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The Interplay Between the Beloved’s Femininity and the Speakers’ Fana in Hafiz’s Ghazals
Abstract by Hossein Salimian Rizi On Session VII-15  (Islamic Poetics)

On Thursday, November 14 at 11:30 am

2024 Annual Meeting

Abstract
Despite the comprehensive research on the ghazals of Hafiz-e Shiraz (d. 1390), femininity and gender representations have remained understudied areas in his poetry. His poems occasionally delve into the sensual aspects of love, and the feminine is depicted in earthly terms. However, even in these moments, there is often a deeper spiritual undertone since his ghazals basically reflect the core principles of Sufism, such as the concepts of annihilation (fana) and subsistence (baqa) as two complementary ideas in the mystic’s ultimate union with the divine. Fana, the absolute annihilation of the human ego before God, has a specific spiritual meaning in Sufi mysticism. It is regarded as a free act of divine grace which might enthral man and take him out of himself. Many Sufis refer to this experiential cycle as ‘death’, in the sense of dying to one’s own qualities to dwell in the divine attributes. This spiritual annihilation of the self is often closely correlated with the feminine representations of the beloved in many of Hafiz’s ghazals. The feminine is often represented as the beloved, embodying qualities such as beauty, grace, and spiritual depth. Influenced by Ibn Arabi’s feminization of God, Hafiz often feminizes the beloved. Ibn Arabi (d. 1240) feminized the beloved God, assuming that man’s longing for woman is a mirror image of God’s longing for the human being. This ‘unity of being’, Lutfi argues, is actualized by the perfect man, who is at once male and female, reflecting the image of the androgynous Godfigure. Occasionally together with the appearance of fana in Hafiz’s ghazals, the feminine attributes of the beloved, with whom the lyric “I” seeks union, get established. In those ghazals with feminine properties or overtones, the speakers would never perfectly attain fana unless they approach the female counterpart to the full extent. This paper investigates some of Hafiz’s ghazals, which demonstrate femininity and gendered depictions of the beloved, with regard to their subtle interplay with the concept of fana towards the mystic’s ultimate union with the divine. As a theoretical foundation, I employ gendered discourse analysis to investigate the feminine meanings generated in the ghazals. I also draw on Ibn Arabi’s recognition of the feminine attributes of the divine. Finally, I suggest that the femininity in his verses serves as a multifaceted symbol, representing both human love and the seeker’s longing for spiritual union with the divine feminized beloved.
Discipline
Literature
Geographic Area
Iran
Islamic World
Spain
Sub Area
None