Between Form and Flame: Hegel, Bulleh Shah, and the Mystical Dialectic of Existence
Journal of Visionary Philosophers December 30, 2025 Imran Atif Khan, Zainab Imran, Awais Qadir Malik
This article compares the philosophies of G.W.F. Hegel and the Sufi poet Bulleh Shah to develop a cross-civilizational account of existence. Both traditions view the self not as static but as a process of becoming through negation, relation, and participation in an Absolute. Hegel's dialectical philosophy seeks rational reconciliation of contradictions, while Bulleh Shah's poetry emphasizes mystical bewilderment and treats paradox as a space for encountering the divine. The authors argue that these structural convergences and divergences support a deprovincialized metaphysics where conceptual dialectic and symbolic poetry are complementary ways of articulating existence as an unfolding unity of self, world, and Absolute.