نشریه خردنامه صدرا
پیاپی 101 (پاییز 1399)

Faith is a truth which, in addition to cognition, embraces human feelings and will. That is why thinkers have provided different cognitive, affective, and voluntarist views of faith, each emphasizing one of these realms. The quality of the unity of faith with act has a long history and has provoked several different views. Following a descriptive-analytic method, the author has tried to explain and analyze Mullā Ṣadrā’s standpoint in this regard in this paper. His view of the nature of faith has often been introduced based on the identity of faith and cognition. However, he believes that faith is a kind knowledge within the heart which, in addition to cognition, entails human feelings and will. His emphasis upon the role of devotional love in the realm of affections and that of faith-related sincerity in the realm of free will has resulted in presenting an acceptable explanation of the quality of the unity of faith and act within his philosophical framework. In this way, through its spread in the realms of feeling and will (love and devotion), faith leads to moral act and is also influenced by such acts in its own turn. Therefore, a mutual relationship is established between knowledge and moral act through the mediation of feelings and will. In other words, faith guarantees the performance of moral acts, which, in turn, reinforce one’s faith.

In an attempt to provide some stronger interpretations of the argument of the righteous which were based on fewer premises, Ḥakīm Sabziwārī presented three main interpretations, two of which can be considered to be among his philosophical innovations. These interpretations attracted great attention from later researchers and inspired some thinkers, such as ‘Allāmah Ṭabāṭabā’ī to present some more advanced interpretations. At the same time, as pioneers, they opened some new horizons before this philosophical discussion and, hence, functioned as turning points in the development of the argument of the righteous. Accordingly, it is necessary to critically examine the mentioned interpretations as well as later thinkers’ interpretations of these interpretations. The present study reports and critically analyzes Sabziwārī’s interpretations and deliberates over the specific points and problems of recent readings of his interpretations.

One of the most important discussions in epistemology focuses on the origins of knowledge. Many contemporary Western philosophers disapprove of gnostic intuition as a source of knowledge while Mullā Ṣadrā, one of the greatest divine philosophers of the world, believes in the opposite and states that, in addition to rational arguments, religious texts also confirm the validity of this view. He maintains that some philosophical problems are outside the domain of reason and can only be accessed through gnostic intuition. According to the Transcendent Philosophy, gnostic intuition will be realized when there is an ontological connection or unity between the knower and the known, when both of them are immaterial, and when the knower depends on the self. In this paper, the authors initially explain gnostic intuition based on presential knowledge, refer to its specific features, and discuss its difference from introspection. Then, through examining the whatness of gnostic intuition and its different types, they investigate its validity and epistemological values and provide a list of the criteria that Mullā Ṣadrā and the commentators of his works have introduced for identifying valid intuitions. Finally, they examine its validity.

The Problem of making is the topic of some philosophical discussions, and there are three famous views regarding its object. Some thinkers, such as Shaykh Ishrāq and his followers, including ‘Allāmah Dawānī, believe that quiddity is made; some others believe in the madeness of attribution, while another group consider existence to be made, Mullā Ṣadrā rejects the madeness of quiddity and attribution but accepts the madeness of existence. Nevertheless, prior to Mullā Ṣadrā, Sayyid Sanad maintained that it is the “concept of existent” which is made. Mullā Ṣadrā holds that Sayyid Sanad’s intention of the “concept of existent” in the problem of making is concept qua concept rather than a real thing. Therefore, he quotes Sayyid Sanad’s view alongside the three main views regarding the made (as a separate idea) and considers it to be close to his own view. In the same vein, Mullā Ṣadrā’s commentators assert that Sayyid Sanad’s intention of the “concept of existent” was concept qua concept. However, a study of Sayyid Sanad’s original works (manuscripts) reveals that this attribution is not consistent with reality and, by the “concept of existent” in the problem of madeness, Sayyid Sanad meant the same true existence and not concept qua concept. Thus Sayyid Sanad and Mullā Ṣadrā hold the same view in this regard.

In spite of the long stay of Sayyid ‘Alī Khān Ṣadr al-Dīn Madanī Shīrāzī (1052-10120 AH) in India and his distance from Shiraz and Isfahan, his kalāmī principles underlying the explanation of God’s anthropomorphic attributes in Rīyāḍ al-sālikīn clearly demonstrate Mullā Ṣadrā’s influence. Nevertheless, despite his agreement with the principles of the Transcendent Philosophy, his method of interpreting divine attributes does not fully conform to the principles of Sadrian philosophy. While clarifying the attribution of a number of anthropomorphic features to God, he adopts an ends-oriented method in order to purify Him from human characteristics. This is because the reasons for the manifestation of some attributes such as mercy and wrath, which are rooted in inner excitement, compassion, and sorrow, are not true about God. In fact, they can only be used for Him based on ends and outcomes. Although he speaks of demonstrating attributes for God without assimilation, this strategy is not consistent with the principles of the Transcendent Philosophy, particularly with gradation of being and distinction of existential levels of God’s attributes from those of human beings as explicitly stated by Mullā Ṣadrā and his fundamental theories.

The Problem of the corporeal nature of what is other than God is of particular importance among Kalāmī theorems and is also among the few discussions about which almost all Kalāmī trends are unanimous. Mutikallīmūn believe that everything other than God, including Man and other existents, are bodily entities and introduce immaterial existents as absolutely perfect and self-sufficient truths. The exoteric, objective, and inclusive Kalāmī view necessitates and confirms the corporeality of Man’s identity and truth. Mullā Ṣadrā was among the thinkers who opposed mutikallīmūn’s corporealist view and tried to present a comprehensive and philosophical interpretation of Man’s reality and identity or an image which could exercise a positive influence on their individual and social life. Following a descriptive and documentary method and content analysis, the present study presents a critical review of Mullā Ṣadrā’s approach to mutikallīmūn’s views and demonstrates that his definition of Man’s identity and existential capacity is completely different from and even in contrast to that of mutikallīmūn. Unlike Mullā Ṣadrā, they consider such elements extremely trivial and limited, which is why their views suffer from several defects and problems.

Like Eckhart, Mullā Ṣadrā also emphasizes the element of the lovers becoming similar to the beloved and maintains that divine love is intertwined with the essence of Man’s existence. Here, given the mentioned similarities and relying on a descriptive-analytic method, the authors have tried to clarify the effects of love on Man’s becoming Godlike with reference to the works of Eckhart and Mullā Ṣadrā.
Eckhart and Mullā Ṣadrā refer to love as one of the influential factors in Man’s Godlikeness. Eckhart equates the essence of the soul with the Essence of God and concludes that the love of God resides in Man’s essence. By emphasizing these two features of love, that is, monopoly and simulation, he maintains that love of God makes other kinds of love to be forgotten and reduces all of them to itself; in fact, the only existing love is the love of God. He also views love as an internal stimulus which creates a kind of drive and attraction in the spirit which, ultimately, make it restless and compels it to become the same as its beloved.

One of the most profound ontological problems which has occupied the minds of thinkers and philosophers is the discussion of origination or eternity of the world. In Islamic tradition, through introducing the theory of trans-substantial motion, Mullā Ṣadrā has tried to portray the renewing origination of the material world in such a way that, while enjoying consistency, it does not contradict any religious teachings. According to Mullā Ṣadrā, renewal is the same as existents’ being, and each renewal is an independent origination which ceaselessly occurs in the essence of existents in the course of time. The chain of events will never stop at a specific point due to the continuity of emanation; therefore, all components of the world are temporally originated. As a result, the world, as a mentally-posited whole, has no independent existence and is temporally originated as well. William Craig, the Christian thinker, has also based his cosmological argument on a new approach to the temporal origination of the world in the contemporary Western philosophical atmosphere. He maintains that the world and all its constituent parts, including time, have been created from nothing at a specific moment on divine free will and, since then, God, who existed prior to the creation of the world in an ethereal state, is now exposed to time because of His true relationship with temporal origination of things. The present study aims to reveal the efficiency of Mullā Ṣadrā’s interpretation of the temporal origination of the world in comparison to Craig’s new approach. The findings of this comparison indicate that Craig’s attempts at presenting this new approach deserve due attention; however, comparing to Mullā Ṣadrā’s view, it not only lacks the necessary consistency but is also in clear contrast to some of the most fundamental religious theorems including the impossibility of attributing change to God’s essence, His eternity, His everlasting simultaneity with the created, and continuity of emanation.