entre la Christiandad y el Islam (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe 1956, 1968) at 17-18 (citing Asín).
101. Citations here to Asín's Abenházam (1927-1932) are generally to the reprint by Ediciones Turner (Madrid, 1984), also 5 volumes.
102. For a contemporaneous review by Ángel González Palencia, see Al Andalus at I: 213-214 (1933).
103. Thus Asín did not intend to elaborate on his poetry, his jurisprudence, his political history, or his ethics, as these subjects had already been addressed by others, for example, Nykl, Goldziher, Dozy, and Asín himself. Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932) at I: 9. Yet Asín's bibliography, at I: 246-279, provides a catalogue of Ibn Hazm's works in Philosophy, Jurisprudence, Theology, History, and Literature.
104. Monre, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (Leiden: E.J.Brill 1970) at 187.
105. Asín does not translate the entire text; for various sections he provides only a summary with analysis.
106. Roger Arnaldez criticized Asín as a translator of Ibn Hazm's Fisal for not sufficiently entering into the Islamic language and its special environment, and for "Christianizing" some lexicon. Arnáldez, Grammaire et théologie chez Ibn Hazm de Cordoue. Essai sur la structure et les conditions de la pensee musulman (Paris 1956) at 320. Nonetheless Arnáldez approved of Asín's biography and of his respectful commentary on Ibn Hazm. Cited by Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín (1992) at 160-161.
107. Ibn Hazm's Fisal became well-known, for example, it is cited by Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) in his Muqaddimah, e.g., at the end of section 25 on the Shi'a (Rosenthal's 1958 translation, v.1 at 414).
108. On the Kitab al-Fisal, cf., Reynold A. Nicholson, A Literary History of the Arabs (London: T. Fisher Unwin 1907; reprint: Cambridge University 1962) at 427-428.
109. About Zoroastro and his religion (II: 127-131, 231-237), Ibn Hazm acknowledges them as people of the book (II: 233), yet whose sacred writings have been alterred--like those of Jews and Christians (II: 233, 237).
110. Asín, Discursos leídos ante la Real Acadamia de la Historia (Madrid 1924). Cf., Monroe, Islam and the Arabs (1970) at 186.
111. Cf., Abdelilah Ljamai, Ibn Hazm et la polémique Islamo-chrétienne dans l'Histoire de l'Islam (Leiden: Brill 2003), e.g., the Hanbali jurist Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328) at 175-183.
112. Cf., Ignaz Goldziher, Die Zâhiriten (Leipzig 1884), translated by W.Behn as The Zahiris. Their Doctrine and their History (Leiden 1971). Goldziher makes a reference to "Ibn Hazm who distinguishes himself by his fanatical enmity against everything non-Islamic." Goldziher (1971) at 56; also at 60, "his personal fanaticism against followers of other religions"; and at 122.
113. Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932) at II: 7-79.
114. This being the Fihrist, which sets out its perceptions about Buddhism, its sects, cults, monastic orders, ceremonies, temples. Asín, Abenházam de Córdoba (1927-1932) at II: 16.
115. Relevant here is a near contemporary Zoroastrian work, the Shikand-gumanic Vichar, a synchronic approach to differing religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) with an evident polemical purpose.
116. Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932) at II: 33-79.
117. Cf., Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932) at I: 136; compare, at 227.
118. Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932) at I: 5; discussion in his chapter X, "Abenházam, Jurista Xafeí" at I: 121-130, and chapter XI, "Abenházam, Jurista Dahirí" at I: 131-144. Yet the Maliki was the madhhab which prevailed in Al-Andalus.
119. Generally: Ignaz Goldziher, Die Zâhiriten (Leipzig 1884), translated by W.Behn as The Zahiris. Their Doctrine and their History (Leiden 1971). Goldziher recognizes Ibn Hazm: "Among the champions of the Dawudi school this remarkable man is known as the most famous by far." Goldziher (1971) at 109.
120. Longer title: Ibtal al-qiyas wa-al-ra'y wa-al-istihsan wa-al-taqlid wa-al-ta'wil ; title in Spanish per Asín: "Libro que de muestra la inanidad del uso de estos cinco criterios jurídicos: el argumento de analogía, la opinión personal, la equidad o preferencia, la autoridad de los maestros y la investigación del espiritu de la ley". Listed in Asín's biography in his Abenházam (1927-1932) at I: 259; cf., his chapter XI, "Abenházam, Jurista Dahirí" at I: 131-144.
121. Asín, Abenházam (1927-1932), at I: 140-144.
122. At part 4 of the Fisal (Asín's volume V, at 7-51), at chapter 4, which Asín entitles "Necessity of the Imam" (Asín at 34-43).
123. Asín, Abenházam de Córdoba (1927-1932) in vol.V: 175-180 (part 6, Ch.4), at 177-179.
124. "Un Códice inexplorada de Cordobés Ibn Hazm" in Al Andalus, 2: 1-56 (1934).
125. Six prior articles (1899, 1906, 1925, 1926, 1926, 1928) of Asín are listed in El Islam cristianizado at p.6 note 1, as well as the discussion of Ibn 'Arabi in his 1919 book on Dante. Several later articles by Asín are cited in Al Andalus, V: 239-241, 240 (1940), where Asín reviews A.E.Affifi's The Mystical Philosophy of Muhyid Din Ibnul Arabi (1939); therein Asín refers to Ibn 'Arabi as "profound, knowledgeable and erudite, complicated and subtle, well versed in all the Islamic systems of thought." Ibid. at 241.
126. For details see "Selected Publications by Asín" below, under "Books".
127. See the discussions in: Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 127-136, 162-174; Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship at 188-189; Addas, Quest for the Red Sulphur, mixed at 1-10.
128. Henry Corbin remarks on Asín's title El Islam cristianizado:

     "The pious sentiment which inspired the great Spanish Arabic scholar with this strange title is perceptible throughout the work, which is still of the utmost value. But it is regrettable that he should have applied language and ideas befitting a Christian monk to a Sufi like Ibn 'Arabi; their vocations are different, and in employing such a method one runs the risk of blurring the originality of both types." Corbin, L'imagination créatrice dans le Soufisme d'Ibn 'Arabi (Paris: Flammarion 1958), translated by Ralph Manheim as Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn 'Arabi (Princeton Univ. 1969) at 39 n.12.

129. Works translated by Asín: Tohfa (Regalo para el Viaje a la Corte de la Santidad) , Amr (La regla taxativa que fija las condiciones que deben cumplir los que siguen el camino de Dios) , Tadbirat (Polítical Divina en el Gobierno del Reino Humano) , Cunh (Epístola sobre lo que es esencialmente Indispensable al Novicio) , Mawaqui (Descenso de los Astros y Ascensiones de los Místicos) , Anwar (Tratado de las Luces, o sea, de los Misterios con que favorece Dios al que entra en la Soledad) , and Fotuhat (Las Revelaciones de Meca acerca del Conocimiento de Dios y del Mundo) .
130. When about fifteen years old, after his acknowledgement of his young wife's virtues, as well as his suffering through a severe illness, Ibn 'Arabe received a calling and so changed his life. Before devoted to literature and hunting, afterwards he found and followed spiritual teachers. Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990) at 36-37, et seq.
131. Shortly after finishing El Islam Asín translated Ibn 'Arabi's Ruh al-Quds, his tribute to his early teachers of Al-Andalus. Vidas de santones andaluces, la "Epistola de la santidad" de Ibn 'Arabi de Murcia (Madrid 1933). See Asín's bibliography below.
132. The elder Averroes as the logical philosopher was pleased to meet Ibn 'Arabi, a respected young student of the intuitive, wise beyond his years. Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990) at 39-40.
133. Here Asín each time provides lengthy quotations from the Fotuhat which give Ibn 'Arabi's retelling of these events. Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990) at 49-50, 62-63, 72-73.
134. Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990), at 60-76 (Fez, Túnez).
135. Ibn 'Arabi's travels east in Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990), e.g., at 77-100 (Meca), at 101-117 (Damasco) and at 118 & 120 (photographs of his resting place there).
136. Asín in his El Islam (1931, 1990) at 123 n.5, mentions the 150 items of Ibn 'Arabi listed by Carl Brockelmann in his Geschichte der arabisches Literatur, 5 volumes (Weimer & Leiden 1898-1942) at I: 442-448.
137. The immense multi-volume al-Futuhat al-makkiyya is the major work by Ibn 'Arabi. Selections are translated as The Meccan Revelations, 2 volumes (New York: Pir Press 2002 & 2004), edited by Michel Chodkiewicz ; Rev. Miguel Asín had translated a few selections of the Fotuhat in his El Islam (1931, 1990) at 450-518. Another major work by the Ibn 'Arabi is the shorter Fusus al-hikam, translated by R. W. J. Austin as The Bezels of Wisdom (Paulist Press 1980), Preface by Titus Burckhardt. Twenty-seven prophets are here individually addressed.
138. Up to 1911, only one of the 150 extant works of Ibn 'Arabi had appeared in a European edition: a "brief glossary of Sufi technical terms" published by Gustav Flügel in 1845. Reynold A. Nicholson, "The Tarjuman al-Ashwaq" 1-9, at 1, in Muhyi'ddín Ibn Al-'Arabí, The Tarjumán Al-Ashwáq. A Collection of Mystical Odes (London: The Royal Asiatic Society 1911; reprint Nabu 2010).
139. Cf., Claude Addas, Ibn 'Arabi ou La quéte du Soufre Rouge (Paris: Editions Gallimard 1989), translated by Peter Kingsley as Quest for the Red Sulphur. The Life of Ibn 'Arabi (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society 1993) at 1, and generally 1-10, in which Asín the pioneer undergoes a critique. Yet unfortunately the Addas biography at 40, note 24, apparently mistakes Asín's text at 37, notes 1 & 2, which does cite and quote to the Fotuhat regarding Ibn 'Arabi's young wife; cf., Austin's "Introduction" 17-59, at 46 n.3 and 22-23, to Ibn 'Arabi, Sufis of Andalucia (1971; 2002).
140. Shaykh al-Akbar or greatest Teacher.
141. Asín, El Islam (1931, 1990), for example, at 5-7 (explaining his title), and at 7-28 (adumbrating his 'hypothesis').
142. Alexander D. Knysh, Ibn 'Arabi in the Later Islamic Tradition. The making of a polemical image in medieval Islam (Albany: State Univ. of New York 1999) at 19 (& 283-284 ).
143. From time to time Asín compares the Sufi practice of Ibn 'Arabi and the Christian. Asín, El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990), e.g., at 138-139 re St. Anthony the Great (251-356), 141-142 re St. John Chrysostom (347-407), 145-147 re Christian monasticism, 153-155 re St. Basil the Great (329-379), 158 re St. Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), 159-160 re St. Augustine (354-430), 169-171 re St. Ephraem the Syrian (c. 306-373), 174 re St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), 183 re St. Pachomius (292-348), 185 re St. John Cassian (c. 360-433), 187 re St. Paul (c. 5 BC-c. 67 AD), 191 re the Monks of Egypt, 195 re repetition of prayer , 202 re borrowing of the word charism (Arabic: carama), 212-215 re St. Athanasius (297-373), 225 re St. John of the Cross (1542-1591), 231 re Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite (late 5th-early 6th), 234 re 16th-century Spanish mystics, 246-247 re Richard of Saint Victor (died 1173), 248-249 re Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-c. 215), 257-258 re Jesus Christ, 260 re Greek lexicon, and 264-274 re Christian spirituality.
144. Asín, El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990) at 163, citing Ibn 'Arabi's work Amr at §109 (p.339), selections of which Asín translated (at 300-351) as Amr. La regla taxativa que fija las condiciones que deben cumplir los que siguen el camino de Dios .
145. Cf., El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990) at 254-255, which cites Ibn 'Arabi's Mawaqui at §193 (pp.390-392). Asín translated it in part (at 378-432) as Mawaqui. Descenso de los Astros y Ascensiones de los Místicos. Asín comments: "Para Abenarabi, ... la tristeza espiritual es la llave de las gracias de oración y contemplación, sin la cual el alma cae en la vanidad e ilusión de espíritu." . El Islam cristianizado, at 254-255.
146. The ultimate abode on the mystic path is "love" . Cf., Asín, El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990), at 199-200. Later he comments: "Todos los caminos, hasta aquí recorridos por el alma, tanto los de la vida ascética como los de la vida mística, deben conducir a este fin último: la unión con Dios por el amor. Abenarabi desenvuelve este tema, con difusión desacostumbrada, en su Fotuhat. (All roads, here running across the soul, as much for the ascetic as for the mystic, will lead to this ultimate end: the union with God through love. Ibn Arabi discloses this theme, with diffuse juxtapositions, in his Futuhat.) Asín, El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990), Capítulo XIII, "El Amor de Dios", at 240-251, 240.
147. A characteristic doctrine widely attributed to Ibn 'Arabi is wahdat al-wujud . "Ibn al-'Arabi is known as the founder of the school of the Oneness of Being (wahdat al-wujud). Though he does not employ the term, the idea permeats his works." William Chittick, The Sufi Path of Knowledge. Ibn al-'Arabi's Metaphysics of Imagination (SUNY 1989), at 79 and 226. Wm. Chittick, Imaginal Worlds. Ibn al-'Arabi and the Problem of Religious Diversity (SUNY 1994), Chapter 1, "Oneness of Being" at 15-29.
148. Asín, El Islam cristianizado (1931, 1990) at 255. Asín later refers us to the Christian experience mentioned by St. Paul of "Christ living within us". Ibid. at 257. Asín's discussion mentions different levels and approaches, and the virtues practiced.
149. Masataka Takeshita, Ibn 'Arabi's theory of the Perfect Man and its place in the history of Islamic thought. (Tokyo: Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa 1987) at 2.
150. Miguel Asín Palacios, El Islam cristianizado (Madrid: Editorial Plutarco 1931; reprint Ediciones Hiperión 1990), for example, at 12-13. Also, Asín Palacios, "Influencias evangélicas en la Literatura religiosa del Islam" at 8-27, in A volume of oriental studies dedicated to Edward G. Browne (Cambridge Univ. 1922), edited by T. W. Arnold and Reynold A. Nicholson.
151. The same year Margaret Smith described this Christian influence on early Islam in some detail in her Studies in Early Mysticism in the Near and Middle East (London: Sheldon Press 1931; reprint Oneworld 1995) at chapters VI, VII, and XI. (This book also said to be reissued in 1976 as The Way of the Mystics, reprint Oxford Univ. 1978).
152. El Islam cristianizado at 171-174; cf. "Selected Publications" below (for example, Abenmasarra y su escuela, and Sadilies y alumbrados). Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 132-133. Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship at 180-181, 193-194.
153. El Islam cristianizado, at 263 note 1, itemizing several with reference to the Fotuhat, and noting that Ibn 'Arabi gave public courses at Mecca on the Ilya of al-Ghazali.
154. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios at 114-116 (Lull), 116-118 (Pascal), 125-126 (Ibn al-'Arif), 137-145 (Juan de la Cruz, Ibn 'Abbad of Ronda, Teresa of Avila, Sadilies and Alumbrados). Monroe, Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship at 190-191, 193-194.
155. See bibliography.
156. Cf. Luce López-Baralt, her "Estudio introductorio" to Asín's Sadilies y Alumbrados (1990), regarding St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, as well as the Sadilies (a major Sufi tariqah located mainly in Northern Africa) and the Alumbrados; and her Islam in Spanish Literature (1985, 1992) on the two saints (chapters III and IV); and as well her San Juan de la Cruz y el Islam (1985, 1990); and her "Saint John of the Cross and Ibn 'Arabi" (2000).
157. Cf., Arabic translation by Badawī of Asín's major work on Ibn 'Arabī (Cairo 1965).
158. Manuscript: Istanbul, Shehid Ali Pasha 1712. Text: Deliverance From Error (al-munqidh min al-ḍalāl).
159. Madrid-Granados: Escuelas de Estudios Arabes, 1934-1941. Nine of his prior works on al-Ghazali are cited therein by Asín (at I: 20-21). Work on these volumes was interrupted by the Spanish Civil War.
160. Asín's writings on Algazal are addressed by Valdivia Válor in Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 97-102, 116-118, 120-123, and La espiritualidad de Algazal at 123-125, 147-150.
161. Asín states that he purposely omits discussion of al-Ghazali's Muslim sources because already adequately covered by other scholars, e.g., Goldziher, MacDonald, Massignon, and Nicholson. Asín Palacios, La espiritualidad de Algazal y su sentido cristiano (Madrid-Granados 1934-1941): Prologue at 9-10.
162. Monroe in his Islam and the Arabs in Spanish Scholarship (1970) at 191-192, 194-195, probes this approach by Asín, and then censures what it may infer. Monroe cites to a blanket critique of orientalists ("dry and sterile") made by Hossein Nasr, Three Muslim Sages (Harvard University 1964) at 156,n1 (to text at 83).
163. Only a few volumes of al-Ghazali's Ihya have been translated into English, for example, The Book of Knowledge or Kitab al-'ulm by Nabih Amin Faris (Lahore: Asraf 1962); and Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife or Kitab dhikr al-mawt wa ma ba'dahu by Timothy J. Winter (Cambridge: Islamic Text Society 1989).
164. There are several abridgements of al-Ghazzali's Ihya 'Ulum-ud-Din including an English translation ("not too literally but in substance" which omits dated material ) by Maulana Fazal-ul-Karim in four-volumes (c. 1971), reprinted in Lahore by Sh. Muhammad Ashraf (2000), and by Kazi Publications.
165. A. J. Arberry, An Introduction to the History of Sufism (Oxford 1942) at 53; cited by Monroe at 192.
166. Cf. Valdivia Válor (1992) at 161. Asín saw Islam as manifesting some similarity to a Christian heresy in its doctrines, given its espoused heritage, for example, referring to Ramadan and Lent .
167. Asín repeatedly commented on the centuries of mutual influence between the two religions, hence his perceived bona fides in taking a Christian approach to al-Ghazali. González Palencia, "Necrologia: Don Miguel Asín" in Arbor II: 179-206 (1944), e.g., at 193-194, 198; cited by Valdivia Válor (1992) at 162-164.
168. In this regard, Asín in his Prologue (La espiritualidad de Algazal at I: 18-19) refers to the Syrian Christian theologian Bar 'Ebraya (1226-1286), his Book of the Dove, in the annotated translation by Wensinck (1919). Another Syrian Christian theologian, Joannis Damascenus (676-749), in his Concerning Heresies discusses the "Heresy of the Ishmailites" at chapter 100 (attribution questioned), Muslims being called after Ishmael son of Abraham .
169. Interfaith dialogue will always have its troubles. "In the dialogue with Islam, Catholics have not always avoided, in an attempt to find shared beliefs and common ground, the danger of 'catholicizing' Muslim concepts and terminology and reading into them a Catholic sense they cannot possess." Cardinal Francis George, The Difference God Makes. A Catholic Vision of Faith, Communion, and Culture (New York: Crossroad 2009), quoted by Robert P. Imbelli, "Identity Crisis?" in America, v.201 #12 at 36 (Nov.2, 2009).
170. Discussion of the mystical is in Asín's third volume, at chapters 30 and 31 .
171. Included are selections from his well-known Tahafut al-falasifa, or The Incoherence of the Philosophers.
172. "Un precursor hispano musulman de San Juan de la Cruz", which was later reprinted in Huellas del Islam (1941), at 235-304. An English translation was made by Douglas and Yoder as Saint John of the Cross and Islam (New York: Vantage 1981).
173. Over half of Asin's article is selected translations of a text by followers of the tariqah's founder, Abu'l-Hasan ash-Shadhili (1196-1258), i.e., the Maxims of Ibn 'Ata Allah of Alexandria (died 1258), with a commentary thereon by Ibn Abbad of Ronda.
174. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios (1992) at 137-139, 138, citing Asín, Huellas del Islam (1933) at 249 .
175. Asín Palacios, Saint John of the Cross and Islam (1933; 1981) at section II, 11-13.
176. Asín, Saint John of the Cross and Islam (1933; 1981) at 24-27 . For further research which develops the work of Miguel Asín Palacios here, see Luce López-Baralt's book, San Juan de la Cruz y el Islam (1985, 1990).
177. José C. Nieto, Mystic Rebel Saint. A study of Saint John of the Cross (Geneva: Droz 1979) at 25-27.
178. Cf., Swietlicki, Spanish Christian Cabala (1986) at 184.
179. In Al Andalus XI:263-274 (1946), later reprinted in a collection of Asín's related articles (introduced by López-Baralt), Sadilies y Alumbrados (1989) at 179-190. Asín had left it untitled (López-Baralt, ibid., at xviii); now called: "El símil de los castillos y moradas del alma en la mística Islamica y en Santa Teresa" .
180. Specifically in Teresa's book Las Moradas o Castillo interior (1577), , translated as Interior Castle by Kavanaugh in Saint Teresa of Avila (Paulist Press 1979); and by Peers (Sheed & Ward 1943; reprint Doubleday 1961).
181. López-Baralt, Huellas del Islam en la literatura española (Madrid: Hiperión 1985), translated as Islam in Spanish Literature (Leiden: Brill 1992), at 107-113 (commenting on Asín's article). For St. Teresa's image of the soul as seven concentric castles: López-Baralt, Ibid., at 93.
182. St. Teresa of Ávila, Interior Castle (1577; Image 1961) at 11-13 , and at 28, 29, 37, etc. ; also cf., E. Allison Peers, Studies of the Spanish Mystics (London 1927-1930), at I: 162-191.
183. Santa Teresa previously used like imagery in her Camino de perfección of 1566, at chapter 67 (cited in Asín's posthumous article at 185).
184. Kitab al-tanwir fi isqat al-taqdir, cited by Asín (1946, 1989) at 179, 180, 183, 186; as well as his Miftah, at 183n1.
185. Kitab al-tayrid, or Libro de la desnudez espiritual , Asín (1946, 1989) at 181, 188.
186. Kitab nawadir, redacted in the 16th century from older material , cited by Asin (1946, 1989) at 183, 185, 186, 187, 190.
187. Asín (1946, 1989) at 183, 186; parallel in number and array.
188. At 182, 184, 186 in Asín (1946, 1989). Among other coincidences: the demonic dog lurking outside, trying to enter .
189. Luce López-Baralt, Huellas del Islam en la literatura española (Madrid: Hiperión 1985), translated as Islam in Spanish Literature (Leiden : E.J.Brill 1992) at 110; for Santa Teresa generally, Chapter Four, 191-142. López-Baralt later translated al-Nuri into Spanish (Madrid 1999). Also: López-Baralt, The Sufi Trobar Clus and Spanish Mysticism (Lahore 2000, as translated by Huxley) re St. Teresa and al-Nuri at 75-85, while she refers to Asín's work at 79-82, 85-87.
190. López-Baralt, Islam in Spanish Literature (1985, 1992) at 91-92 text, and at note 2.
191. López-Baralt, Islam in Spanish Literature at 91, note 2; she discounts a possible "Jungian" dimension to the symbolic similarities.
192. For example, Francisco Marquez Villanueva, "El símil del Castillo interior: sentido y génesis" in Acta del Congreso Internacional Teresiano (Univ. Pontifica de Salamanca 1983); and, J. A. Carpenter and Come Carpenter, "La experiencia y la escatología mística de Santa Teresa y sus paralelos en el Islam medieval de los sufis" at 159-187 in Actas del I Congreso Internacional sobre Santa Teresa y la Mística Hispanica edited by Manuel Criado de Val (Madrid 1984).
193. Santa Teresa's father, Don Alonso Sanchez de Cepeda, was pius and learned; his father (her grandfather) was a "New Christian" or Jewish converso. Cf., Swietlicki, Spanish Christian Cabala (1986) at 49-51.
194. Catherine Swietlicki, Spanish Christian Cabala. The Works of Luis de Leon, Santa Teresa de Jesus, and San Juan de la Cruz (University of Missouri 1986), i.e., St. Teresa and the Christian Kabbalah generally at 51-81, re Sufis and the seven castles at 62-66. Swietlicki here is cited by López-Baralt, Islam in Spanish Literature (1985, 1992) at 127-131, 134.
195. "Convivencia" signifies "living together" in Spanish, and may refer to an early medieval Golden Age ideal, in which the three faiths would share their cultures in peace. Prof. Asín contributed to the reification of the third pillar.
196. The 16th century when Saint Teresa lived, however, was a period of prolonged conflict and discord. For the Convivencia epoch, e.g., Mann, Glick, Dodds, editors, Convivencia. Jews, Muslims, and Christians in Medieval Spain (New York: George Braziller, & The Jewish Museum 1992); Burns, editor, Emperor of Culture. Alfonso X the Learned of Castile and His Thirteenth Century Renaissance (University of Pennsylvania 1990); Américo Castro, The Spaniards. An Introduction to Their History (University of California 1971); Richard Fletcher, Moorish Spain (New York: Henry Holt 1992).
197. Valdivia Válor, Don Miguel Asín Palacios. Mística cristiana y mística musulmana (Madrid: Hiperión 1992) at 14. Among other contributors to this subtle sea-change in Spanish attitudes would be Ramón Menéndez Pidal and Américo Castro.

External links

• Works by or about Miguel Asín Palacios at the Internet Archive
• Al-Qantara. Revista de estudios árabes

• Academic staff of the Complutense University of Madrid
• Members of the Royal Spanish Academy
• Spanish orientalists
• Comparative literature academics
• Christian scholars of Islam
• Spanish Arabists
• Spanish literary historians
• 1871 births
• 1944 deaths
• 20th-century Spanish Roman Catholic priests
• 19th-century Spanish writers
• 19th-century Spanish male writers
• Corresponding Fellows of the Medieval Academy of America
• Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Fellows of the Medieval Academy of America
• Ibn Arabi scholars