The Spiritual Writings of Amir Abd al-Kader.

• Author: Elmore, Gerald

Translated by MlICHEL CHODKIEWICZ. Albany: STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS, 1995. Pp. ix + 233. $16.95 (paper).

The publication of an English translation of Michel Chodkiewicz's selection of texts from the Kitab al-Mawaqif (Book of "Stops," or "Halts")(1) of the famous North African mujahidcure-marabout, Amir Abd al-Qadir al-Jaza iri (d. 1300/1883), is a welcome event for Ibn al-Arabi studies in English, even apart from the value that the book will have in its own proper field (somewhat neglected in the United States), relating to a seminal figure in the nascent history of Algeria and the wider Arab national awakening. This is because of the special credentials brought to the work by Dr. Chodkiewicz, the dean of Akbarian (that is, "Ibn al-Arabian") studies, and, not less, because of the nature of the K. al-Mawaqif itself, which is, at least in part, a commentary upon and exposition of particular aspects of Ibn al-Arabi's teachings as found in the Futuhat al-makkiyah, Fusus al-hikam, and other works such as the K. al-Tajalliyat. The latter point is worth emphasizing since, both in the east and the west, most biographies of Amir Abd al-Qadir fail to account adequately for the Shaykh al-Akbar's influence upon him, if it is even acknowledged at all.(2) But, as Chodkiewicz writes on what he calls the "Akbarian renewal," in the tumult of the Arab renaissance (al-nahdah), "this other renaissance, contemporary with it, is in danger of passing unnoticed. It arises from an Islam of silence, because it is an Islam of the inexpressible."(3)

This statement is quite apt, both metaphorically and literally. In the first place, the degree to which Abd al-Qadir devoted himself in his Mawaqif to the study and propagation of Ibn alArabi's "Islam of the inexpressible" is, if anything, understated in the present sampling of texts, since some of the mawaqif are simply running commentaries on passages from the Futuhat or Fusus, The very long chapter 366, for instance, is an extensive exposition of the opening paragraph of the Futahat's prologue,(4) and the first lines of the Fusus are the basis of the entire chapter following.(5) Moreover, while Chodkiewicz makes the point that Abd al-Qadir is "not a slavish follower" of the Shaykh alAkbar(6) (but what self-respecting student of Ibn al-Arabi would ever neglect weighing in against taqlid?), his major thesis is that the Amir is to be understood as a true inheritor of Ibn al-Arabi's doctrine (warith al-ulum...