Mulla Sadra on God's Pre-Knowledge: A Critique of Allameh Tabatabayi's Understanding of Mulla Sadra

According to Mulla Sadra in his famous work، al-Asfar، God’s pre-knowledge is a set of epistemic forms which are (1) inseparable from His essence، (2) uncreated، (3) beyond the universe، (4) devoid of real possibility، (5) eternal per se، and (6) extant by His extance. Tabatabayi in Nihayat al-Hilmah believes that the term، “inseparable”، in (1) does not mean “out of essence”; otherwise، (1) would contradict (2) - (6). Furthermore، if the epistemic forms were out of God’s essence، then if they were known by presence، the theory of Ideas would be true، and if they were known by acquisition، the theory of “depicted Forms” would be true، while both of them are rejected by Mulla Sadra. Tabatabayi، therefore، says that these epistemic forms are identical with God’s essence، and that pre-knowledge in Mulla Sadra’s view is the same as God’s essential knowledge of the details of creature. In my opinion، but، this claim and its arguments، both، are incorrect، because the mentioned epistemic forms، in Mulla Sadra’s philosophy، are identical with abstract intellects which have all six properties without any contradiction. Again، Mulla Sadra، in contrary to Tabatabayi’s strange claim، believes in the existence of Ideas as thesauruses of divine pre-knowledge.