Journal of Al-Mustafa International University
Volume:3 Issue: 1, Summer 2020

The functionalist approach to religion is among the approaches employed in the study and propagation of religion. The use of this approach can also be noted in religious sources. The important point, however, is what rules and criteria should govern this approach.The proper use of this method can be instrumental in understanding religion and benefiting from, and propagating, religious teachings, whereas the arbitrary and improper use of this method can lead to misunderstanding religious teachings as well doctrinal and practical deviations in religiousmatters.By reflecting on the verses and narrations that allude to the functions of religious teachings and by rational contemplation, we conclude in this study that employing the functionalist approach requires taking certain rules and criteria into consideration, which include simultaneous consideration of worldly and otherworldly functions, paying attention to the primacy of otherworldly functions and the marginality of worldly functions, and eschewing functionalism in the purely theoretical realms of religion.

With the commencement of the occultation of the Twelfth Imam (a), a period of perplexity (ḥayrah) begins in the Shīʿī community: on the one hand, the Shīʿī community is faced with questions from within, and, on the other hand, the Shīʿīs are confronted with doubts and questions from other sects and schools, especially the Zaydīs and the Muʿtazila. It was in this intellectual milieu that the two schools of Qom and Baghdad shaped the two distinct Shīʿī doctrinal systems based on scripturalism and rationalism. The crises of the period of perplexity led al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq and al-Shaykh al-Mufīd to employ their innovative thinking in their respective scripturalist and rationalist approaches so as to bring the Shīʿī community out of this plight. The present article seeks to carry out a comparative study of the place of intellect in the doctrinal systems of the rationalist school of Baghdad and the scripturalist school of Qom, as well as the innovations brought about by al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq and al-Shaykh al-Mufīd in presenting the role of reason. In examining this question, an attempt will be made to show that, due to the guiding teachings of the Ahl al-Bayt (a), the place of reason in Shīʿī doctrines and the categorization of the two schools of Qom and Baghdad into scripturalist and rationalist in the era of the Infallible’s occultation did not result in a deep fissure, as witnessed between the Ashʿarī and Muʿtazilī theological schools.After the commencement of the age of occultation and the needs of Shīʿī communities in this era, al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq and al-Shaykh al-Mufīd, with their novel approaches in hadith studies and theology, elevated the role of reason in Shīʿī teachings. The effects of this were subsequently transferred from ḥadīth studies to theology and thereafter to jurisprudence and legal theory, and reason became the fourth principle in jurisprudence.

After the holy Qur’an, Hadith is the second source of Islam in terms of authority and the first in terms of extent. Contrary to the Qur’an, hadith is prone to manipulation and forgery, as the Prophet (s) warned about it and history testifies to it. Prior to the era of occultation, many hadiths were presented to the Imams, and they rejected some of them and corrected or explained the others. Al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq (d. 381/991) gathered many of these hadiths in his Maʿānī al-akhbār. On the other hand, the most important Shiite hadith books were compiled after the occultation of the Twelfth Imam. The period of the Minor Occultation was a crucial time in Shiite history. With a historical and analytical approach, this article studies the identity and conditions of the Four Deputies and their role in guiding the Shiite community in relation to Hadith. In this regard, the article discusses the stance of the Four deputies against the hadiths of false claimers like Shalmagānī (d. 322/933), their relation with the scholars of Qom, the reason why al-Kāfi was not presented to them so as to obtain the approval of Imam Mahdi (a), and finally the relation between al-Kulayni (d. 329/941) and the Four Deputies.

The viewpoint of individuals about the essence of being and about man’s and God’s relationship with the whole of being affects their way of spirituality. The spirituality of one who thinks that being (nature, the supernatural realm, man, and God) is one integrated and indistinct whole is very different from that of one who distinguishes between the visible and invisible worlds and considers man and God to be two different beings. In this article, we are going to show, by using available studies about the beliefs of new spiritualists,1 how the idea of being is explained in this school of thought and what impacts the ontology arising from this school has on the theology and anthropology of new spiritualists. In the present article, we shall try to explain this kind of ontology by using the concept of monism and will briefly mention some of its ideological requirements.

The relationship between reason, tradition, and revelation has always been a controversial issue in Islamic and non-Islamic thought. The stand one adopts concerning how they are related to each other and what epistemological status they occupy serves as an important criterion for categorizing Islamic schools and sects, having thus crucial consequences for Muslims’ intellectual and social life. This article relates and studies the relationship between reason and revelation from the viewpoints of Ayatollah Jawadi and Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd. Revelation, which, according to Ayatollah Jawadi, is accessible to prophets and imams, is related to the realities on the ground, and pure reason, which is of paramount epistemic importance, discovers only some realities. He is thus of the view that reason is faced with limitations, and hence it is irrelevant to talk of conflict between reason and revelation in place of conflict between reason and tradition. Abu Zayd, on the other hand, believes that revelation is beyond access and holds that a text follows the rules of language and cultural norms, and thus the reader and his temporal and spatial reason play a determining role in understanding and interpreting the text. He thus puts an end to the conflict by giving priority to reason.

After briefly introducing the Encyclopedia of the Qurʾān (EQ) and mentioning its merits, this article addresses the structural and methodological problems of this encyclopedia. Subsequently, the most important problems with the content of this work are discussed, which in turn will reveal some of the shortcomings and methodological errors in Western Islamic and Qurʾānic studies.