Biography
Dr. Mukhtar Ali is Associate Professor of Islamic Studies and received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. His work focuses on Islamic mysticism, philosophy, and ethics, with broader interests in Arabic and Persian literature, Qurʾānic studies, theology and traditional medicine.
His scholarship centers on Ibn al-ʿArabī and the later intellectual tradition that developed around his metaphysics, especially in the writings of figures such as Qayṣarī and Jāmī. His methodology combines close textual and philological analysis with philosophical interpretation, situating Arabic and Persian Sufi texts within the broader traditions of Islamic metaphysics, theology, and Qurʾānic hermeneutics. He is the author of Philosophical Sufism: An Introduction to the School of Ibn al-ʿArabī (Routledge, 2021) and The Horizons of Being: The Metaphysics of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the Muqaddimat al-Qayṣarī (Brill, 2020). His work, Inscriptions of Wisdom: The Sufism of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the Mirror of Jāmī, examines Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam through the lens of Jāmī’s Naqd al-nuṣūṣ fī sharḥ Naqsh al-Fuṣūṣ. He has also translated two works in contemporary Islamic metaphysics by Dr. Akram Almajid: The Law of Correspondence (2021) and The New Creation (2018).
In addition to his academic work, Dr. Ali holds advanced training in Traditional Chinese Medicine and is a practitioner in the field. Drawing on his background in both religious studies and traditional medicine, he teaches courses on religion, healing, and medicine, with particular attention to comparative traditions of healing.
Courses
Introduction to Islam (REL 214) – 3 credits
History of Islamic thought from the time of Muhammad to the present, including the prophethood of Muhammad, the Qur'an, theology and law, mysticism and philosophy, sectarian movements, modernism and legal reform, and contemporary resurgence.
Islamic Intellectual Culture (REL 280) – 3 credits
Explores traditions of knowledge and culture that shaped Islamic civilization from the seventh to the fifteenth century. Through recent scholarship and translated primary texts, students examine poetry, philosophy, cosmology, mysticism, art, and medicine to understand how Muslims interpreted the world and pursued learning. The course investigates debates on revelation and reason, the soul, sacred art, and healing traditions while developing tools for studying Islamic intellectual culture within broader humanistic and comparative frameworks.
Mystics and Saints in Islam (REL 260) – 3 credits
Examines mystical concepts and practices in Islam through the ages, through the lives and writings of important mystics and Sufi holy men and women, as well as the integration of mysticism and the Sufi Orders into Muslim society and Islamic orthodoxy.
The Qur’an (REL 223) – 3 credits
Introduction to the Qur'an (Koran), the holy scripture of Islam, examining its major doctrines, thematic development, literary style, and its relationship to pre-Qur'anic, especially Biblical, traditions. Special attention is given to various methods Muslims have used to interpret the Qur'an.
Islamic Philosophy (REL 343) – 3 credits
Survey of major developments within Islamic philosophy from the early classical to the early modern period. Focuses on the ideas and figures that have shaped Islamic philosophy through the centuries, as well as the contexts in which those ideas were produced. Topics covered include the transmission of Greek philosophy into Arabic. Islamic Peripatetic philosophy, Illuminationism, Shi'ite philosophy, and philosophical Sufism, including the great synthesis of Mulla Sadra.
Islamic Ethics (REL 481) – 3 credits
This course presents a comprehensive survey of ethics in Islamic theology and philosophy. The main focus is to examine ontological and epistemological questions related to ethics, covering different approaches to human action, obligation and ethical judgments. In the philosophical section, the course covers principle ethical themes in Greek philosophy and its effect on classical Islamic philosophy and later developments. Students will learn the history, concepts, doctrines, and philosophers in the classical Islamic tradition, as well as modern contemporary trends in moral philosophy.
Medicine and the Sacred: Healing Traditions Across Cultures (REL 380) - 3 credits
Medicine and the Sacred Course Description This course is a comparative exploration of medical and healing traditions and their religious, spiritual and cultural intersections. Students will gain an understanding the systems of medicine in China, India, and the Middle East, including the histories that inform those traditions. Within the frameworks of Chinese Medicine and its related disciplines, Greco-Islamic Medicine, Ayurveda and Western Medicine, we will discuss some of the following topics: divine healers and medical authority, etiology and pathology, religious pharmacology and drugs, mental health, spiritual states, among others.
Rumi: Poetry, Wisdom, Metaphysics (REL 495) – 3 credits
Hailed as one of the world’s greatest mystical poets, Jalal al-Din Rumi (d. 1273) transcends the boundaries of language, religion and ethnicity. Today Rumi’s poems can be heard in mosques, monasteries, churches and synagogues. This course examines Rumi’s teachings, the metaphysics of love and his perennial wisdom through translations of his sublime verse, the quintessential art form of the Sufis.
Islamic Theology (REL 514) – 3 credits
Study of the language, arguments and schools of classical Islamic theology, mainly through direct study of English translations of theological texts from various theological schools.
Education
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 2007
B.A. University of California, Berkeley, 1998
Highlighted Publications
Books
Inscriptions of Wisdom: The Sufism of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the Mirror of Jāmī. Albany: State University New York Press, 2025.
Philosophical Sufism: An Introduction to the School of Ibn al-ʿArabī. London: Routledge, 2021.
The Horizons of Being: The Metaphysics of Ibn al-ʿArabī in the Muqaddimat al-Qayṣarī. Leiden: Brill, 2020.
Translations
Almajid, Akram. Qānūn al-Tanāsub (The Law of Correspondence), translated by Mukhtar H. Ali. London: Sage Press, 2021.
Almajid, Akram. al-Khalq al-jadīd (The New Creation), translated by Mukhtar H. Ali. London: Sage Press, 2018.
Current Research
Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī: The Compendium of Mysteries (Jāmiʿ al-asrār wa manbaʿ al-anwār), Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming).
Recent Publications
Articles
- “Reading the Soul: Firāsa and the Science of Character in Islamic Thought.” Journal of Sufi Studies, (in press, 2027).
- “Truth and Reality (al-ḥaqq wa-l-ḥaqīqa)” in St Andrews Encyclopaedia of Theology, edited by Brendan Wolfe et al. University of St Andrews, 2024.
- “Sufi Ethics: Synthesis and Legacy” in Oxford Handbook of Islamic Ethics, edited by Mustafa Shah. Oxford: Oxford University Press (in press).
- “The Fusion of Shi’ism and Sufism in the Thought of Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī.” Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 11.1 (2024) 1-24.
- “The Book of Majesty Which is the Word Allah (Kitāb al-Jalāla wa huwa kalimat Allāh).” Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi Society 74 (2023): 39-58.
- “The Religion of Abraham: Sufi Perspectives on the Abrahamic Reality” Journal of the Institute for Sufi Studies (JISS) 1, no. 2 (2022), 3-16.
- “Prophetic Archetypes in Sufi Hermeneutics: The Allegories of Abraham, Joseph and Moses.” Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi Society 70 (2022), 1-21.
- “Futuwwa as the Noblest Character Traits (Makārim al-Akhlāq) in Anṣārī’s Manāzil al-Sāʾirīn with al-Kāshānī’s Commentary.” Journal of Islamic Ethics 4, no. 1-2 (2020): 8-24.
- “The Doctrine of Love in Khwāja ʿAbd Allāh al-Anṣārī’s Manāzīl al-sāʾirīn with a Critical Paraphrase of ʿAbd al-Razzāq Kāshānī’s Commentary.” Journal of Sufi Studies 5, no. 2 (2016): 140-155.
- “The Concept of Spiritual Perfection According to ʿAlī ibn Sīna and Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qūnawī.” Journal of Shiʿa Islamic Studies 2, no. 2 (2009): 141-158.
Book Chapters
- "Wisdom as the Sublime Measure: A New Epistemology of Ḥikma," in A Luminous Intellect, edited by Amina Inloes and Alan Godlas. Leiden: Brill, 2025. 365–387.
- “Islam and the Unity of Being” in Nondualisms: An Interreligious Exploration, edited by Jen Wade, Anthony Watson, and Jon Paul Sydnor. Lexington Books, 2023.
- “On Self-knowledge, Divine Trial and Discipleship” in From the Divine to the Human: Contemporary Islamic Thinkers on Evil, Suffering, and the Global Pandemic, edited by Muhammad Faruque and Mohammad Rustom. London: Routledge, 2023, 29-43 (Routledge Studies in Islamic Philosophy).
- “Translating Islamic Metaphysical Texts: Reflections on Knowledge Transmission,” in Islamic Thought and the Art of Translation: Essays in Honor of William C. Chittick and Sachiko Murata, edited by Mohammad Rustom. Leiden: Brill, 2023, 429-440 12 (Islamic History and Civilization; vol. 202).
- “Maḥmūd Shabistarī: The Rosegarden of Mystery - Shams al-Dīn Lāhījī: Keys to the Wondrous Exposition” in Global Philosophy: A Sourcebook, edited by Mohammad Rustom. Sheffield: Equinox (2024).
- Personality Analysis according to Islamic Analytical and Spiritual Physiognomy (al-firāsa), in Typologies in the Islamic Ethical Discourse. Beirut: Beiruter Texte und Studien (in press).
- “Spiritual Education: Reform and Renewal” in A Festschrift for Seyyed Hossein Nasr, edited by Muhammad Faruque, Mohammad Rustom and Atif Khalil. Leiden: Brill, 2025.
- “Mullā Ṣadrā” in Handbook of Qurʾānic Hermeneutics, Volume 3: Qurʾānic Hermeneutics from the 13th to the 19th Century, edited by Georges Tamer. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2024, 291-304.
- “The Chinese Classics in the Light of Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Metaphysics” in Mysticism and Ethics in Islam, edited by Bilal Orfali, Atif Khalil and Mohammed Rustom. Beirut: American University of Beirut Press, 2022.
- “Ibn al‐ʿArabī, the Greatest Master: On Knowledge, God, and Sainthood” in A Companion to World Literature,edited by Ken Seigneurie. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 2020.
- “The Power of the Spoken Word: Prayer, Invocation, and Supplication in Islam” in Spirituality and the Good Life: Philosophical Approaches, edited by David McPherson. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2017, 136-154.