Divine Names and Attributes in the Holy Quran: A Comparative Study of Allameh Tabatabai's Viewpoint and Conceptual Metaphor

One of the theological issues among the commentators is the interpretation of the Quranic verses which introduce God by mentioning Divine names and attributes. On the one hand, the holy Quran considers God matchless and beyond fantasy and delusion and, on the other hand, some delusory verses attribute human-like qualities to God. In recent years, negative theology has drawn the attention of a lot of theologians by stressing the inability of human intellect to know God, as well as the impossibility of God’s speaking. Nonetheless, the main mission of Divine prophets is the introduction of the Lord to human beings, and this introduction must be carried out using the common mechanisms of human mind and speech.
The late Allameh Tabataba'i has dealt with the interpretation of some of the Quranic verses which include Divine names and attributes adopting a negative, at the same time affirmative, view which embraces the path of moderation between pure affirmation and being put in jeopardy of polytheism and simulation, and pure negation, inhibiting intellect from knowing God, and agnosticism. There is a lot of correspondence between this view and conceptual metaphor which has attracted various cognitive linguists in the last two decades. After offering an explanation of metaphor considering the literary and linguistic perspectives, this paper examines the view of Allameh Tabataba'i, the great contemporary Twelver commentator, on purifying God from human-like attributes, compares it with the contemporary view on conceptual metaphor, and demonstrates how to relatively know God in the light of this view