Authors

• t zinivand
• i Najafi

Abstract

Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn Muhammad (Ahmad) Daylami (391 AH.) is the writer of the first and oldest book in Islamic-Iranian Sufism about Divine love. There seems to be inadequate data about biography of this uncelebrated and theorist Sufi. Through studying his work (‘Atf al- Alf…) and some of his teachers whom he wrote about (e.g. Muhammad ibn Khafif known as Sheykh-i Kabir), it can be deduced that he lived in the fourth century AH. and benefit from mystical schools of Shirāz and ibn Khafif courses (269-371AH.). His divine theories about “mystical love” (its’ nature, source, reason, categorizations and levels, along with comparison of Human and divine love), as disclosed in ‘Atf al-Alf, has extensively been echoed in works of great Islamic Sufis, especially Rouzbehān Baqli (522-606 AH). It appears that his theories in interpretation of love, especially mystical one, are mostly affected by Islamic Sufism and wisdom of Greece.

Keywords

• Abu al-Hasan al-Daylami
• ‘Atf al-Alf
• Mystical Love
• Islamic Sufism and Mysticism