The Legacy of Henry Corbin: Sacred Web 26 Now Available

"...the Imagination (or love, or sympathy, or any other sentiment) induces knowledge, and knowledge of an 'object' which is proper to it..."

Henry Corbin (1903-1978) was a scholar, philosopher and theologian. He was a champion of the transformative power of the Imagination and of the transcendent reality of the individual in a world threatened by totalitarianisms of all kinds. One of the 20th century’s most prolific scholars of Islamic mysticism, Corbin was Professor of Islam & Islamic Philosophy at the Sorbonne in Paris and at the University of Teheran. He was a major figure at the Eranos Conferences in Switzerland. He introduced the concept of the mundus imaginalis into contemporary thought. His work has provided a foundation for archetypal psychology as developed by James Hillman and influenced countless poets and artists worldwide. But Corbin’s central project was to provide a framework for understanding the unity of the religions of the Book: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. His great work Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn ‘Arabi is a classic initiatory text of visionary spirituality that transcends the tragic divisions among the three great monotheisms. Corbin’s life was devoted to the struggle to free the religious imagination from fundamentalisms of every kind. His work marks a watershed in our understanding of the religions of the West and makes a profound contribution to the study of the place of the imagination in human life.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Sacred Web 26 Now Available

SACRED WEB 26 is now available.

Including:
Coming Into the World: Henry Corbin & the Exegesis of the Soul.
Part Two: The Visionary Recital (pp. 17-40)
by Tom Cheetham
This essay—the second of two parts—continues a reading of Henry Corbin's "Cyclical Time in Mazdaism and Isma'ilism" and Avicenna and the Visionary Recital. The first part of Cheetham's essay appeared in volume 25 of Sacred Web, and focused on Corbin's view of cyclical time. The second part focuses on the concept of taw'il (or hermeneutics) and on the phenomenological and hermeneutic vision (the rendering of the Presence of transcendent reality through sacred dramaturgy and angelology) that constitutes the pluralistic foundation of Corbin's work.

The link above connects to the full table of contents AND online links to poetry, interviews and book reviews. Don't miss the review of Peter Kingsley's new book.