Mystical philosophy
in Islam represents a persistent tradition of working philosophically within
the Islamic world . Some philosophers managed to combine mysticism with
Peripatetic thought, while others saw mysticism as in opposition to
Peripateticism.
Al-Ghazali had great influence in making mysticism in its Sufi
form respectable, but it is really other thinkers such as al-Suhrawardi and Ibn al-‘Arabi who produced
actual systematic mystical thought. They created, albeit in different ways, accounts
of how to do philosophy which accord with mystical approaches to reality, and
which self-consciously go in opposite directions to Peripateticism.
Ibn
al-‘Arabi concentrated on analysing the different levels of reality and the
links which exist between them, while al-Suhrawardi is the main progenitor of
Illuminationist philosophy.
This tries to replace Aristotelian logic and metaphysics with an alternative
based on the relationship between light as the main principle of creation and
knowledge, and that which is lit up – the rest of reality. This tradition has
had many followers, including al-Tusi, Mulla Sadra, Mir Damad and al-Sabzawari, and has been
popular in the Persian world right up to today. Shah Wali Allah extended
this school of thought to the Indian subcontinent.
