Women in Islamic Philosophy? Sitt al-ʿAjam and the Interpretation of Akbarian Thought

Although scholarship in Islamic Studies has highlighted the contributions of women as religious scholars engaged in the transmission of ḥadīth and in jurisprudence, or as ascetics in the mystical traditions of Sufism, their roles in and contributions to the history of Islamic philosophy remain unexplored. The fourth paper examines the philosophical contributions of Sitt al-ʿAjam bint al-Nafīs, a thirteenth-century philosopher, who is known for her commentary on Ibn ʿArabi’s Mashāhid al-asrār al-qudsiyya as well as authoring two additional works. In addition to being an important text in the reception history of Ibn ʿArabi, the commentary is also important for a central aim in modern scholarship: understanding the ways in which philosophers of the Islamic world engaged with various traditions of Greek thought and Islamic mysticism. The paper also raises methodological challenges and questions concerning the retrieval of women’s philosophical works in the Islamic context, raising larger questions on what constitutes a canon and what counts as philosophy.