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What is the book "Mukashafat al-Qulub fi Hadrat Allam al-Ghuyub" and is it considered one of the books of Sufi innovations (bid'ah)?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

The book "Mukashafat al-Qulub fi Hadrat Allam al-Ghuyub" (Unveiling of Hearts in the Presence of the Knower of the Unseen) is falsely attributed to Imam Abu Hamid al-Ghazali. Researchers have cited several reasons for this, including:

1. The author's statement at the beginning of the book: "Named Mukashafat al-Qulub, bringing one closer to the Knower of the Unseen, attributed to Sheikh al-Ghazali." It is inconceivable that al-Ghazali would say this about himself. 2. The author of the book mentions al-Qurtubi, who died in 671 AH, while al-Ghazali died in 505 AH. How could he transmit from him? 3. The writer quotes in several places from the book "Zahr al-Riyad wa Shifa' al-Qulub al-Mirad" by al-Qastallani, who died in 923 AH. 4. The book includes a large number of embellished anecdotes and lessons from al-Ghazali's books and others, which indicates the absence of al-Ghazali's intellectual rigor and independent writing style.

Researchers have not found any statements from scholars evaluating the book or any critical studies of its content.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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