Normalizing the Mahdī: Ibn ‘Arabī’s Khātim al-Awliyā’ as a Constitutional Principle

Recent studies on Islamic mysticism in the early modern period have explored the influence of Muḥammad ibn ‘Arabī (1165-1240) on political theory and social movements in Asia. However, to what extent did Ibn ‘Arabī see himself as contributing to Islamic political theory. This paper explores the ways in which Ibn ‘Arabī bridges the classical Ṣūfism of the Islamic East with a native, Andalusī-Maghribī mystical tradition (I‘tibār). I argue that the political dimensions of texts like The Meccan Revelations and the Bezels of Wisdom represent draw heavily on caliphal and mahdist ideologies from the Islamic West (Fāṭimids, Umayyad Córdoba, Almohads) that are absent from classical Ṣūfism. I further argue that Ibn ‘Arabī’s “Seal of the Saints” (khātim al-awliyā’) recasts the mahdī as a transhistorical, mystical influence on awliyā’ across time and functions as new constitutional principle for a caliphate that incorporates the mahdī’s  power to create post-prophetic sunna.