A survey on Dawani's perspectives on acquired knowledge and its epistemological requirements

The problem of acquired knowledge is one of the vital and notable issues in the Islamic philosophy. Philosophers and theologians have made a different approach to the knowledge and its nature. Allameh Dawani had a specific doctrine on the knowledge. He in contrast to the others has not regarded the acquired knowledge under the category of quality believing that the philosophers who have considered the knowledge as a psychic quality applied simile and metaphors in philosophical discussion. His doctrine has been criticized by later great philosophers such as Mulla Sadra. In this paper his thought on the basis of Mulla Sadra’s works and its epistemological consequences has been explained. The most important requirements are as following: denial of categorical relation view, existence and necessary of nothings, fallacy of common usage instead of real application, rejection of resemblance idea, denial of regarding knowledge as a category, returning acquired knowledge to the knowledge by presence.