Ibn Arabi

 “The sight of God in woman is the most perfect of all.” 

Rumi says something similar in his Masnavi:

“She (woman) is a ray of God, she is not that earthly beloved: she is creative, you might say she is not created.”

“As the mystical side of Islam developed, it was a woman, Rabi‘a al-Adawiyya (717-801 c .e .), who first clearly expressed the relationship with the Divine in the language we have come to recognize as particularly Sufic, by referring to God as the Beloved.

Rab‘i’a was the first human being to speak of the realities of Sufism with a clear language that anyone could understand. Though she experienced many difficulties in her early years, Rabi'a’s starting point was neither fear of hell, nor desire for paradise, but only love. Her method was love for God because “God is God; for this I love God . . . not because of any gifts, but for Itself.”

Her aim was to melt her being in God. According to her, one could find God by turning within oneself. As Muhammad said, “He who knows himself knows his Lord.” It is love that carries and sustains us through this process. The door of Sufism will finally open only with Love, because—though knowledge may be important and can assist in our discrimination along the way and may help us to reach the threshold—it is ultimately through Love that we are brought into unity of Being.”