An Analysis and Criticism of Salafieh's View on the Epistemological Value of Reason in Religious Knowledge

The Salafieh course of thought may be investigated and analyzed from different perspectives and the presuppositions of this analysis affects the final structure of the research. Salafieh is sensual in ontology, traditional and based on the literal meaning in epistemology and methodology, and consider the ancestor's understanding, words and acts as their source on the one hand, and assume reason and its understandings and reflections inefficient on the other hand; which makes them so obsolete that in some cases their statements end up to be in contradiction with the tradition they claimed to be loyal to. Reviewing the basis of the school of Salafieh and investigating its approach in ontology, epistemology and methodology, I have explained the result of this approach – which is an anti-reason and literalistic (those who trust to outward of statement rather inward of it) Islam - and have analyzed and criticized the epistemological value of reason and its function in religious knowledge.