Understanding Ibn ‘Arabi Autumn online seminars November 2021
Presented by the Institute for Ibn ‘Arabi Studies (based at the Kerim Foundation) and the Institute for Sufi Studies at Üsküdar University, in collaboration with the Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi Society.
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6th November, 2021, 20.00 (İstanbul), 17.00 GMT (Londra)
Mahmud Erol Kılıç: ‘Ahmad Avni Bey’s Understanding of Ibn ‘Arabi’
Moderator: Hasan Kerim Güç
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pr2Vh7mq3kU
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Speakers and Presentations
Mahmud Erol Kılıç is a Professor of Sufi Studies. His numerous books, articles and translations have focused on Ibn ‘Arabi and the Ibn ‘Arabi school of thought as well as Sufism in Anatolia. He has been the ambassador of the Republic of Turkey to the Republic of Indonesia, and was the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Union of the OIC Member States (PUIC) based in Tehran. Prof. Kılıç currently serves as the Director General of the Research Center for Islamic History, Art and Culture. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi Society.
Mahmud Erol Kılıç writes: ‘Ahmed Avni Konuk (d. 1938) was a Sufi, musician, and composer with the masterful approach of applying his Sufi experience within the Mawlawi Sufi path to his work in the state postal service. Following a voluminous commentary on the Masnavi (considered one of the most comprehensive commentaries made in Turkish), he also wrote a commentary on Ibn ‘Arabi’s Fusus al-Hikam. This commentary serves as a key to Ibn ‘Arabi’s main ideas and concepts; the introduction in particular is almost a summary of the entire Akbari system of thought. What is even more interesting about Ahmed Avni Bey, however, is that his vision did not separate Mevlana and Ibn ‘Arabi, but rather explained one through reference to the other – an approach that brought together the two figures of Mevlana and Ibn ‘Arabi like pieces of a puzzle, to present a unified understanding of two traditions’.
Hasan Kerim Güç is a Ph.D. candidate at the Institute for Sufi Studies, Üsküdar University, Istanbul. His studies include Sufism and the thought, history and Islamic literature of the Ottoman period. He worked in Virginia, USA, in software engineering between 1999-2010. He is currently the Managing Director of Nefes Publishing (Nefes specialises in books on Islamic texts and Sufi studies. It also includes the Tuti imprint, which specialises in popular science).
He is a founding and board member of the Kerim Foundation and is the author of Ken’an Rifai’nin Dervişlik Anlayışı (Kenan Rifai’s Understanding of Dervish) (Nefes, 2020) and The Birds of Attar (Nefes, 2021). He has also published translations of philosophical classics.
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