The Polished Mirror

Cyrus Ali Zargar is Associate Professor of Religion at Augustana College, in Rock Island, Illinois, where his primary research interest is the literature of medieval Sufism in Arabic and Persian.

• Introduction Part One Islamic Philosophy Chapter One: The Humors (al-akhlāṭ) and Character Traits (al-akhlāq) According to the Brethren of PurityChapter Two: Virtue Ethics in Avicenna’s Philosophical AllegoriesChapter Three: The Virtues, from Philosophy to Scripture: Refining Character Traits in Miskawayh and GhazālīChapter Four: Reason, Revelation, and Discovering the Virtuous in Ibn Ṭufayl’s Literary Thought ExperimentChapter Five: From Humors to Pure Light: Knowledge and Virtue in the Allegories of Suhrawardī Part Two Sufism Chapter Six: The Soul’s Constant Returning: Repentance (Tawba) in the Sufi Legacy of Jaʿfar al-ṢādiqChapter Seven: Distancing Oneself from the Worldly: Renunciation (Zuhd) According to al-Muḥāsibī and al-SarrājChapter Eight: Self-Awareness that Leads to Self-Loss: Futuwwa as a Compound Virtue in the Legacy of AnṣārīChapter Nine: The Completion of Ethics: Self-Annihilation (Fanāʾ) Through the Lens of ʿAṭṭārChapter Ten: Virtue in the Narrative Poetry of Rūmī Conclusion: A Brief Case for RelevanceAcknowledgmentsBibliographyIndex

‘The Polished Mirror is the perfect title for Zargar’s erudite and eloquent book, for it reflects with superb analytical clarity the views of a wide range of thinkers on the subject of ethics. Justifiably going beyond writings that explicitly deal with the topic, he draws together various strands of Islamic tradition, clarifying both the links and similarities that join them and the distinctions that separate them. A major contribution to Islamic studies, from which both established scholars and those new to the field stand to gain significantly.’