Mulla Sadra's Life, Works, and Philosophy

Prof. S. M. Khamenei

Aqajani's Social and Scientific Status

 In line with the method of his contemporary philosophers and the common tradition of sages, Aqajani followed Peripatetic Philosophy and, particularly, the Sinan philosophy. He considered himself an independent religious jurist - rather than an imitator - in rational sciences and philosophical issues.[1] Even if he had a hand in gnosis and the Transcendent Philosophy, unlike the first commentator of Qabasat (Seyyed Ahmed Amili), he never set foot beyond the principles of the Sinan School in his commentary of this work and rarely ever went beyond the framework of the common philosophical tradition of his time.

This philosopher bravely expressed his views and did not fear being reproached by others. However, due to being far from his enemies, he might have been immune against their attacks and slanders.

Apparently, he was a very busy man; however, it is not clear what his main occupation was. Was he a hard-working teacher? Was he a judge who dealt with people's Shar'i affairs? Was he a preacher or the leader of Friday prayer? Or, was he, like many great people, a businessperson or landowner?

Considering his scientific status, it is enough to say that he managed to write a commentary on Qabasat. Although he was well aware of the difficulty of this task and refers to it as a stubborn horse and unyielding fortress, like Tahamtan (the mythical Iranian hero), he opened the gates of its castles and turned that stony and cumbersome way into an even road. In doing so, as he himself says, he does not fear the ill-speaking and tongue-lashing of others.

Considering his words, "Since my life was coming to an end, I decided to write a commentary on Qabasat", and also the fact that this commentary finished in 1071 AH, we can infer that he was more than 50 or 60 years old at that time.

The writer of A Selection of Philosophers' Works, while trying to revive the works of philosophers and Mulla Sadra's students, presents a part of this prominent philosopher's commentary on Mir Damad's Qabasat in his book. Therefore, we will not discuss Aqajani's ideas in this regard but invite researchers and scholars to read this book.

Mulla Sadra's Masters

Previously, we talked about Mulla Sadra's masters in detail.[2] This was due to the great similarities between the character and methods of this distinguished philosopher and those of his two well-known masters, Mir Damad and Shaykh Baha al-Din Amili. In fact, a study of their characters and lives functioned as a guide to the secrets and subtleties of Mulla Sadra's life and character.

We do not have any information about Mulla Sadra's other masters. However, we know that during his childhood and adolescence (when Shah Mohammed Khudabandeh and Mulla Sadra's father, Mirza Ibrahim, certainly lived in Shiraz, i.e. in about 1000 AH), some philosophers such as Mirzajan Shirazi, known as Baghnawi (who is said to have been Dawani's student, died in 994 AH) and also Mirza Fakhr al-Din Samaki (Mir Damad's master and Mir Ghiyath al-Din Mansur Dashtaki's student), as well as their students, lived in Shiraz.

After Mohammed Khudabandeh's coming to the throne and his moving to Qazwin (Safawid's capital at that time), Mulla Sadra either went there with his father, or (although a weaker possibility) his father stayed in Shiraz, and he went to the capital alone in order to benefit from the classes of the well-known masters of that period who might have gathered there. At that time, there were many other masters in Qazwin in addition to Shaykh Baha al-Din and Mir Damad.

Reference has been made in history to the names of some of these famous scholars who, after the transfer of the capital to Isfahan, moved there in company with Shah Abbas. For example, we can refer to Mir Ghiyath al-Din Muhammed (known as Mir Miran and Naqib al-Nuqaba'), Mir Seyyed Hussein Husseini Jibil Amili (Muhaqqiq Karaki's grandson on his daughter's side and Mir Damad's cousin), Mir Mahmud Isfahani (known as Khalifat al-Sultan Mar'ashi), Shah Taqi al-Din Muhammed, Mir Mahmud Shulistani, Shah Muzaffar al-Din Ali Shirazi Shaykh al-Islam, Mirza Ibrahim Hamadani Tabataba'i (Samaki's student),[3] as well as Mir Kalan Astarabadi Faqih, Mir Abu Talib Imami Mutiwalli, Shaykh Ali Minshar (Shaykh Baha'i's father-in-law), Shaykh Lutfullah Talisi, Shaykh Yahya Nau'i Ibn Nasuh (the writer of the glosses on Hayakil al-nur, died in 1007 AH), Isma'il Molawi Anqarawi (from Ankara and the writer of the glosses on Hayakil al-nur, died in 1020 AH), Azar Kaywan (the Zoroastrian priest), and Hakim Munir Shirazi.[4] Most probably, they lived in Qazwin and Isfahan at that time and held some classes in which they taught Peripatetic and Ishraqi philosophies, gnosis, jurisprudence, or other religious sciences.

Apart from Shaykh Baha al-Din Amili and Mir Damad, Mulla Sadra certainly had some other masters. However, he has not referred to their names anywhere. There might have been different reasons for this; he might not have felt himself indebted to them; like Ibn Sina, he might have considered himself equal, if not superior, to them in terms of knowledge and perception; or, because his father was a rich man and paid money to his son's masters, Mulla Sadra did not feel that he owed them anything.

* * *

A good custom of seminaries at that time was (and still is) not to charge students for the lessons. Like a true mother who views feeding her baby with her own milk as a responsibility and enjoys devoting herself to him/her, seminary teachers sacrificed their lives and personal comfort for the proper training of their students.

Like honeybees searching for desirable flowers, the students also looked for appropriate masters and were never pressurized to study under specific ones. The teachers did not care about material benefits and did their best to train their students and satisfy their thirst for learning by opening the doors of their treasure of knowledge and experience to them.

Paying masters for their job and changing the student-master relation into an employer-employee one was, in fact, a custom that entered Iran and the East under the influence of European civilization and culture. Since then, masters have been presenting their knowledge in return for "money" rather than "love of learning". Therefore, except for a few pious and knowledge-loving masters, the rest of them view students as some strangers who disrupt their peace and quiet, and thus they should waste their time by writing pamphlets for them, teaching them, and testing them.

When the goal becomes material and the height of flight becomes lower, learning turns into a duty in order to provide for life and earn money. When this happens, the master sees himself needless of research and attaining more knowledge and, after a while, turns into a tape recorder repeating the lessons to students. This leads to man's distortion and stagnancy of science and blocks human mental and spiritual development.

* * *

One of the questions in the philosophy of training and education is whether a student, like raw matter whose hyle comes after his form, should be trained by a single teacher or multiple teachers.

Each of the above methods has some specific features, advantages, and disadvantages, and, of course, the character of the teacher or the characters of teachers also play an important role here. Apparently, Mulla Sadra was an advocate of the first method, because, after finding Shaykh Baha and Mir Damad, he never left them and never turned his back to them until they were alive.

The nectar that he had tasted in the presence of these two masters had entrapped him and the sweetness of their lessons did not let him desire the presence of any other master. In the tavern of these wise magi, a kind of drunkenness was found that was missing in other taverns, and Mulla Sadra's appreciation of this drunkenness did not leave him with any desire to step into another tavern.

He never forgot his debt to these two masters, particularly, Mir Damad, and always spoke of them with respect and appreciation. Available evidence suggests that he always maintained his relation with them, whether when he was near or far from them, until the end of their lives. We referred to his correspondence with Mir Damad previously.[5]

The truth is that if the hand of fate puts a perfect teacher and guide on the way of a student, he will attain a higher level of knowledge and perfection and wander less in the process of learning. However, if the master himself has not reached the level of perfection in terms of knowledge, act, thought, and experience, he will not be able to train his students alone, and some other masters will be required to complete his work.

Mulla Sadra's Works

Mulla Sadra was a prolific philosopher and left a lot of books, treatises, glosses, and commentaries from himself. These works, which amount to about 50, comprise one of the invaluable philosophical collections of the history of Islam and Iran.

Most of his works - if we do not say all of them - are on philosophy and gnosis. In fact, even in those of his works which are on the interpretation of the Qur'an or hadith, he has dealt with the related issues following a philosophical and gnostic approach and employed the principles of these two fields of knowledge.

Here, in addition to referring to his books, we will classify them into different groups and provide some explanations about them.

 

Abstracts

Audition of Being and the Pre-eternal Plectrum

Prof. Seyyed Mohammed Khamenei

One of tools for the development of philosophical thought has always been the clash of the thoughts of thinkers and philosophers in the course of the history of philosophy and wisdom. The good tradition of criticizing others' words and writing glosses or commentaries on their books is one of the manifestations of this development. One of the people who tried to examine, analyze, reject, and criticize others' ideas and thoughts in his works was Ayatullah Rafi'i Qazwini. In his glosses on Jalal al-Din Dawani's Sharh-i hayakil al-nur, he has harshly attacked the commentator employing a religious tone. However, following a specific and clever method, he has agreed with its religious framework.

 

Key words:

audition                                                            spheres

glorification                                                    desirous motion

 

Essential Characteristics of the Necessary Being

 Maqsud Muhammedi

 According to divine philosophers, there is an Origin at the peak of the pyramid of being Who is the Necessary Being and is absolutely Independent. His Existence can be demonstrated based on rational arguments; however, it is not possible for human beings to know His Truth and Essence. This is because He is the Absolute Being. He can only be known through specific attributes that exclusively qualify Him. His characteristics are generally in contrast to those of possible beings. In other words, all of them reveal His Needlessness. In sum, "the Necessary Being" never needs and depends on the other, since He is the Origin of the existence of all existents of the world. Rather, He possesses every and all ontological perfections. Otherwise, He would be one of the existents of the world, who need another origin to exist. The present paper deals with a study and analysis of the characteristics of the Necessary Being from the viewpoint of Islamic philosophers.

 

Key words:

the Necessary Being                                   equivalency

inseparable accidents                                  the fallacy of correlation

necessary by itself                                       necessary through the other

 

 

Macranthoropos and Microcosm (Perfect Man) in Mulla Sadra's Philosophy and its Historical Background

 Tuba Kermani

 The issue of macranthropos and microcosm is discussed in Sadrian Philosophy. Here, man is compared as the "microcosm" with the external world as the "macranthropos".

In order to grasp a better understanding of this topic in Mulla Sadra's works, we have to pay attention to certain preliminary points. For example, we should learn from which perspective and based on which philosophical thought Mulla Sadra studies man. The knowledge of the background of this topic in other schools is also necessary in this regard.

This paper does not deal with this issue in the field of anthropology, which studies man from the four dimensions of physical anthropology, archeology, linguistics, and cultural anthropology. Rather, the question here is whether there exists essentially anything under the title of macranthropos and microcosm in the history of philosophy. That is why we recognize Mulla Sadra not merely as a rationalist philosopher, but as a theologian (muti'allih) philosopher. A related question here is whether there exists anything in this regard in the Book and Sunna.

This paper will also cast a glance at gnostics' related ideas because they play an essential role in our understanding of Mulla Sadra's view of man. Perhaps, one can claim that without following a gnostic approach, which is apparent in the Transcendent Philosophy, we cannot learn about Mulla Sadra's view of this issue.

 

Key words:

Superman (ūbermensch)                              macrocosm

perfect man                                                 microcosm

macranthropos                                            God's vicegerent

micranthropos

 

 A Study of Relation between God and the World in Ghazzali and Ibn Rushd

 Ali Allah Bedashti  

Considering the importance of the argument of the righteous in the history of Islamic philosophy, through examining the related religious, philosophical, and theological texts, the writer has first tried to introduce its philosophical background and context of development. Second, he has studied and analyzed its historical changes from the time of Ibn Sina until 'Allamah Tabataba'i in various philosophical seminaries, particularly those of Shiraz and Isfahan. In doing so, he has specified each thinker's principles in the formulation of this argument. Moreover, while reporting the various interpretations of this argument in brief, he has revealed the strengths and weak points of each and introduced the most solid and reliable of all them.

 

 Key words:

argument of the righteous                             gradation of existence

existence                                                     the Necessary Being

reality                                                         Light of all Lights

principiality of existence

 

The Background of the Evolution of the Argument of the Righteous in the History of Islamic Wisdom

 Ali Allah Bedashti  

Considering the importance of the argument of the righteous in the history of Islamic philosophy, through examining the related religious, philosophical, and theological texts, the writer has first tried to introduce its philosophical background and context of development. Second, he has studied and analyzed its historical changes from the time of Ibn Sina until ‘Allamah Tabataba’i in various philosophical seminaries, particularly those of Shiraz and Isfahan. In doing so, he has specified each thinker’s principles in the formulation of this argument. Moreover, while reporting the various interpretations of this argument in brief, he has revealed the strengths and weak points of each and introduced the most solid and reliable of all them.

  

Key words:

argument of the righteous                         gradation of existence

existence                                                    the Necessary Being

reality                                                        Light of all Lights

principiality of existence

 

 

A Comparative Study of the Evolution of the Analysis of Causality in Modern Western Philosophy and Islamic Philosophy

 Hamid Reza Ayatullahi and Ali Sanee

   

The study of concepts such as "causality" in western philosophy in the modern era has been a challenging endeavor. Considering the empiricism dominating western philosophy during this period, causality has been analyzed in an atmosphere of western subjectivism. This has led to some challenges and ups and downs in this regard in the West.

This paper initially deals with and portrays the process of evolution of the analysis of causality in the new Western Era from the viewpoint of a number of distinguished philosophers who have presented some significant ideas in this regard. Then it examines the same topic in Islamic philosophy from the viewpoint of theologians, Peripatetic philosophers, and the thinkers following the Transcendent Philosophy.

Finally, the author has compared the analyses of causality in the new western philosophy and Islamic philosophy with each other and introduced the related differences, which are essentially rooted in following two different approaches to similar issues and categories. Accordingly, in western philosophy causality is an empirical and, ultimately, subjective issue, while in Islamic philosophy it is a "nafs al-amari" (fact itself) or "intelligible" category.

 

Key words:

causality                                                      necessity

empiricism                                                  secondary philosophical intelligible

nafs al-amr (fact itself)                               subjectivism

 

 

A Study of the Whatness of Accident from the Viewpoint of Muslim Theologians and Philosophers

 'Aynullah Khadimi

 One of the main epistemological questions today is related to the whatness of objects. This question itself is divided into explicative and essential types. In response to essential questions concerning accident, theologians and philosophers have given various responses. They have also provided different definitions for accident - such as something that is added to essence; something whose existence has no permanence and continuity; something that depends on the other; an originated thing that depends on the spatial; something that is spatial, etc. However, in their definitions of substance and accident, they typically consider the divided as the originated existent.

Philosophers have also presented various definitions for accident such as quality, predicate, what is constituted by what constitutes itself, a quiddity which is not found but in a subject, an existent in a thing (but not as a part of it) which has no constitution beyond what contains it, etc. Nevertheless, in their definitions of substance and accident, they consider the divided as quiddity and do not pay attention to the limitation of "the subject's being spatial". When evaluating these definitions, we can say that none of them is a definition in the real sense of the word. According to Ibn Sina, they are not even true descriptions. On the whole, the definitions that present a greater number and more important characteristics of accident are more valid than others.

 

Key words:

whatness                                                     explicative and essential questions

present                                                       spatial

accident