Singularity, Relationship, and the Oneness of Being: Maurice Blanchot and Ibn ‘Arabi

Abstract

This paper reads al-Futuhat al-Makkiyyah by Ibn ‘Arabi through L’Entretien infini (The Infinite Conversation) by Maurice Blanchot to criticize the dominant idea of oneness and unity of being in metaphysics. To go beyond this, Blanchot proposes in the human experience a new set of relations in which the human comes into existence by being in relation with the One which is no longer a unified essence but rather is the Other unknown and is always in the process of becoming. Here, the human becomes an other facing the Other having an absolute singular relation every single moment causing the strangeness and the interruption in their being. By reading Ibn ‘Arabi’s idea of the Onness/Manyness while thinking of Blanchot’s new kind of relationship, it is argued that God and the human are neither the One nor the many. They are perpetually distancing themselves from each other in close proximity without standing in a one/many relationship.