فصلنامه تحقیقات کلامی
پیاپی 24 (بهار 1398)

The “divine providence” is an attribute paid less attention by philosophers and theologians, while it has a prominent place in the Qur’anic verses and narrations. In this article, documenting to the narrations of the book Al-Kafi in this topic and using its commentators, the divine providence has been explained in a descriptive-analytic way and its place in procession of God’s act and also its impact on the human volitional act have been examined. According to these narrations, the existence of all things in the existing system, even the human volitional acts, are based on the divine providence so that, for their occurrence, all the divine providence stages even creation and giving existence to the act most be considered. On the other hand, the divine providence in relation to the human volitional act is not autonomous in effect, but the human will is the last stage of his act’s occurrence; because by the expediency of religious obligation, God does not compel anyone to obey his orders and prohibitions. Therefore, this stage of providence may be in contrast to the divine order and prohibition and even divine love and pleasure. Furthermore, the human being also is affected in his volitional act by the divine providence. Thus neither the free will is complete nor the determination.

The free will, that means the possibility of both to do and not to do, contradicts three philosophical rules of “the necessity of the cause and the effect”, “the final cause is the cause for the agency of the agent”, and “the impossibility of preference without preponderant”. And from the other hand, because it is a possible meaning, it is impossible to be an attribute for the Necessary. The resolution of philosophers for this problem is to introduce another meaning for free will that is known as the “philosophical meaning of free will”. But in addition to corrupt consequences of the “philosophical meaning of free will” which the philosophers themselves also do not acknowledge them, their method in solving this contradiction is in contrast with logical principles and bases. Because, in the case of contradiction of an evident knowledge a theoretical one, logically we must reject the theoretical knowledge or, at least doubt about it and reexamine its arguments. Explicitly explaining this contradiction and mentioning the failure of philosophers’ resolution, the main purpose of this writing is to prove the necessity of revise in the abovementioned philosophical principles and rules.

In the Kalam terminology, “inerrancy” (al-’ismah) means to prevent and protect against sin, and “inerrant” is one who is prevented and protected against sin. “Free will” means the effectiveness of human will in his/her act. In this writing we examine the place of free will in the acts of the inerrant (AS). We suppose that the inerrancy of the inerrant has various aspects and dimensions. By separating the domain of inerrancy, the author explained the place of free will in each of these aspects. According to the most important results of this research, the existence of free will in the cases of immunity of mistakes could not be objectively reflected. But in the arena of immunity of sin, the free will is completely possible and the misgivings of the antagonists regarding the determined inerrancy for the inerrant are incorrect.

The human expectation of religion and the religion expectation of humanity are two important historical challenges in the discussion of the relation of religion and humankind. With a library research method, this article develops the viewpoint of Ayatullah Javadi Amoli. Using the definition of “humankind” and the correspondence of the factuality of the human innate nature (Fitrah) and the true religion in his point of view, the authors, along with the two meaning of expectation offered by Ayatullah Javadi Amoli, offer a third meaning of expectation. According to the third meaning of expectation, the divine innate nature of human and the true religion in the material universe are the manifestations of a single fact of the intellect universe and are the same. Thus the phrase “human expectation of religion” in this world is the same expectation of the manifested human innate nature of the manifestation of religion in the world; and the phrase “religion expectation of humankind” is the same manifested religion’s expectation of the manifested human innate nature. And because the fact of human innate nature and the fact of religion are the same, the human expectation of religion and the religion expectation of humans refer to a single fact.

From the viewpoint of those who believe in the confusion of “human will regressive chain”, the criterion to consider an act as volitional is the belonging of free will to that act. This criterion is tabled about the “will” itself. That is, if the will is willed by another will, it would be a regressive chain (tasalsul); and if the cause of the will is out of the human nature, it would lead to determinism. Sadr al-Mutallehin and Imam Khomeini have tried to answer this problem. From the viewpoint of Sadr al-Mutallehin the criterion for an act as being volitional is the belonging of free will to it, not the free will itself as being volitional; but by referring the human will to the divine will, he failed to solve the confusion. Imam Khomeini at first defends the viewpoint of Sadra, but finally tries to answer it with an innovative resolution. By dividing the acts of soul into two kinds of “heart” and “organs” and considering will as the heart act and attributing it to the free nature of the soul, he tries to solve the confusion. This research shows that the answers of Sadra and the philosophers before him are not acceptable, but the Imam Khomeini resolution could be defended.

In this article, a comparison of the ontological philosophy of Mulla Sadra with his Knowledge of Imam has been examined. The principles and bases that have been argued in the Sadra philosophy and have been used here consist in: “the rule of the possibility of the best”, “authenticity of existence and its hierarchy and levels”, “the hierarchy of the intellect”, the causal system of the existence” and “the rule exuno non fit nisisunum” (the one does not create except one). These principles and bases have been used in the issues of Sadra’s knowledge of Imam such as “being divine and designated” and “existential and legal guardianship” of the Imams. This “existential and legal guardianship” includes consequences and implications such as Imam witnessing the acts of the people, the spread of Imam’s awareness and his inerrancy. Briefly comparing the Sadra’s knowledge of Imam with other opinions on the challenging issues, the purpose of this article is to strength this hypothesis that the principles and bases of Sadra’s philosophy can, by aid of the reveled narrations, provide a philosophical support for his knowledge of Imam. One can compare the Mulla Sadra’s knowledge of Imam with his bases and explicitly extract the impact of his bases on his knowledge of Imam in some of his works or implicitly deduce it from his other works. What can here have more general kalami efficacy is the usage of Sadra’s bases in his defense of the kalami common views with him in the issue of Imamah.

One of the challenging discussions in the Salafi thought is the special kind of approach of this group to the issue of “imploration (tawassul) to the dead”. In this regard, the critique and examining the roots of Allusi’s approach as the exegete attributed to Salalfiyyah could be considered. By comprehensive look to Allusi’s views in this field, we find that his thought in this realm suffers from a kind of contradiction and inner inconsistency and does not corresponds completely the extremist salafi approach in this issue. Considering the semantic and ontological kind of view of Allusi could be helpful in the examination of this issue. The distinct semantic of Allusi is apparent in comparison to the salfis in the realm of monotheism of divinity and lordship (tawhid al-‘uluhiyyah wal-rububiyyah) along with his ontological view in the discussions such as knowledge of the unseen, purgatory life, hearing by the dead etc. and is different from the salafiyyah attitude. It can justify his different epistemological approach to the issue of imploration (tawassul) in comparison to the salafi thought.