The Category Mistake in Mulla Sadra’ Thought

In this paper, I tried to analyze Mulla Sadra’s solution to the paradox of Ma‘dūm Motlaq (absolute non-existent) with the aid of “category mistake.” This concept had an important place in the thought of Gilbert Ryle, who conceptualized it to undermine the classical view of the mind-body problem. In this paper, we argued that Sadra used the same concept in other terminologies to solve the paradox of absolute non-existent. The basis of Mulla Sadra’s solution to the paradox rested on distinguishing the concept of Ma‘dūm Motlaq, and the object of that concept, which showed the knowledge of the two was not in one logical category. This meant there were two different logical categories to solve the paradox. Thus, the paradox itself became an instance of a category mistake in the thought of Ryle. We argued that category mistake, expressed by Ryle, had been used by early Islamic philosophers like Mulla Sadra.