The Seba library treats Tawil in 9 passages, across 2 authors (including Corbin, Henry, Armstrong, Karen).
invested with their theophanic function, they demand to be carried back from their apparent form (ẓāhir) to their real and hidden form (bāṭin), in order that the appearance of this Hidden form may manifest it in truth. That is ta’wīl
Corbin establishes ta’wil as the Active Imagination’s hermeneutical operation of restoring every theophanic appearance to its hidden reality, with unlimited application to all sensible experience.
, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis
Its function is to initiate into the ta’wīl, and initiation into the ta’wīl marks spiritual birth. Thus prophetic Revelation is closed, but precisely because it is closed, it implies the continued openness of prophetic hermeneutics, of the ta’wīl, or intelligentia spiritualis.
Corbin identifies ta’wil as the Imam’s initiatic mission — the means by which the closed cycle of prophetic Revelation remains perpetually open through esoteric interpretation.
, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis
it is not possible to utter the word ta’wil without suggesting Shi’ism, whose fundamental scriptural principle it is that every exoteric meaning (zahir) has an esoteric counterpart (batin). And throughout Western Islam this sufficed to alarm the authorities
Corbin demonstrates that ta’wil is structurally inseparable from Shi’ite esoterism and was historically dangerous precisely because it subordinated literal religious authority to interior spiritual knowledge.
, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis
Ibn ‘Arabī was himself a great master of ta’wīl — we shall see him at work in the course of this book — and it is impossible to speak of ta’wīl without speaking of Shī’ism, for ta’wīl is basic to its attitude toward Scripture.
Corbin affirms ta’wil as the foundational hermeneutical attitude of Shi’ism and identifies Ibn Arabi as its supreme practitioner in the Sufi tradition.
, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis
Tawil was not designed to provide information about God but to create a sense of wonder that enlightened the batini at a level deeper than the rational.
Armstrong distinguishes ta’wil from rational theological inquiry, framing it as a transformative practice aimed at illumination beyond discursive knowledge.
, A History of God, 1993thesis
all the creativity of the heart are needed to set in motion the ta’wil, the mystic interpretation which makes it possible to read and to practice the Koran as though it were a variant of the Song of Songs.
Corbin links ta’wil to the ‘science of the heart,’ presenting it as the creative-imaginative act that transforms sacred scripture into a living theophanic encounter.
, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis
Tawil The symbolic, mystical interpretation of the Koran advocated by such esoteric sects as the Ismailis.
Armstrong provides the lexical definition situating ta’wil within the specific historical context of Ismaili and related esoteric movements.
, A History of God, 1993supporting
the inner meaning (batin) of the Koran. Contemplating the abstractions of science and mathematics purified their minds of sensual imagery and freed them from the limitations of their workaday consciousness.
Armstrong contextualizes ta’wil within the Ismaili program of spiritual discipline, showing how science was deployed to prepare the practitioner for esoteric scriptural perception.
, A History of God, 1993supporting
the entire second angelic hierarchy, that of the celestial Angel-Souls, governing the world of the active Imagination or Imagination of desire, the world which is the scene of visionary events, of symbolic visions, and of the archetypal persons to whom the esoteric meaning of Revelation refer
Corbin notes that Averroes’s exclusion of the angelic imaginal hierarchy from his cosmology also removes the very ontological ground on which ta’wil’s symbolic visions are possible.
, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969aside