A Study of Compound Theories in Islamic Ethics, Case Study: Mesbah-Yazdi's and Surush's Viewpoints

In Islamic ethics, Muslim thinkers have been divided into two groups concerning the problem of goodness and badness, Ashaira and Mutazila. Can we have a new compound theory which gathers some elements from each of these two groups? We will show that it is possible. This is exactly what happened in ethical Islamic theories, especially Shii theories. Theories of Muhammad Taqi Mesbah and Abdulkarim Surush are two samples of these compound theories. Mesbah Yazdi agrees with Mutazila that the universal principles of ethics are rational, but nevertheless agrees with Ashara that in assigning and determining applications of these principles we need to return to Sharia. On the contrary, Surush agrees with Ashara that moral values are derived from Sharia and God's will and commands, nevertheless he agrees with Motazila that to prove these we should return to reason. The above mentioned theories defend a compound way in the important problem of the "relation between religion and ethics". They hold that ethics is neither completely dependent on religion and nor completely independent of it.