At the beginning of our article (Kars and Bahrani 2022), we mentioned that the Book of Giving [Kitāb al-Ifāda] “appears in the List of Writings [Fihris al-Muʾallafāt] compiled by Ibn al-ʿArabī.” We also discussed the dating of the Book of Giving based on this assumption. A recent edition of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s List of Writings, which utilizes the earliest manuscripts, displays that our assumption was mistaken. The Book of Giving is not mentioned in Ibn al-ʿArabī’s List of Writings, and thus, our initial dating was erroneous. This means that the Book of Giving is a later work of Ibn al-ʿArabī.
A correction has been made to the first paragraph of the article:
With its rhyming title, the Book of Giving for the Aspirant for Receiving [Kitāb al-Ifāda li-man Arāda al-Istifāda] is a short work composed of around 1200 words in Arabic penned by one of the most influential Muslim scholars in history, Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn al-ʿArabī (d. 1240). A key piece of evidence that simultaneously establishes the authenticity of the Book of Giving and its date of composition is an internal reference to a poem in another work of the author, called “the Bezels” [al-Fuṣūṣ]. This is an explicit reference to Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Bezels of Wisdom, suggesting that he wrote the Book of Giving afterwards. The Bezels of Wisdom was penned upon the vision that Ibn al-ʿArabī experienced in Damascus in late November, 1229 CE (early Muḥarram of 627 AH). Besides, the title of Book of Giving does not appear in the List of Writings [Fihris al-Muʾallafāt] compiled by Ibn al-ʿArabī himself (Ibn al-ʿArabī 1441/2020). The earliest extant manuscript copy of the List of Writings, MS Yusuf Ağa 7838, was written by the hand of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s stepson and leading student, Saḍr al-Dīn al-Qūnawī (d. 1274), who studied the List with him in January 1230 CE (Ṣafar 627 AH) in Damascus (Elmore 1997, p. 165; Clark and Hirtenstein 2012, p. 19). This absence also indicates that the Book of Giving is a later work of Ibn al-ʿArabī.
With this correction, the following reference has been added, the order of some references has been adjusted accordingly.
- (Ibn al-ʿArabī 1441/2020) Ibn al-ʿArabī, Muḥyī al-Dīn Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad. 1441/2020. Al-Fihrist wa-l-Ijāzāt. Edited by Bakri Aladdin. Syria: Dār al-Shaykh al-Akbar.
The authors state that the scientific conclusions are unaffected. These corrections were approved by the Academic Editor. The original publication has also been updated.
Reference
- Kars, Aydogan, and Ashkan Bahrani. 2022. Knowledge and Causality in Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Book of Giving, and the Buddhist Notion of Dependent Origination. Religions 13: 768. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
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