A Comparative Study of God's Essential Knowledge from Plotinus's and Mulla Sadra's Viewpoints

In this paper we will discuss whether God has knowledge in the level of his essence and we will compare Plotinus''s and Sadra''s views on this problem. Plotinus''s approach is completely different from that of Mulla Sadra. Plotinus does not represent any clear and specific argument for the essential knowledge of God. But he does not attribute ignorance to God at his essence level، and based on his negative theology concerning the «One»، he accepts that God possesses a kind of witness at this level. On the other hand، Mulla Sadra initiates a new method discussing God''s knowledge and represents several arguments in this relation. In the final step we can find a kind of similarity between these two thinkers in attributing a sort of knowledge by presence to God.