An Investigation of the School of Separation's Criticism of the Function of Philosophical Knowledge in Religion

The subject inspected in this article is "the school of separation's criticism of the function of philosophical knowledge in religion". The purpose of this research is to prove that the resultant awareness of human's Divine reason has some functions in religion. The domain of this research is the range of the main criticisms of the school of separation to the functions of philosophical knowledge in religion. On the other hand since most of their criticisms are intended to the transcendental theosophy, their answers are presented from the perspective of Molla- Sadra and his followers. The content of the discussion starts with explaining the reasons of the school of separation. Among their reasons, six reasons are presented here. In the first reason they claim that religion wants to explain the matters in which philosophy –by itself - has comments in them. On the other hand it is remarked that philosophers believe the necessity of having a philosophical understanding of some religious matters. In the second reason they claim that there is a contradiction between religion's explanation of realities and philosophy's explanation; presenting Molla-Sadra's statement I have denied this claim. In third reason they argue that the Prophet did not pay any attention to the philosopher's sayings in his words. I have criticized having objection to this reason adducing some narrations with weak chain of narrators The fourth reason is the severe terms of some narrations in dispraising philosophers; on the other hand I have remarked that this kind of terms exists in some other narrations about some other groups of scholars. In the fifth reason they claim that entrance of philosophy is a betrayal of the Abbasian government. The philosophers have answered this question saying this purpose is not in contrast with the course of philosophical thought. The sixth reason is that philosophers themselves confess the contrast between religion and philosophy; I believe it is not correct to understand this meaning from their terms. Then I have studied the contrast between the school of separation and philosophers with the measure of existing narrations; and have suggested the third method.