نشریه خردنامه صدرا
پیاپی 65 (پاییز 1390)

In relation to the faculties of the soul, philosophy in divided into practical and theoretical types. Since long ago, philosophers have emphasized the simultaneous acquisition of these two branches of knowledge for the realization of the definition and meaning of “philosophy”. Like other philosophers, Mulla Sadra has emphasized this task. However, because of its applied and practical implications for the perfection and transcendence of the soul, practical wisdom is concomitant with the purification of the soul, and since the end of wisdom is the perfection of souls, the purification of the soul bears a tight relationship with wisdom or philosophy, its definition, and its end.The present paper is devoted to a study of this relationship from Mulla Sadra’s point of view and seeks to analyze and explain the reality of wisdom and its connection with belief and purification of the soul based on the principles of the Transcendent Philosophy. Accordingly, the writer has initially referred to the end of philosophy and then examined the mutual relationship between the ends of wisdom and the purification of the soul in detail. In this way, she has demonstrated the following:1. Mulla Sadra’s main focus in the definition and explanation of the Transcendent philosophy is the purification and perfection of the soul.2. The ends of wisdom which Mulla Sadra and others have referred to as “end” are, in fact, ontological and practical ends rather than scientific and methodological ones.3. Wisdom is the main element of the correct purification of the soul, and the purification of the soul is the main element in the correct perception of philosophical problems.4. The purification of the soul plays a greatly significant role in the development of the concept, definition, applications, and worldly ends of wisdom.

God’s knowledge of material things is among the most complicated philosophical problems the complexity of which stems from the status of the changing existence of material objects. Accordingly, such knowledge must be explained in a way that the cognitive relation between Almighty Necessary and changing material things does not lead to the rise of any change or plurality in His Essence. Mulla Sadra’s general view of solving the cognitive relationship between Almighty Necessary and material things comparing to that of Ibn Sina enjoys particular comprehensibility and has removed the defects of his theories in this regard, such as considering God’s knowledge of other than God as acquired knowledge and their failing to demonstrate the Necessary’s essential knowledge of other than Himself. Mulla Sadra’s fundamental innovation regarding the Necessary’s knowledge of material things is benefitting from the principle of truth in its simplicity in demonstrating the fixed essential knowledge of Almighty Truth. On the other hand, he considers Almighty Necessary’s actual knowledge of material things to be the same as their external presence before Him. Since he attributes God’s cognitive perfection to His essential knowledge, he argues that the changeability of actual knowledge does not prove the existence of any defect in His almighty essence. This is because, in his view, actual knowledge, which is the same as act, is considered the cognitive perfection of act rather than that of the agent. Of course, Mulla Sadra has some seemingly contradictory statements in his explanation of God’s knowledge of material things which are justifiable if viewed from two different perspectives.

The word revelation has a particular place in Islam. In fact, the basis and main center of all religious lessons and the origin of all teachings is revelation.The Holy Qur’an is the manifestation of revelation, and its words, sounds, letters, and language represent the divine language in the view of Muslims. No issue in Islam holds a place as high and glorious as that of revelation, and it is the foundation of everything else in Islam. It is wroth mentioning that, from among Abrahamic religions, only Islam, and from among all holy texts, only the Qur’an have spoken of revelation and its different types in detail. Thus revelation is a fundamental concept in Islamic culture.A careful study of the history of Islamic philosophies reveals to what extent the nature of revelation has affected theological, philosophical, and other religious thoughts. The presence of revelation is evident in all branches of religious sciences. One of the purposes of this paper is to provide some answers to the following questions: what are the different views of revelation? What is the theological view of revelations? What is the reality of revelation? Is revelation the same religious experience? Is prophetic experience the same as revelation? Can the Islamic concept of revelation be reduced to prophetic experience? Is revelation a kind of religious experience?Moreover, the writer has tried to explain the principles of Islamic and Qur’anic revelation using a clear but demonstrative language and sought to reject the opposing views.Presently, there are three different views concerning the nature of revelation: 1. propositional approach; 2. religious experience approach; and 3. speech acts approach. apparently, the closest approach to the reality of Islamic revelation is that of speech acts approach; however, the propositional approach is also compatible with it to some extent. In these two approaches, the linguistic nature of revelation is the focus of attention. The farthest approach in this regard is that of religious experience.

Oneness (tawhid) is a fundamental principle in all divine religions; however, neither do all monotheists have the same perception of oneness, nor do all divine religions present the same picture of the reality of oneness. The Holy Qur’an has introduced oneness in its most sublime and extensive sense of the word. One of the Qur’anic verses descended in this regard is the noble verse 18 in chapter al-Imran. According to it, Almighty God Himself testifies to His Oneness. This noble verse has inspired many Islamic scholars in the presentation of various interpretations and explanations of the quality of God’s testimony to His Oneness. A study of these interpretations and explanations some of which are compatible with a theological approach, some with a philosophical approach, and some with a gnosic approach, on the one hand, represent the hierarch of the perception of the truth of oneness and, on the other, are based on the meanings of the exterior, interior, and interior of the interior of the Noble Qur’an so that each perception corresponds with a specific level of meaning. This paper is a study of the various interpretation of verse 18 in Chapter al-Imran based on the above approaches.

A study of the discussions in the chapter entitled Bab al-‘aql wa al-jahl in Mulla Sadra’s Sharh al-usul al-kafi leads us to the point that in this work he always interprets the intellect as the most principial constitutive element of human beings and the only instrument for unveiling the secrets of being that conform to the facts referred to in the words of the infallible Imams (a). In his view, in spite of the conceptual variety of the intellect in the 34 traditions in chapter al-‘Aql wa al-jahl in this book, one can consider all of them to be referring to equivocal meanings. However, following this part, based on his philosophical system, Mulla Sadra maintains that the four-fold intellects in the book of “the soul”, the levels of practical intellect in the books of ethics, the immaterial intellect in the book of theology, and the intellect in the sense of human instincts represent instances of the gradation of the intellect which all refer to the same reality in spite of their different levels of perfection and defect. Mulla Sadra believes that such community and gradation can be gathered in the mould of theoretical intellect and practical intellect and argues that their unity is a premise in the acquisition of the immaterial intellect. He also emphasizes the graded-vertical interaction between them. Finally, he introduces “Muhammedan truth” as the most perfect referent of the immaterial intellect, the first created, and the intermediary between emanation and the creation of other existents. Moreover, he views the union of the first intellect with Muhammedan spirit as an important proof in the interpretation of the intellect’s attention and inattention to the Holy Prophet’s spiritual states.

Presential knowledge is a particular theory concerning knowledge which has been well-developed in Islamic philosophy and, specifically, in Sadrian philosophy, and its epistemological effects have become clearly manifested there. However, without resorting to the principiality of existence, one cannot defend presential knowledge. Based on Sadrian philosophy, knowledge is the same as existence; it is not an accident of it or added to it. Accordingly, the various levels of existence demand various levels of knowledge and awareness. Here, in addition to his own existence, man has presential knowledge of his soulish faculties and knowledge, and since presential knowledge is at the threshold of human knowledge and the point after which conceptualization and acquired knowledge begin, one can reveal the main defects of idealism, solipsism, skepticism, and finally subjectivism in the light of this theory and go beyond them.In this paper, it has been tried to briefly introduce the theory of presential knowledge and demonstrate its potential for going beyond various kinds of subjectivism.

The present paper deals with the theory of Ibn Sina’s certain judgmental knowledge in terms of determining its constituent parts. Given Ibn Sina’s existing ideas, these constitutive elements include belief, bi-dimensionality of belief, stability, and existence of middle term (in non-axioms). Nevertheless, regarding the notion of truth, we should say that Ibn Sina’s considering it a constituent part creates several problems. The writer believes that since this point has not been directly stated in Ibn Sina’s views, truth is necessary for a specific type of certain affirmative knowledge. Truth is neither a constituent of certain judgmental knowledge nor something external to it; rather, it is necessary for it.