Before Homosexuality in the Arab-Islamic World, 1500-1800 (36 page)

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Authors: Khaled El-Rouayheb

BOOK: Before Homosexuality in the Arab-Islamic World, 1500-1800
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In literary representations passionate love often appeared as a mysterious and ineffable force that suddenly and unpredictably took hold of the soul. Both Baha
ʾ al-Di
n al-ʿA
mili
and the later Shi
ʿi
scholar Niʿmatallah al-Jaza
ʾiri
(d. 1702) cited the following view:
Love is a spiritual secret that descends on the heart from the supernatural world, and therefore it is called
hawa
,
from the root
hwy
and the verb
yahwa
,
meaning “falls.” It is also called
h
ubb
since it reaches the core of the heart (
h
abbat al-qalb),
which is the source of life. If it reaches the heart, it then flows with life in all parts of the body, imprinting on it the image of the beloved.
136
 
The Damascene belletrist Muh
yi
al-Di
n al-S
alti
(d. 1702), author of a tract on love, similarly defined it as “a disposition
(malakah)
that seizes the soul; if it gains ascendancy over the soul, the latter will assume its characteristics, and if the soul gains ascendancy over the power, it will be driven back to its world.”
137

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