پژوهشنامه حکمت و فلسفه اسلامی
سال یازدهم شماره 42 (زمستان 1391)

Sadra, the foremost among theosophers and Musa Ibn Maimonides are twophilosophers belonging to Islamic and Jewish traditions respectively and bothdiscussed the issue of prophecy in detail. By comparative study one finds that thereare more similarities than differences between the two views. On such topics asnature of prophethood, proof of its necessity, way of recognizing true prophet fromfalse one, and distinguishing the Divine Law from profane one, character traits ofprophet, hierarchy and missions of the prophets, both think in much the same way.The only matter over which they disagree is the question as to which prophet is themost excellent. Sadra believes that Muhammad the holy prophet of Islam is the mostexcellent and his holiness was not obliged to follow the previous Divine Lawswhereas Maimonides is of the opinion that Moses is superior and so the later prophetare also to follow Mosaic Law.

The present article is to discuss reality of man, two-dimensionality of hisexistence, immateriality of human soul and the capacity of man to arrive the noblehuman states in light of servitude to God the Exalted, status of primordial nature,nobility of man, role of self-knowledge, and state of proximity of perfect man. Thearticle concluded that the servitude man before God is not to be regarded as captivityand limitation. Rather, it can place man in highest rank in the possible world.

The predestination and free will of man is among the controversial problems inreligions and schools of thought. Among Muslims this problem has drawn theattention of mystics as well as philosophers and theologians. Islamic thinkers havedealt with it on basis of Qurʾānic revelations. Some chose the idea of predestination.Others drew to free will. Still another group of thinker found the middle way as trueand justified. The present article is to explain the middle way on the basis ofQurʾānic revelations and supporting arguments from reason and mysticism, showingGod's knowledge and omnipotence, the hallmark of His All-Dominion, are notinconsistent with human freedom. Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence that areground of human will can be reconciled with it and each has its own proper placeand there is no incompatibility among them.

Man as free and rational being is the addressee of the divine commandments.Since, however, he is of many existential dimensions such as body, soul and mentalstates and there are different views on definition of human identity, it is important todecide which approach to take to determine personal identity in defining the exactaddressee. For obligation is addressed to human being and thud our definition isdecisive in this respect. If corporeal bod is identified as the true nature of humanbeing, the addressee will be human body whereas if mind or soul or spirit isrecognized as human identity then all commandments are held to be addressed tosoul or spirit.As human nature is inextricably constituted with both corporeal body andimmaterial soul in this world, the mind-body dualism as the theory of human natureseems to be justified and as result the addressee of Divine commandments will be acompound identity of mind and body.

Justice as one of the important problems of epistemic and social sciences hasalways been interesting subject for philosophers and thinkers. Justice is but therealization and practical version of monotheism. Justice is a key and fundamentalconcept in the thought of both Muslim thinkers, Farabi and Sadr. This article is anattempt to deal with this concept in political philosophy of Farabi (second teacher)and Martyr Sadr. Attempts are also made to show that justice in the eyes of thesetwo thinkers is intended to be a mean between the two excesses, harmony or to put athing in its proper place, avoiding any sort of extremist act or shortcoming. Justice isalso meant to be with Truth or Reality as rationally good and proper and essentialfeature of the world.

Most of the Sunni Muslims deem Shiites to be in favor of Badaʾ (lit. appearance)in its literal sense namely appearance after being hidden and hence they chargeShiites of allowing such a concept of Badaʾ for and thus denying God's omniscience.Shiite scholars traditionally advocated the doctrine of Badaʾ arguing that it is aQurʾānic truth in support of which there are many Qurʾānic verses and Hadiths in thecollections of tradition from both Sunni and Shiite Muslims.Both Sunni and Shiite scholars deny attributing Badaʾ in its literal meaning toGod, though there is difference of opinions of technical meaning. Some identify itwith abrogation and conceive a conventional difference between the two. Thepresent article is an attempt to explain various views on the reality of Badaʾ esp. onthe basis of Shiite hadiths with a reference to effects of belief in the doctrine ofBadaʾ.

On the basis of incompatibilist views, free acts based on free will are notpossible in view of determinism governing the whole order of existence, nor is theexistence of evils with justice-centrality. Compatibilist views by contrast, maintainthat free will is possible if only it coheres with determinism in whole scale of reality.Compatibilist responses to the objections to justice-centrality in order of beingsand of irrationality of religious beliefs in view of the reality of free-will-based evilevents are the theories of free will theodicy and free will defense respectively. Thepurport of the former is the idea that God has created the best possible world out ofbeings possessed of free will though He knows from all eternity that some thesebeings would prefer evil to goodness. The content of the other theory, however, isthat belief in God who is absolutely perfect and omnibenevolent is not incompatiblewith the existence of evil and does not imply any contradiction or essentiallyimpossibility. Such a universe is possible in itself and one can rationally believe inGod as its creator.