The Legacy of Henry Corbin: Corbin at Pacifica

"...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.

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Corbin at Pacifica

In addition to the thesis posted earlier, From mundus imaginalis to nakoja-abad: An inquiry into the imaginal world of soul through the visionary recitals of Shahabeddin Yahya Sohravardi, by Kiyanoosh Shamlou, here are three more citations from Pacifica Graduate Institute that relate to Henry Corbin:

Daniel Walsh - "Imagination and reality : a study of cogitative imagination in Henry Corbin and depth psychology" (M.A. Thesis in Counseling Psychology at the Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2007).

Robert Lay - "Exploring subjectivity in the work of Jung, Heidegger, and Corbin through an artistic dialogue of film" (Ph.D., Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2006). The full text can be downloaded on ProQuest

Tracey Lee Hess - "Consciousness and quantum physics: Freud's death instinct and the phenomenology of Corbin's mundus imaginalis manifested as a complex fractal in epilepsy", Ph.D., Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2004. Also available from ProQuest.

(Thanks to Hadi Fakhoury)