Gilis was a leading French Traditionalist (of Belgian origin), an expert on Ibn Arabi, and a follower of Michel Valsan (1907-1974), the most important Traditionalist Sufi shaykh in France during the later twentieth century.
His first two books, published in 1960 and 1964, dealt with the Belgian Congo. His later books, of which there were many, dealt mostly with Islam, but he also wrote on other Traditionalist topics such as Free Masonry and on Guénon himself. His books on Islam included titles like Marie en Islam (Mary in Islam, 1990), La Doctrine initiatique du Pèlerinage (The Initiatic Doctrine of the Pilgrimage, 1994), and L'Intégrité islamique ni intégrisme, ni intégration (Islamic Integrity: Neither Fundamentalism nor Integration, 2011). Several were translated, most often into Italian. In addition, he published several translations of classic texts with notes and commentary, most notably a two-volume translation of Ibn Arabi’s Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam, as Le livre des chatons des sagesses (1997). In addition to writing and translating, he served as Friday preacher in a Paris mosque.
An unsigned obituary on the website Conscience Soufie concluded:
Charles-André Gilis was… a combination of Ibn 'Arabî and Ibn Hazm, an eagle with a hieratic posture and a contemplative nature, who could swoop down on his prey at any moment like a marksman. Like everyone else, he had the qualities of his faults and the faults of his qualities. But it is up to believers to consider the greatness of a man by what he leaves behind, a legacy that is, in this case, essential for anyone who wishes to immerse themselves in the serious study of Ibn 'Arabi and Sufism in its speculative mode of expression.
