theology

In this period, Lahijan passed one of its brilliant periods and Lahijani scientists in the Safavid era took advantage of the favorable atmosphere of this era, boasted and were able to make important impacts in various scientific fields on the Islamic culture and civilization of the Safavid era. The results of this research show that among the sciences, according to the dominant Shiite worldview and horizon of thought in the Safavid era, many Lahijan scholars have grown and mastered the science of theology. Even some of these celebrities were doctors or politicians and even poets In addition to their expertise, they belonged to theological topics and had made significant works in this field. Some of these elders even had a direct hand in the affairs of politics. Politically, the situation of Lahijan during the Safavid era made possible the main fields for the cultivation of cultural, scientific, religious figures, etc. Fields such as jurisprudence, logic, philosophy and theology among the theological sciences, fields such as medicine, astronomy and mathematics as well as political knowledge and of course poetry and literature were among the most important cultural and civilizational bases that Lahiji scholars in this era. They boasted in its horizon and their name became famous in Iran.

The understanding of the Salafis in the issue of God's attributes is based on sensory knowledge, and this point is affected by their epistemological method such as appearanceism, lack of attention to interpretation, and negation of the understanding of reason, which without considering the damage in sensory cognition, is the context for deviant interpretation in theological teachings and Especially, it has provided the understanding of divine attributes; God's physicality and belief in God's sensory vision is the result of an error in understanding divine attributes. Ibn Taymiyyah, as the founder of Salafi thought, considered sense as the only way to know external affairs. This view of Salafis originates from a sensuous epistemological base, which places them in line with physicalists. Physicalism, as a naturalist trend, considers everything, not just matter, to be reducible to the properties of physical objects. This article has tried to answer the question whether the Salafists' understanding of God's attributes is not a form of physicalistic theology. In this essay, an attempt is made to consider the nature of physicalist theology, the understanding of the Salafis and especially Ibn Taymiyyah about divine attributes, and its reduction to material things and returning it to tangible phenomena is considered a physicalist explanation and criticizes it.

Examining the extent of influence of Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā) from the dual contexts of Aristotelian philosophical thought and Islamic religious teachings in theology is a significant issue that can help affirm the originality of Islamic philosophy. To elucidate this influence, which is the primary aim of this article, Aristotle's and Avicenna's theology must be compared, and the impact of Islamic teachings on Avicenna's theology should be analyzed using a library-based method and analytical approach. While Avicenna remained loyal to Aristotelian philosophy in terms of rational and logical methodology as well as its ontological themes and extensively benefited from Aristotle's content, he significantly transcended Aristotle in terms of themes, concepts, and content, moving closer to Islamic theology. However, it cannot be said that the image of God presented by Avicenna fully aligns with the God of Islam. Attributes such as God’s agency, knowledge, providence, impeccability, and unity are key aspects that distinguish Avicenna’s theology from Aristotelian theology and bring it closer to the God of Islam. Conversely, insufficient attention to God as an object of worship and his anthropomorphic attributes is a major point of divergence between Avicenna’s philosophy and Islamic teachings.

Evolution means to change and taking a different form, it is a continuous activity and effort to achieve goals in the direction of improvement, updating and practicalization and upgrading from the current position to a superior and higher position. The evolution of any knowledge, including theology, indicates its active presence in human life and the presentation of plans and ideas to solve intellectual, social and political issues and problems, and the production of religious knowledge that is in line with the needs of the day. The steps taken by the contemporary theologians of Qom school has become the basis for the realization of levels and stages of the evolution of theology in the seven axes and dimensions of management, method, research, content, goals and objectives. The theologians of  Qom school in the recent century have examined and analyzed the development of theology and the growth and promotion of religious studies in the society, and while reminding some shortcomings and harms, they have expressed other needs to realize the better process of the development of this knowledge.

One of the challenges of contemporary theology is natural evil. We will argue that since humans often play no role in the emergence of natural evils, one instance of natural evil is the issue of salvation and the well-being of those individuals who either lived long before the emergence of religions or have been deprived of encountering God's message. Therefore, the question of the possibility or impossibility of the salvation of such individuals can be included among theological discussions, especially in Christian theology, as well as in the realm of the philosophy of religion. This issue is also related to pluralistic and exclusivist approaches in Christian theology. However, based on Thomistic theology, although God manifested His message at a specific time and place in Christ, we will find that God has never deprived humans of encountering His saving message by having a correct understanding of God and His attributes.

Anyone who seeks truth and happiness acknowledges the necessity of studying God's existence and his uniqueness. This necessity is even more important considering that human’s innate nature has a tendency towards God. However, one can research this issue in the holy texts of different religions, not with “a priori” approach or seeking their rational reasons, but merely with “a posteriori” and descriptive approach; and can reach to this conclusion that the doctrine of the existence of God and monotheism is not necessary in one religion, but it is necessary in various religions. This result can be worthwhile for religious scholars. This research has tried to analyze the issue of God's existence, especially his uniqueness, in the Old Testament, using a library research method and a descriptive-analytical method. According to this research, there are numerous evidences in the Old Testament that introduce God as the progenitor of being, and several terms indicate the unity of God as well. Although some believe that the two mentioned belief principles are evident based on the Old Testament, but this claim is not acceptable, which is elaborately discussed in the article.

In order to examine the rationality of the belief in the “disparity in the relationship between science and religion in the cases of evolutionary biology and cosmology,” this article focuses on evolutionary biology, cosmology, and religion (theology) from the perspective of epistemic entities. Accordingly, the disparity between these epistemic entities refers to the difference in the way they logically align with each other. Initially, the approach and assumptions accepted for establishing this argument are explained. In this section, it is clarified that the approach of this article is to present an evidential argument, and its most important assumption is the epistemic independence of evolutionary biology and cosmology from each other. Additionally, it is explained that by religion, the belief in the existence of a concept of God that implies the purposiveness of divine action is meant. Subsequently, the main middle term of this argument, which is the analysis of the implications of evolutionary biology and cosmology for purposiveness, is discussed in detail. In this discussion, purposiveness is precisely defined, and the content of existing and conventional theories and models in evolutionary biology and cosmology is considered, rather than the philosophical debates of biology or cosmology or philosophical interpretations of theories. Thus, the content of the premises of the argument is obtained, and its conclusion is presented at the end of this section. However, due to the fundamental nature of this claim, the logical-formal structure of the argument used to support the claim is explained further. This formal structure, which is explained based on the logic of probabilities, clarifies the degree of validity of the conclusion and the type of relationship between it and the premises. Following this, some of the important implications of this conclusion are mentioned.

This article, emphasizing Peter Byrne’s thought, one of the most important figures of contemporary religious philosophy, in addition to explaining his views on realism and non-realism as well as theism, religion, and theology, analyzes the philosophical foundations of this issue. Byrne’s critical approach to various dimensions of non-realism contains a fundamental distinction between theism and theology in adopting a realist and non-realist point of view about them; considering the separation of the two fields of theology and theism, he believes in the unrealistic nature of liberal theology as an academic discipline and the realism of religion, God, and theistic discourse; the purpose of the theistic discourse refers to an extra-mental, extra-mundane, transcendent entity. Ultimately, has analyzed the philosophical foundations of this issue; and Peter Byrne’s brief reference in examining the origin of the distinction between realism and non-realism, and also highlighted the modern non-realistic interpretation of religion, and in addition to analyzing the roots of the problem of religious realism and non-realism and by emphasizing the relationship between subject and object-especially in Kant’s philosophy, he has reviewed this philosophical foundation in the opinion of Peter Byrne.

The issue of the unity of existence is one of the key topics in Islamic theology, mysticism, and philosophy. It is the central subject in mystical thought and one of the most controversial issues in the history of Islamic theology and mysticism, even among Western scholars. Almost all other discussions around mysticism and theology in some way return to this issue. Some theologians, such as Mohammad Taher Qomi and Mirlohi, were fundamentally opposed to the ideas of mystics. On the other hand, scholars like Sayyed Haydar Amoli, Feyz Kashani, and Mulla Sadra sought to use mystical theories in interpreting religious texts. The late Allameh Mohammad Baqir Majlisi adopted a middle-ground approach between these two groups of scholars. In his engagement with the leading figures of mysticism, he accepted their mystical interpretations based on the school of the Shiite Imams. This article compares the mystical monotheism of Sayyed Haydar Amoli with the theological monotheism of Allameh Majlisi and attempts to present a coherent and comprehensible understanding of the unity of existence theory.

Theoretical wisdom and practical wisdom are like two wings for the development of the Islamic society. Today, practical wisdom is mostly manifested in jurisprudence. The duty of jurisprudence in the current approach is to infer religious injunctions from Islamic sources. In this article, the impact of Ṣadrā's transcendent philosophy on jurisprudence and the role of jurisprudence on the system of transcendent wisdom have been investigated. The main problem of this article is why there are some shortcomings in the popular jurisprudence, and in this regard, we have come to the conclusion that jurisprudence should not be separated from ontology. Theology should be the focus of jurisprudence, not a marginal and unimportant issue. In this regard, the main goal of the article is to show the impact of ontology (of transcendent philosophy) on jurisprudence. As a result, while explaining what the science of jurisprudence is, we will explain the source of reason and the implications of the centrality of reason as a common source of jurisprudence and philosophy and its definition in terms of jurisprudence and philosophy. The intended jurisprudence of transcendent philosophy has an existential goal in the individual and social sphere and emphasizes insight in religion and awe. In the transcendent system, jurisprudence is a subset of theology, and its definition and rulings are examined in this regard. In Ṣadrian system, jurisprudence, mysticism and philosophy are not separate from each other and all are layers and levels of religion. This can lead to the correct explanation of the scope of jurisprudence. Civilization-building and anti-tyranny jurisprudence is one of the characteristics of Ṣadrian jurisprudence. On the other hand, jurisprudence is also considered as a subset of individual and social practical wisdom, and Mullā Ṣadrā's explanation of practical wisdom is very effective in directing his jurisprudence. This approach accelerates the scientific development of the Islamic society and prevents some damages; as in the jurisprudence style of the contemporary Ṣadrian jurist - Imam Khomeini - this influence caused the growth of the Muslim community. At the end of this article, these effects have been shown more vividly in the form of Motahari's jurisprudential approach.

The interpreter's presuppositions and mental beliefs directly or indirectly influence his interpretation of the texts. Some commentators do not accept the influence of presuppositions in the interpretation of texts, while some others consider it as being unavoidable. Based on philosophical hermeneutics, Mr. Mojtahdshabastri considers the existence of a presupposition to be necessary in the interpretation of the Qur'an and believes that without it, the understanding of any text cannot be achieved. One of the most important presuppositions of Mujtahad Shabastri in understanding the Qur'an is his theological presuppositions. With three basic presuppositions about God, he went to understand the Qur'an. These consist in: God is unprovable, Man is facing an unknown God and Due to the lack of God`s language, one cannot believe in any linguistic revelation. This research examines the criticisms of the three presuppositions of Mojtahedshabastri's theology with a descriptive, analytical and critical method. The findings of this research show that his presuppositions cannot be accepted and generalized to the correct interpretation of the Holy Quran due to internal contradictions and opposition to reason.