The Limits of the Sufi Idea of ‘Oneness of Reality’ in Global IR

The twofold understanding that originates from the philosophical and historical readings of Sufism has created a major epistemological problem in scholarly traditions (Western and non-Western alike). On the one hand, the ‘philosophical’ consideration of Sufism (especially in Ibn al-‘Arabī’s teachings) is perceived as a trans-historical model of ‘universal mysticism’, which might provide a privileged terrain for mutual collaboration between human beings beyond all religious, ethnic and cultural boundaries, on the grounds of a non-dualistic epistemology endorsing ‘oneness of reality’ (waḥdat al-wujūd) and amalgamating rationalist, reflectivist and extra-rational methods of knowledge acquisition. On the other hand, the ‘historical’ consideration of Sufism may ignore neither the diversity of trends, doctrines and practices grouped under the label of taṣawwuf (Sufism) nor the explicit self-definition of all Sufi trends in history as ‘Muslim’. Indeed, all great Sufi masters (including Ibn al-‘Arabī) overtly referred to one definite religious form ‘Islam’ and one definite epistemological foundation ‘the Quran’, as transpired through exegesis and embodied in Prophet Muḥammad’s historical example, the ‘Sunna’. In particular, the widespread recommendations of Sufi masters to take the Quran and the Sunna as the touchstone for one’s mystical inspiration (ilhām) might imply potential opposition between ‘subjective human inspiration’ and ‘objective divine revelation’. In this sense, rather than dissolving the allegedly Eurocentric dualism of ‘reflectivism vs. rationalism’, the Sufi epistemological views might thus end up proposing a theocentric (or say, Islamo-centric) version of the same dualism. The present chapter evaluates how this Islamo-centric dualism might adversely affect the prospects of Sufism as a proper philosophical foundation for an unbiased Global IR theory.