Determinism versus Free Will in the Viewpoint of Allameh Tabataba i

Determinism versus Free Will is one of the important concepts and an impediment in philosophy. Throughout history, philosophers of the East and West have had much reflection over this issue. Islamic philosophers have debated over determinism amidst the topics of affective qualities, the principle of causality and divine attributes. Allameh Tabataba’i, too, both in his philosophical scholarly works and in his book Tafsir al-Mizan, has studied different aspects of determinism versus free will. He, by considering free will as innate, has criticized the view of materialists about determinism in human actions and has later, through proposing suppositions of different human actions, has studied human free will and authority.Allameh Tabataba’i, based on his own philosophical methods and by analysing the trinal concept of will, authority and exigency, has analysed the relationship between these three notions through his philosophical contemplations.The discussion about divine will and its relation to authority is another topic which has drawn Allameh Tabataba’i’s attention and studies. Amidst his discussions, he has criticized the theories of Ash’ari and Mu’tazilite scholars as well as criticizing the opinions of some of the fundamentalists regarding the issue of priority (in the analysis of authority).