The Concept and Principles of Peace in Nahj al-Balaghah

Throughout the history of mankind, peace has always been one of the aspirations of the Men. However, individuals and communities' perceptions of the notion and indicators of peace are very different based on their cultures and diverse epistemic foundations. In the West, Kant Based on his own anthropological and epistemological concepts and the humanism school, has a minimalistic and pragmatic comprehension of peace within the framework of ethics and democracy; While from the viewpoint of Imam Ali in Nahj al-Balaghah, a justice-centered and monotheist conception of peace is presented that delivers much more consistent and more complete conception of peace in comparison to Kant's conception of peace. In this study, through using a constructivist approach to the concept of peace, an attempt is made to define this concept in both the Alavi and the Kantian perspectives, to analyze their views in a comparative method. The present study finds that although the concept of peace within the Kantian discourse is different from that of Imam Ali in terms of epistemic and ontological basis, but they overlap with each other in terms of their cosmopolitan attitude.