Tafsir as Mystical Experience: Intimacy and Ecstasy in Quran Commentary, Tafsir Surat Al-Baqara of Siyyid Ali Muhammad Shirazi, the Bab (1819–1850)

Description

In Tafsir as Mystical Experience, Todd Lawson shows how the Quran may be engaged with for meaning and understanding, the usual goal of mystical exegesis, and also how it may be engaged with through tafsir in a quest for spiritual or mystical experience. In this earliest of the Bab's extended works, written before his public claim to be the return of the hidden Imam, the act of reading is shown to be something akin to holy communion in which the sacred text is both entrance upon and destination of the mystic quest. The Quran here is a door to an "abode of glory" and an abiding spiritual encounter with the divine through the prophet, his daughter Fatima and the twelve Imams of Ithna-'ashari Shi'ism who inhabit the letters, words, verses and suras of the Book. ‎Contents......Page 10 ‎Acknowledgements......Page 12 ‎Abbreviations......Page 14 ‎Stylistic Note......Page 16 ‎Introduction. Entering the House of Glory......Page 18 ‎Chapter 1. Walāya......Page 26 ‎Chapter 2. Tetrads......Page 65 ‎Chapter 3. Heptads......Page 93 ‎Chapter 4. Tajallī......Page 133 ‎Chapter 5. Qāʾim......Page 169 ‎Epilogue. A Mysticism of the Covenant......Page 193 ‎Bibliography of Printed Works......Page 198 ‎Index of Subjects......Page 214 ‎Index of Qurʾanic References......Page 225