Al-Ghazali's Unspeakable Doctrine of the Soul

This text marks a radical rethinking of the soul and the afterlife in the writings of al-Ghazali (d. 505/1111), particularly within his magnum opus, Reviving Religious Knowledge (Ihya'ulum al-din). Attending closely to variations of genre and discourse mode within his works, it attempts to resolve some of the major ambiguities that have vexed al-Ghazali's readers for nearly nine hundred years.Beginning with his theory of multi-level, multi-genre writing and working through his theological, philosophical, and mystical positions on the soul's true nature, the study culminates in an exploration of al-Ghazali's mystical "e;psycho-cosmology"e;, where some startling conclusions are drawn regarding his most intimate thoughts on the "e;secrets"e; of the soul and the Hereafter.Meticulously researched and yet engagingly written, this study speaks to both the specialist and the amateur intellectual historian.