نشریه حکمت اسرا
سال پنجم شماره 2 (پیاپی 16، تابستان 1392)

In Bin Arabi’s mystical tradition, after the unity of existence, a central component called “the perfect man” is put forth. Some reviewers have considered the “perfect man” and “monotheism” as the two fundamental issues in theoretical mysticism. Guardianship and the position of Allah’s caliphate, making alterations in the world and being its soul, being the treasurer of the Divine secrets and king appointed by Allah and possessing the ultimate wisdom are but a few of the characteristics of the perfect man. Therefore, the component of the perfect man, just like Sohravardi’s concept of the “Guardian of the Book”, enjoys the characteristics of the Imam in the Shiite traditions the Shiite audience finds it very similar to the example of the “Imam”. The idea of the perfect man within the intellectual framework of Feyz Kashani, as a Shiite intellectual, has led him to pay a novel and more serious attention to those traditions that have been given less attention by the other Shiite intellectuals, especially the theologians; he has been able to discover some hidden implications or prove the obvious implications in the Quranic verses and the traditions by the use of the aforementioned idea. In this paper, the intentional role of the perfect man in Imamate has been studied and, based on Feyz Kashani’s works as well as the idea of the perfect man, the manner of discovering the hidden implications in the traditions with regard to the position of the Imam in the existence and proving the obvious implications has been discussed.

The issue of the unity of existence is one of the major ontological issues which has come into being in mystic atmospheres and has gradually entered philosophy as well and influenced it to the point that accepting or rejecting it would overshadow all philosophical issues; this is because by accepting the unity of existence, the world takes on a new meaning as causality would depart this world and all creations. Moreover, the unity of existence will provide a different interpretation of Allah Almighty and the religion. Though the philosophers before Mulla Sadra have made arguments in this regard, Mulla Sadra claimed to have made a demonstrative reasoning about it and have defined it exactly and precisely. After Mulla Sadra, the followers of his school of thought also argued about such an issue, the most important of whom is Allameh Tabatabaaii. This paper seeks to present and study the statements of Allameh Tabatabaaii and his argumentations with regard to the unity of personal existence. Allameh Tabatabaaii has proved the unity of existence through the three ways of “copulative existence”, “pure being”, and “infiniteness”.

In Sadr Al-Mote’alehin’s school of thought, Allah’s will is his complete knowledge of the best system and it is one of the attributes of the essence. Allah is the reason for the existence of all the creation and the administration of his will is essential. In contrast to Sadra’s view, the proponents of the detachment school of thought believe that Divine will does not mean knowledge, but a domination and power over doing or not doing something; as a result, it is considered to be one of the active attributes. Such a definition would entail believing that Allah has freewill in whatever He does and, thus, due to His complete power over everything He will be the causing agent too. Among the criticisms that the followers of detachment school of thought have leveled at Mulla Sadra’s view is the one with regard to the meaning of freewill and the necessity of the existence of a cause and effect between Allah and His creations which leads to Allah being the causing agent. In the present paper, Mulla Sadra’s view regarding the Divine will has been contrasted with that of the followers of the detachment school of thought and the problems raised by the followers of the detachment school of thought against Mulla Sadra’s view in this regard have been answered.

This paper seeks to investigate the efforts of the Muslim theologians and philosophers with regard to the issue of the resurrection of animals from the two aspects of the rational possibility of resurrection and its reason. The answers provided by the theologians to the first question are varied. Some have considered the resurrection of animals like that of human beings as the rejoining of the scattered body parts, as they basically do not believe in any immaterial other than Allah; some others have denied the existence of an immaterial being in animals as they consider humans and animals to be in an equal level and so they have denied the resurrection of animals; and yet another group have tried to prove the existence of an immaterial being in animals through a proof based on induction. However, based on the philosophers’ view, the animal soul resides in the perceptive-imaginable level; this is why Farabi has taken the animal souls to be non-immaterial due to a lack of intellectual perception. In Avicenna and Sheik Eshraq’s works, there seems to be a duality with regard to the immateriality of imagination in which the stronger argument is the one that has denied the immateriality of imagination and, consequently, the immateriality of animal souls and their resurrection. By proving the immateriality of imagination, Mulla Sadra has taken a novel step towards the justification of the rational possibility of the resurrection of animals. With regard to the second question, the theologians have focused on the issue of countervalue which has been criticized due to incomprehensiveness. Allameh Tabatabaaii has also believed in a sort of obligation for animals through a discussion of freewill and intelligence in animals. Using the theological argument, Mulla Sadra has proved that all the creation will go back to their origin; otherwise, we will face inconsistency and contradiction. This research aims to show, by putting forth a novel perspective, that the resurrection of animals can be considered to be the resurrection of some human beings as animals on the judgment day which is, in fact, the failure of ascension from the animal level to the human level.

It is widely held by the philosophers that the principle of rational good and evil is an accepted truth and a view welcomed by all and it is reliable and a valid truth based solely on the views of the wise thinker; this is why it can be used in dialectics. However, it seems to be among the evident premises and thus being capable of being used in demonstrative reasoning. In this paper, first the widely held view of the philosophers has been studied and criticized and the pretexts of this undue view have been specified. Second, the two contemporary views on the criterion for the rational good and evil have been studied and finally the viewpoint that maintains “the good and evil of the inherent propositions of the experimental intellect is self-evident” has been chosen and explained.

The explanation of the significance of axioms in the intellectual system of Muslim philosophers is one of the most essential philosophical issues which have received little attention in some aspects despite its great significance and its unique role in the epistemic system of philosophers. The lack of enough studies in this regard is so critical that the existing ambiguities in the semantics of axioms and the absence of a clear-cut distinction between axiomatic and theoretic perceptions cause an incorrect usage of theoretical and axiomatic propositions which, in turn, yield ambiguous knowledge in the epistemic system. A study of the precise meaning of the axiomatic concepts, the number of axioms and the origin of axioms are among the issues that are addressed in this study. A brief reference to the perspectives of these three philosophers reveal that, despite the differences that exist in their various propositions, their analyses concerning the logical explanation of the concept of axioms are analogous. However, Avicenna and Mulla Sadra have also provided a philosophic explanation of the concept of axioms and believed that without axioms, no reasoning and explanation is possible. Considering this fact and based on a philosophic point of view, axioms are neither verifiable nor deniable. Such a belief is not evident in Suhrawardi’s writings. Avicenna and Mulla Sadra’s views with regard to the number of axioms are the same but Suhrawardi has decreased them to three types and has explicitly restricted the range of axioms. Moreover, the origin of the axioms has been called the active intellect by Avicenna, intuition by Suhrawardi, and sense-perception by Mulla Sadra.

In his political plan, Farabi sought to administer his metaphysical project in the human world. Politics is an inseparable part of human life and the only political project that can ensure mankind’s welfare and felicity in his worldly and otherworldly life is the Utopia politics which is based on Utopia. From Farabi’s perspective, politics is synonymous with educating and nurturing the people in Utopia and it works to realize the goals of the ruler of Utopia. The purpose of educating the people of the city has said to be the establishing of a Divine order in the human city. In fact, felicity is held to be achievable only within the framework and the zone of Allah’s law and order. Therefore, the philosopher-prophet, as the ruler of the city, seeks the political administration of the truth and also to administer the Divine commandment and order in the human life. Thus, a new horizon and perspective towards the truth and existence is opened towards the residents of the Utopia and the humanity of mankind is consolidated there. On the other hand, Utopia works like the illumination of the existence; it is the only arena in which existence is realized and manifested.