The Mystical Content Attained by Love: The Line of Ahmad al-Ghazâlî, al-Baqlî and 'Irâqî

Love is one of the important concepts of Sufism. The concept of love that used to refer to the relationship between humans during the early period was then started to be utilized by Sufis as a concept that stands for the love between God and human. In this context, Ahmad al-Ghazali wrote his book Sawanih describing the metaphysical dimension of mystical love. Then he was followed by Ruzbihan al-Baqli and Fakhr al-Din 'Iraqi by their works on divine love. In this article, within the framework of the views derived from the works of these sufis, attention is drawn to the nature of mystical love in the light of the concepts of beauty (jamal, husn), tawhid (oneness of God), fana (annihilation in God), tajalli (self-disclosure), majaz (metaphor) and haqiqah (truth).