A Comparative Study of Allamah Shahid Motahari and Allamah Misbah's Views on the Theoretical Philosophy of History

Based on the two different applications of the word ’’history’’, philosophy of history underlies two different sciences. One of them is “philosophy of history” which deals with the philosophical-logical knowledge of history and historiography. The other deals with the theoretical philosophy of history which investigates the historical phenomena and events, and seeks to discover the philosophical and ontological rules governing the historical development process of man’s life and studies such issues like meaningfulness, evolution and lawfulness of the mentioned course.Using a philosophical-Qur’anic approach and making a comparative study, this paper considers the views of two current eminent thinkers in the Islamic world, Allamah Shahid Morteza Motahari and Ayatollah Allamah Misbah, about the basic issues about the theoretical philosophy of history and investigates the views of the two philosophers and Qur’anologist thinkers about the reality and identity of society and history and the question of their being original or arbitrary. It also discusses the lawfulness of society and history, the adoption of similar sociological rules by all societies, human freedom and its relationship with social and historical rules, evolution in society and history and the possibility or impossibility of predicting the future of history, and sometimes criticizes these views.