Cyrus Ali
Zargar
Scholar of Sufism · Islamic Philosophy · Arabic & Persian Literature
University of Central Florida
سالکان دانند در میدان درد
تا فنای عشق با مردان چه کرد
فريد الدين عطَار
On the Scholar
Scholarship & Vision
Cyrus Ali Zargar is the Al-Ghazali Distinguished Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Central Florida in Orlando — a chair that honors his singular dedication to the living tradition of Islamic mysticism. A product of UCLA and UC Berkeley, where he earned his doctorate in Near Eastern Studies in 2008, Zargar has devoted his scholarly life to the literature of medieval Sufism in Arabic and Persian.
His research moves with the grace and rigor of the tradition it illuminates: he explores the poetic expression of mystical experience, the ethical treatises of the great saints, the theosophical writings of Ibn al-ʿArabi, and the transformative power of love poetry as a vehicle for spiritual insight. He has also taught at Augustana College, San Francisco State University, and UC Berkeley, contributing to the growth of Islamic studies across the United States.
A member of the American Academy of Religion, Zargar's scholarship bridges the worlds of philosophy, mysticism, narrative, and poetry — offering readers a rich tapestry that illuminates the interconnectedness of the Islamic spiritual universe.
UC Berkeley, 2008
Major Works
Sacred Language
University of California Press · 2027
An exploration of Islam through its most sacred forms of language — revelation, prayer, and dream. Zargar illuminates how Muslims across centuries have understood divine communication as a living presence, and how sacred speech shapes self, community, and cosmos.
Publisher's Page ↗
Religion of Love
SUNY Press · 2024
An exploration of Sufism and self-transformation through the poetic imagination of ʿAṭṭār, the great Persian mystic poet. Zargar illuminates how love — divine, spiritual, and ineffable — functions as the primary vehicle for the soul's journey toward God in the classical Sufi tradition.
Publisher's Page ↗
The Ethics of Karbala
Routledge · 2024
A profound meditation on the myths, modernity, and virtues of nobility emerging from the tragedy of Karbala. Zargar traces how this foundational event in Islamic history continues to generate an ethics of sacrifice, dignity, and moral courage across centuries of literature, ritual, and memory.
Publisher's Page ↗
The Polished Mirror
Oneworld Academic · 2017
The first English-language study to explore Islamic virtue ethics through the lens of narrative and storytelling. Drawing on philosophers, ascetics, poets, and saints from 900 to 1300 CE — from Ibn Sina and al-Ghazali to Rumi and Suhrawardi — Zargar reveals how pre-modern Muslims cultivated moral character through the art of the parable.
Publisher's Page ↗
Sufi Aesthetics
University of South Carolina Press · 2011
A groundbreaking inquiry into beauty, love, and the human form in the mystical writings of Ibn ʿArabi and Fakhr al-Din ʿIraqi. This work reveals how Sufi thinkers understood aesthetic experience as a gateway to divine presence — and why the beloved's face could become a theophany.
Publisher's Page ↗Areas of Inquiry
Classical Sufism
The literature, practice, and theoretical elaboration of Islamic mysticism from its formative centuries through the high medieval period, with attention to Arabic and Persian sources.
Islamic Ethics & Virtue
The intersection of Islamic philosophy and Sufism around questions of character, moral formation, and the perfection of the soul — illuminated through the art of narrative and parable.
Sufi Aesthetics
How beauty, love, and the experience of the human form function as spiritual and philosophical categories within the mystical imagination, particularly in the thought of Ibn ʿArabi.
Arabic & Persian Poetry
The poetic expression of mystical experience and divine love — from the ghazal tradition to the great masnavi epics — as a vehicle for self-transformation and theological reflection.
Ethics in Literature & Film
The continuing life of Islamic ethical imagination in modern and contemporary forms, including satire, fiction, and cinema as sites of moral discourse.
Islamic Philosophy
The philosophical tradition from Avicenna to Suhrawardi, traced in relation to Sufi thought and the shared concern with illumination, self-knowledge, and the soul's ascent.