The Legacy of Henry Corbin

"...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 2, 2014

Conférences publiques 2014
"Liberté et contrainte dans les sociétés musulmanes"

Christian Jambet, directeur d’études, EPHE
La liberté spirituelle en islam et l’interprétation de “Pas de contrainte en religion”

Mardi 7 janvier 2014

18h-20h

Amphithéâtre François Furet, 105 bd Raspail, 75006 Paris (M° Saint-Placide ou Notre-Dame-des-champs)

Entrée libre

Dans l’esprit et la lettre des théologies majoritaires en islam, la liberté de l’homme est inséparable de la Loi et du décret divin. On montrera que les formes de la liberté consistent non à s’abstraire de l’ordre divin intégral, mais à se rendre, en quelque façon, semblable à Celui qui l’instaure, par une démarche intérieure et spirituelle. On prendra l’exemple de l’interprétation de la phrase fameuse, présente dans le Coran (2, 256), “Pas de contrainte en religion”, par le grand philosophe Mullâ Sadrâ, et l’on s’interrogera sur le sens, pour le destin de l’islam, de la distinction entre une liberté intérieure, perfection de l’âme, et une liberté extérieure à la Loi, jugée illicite ou illusoire.

Modérateur : Bernard Heyberger, directeur d’études EHESS, directeur de l’IISMM-EHESS

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