and the people’s esteem for him grew. He then remained there for a year and a half, after which he was released. They compelled him to write out certain phrases they had drafted, and he was threatened—or (1) expressly warned—with death should he refuse to do so (2).
He stayed on in Egypt teaching the religious sciences, and great numbers (3) gathered around him, until he spoke out against the ittiḥādiyya, the proponents of the doctrine of the oneness of existence—namely Ibn Sabʿīn, Ibn ʿArabī, al-Qūnawī, and their peers (4). At that, a faction of Sufis and mendicants rallied against him, charging that he had spoken ill (5) of the elite among the saints. A public hearing was convened for his case; afterward they sent him off under guard by the royal post, only to bring him back after a single stage from Cairo. Seeing advantage in detaining him, they confined him in the judges’ prison for another year and a half.
(1) The other manuscripts read: "wahuddida wa tuwwi'a" (he was threatened and warned).
(2) For a detailed account of this incident, see the introduction to al-Jami' li-Sirat Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyya, 3rd ed., pp. 39-47.
(3) Manuscript K has: "indahu khalq" (a crowd was with him).
(4) Ibn Sabin is Abd al-Haqq ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al-Ishbili (d. 669/1271), a philosopher-mystic who espoused wahdat al-wujud (the oneness of being); see Tarikh al-Islam 15:168. Ibn Arabi is Muhammad ibn Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Arabi al-Ta'i al-Andalusi, known as Muhyi al-Din and titled al-Shaykh al-Akbar (d. 638/1240), a leading Sufi advocate of wahdat al-wujud with numerous writings; see Tarikh al-Islam 14:273. Al-Qunawi is Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Muhammad, Sadr al-Din al-Qunawi al-Rumi (d. 673/1274), one of Ibn Arabi's foremost pupils— Ibn Arabi married his mother and raised him— and the author of many Sufi works; see Tarikh al-Islam 15:266.
(5) Manuscripts B and Q read: "yatakallam" (speaks).