Ibn 'arabi Society

Michael Sells, Ph.D. (University of Chicago), is a John Henry Barrows Professor of Islamic History and Literature in the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. Michael Sells studies and teaches in the areas of qur'anic studies; Sufism; Arabic and Islamic love poetry; mysticism (Greek, Islamic, Christian, and Jewish); and religion and violence. He is currently completing a new and expanded edition of his 1999 book Approaching the Qur'an: the Early Revelations. He has published three volumes on Arabic poetry: Desert Tracings: Six Classic Arabian Odes; which focuses upon the pre-Islamic period; Stations of Desire, which focuses upon the love poetry of Ibn al-'Arabi; and The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature, Al-Andalus which he co-edited and to which he contributed. His books on mysticism include Early Islamic Mysticism, translations and commentaries on influential mystical passages from the Qur'an, hadith, Arabic poetry, and early Sufi writings; and Mystical Languages of Unsaying, an examination of