A correspondent has drawn my attention to an
interesting article, and asked an
interesting question.
The article is Renaud Fabbri, "
The Milk of the Virgin: The Prophet, the Saint and the Sage," which appeared in
Sacred Web 20 (Winter 2007). It is
available directly from the Bloomington "World Wisdom" website. Given this, it certainly does not contradict
the current consensus of the Bloomington community.
The central argument of the article is that Schuon should be "understood neither as the founder of a new religion (a prophet in the classical sense of the word) nor as a Muslim saint, but as
a universal sage." The article disagrees with my analysis (in
Against the Modern World) that Schuon progressively moved away from a starting point in Sufi Islam as "typically modernist and psychological" in its assumption that Schuon's positions evolved. In fact, argues Fabbri, there was "a progressive unveiling" of what had always been there. "The growing emphasis of the late Schuon on primordiality and universality did not represent a deviation but corresponded to a final, yet perfectly natural crystallization revealing that, to some degree,
Schuon's connection with Islam was not absolutely essential." In fact, the "undeniable connection of Schuon with Islam
did not mean however that his message was intrinsically Islamic."
The difference between Fabbri and myself is
partly about timing and partly about method. Fabbri and I seem to agree on how Schuon was seen and saw himself at the end. The question is whether this position evolved, or was always there. The method of the historian assumes that nothing is pre-ordained, and everything develops, to some extent by chance. Fabbri's method assumes the contrary.
Now to the question:
As a Muslim (but by no means an 'aalim/scholar), I am surprised that, in spite of works like yours and other recent ones which shed more light on Schuon's beliefs and practices, there has than been so little response from traditional Islamic spiritual authorities as to the standing of Schuon as a Shadhili "Shaykh" and the Maryamiyyah as a Shadhili "tariqah". It now seems there is little doubt as to how Schuon viewed his function and message; articles such as Rennaud Fabbri's "The Milk of the Virgin: the Prophet, the Sage, and the Sage" emphasise that, due to Schuon's "supra-confessional" starting point and standing, it would be a mistake to confine the Schuonian message and function within Islam and subject to the Islamic criteria for judging orthodox Shaikhs and Tariqahs. To me the Perennialists' writings that have appeared after Schuon's death effectively place Schuon's "religio perennis/pure esoterism" beyond the criteria and authority of Islam/traditional sufism and basically ask us to accept whatever Schuon said ultimately on the basis of his own authority (or, for the Perennialists, the authority of the "Intellect"). Such being the case, where is the response of traditional Islam/Sufism? Is it because Schuon's/Pernnialist writings have not been translated into Islamic languages and therefore generally not known? Or is it that Pernnialism is/was not taken that seriously in such circles and thought not worth responding to?
I think the answer to this may come in two parts. One part is that "traditional" Muslims, in contrast to Salafi Muslims, are
very cautious indeed when it comes to takfir, to charges of heresy that potentially have the effect of excommunication. This is partly because of numerous
hadith warning against this, partly because of
adab, partly because of reluctance to cause
fitna--and partly precisely because of Salafi enthusiasm for
takfir.
The second part of the answer is that one has to make
a distinction between the Bloomington community and the Maryamiyya as a whole. In Schuon's lifetime, Bloomington was more universalist than the worldwide Maryamiyya, which was more Sufi and Islamic, but the authority of the figure of Schuon kept these two trends from producing a split, rather as the authority of the figure of Tito kept Yugoslavia together. Since Schuon's death there seems to have been
a clear split--I say "seems" because I have not researched this properly. What are best known today are not the universalist Bloomington positions but the Islamic positions. The universalist Bloomington positions are
so universalist that they need not concern Muslims, any more than the positions of--say--the Mormons need concern Muslims. And, given the split, the Islamic positions can be--and are--taken separately.
Whether this is as it should be is another question, and one that is not really the business of this blog.
