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Rumi and wahdat al-wujud

Rumi and wahdat al-wujud

Few technical terms of Sufism are as well known as wahdat al-wujud , “Oneness of Being” or “Unity of Existence.”

Though this expression has historical connections with the school of Ibn al-‘Arabi, it is sometimes employed to refer to the views of other Sufis, including figures who lived long before Ibn al-‘Arabi.

It has also been said that Rum! Supported wahdat al-wujud \ but if this statement is taken to mean that Rumi derived the idea from Ibn al-‘Arabl or his students, serious historical and intellectual questions arise.

In order to understand these questions, one needs a clear idea of the meaning of the term wahdat al-wujud.

The expression wahdat al-wujud is built from two words – wahda and wujud – both of which were important for Islamic thought from early times.

Islamic theory and practice is grounded in the shahada or the giving witness that “There is no god but God,” an expression often called kalimat al-tawhid , the “statement through which God’s Unity is declared.”

The basic sense of tawhid or the declaration of God’s Unity is that everything in creation derives from God, who is One Reality.

The word tawhid comes from the same root as wahda , as do other related and often discussed terms such as ahad and wahid (“one”) and ahadiyya and wahdaniyya (“oneness” or “unity”).

Already in the sayings of ‘Alt we come across a reference to four different meanings for the apparently simple statement, “God is One