The Role of Active Intellect in Prophecy from the View of Ibn Sina and Mulla Sadra

The role of active intellect which is to reach human being to happiness and ultimate perfection is seen in the works of philosophers such as Ibn Sina and Mulla Sadra. In one hand, the ultimate human gradation in happiness and perfection is the degree of prophecy. A prophet is a person who has strong and authentic conjecture and his theoretical and practical intellect has been actualized in light of her relationship with active intellect and thereby worthy of receiving revelation. Revelation which is inspired by the active intellect helps the development of the theoretical and practical intellect. Ibn Sina and Mulla Sadra both believe in divine soul that by his strong conjecture reach to all ineligibles, cognitions and rational forms without learning and they call such a soul a prophet. Ibn Sina believes that revelation is through divine intellect but Mulla Sadra thinks that the rational faculty of the prophet in the degree of the acquired intellect united with the active intellect. In this study we examine these two ideas.