Ibn 'arabi Society

Yafiah Katherine Randall is a doctoral student in the department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Winchester. Her thesis investigates Sufism among Israeli Jews and Muslims in Israel and explores its potential contribution to reconciliation and conflict transformation

Dr. Kazuyo Murata is a lecturer in Islamic Studies at King's College London. Her ongoing work includes a study of the so-called jamal-parasti ("adoration of beauty") in the history of Sufism, also an investigation of the Quran commentary by Ruzbihan Baqli Shirazi, with a particular attention to his understanding of prophets.

Omer Colakoglu teaches English at a school in Istanbul, and continues to work as a translator between Turkish and English. He has translated 14 books (two of them into English, the others into Turkish), and hundreds of articles. He is part-way through an MA program in Fatih University's School of Divinity

Dr Cyrus Ali Zargar is Assistant Professor in Religion at Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois, in the USA. He is interested in using the study of literature in Persian and Arabic, especially lyric poetry, to explore Sufism and Shi'i mysticism. He recently published Sufi Aesthetics, which explores the spiritual writings and poetry of Ibn al-'Arabi and Fakhr al-Din 'Iraqi (d. 1289)

Prof. Georg Bossong has been full professor of Romance philology (especially Ibero-Romance linguistics) at the University of Zurich since 1994, and visiting professor at many other universities. Some of his published articles can be downloaded from his web page at the University of Zurich. He is currently preparing a translation of the Tarjuman al-Ashwaq into German

Jane Clark is a teacher and independent scholar who has been studying Ibn 'Arabi for more than thirty years. She is a Senior Research Fellow of the Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi Society, working particularly on the Society's archiving project. Her recent publications include "Establishing Ibn 'Arabi’s Heritage" (JMIAS 2013) and "Towards a Biography of Sadr al-diin al-Qunawi" (JMIAS 2011)

Olga Louchakova-Schwartz is Professor of Psychology and Comparative Religion at Sofia University and spiritual teacher in the traditions of Advaita Vedanta, Kindalini, Yoga and Prayer of the Heart. Her numerous publications cover a broad range of topics including autoimmune diseases of the nervous system, psychosomatic mysticism and non-dual consciousness

Nargis Virani is Assistant Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at The New School in New York City. She has a PhD from Harvard University. Her research explores intersections between The Qur'an and Literatures originating in Muslim milieu. She has just completed two books on Rumi's multilingual poetry: I am the Nightingale of the Merciful: Translation of Rumi's Multilingual Poems with an Introductory Essay, and Keeping God's Secrets: Multilinguality and Mystical Discourse

Todd Lawson is Associate Professor of Islamic Thought at the University of Toronto. He teaches courses on the Qur'an, Sufism, Shi'i Islam and related topics. His most recent book is Gnostic Apocalypse and Islam. He is now writing a book on the Qur'an as sacred epic.

Carl Ernst is a specialist in Islamic studies, with a focus on West and South Asia. He is the William P. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. His most recent publications are How to Read the Qur'an: A New Guide, with Select Translations and Islamophobia in America.

William Chitick is Professor of Religious Studies at Stony Brook University and has published extensively on both Rumi and Ibn 'Arabi. His most recent books are In Search of the Lost Heart: Explorations in Islamic Thought and Divine Love: Islamic Literature and the Path to God

Wahid Amin is a D Phil candidate at the University of Oxford. His research focuses on the development of post-Avicennan philosohy in the 13th Century with a special focus on Nasir al-Din al-Tusi and the school of Maragha philosophers

Mohammed Rustom is Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies at Carleton University, Ottawa. He is the author of The Triumph of Mercy: Philosophy and Scripture in Mulla Sadra, and the main editor of an anthology of William Chittick's writings entitiled In Search of the Lost Heart: Explorations in Islamic Thought.

Dot Clark is an experienced PersonCentred psychotherapist, supervisor and trainer. Currently she is a PhD candidate in Counselling and Psychotherapy at the University of Edinburgh. Her study relates the Metaphysics of Unity of Ibn 'Arabi to psychotherapy.

Samir Mahmoud is currently the Agha Khan Post-Doctoral Visiting Fellow at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He recently submitted his doctoral dissertation on Ibn 'Arabi at the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge

Eric Geoffroy is Professor of Islamic Studies in the Department of Arabic and Islamic studies at the University of Strasbourg. He also teaches at the Open University of Catalonia and at the Catholic University of Louvain (Belgium). He is a specialist in the study of Sufism and sanctity in Islam

Cemalnur Sargut received her BSc in Chemical Engineering from the State Academy of Architecture and Engineering in 1974 and taught Chemistry to high school students in Istanbul for 20 years. For the last 25 years, she has been carrying out research and studies on Ahmad alRifai,Kenan Rifai and Rumi as well as Ibn 'Arabi, Niyazi Misri, Shibli, Qunawi and Jilli. She is President of the Turkish Women's Cultural Association (TURKKAD), Istanbul

Alison Yiangou read physics and psychology at Bristol and Oxford and then trained in business management and human relations before joining her husband to found Yiangou Architects in 1981. A long-time student of the Beshara School and member of the Ibn 'Arabi Society, she has lectured internationally and has published in the Society's Journal. She recently helped establish the "Self-Knowledge and Global Responsibility" Journal

James W. Morris, PhD, Professor at Boston College and former Chair of Islamic Studies at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter has also taught Islamic and comparative religious studies at many universities, including Princeton, Oberlin, and the Sorbonne. His many books include: Knowing the Spirit ; The Reflective Heart: Discovering Spiritual Intelligence in Ibn 'Arabi's 'Meccan Illuminations'; Orientations: Islamic Thought in a World Civilisation ; and Ibn 'Arabi: The Meccan Revelations.

Dr. Ann Coxon has been associated with the Society for many years and was the Fellows' Representative in 2005. She had an international childhood exposed to many religious faiths, and was educated in convent schools. She is a respected Consultant Physician and Neurologist, in full time Medical Practice in London at the age of 70. She says "she is still looking for the relationship between Medicine and Healing". As a child she realised that religion does not necessarily result in goodness, but that did not deter her from the search for a spiritual path. She is due to go on Hajj for the second time; the first time she was one of the pilgrims from the UK being followed by television. Ann describes herself as being an "unconventional Muslim" and believes "each person seeks and finds their own spiritual path".