Khalil, Atif

Khalil, Atif
Associate Professor

History and Religion Department

Phone
(403) 332-4585
Email
atif.khalil@uleth.ca

Office Hours

By Email Appointment

About Me

Primary Research Interests: Sufism; Classical Islamic Ethics, Moral Psychology, and Virtue Theory; Ibn Arabi (d. 1240 CE).
Secondary Research Interests: Islamic Philosophy (falsafa) and The​ology (kalam); Orientalism, Decolonialism, and the Study of Islam; Islamophobia; Theologies of Difference and the Problem of Universalism and Particularism in Religion; Comparative Mysticism; Jewish-Muslim Relations and the Medieval Judaeo-Islamic Tradition; Islam and the Near-Death Experience (extra-disciplinary interest).

Courses Taught (Undergraduate): 

  • RELS1000 World Religions
  • RELS2600 Introduction to Islam
  • RELS3600 Islamic Theology and Philosophy
  • RELS3600 Classical Islamic Thought
  • RELS3600 Sufism
  • RELS3600 Islamic Art, Architecture, and Music
  • RELS3600 Islamic History (forthcoming)
  • RELS4000 Comparative Mysticism
  • RELS4400 Advanced Readings in Islamic Thought
  • RELS4400 Advanced Readings in Theology and Philosophy of Religion
  • RELS4400 Advanced Readings in Mystical Thought

Publications

Books and Edited Volumes

  • Sufism: The Basics (Routledge, under contract)
  • I of the Heart: Essays in Islamic Studies, co-edited with M. Faruque and M. Rustom (Leiden: Brill, forthcoming).
  • Mysticism & Ethics in Islam, co-edited with B. Orfali and M. Rustom (Beirut: American University of Beirut Press, 2022).
  • Repentance and the Return to God: Tawba in Early Sufism (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2018). Reviewed in Journal of the American Oriental Society (2022); Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (2022); Philosophy East and West (2022); Studies in Religion (2022); Journal of Sufi Studies (2020); Journal of Islamic Ethics (2020); Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies (2020); Islamochristiana (2020); Medieval Religious Cultures (2020); Nazariyyat (Turkish) (2019); American Journal of Islam and Society (2019); Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi Society (2018). 
    • https://sunypress.edu/Books/R/Repentance-and-the-Return-to-God2
  • Special Issue on Sufism, co-edited with S. Sheikh, Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 43, no. 3 (2014).
  • In Search of the Lost Heart: Essays in Classical Islamic Thought by William C. Chittick, co-edited with M. Rustom (lead ed.) and K. Murata (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2012). Translated into Albanian, Indonesian, Turkish, and other languages.
Select Academic Articles, Papers, Book Chapters, and Review Essays

  • “Humility, Self-Naughting, and Self-Transcendence: A View from the Islamic Mystical Tradition,” in Humility: A Philosophical Perspective. Ed. Justin Steinberg (Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming).
  • “Purifying the Self in Sufism,” in The Routledge Handbook of Islamic Ethics. Ed. M. Ghaly (London: Routledge, forthcoming).
  • “Circles of Remembrance: The Halveti-Jerrahis of Toronto,” in Sufism in Canada: Weaving Islamic Practice and Contemporary Spirituality. Eds. Merin S. Xavier and Geneviève Mercier-Dalphond (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2025), 40-65.
  • “Ethics in Islam,” in St. Andrew’s Encyclopedia of Theology. Eds. Brendan N. Wolfe et al. https://www.saet.ac.uk/Islam/Ethics (open access, 2024/25)
  • “Fasting in Early Sufi Literature,” Oxford Journal of Islamic Studies 35, no. 2 (2024): 216-241.  
  • “The Gifts of Suffering and the Virtues of the Heart,” in From the Divine to the Human: New Perspectives on Evil, Suffering, and the Global Pandemic. Eds. M. Faruque and M. Rustom (London: Routledge, 2023), 143-157.
  • “Ibn al-‘Arabī on the Circle of Trusteeship and the Divine Name al-Wakīl,” Journal of Sufi Studies 12 (2023): 65-82.
  • “The Beneficiary as Benefactor: al-Ghazali on the Etiquettes of Charity,” Maydan: An Online Publication of the Abu Sulayman Center for Global Islamic Studies at George Mason University (2023).
  • “Atonement, Returning, and Repentance in Islam,” Religions (special issue on Atonement, edited by Joshua Thurow) 14, no. 2 (2023): 2-9 (168).
  • “Remembering Toshihiko Izutsu: Linguist, Islamicist, Philosopher,” in Islamic Thought and the Art of Translation. Ed. M. Rustom. Islamic History and Civilization (Leiden: Brill, 2023), 528-550.
  • “Ibn al-‘Arabī & the Sufis on Trust in God (Tawakkul),” Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi Society 71, no. 1 (2022): 87-105.
  • “On Patience (Ṣabr) in Sufi Virtue Ethics,” in Mysticism and Ethics in Islam, eds. B. Orfali, M. Rustom and A. Khalil (Beirut: American University of Beirut Press, 2022), 71-78.
  • “Charity, Detachment, and the Global Inequality of Wealth: Ruminations from the Muslim Tradition,” Maydan: An Online Publication of the Abu Sulayman Center for Global Islamic Studies at George Mason University (2022).
  • “White Death: Ibn al-‘Arabī on the Trials and Virtues of Hunger and Fasting,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 141, no. 3 (2021): 577-586. Albanian translation (by E. Lohja), “Vdekja e bardhë: Ibn ʿArabīu rreth sprovave dhe virtyteve të urisë dhe agjërimit,” Zani i Naltë 34 (2022).
  • Review Essay of The Pure Intention: On Knowledge of the Unique Name by Ibn ‘Ata Allah al-Iskandari, trans. Khalid Williams (Cambridge: ITS, 2018), Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies 6, no. 1 (2021): 108-114.
  • “Sufism and Qur’ānic Ethics,” in The Routledge Handbook on Sufism, ed. L. Ridgeon (New York: Routledge Press, 2020), 159-171 (chapter 12). Albanian translation (by E. Lohja), “Shpirtshmëria Islame dhe etika Kur’anore,” Zani i Naltë 31 (2020): 5-22.
  • “Humility in Islamic Contemplative Ethics,” Journal of Islamic Ethics 4 (2020): 223-252.
  • “Science, Religion and the Challenge of Near-Death Experiences,” Renovatio: Journal of Zaytuna College (July 2020).
  • “Rreth pendesës në shpirtshmërinë islame (Repentance in Islamic Spirituality),” Zani i Naltë (2020). Albanian translation (E. Lohja).
  • “The Dialectic of Gratitude in the Non-Dualism of Ibn al-‘Arabī,” Journal of the Muhyiddin Ibn ‘Arabi Society 64 (2018): 27-51. Albanian translation (E. Lohja), Zani i Naltë.
  • “At the Tomb of René Guénon in Old Cairo,” Sacred Web 41 (2018): 84-91. Hungarian translation (Umenhoffer István), “René Guénon sírjánál Kairó óvárosában,” Duo Gladii: A szellemi ellenállás lapja 4, no. 2 (2025). 
  • Review Essay of Ibn al-‘Arabī and Islamic Intellectual Culture: From Mysticism to Philosophy by Caner Dagli (London: Routledge, 2016), Nazariyat (2017): 157-165. Translated into Turkish (by S. Parildar).
  • “A Note on Interior Conversion in Early Sufism and Ibrahim b. Adham’s Entry into the Way,” Journal of Sufi Studies 5, no. 2 (2016): 189-198.
  • “The Embodiment of Gratitude (Shukr) in Sufi Ethics,” Studia Islamica 111 (2016): 159-178. 
  • “Sufism in Western Historiography” (with S. Sheikh) Philosophy East and West 66, no. 1 (2016): 194-217. Revised, edited version published as “Sufism, Scripture, and Scholarship: From Graham to Guénon,” Sacred Web, 44 (2019): 16-25. Arabic translation (by M. Sifar), “Al-taṣawwuf fi-l acādīmiyya al-gharbiyya,” forthcoming in a collection of essays edited by M. al-Lawati.
  • “On Cultivating Gratitude in Sufi Virtue Ethics,” Journal of Sufi Studies 4 (2015): 1-26. Persian translation (by M. Kazemi), “Dar bāb-i parwardan-i shukr dar akhlāq-i faḍīlat-garāy-i ṣūfīāna,” Faṣl-nāma-yi Hunar-i Zabān (2020): 7-38.
  • “From René Guénon to Christopher Hedges: The ‘Signs of the Times’ in an Empire of Illusion?” Sacred Web: A Journal of Tradition and Modernity 36 (2015): 97-118.
  • “Jewish-Muslim Dialogue, Globalization and the Judeo-Islamic Legacy,” Journal of Religion and Society 17 (2015): 1-21 (open access). https://cdr.creighton.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/d6a220b9-d9b0-455e-aa63-add0936bcc0d/content
  • “Contentment, Satisfaction and Good Pleasure: Rida in Early Sufi Moral Psychology,” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 43, no. 3 (2014): 1-19.
  • “Tawba in the Sufi Psychology of Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (d. 996),” Oxford Journal of Islamic Studies 23, no. 3 (2012): 294-324.
  • “Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (d. 996) and the Qūt al-Qulūb (Nourishment of Hearts) in the Context of Early Sufism,” Muslim World 122, no. 2 (2012): 335-356.
  • “Is God Obliged to Answer Prayers of Petition? The Response of Classical Sufis and Qur’anic Exegetes,” Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures 37, no. 2 (2011): 93-109.
  • “The Vision of Existence in Hua-yen Buddhism,” Sacred Web: A Journal of Tradition and Modernity 23 (2009): 49-76.
  • “Ibn al-‘Arabī (d.1240) on the Three Conditions of Tawba,” Journal of Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations 17 (2006): 403-416.
  • “Some Tensions in Fārābī’s (d. 950) Metaphysics of the One and the Emanative Descent,” in Towards Comparative Philosophy, ed. Musa Akrami (Iran: Azad University, 2006), chapter 4.​
Select Conference Papers, Invited Lectures, Interfaith & Intercultural Symposia

  • “Ihsan, Catharsis, and the Trilogy of the Soul,” Opening address for Ihsan and Tzelem: Aesthetic Vision and Ethical Task, Conference on Jewish-Muslim Relations and the Judeo-Islamic Legacy, University of Virginia (February 2024)
  • “Tapestries of the Ethical Self in Islamic Piety,” Annual UCF al-Ghazali Islamic Studies Lecture, University of Central Florida, Orlando (February 2024)
  • “Ghazali on Charity and Ruminiations on the Global Disparity of Wealth,” University of Sarajevo, Bosnia (October 2023).
  • “Ibn al-‘Arabi in Japan: The Life and Legacy of Toshihiko Izutsu (1914-1993),” Translated Desires: Ibn Arabi and the Multilinguial Islam Past, Columbia University (October 2023)
  • “Charity, Detachment & Generosity in Islamic Ethics,” George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia (October 2022)
  • “Loyalty in Friendship: A Sufi Perspective,” University of Edinburgh (September 2022)
  • “On Suffering: Reflections from the Sufi Tradition,” From the Divine to the Human: New Perspectives on Evil, Suffering, and the Global Pandemic. Co-organized by M. Rustom and M. Faruque, University of Cincinnati (June 2022, remote presentation due to pandemic.“
  • Gratitude as Virtue and Vice: Critical Reflections from the Sufi Tradition,” University of Virginia (April 2022, remote presentation due to pandemic)
  • “Loyalty to God: A Sufi Perspective,” Union Theological Seminary, New York (March 2022)
  • “Ibn ‘Arabi on the Circle of Trusteeship,” Monash University (July 2021, remote presentation due to pandemic)
  • “Humility between Pride and Self-Loathing in Islamic Ethics,” University of Chicago Divinity School (May 2021, remote presentation due to pandemic)
  • “The Anti-Reformist Reformism of ‘Abd al-Wahid Yahya,” Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Conference on Muslim Reformers, Doha, Qatar (March 2020, conference postponed due to pandemic)
  • “Death in the World Religions: An Islamic Perspective,” Panelist on Islam, Hosted by the City of Lethbridge & the Lethbridge Interfaith Council (February, 2020)
  • “When does a Virtue become a Vice? Gratitude as Panacea and Poison in Sufi Ethics,” British University, Dubai, UAE (January, 2020)
  • “Humility in Sufi Ethics,” Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Conference on Sufism, Gender and Futuwwa, Doha, Qatar (November, 2019)
  • Panelist for Discussion on Politics, Religion & Muslim Identity following international award-winning play Disgraced at the Martha Cohen Theatre, Calgary (October, 2019)
  • “Gratitude Towards the ‘Other’ in Islamic Contemplative Ethics,” Yale University, Divinity School Symposium on Gratitude (September 2019)
  • “Patience in Early Sufism,” American University of Beirut, Conference on Mysticism and Ethics, Beirut, Lebanon (May 2019)
  • “Compassion in Islam: Ideals & Realities” Open House, Lethbridge Muslim Association (April 2019)
  • “Sufi Ethics and the Station of Repentance,” and “Islam and the Near-Death Experience: Some Preliminary Reflections,” Uskudur University, Istanbul, Turkey (March 2018)
  • “The Shirk of Shukr: Gratitude in the Non-Dualism of Ibn al-‘Arabi,” Annual Ibn al-‘Arabi Conference, University of California at Santa Barbara (November 2017)
  • “The Wings of Angel on the Tail of Donkey: Rumi on the Human Predicament,” Waterloo-Kitchner, Wilfred Laurier University (September 2016).
  • “Intimate Strangers? Jewish-Muslim Relations in Light of Medieval and Modern History,” Centre for Judaic and Inter-Religious Studies, Shandong University, Jinan, China (June 2016)
  • “Music in Islamic Law, Theology and Mysticism,” Centre for Advanced Humanistic Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China (June 2016)
  • “Averroes on the Relation of Reason and Revelation,” Minzu University, Beijing, China (June 2016)
  • “Rabia of Basra (d. 801 CE): Between Myth and History,” Dept. of Religious Studies, University of Calgary (Fall 2015). 
  • “Islam in the Abrahamic Mosaic,” In Muslims Next Door, a short lecture followed by panel discussion, sponsored by the City of Lethbridge, the Canadian Coalition of Municipalities Against Racism and Discrimination, and the Lethbridge Islamic Centre, Lethbridge City Hall (January 2015).
  • “Jewish-Muslim Relations, Globalization & the Perennial Philosophy,” Wilfred Laurier University (Fall 2014).
  • “Reflections on Detachment in the Writings of Meister Eckhart,” Wilfred Laurier University (Fall 2013).
  • “Cultivating Gratitude as a Mode of Being: Reflections from the Sufi Tradition and Positive Psychology,” Wilfred Laurier University (Fall 2012)
  • “The Experience of Muslim Minorities in Southern Alberta,” Diversity Conference, sponsored by the City of Lethbridge and the Canadian Coalition of Municipalities Against Racism and Discrimination, Lethbridge (Spring 2012).
  • “The Virtues of Sin and the Sins of Repentance: The Mystical Theology of a Medieval Spanish Mystic,” Department of Religious Studies, University of Calgary (April, 2009).
  • “Sufism as Inner Islam,” Calgary Inter-Mennonite Church (November, 2009).
  • “The Abrahamic Vision of Islam,” and “The Islamic Intellectual Tradition,” invited by Rabbi Azrael of Temple Israel as keynote speaker to address rabbis and clerics for the 67th Annul Rabbi Sidney H. Jane Brooks Institute on Judaism for Christian Clergy. Omaha, Nebraska (April 2007).
  • “The Poethics of Teshuva / Tawba as a Critical Discipline for the Reconciliation of Judaism and Islam” (co-authored with Rabbi [Dr.] Aubrey Glazer, Sufism et Kabbalah for international conference sponsored by the Alliance Israelite Universelle). Paper presented by Rabbi Glazer in Paris, France (October 2006).
  • “Science and Philosophy in Medieval Islam,” Toronto Noor Centre for Islamic Culture (March 2005).
  • “Abraham’s Call & the Binding: An Islamic Perspective,” Voices from the Children of Abraham (interfaith dialogue with John Boissonneau, Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Toronto, and Rabbi Yael Splansky), Holy Blossom Synagogue, Toronto (February 2005).
  • “Surmounting Inter-Otherness: On the Prospects for Jewish-Muslim Understanding,” Inscriptions: Decoding Politics, Gender and Culture in Epistemologies and Praxis, AAMSS Annual Conference, Toronto, Canada (November 2004).
  • “Judaism & Islam in Contemplative Dialogue,” with Rabbi Aubrey Glazer, Beth Tzedec Synagogue, Toronto (June 2004).
  • “Muslim-Jewish Mysticism in Dialogue,” Spirit Matters: Wisdom Traditions and the ‘Great Work’ (dialogue circle co-hosted with Rabbi Aubrey Glazer), Ontario Institute of Science and Education, Toronto (May 2004).
  • “An Islamic Response to the Environmental Crisis,” Symposium on Religion and the Environment, Toronto School of Theology (July 2002).

Book Reviews

  • House of the Prophet: Devotion to Muhammad in Islamic Mysticism by Claude Addas, trans. D. Streight (Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae, 2024), Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies, forthcoming.
  • Rabia from Narrative to Myth by Rkia Cornell (Oxford: Oxford Oneworld Academic, 2019), Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies, 8, no. 1 (2023): 82-88.
  • Sainthood and Authority in Early Islam: Al-Hakīm al-Tirmidhī’s Theory of Wilāya and the Reenvisioning of the Sunnī Caliphate by Aiyub Palmer (Brill, 2019), Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies 5, no. 2 (2020): 88-93.
  • Ethics and Spirituality: adab in Sufism, eds. F. Chiabotti et al. (Brill, 2017), Journal of Islamic Ethics 4 (2020): 268-273.
  • Ahmad al-Ghazālī, Remembrance, and the Metaphysics of Love by Joseph Lumbard (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2016), Journal of Sufi Studies 6 (2017): 233-236.
  • Sufism and Deconstruction by Ian Almond (London: Routledge, 2009), Sacred Web: A Journal of Tradition and Modernity, 39 (2017): 163-168.
  • Sufism Black and White, eds. Bilal Orfali and Nada Saab (Leiden: Brill, 2012), Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses. 45, no. 1 (2016): 79-80.
  • Spiritual Purification in Islam: The Life and Words of al-Muhasibi by Gavin Picken, (New York: Routledge, 2011), Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures 42, no. 2 (2016): 278-280.
  • Islamic Mysticism and the Role of the Heart by Saeko Yazaki (Routledge, 2012), Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 25, no. 2 (2015): 357-360.
  • The Comfort of the Mystics (Salwat al-‘ārifīn) by Gerhard Bowering and Bilal Orfali (Leiden, Brill: 2013), American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 31, no. 3 (2014):149-152.
  • The Cardinal Virtues in the Middle Ages by István Bejczy (Leiden: Brill, 2012), Studies in Religion 43 (2014): 183-185.
  • Arabic-English Dictionary of Qur’ānic Usage by Elsaid M. Badawi and Muhammad Abdel Haleem (Leiden, Brill. 2008), Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures 40 (2014): 101-104.
  • The Ocean of the Soul: Men, the World, and God in the Stories of Farīd Al-Dīn Aṭṭār by Hellmut Ritter (Leiden: Brill, 2003), Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 36 (2007): 626-627.
  • The Formation of the Classical Tafsīr Tradition: The Qur’ān Commentary of Al-Tha‘labi by Walid Saleh (Leiden: Brill, 2003), Studies in Religion/ Sciences Religieuses 35 (2006): 610-611.
  • Al-Ghazālī’s Unspeakable Doctrine of the Soul: Unveiling the Esoteric Psychology and Eschatology of the Iḥyā’ by Timothy Gianotti (Leiden: Brill, 2001) American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 23, no.1 (Winter 2006): 126-128.
  • Ibn Arabi and Modern Thought: The History of Taking Metaphysics Seriously by Peter Coates (Oxford: Anqa Publishing, 2002), Journal of Religion and Society 7 (2005).
  • The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria by Josef Meri (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 21, No. 4 (Fall 2005): 133-136.
  • The Elixir of the Gnostics: A Parallel English-Arabic Text by Mulla Sadra translated with introduction and by William Chittick (Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 2003), American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 21, no.1 (Winter 2004): 127-130.

Degrees

PhD (2009), University of Toronto (Center for the Study of Religion). The SSRHC-funded thesis examined the semantic and conceptual dimensions of repentance and atonement in the Quran and the diachronic development of these ideas in early Islam. Doctoral Supervisor: Todd Lawson; Thesis Committee: Amir Harrak, Michael Marmura, Walid Saleh, Maria Subtelny; External Examiner: Ahmet Karamustafa.

Hon. BA (2000), University of Toronto (with high distinction; religion and philosophy; some course work at McGill). 

Arabic & Islamic Studies Abroad: Syria (2003/04); Yemen (1998/99).

Research Interests

 

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