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Transcendent Philosophy of Mulla Sadra Professor
S.M. Khamenei Unlike
other heavenly books, the Qur'an involves some very profound and
discussion raising verses and statements on theology, worldview,
and anthropology. This Holy Book, from the very early days of the
prevalence of Islam - when there was no word of Greek or
Oriental philosophy - coulo^introduce a series of important philosophical
issues such as God's knowledge, the meaning of His Will
and Attributes, the concepts of Divine Decree and Destiny, predestination,
renunciation, life after death,
resurrection, and the Hereafter to the field of thought and philosophy. Moreover, it makes references to the quality of the creation of the material world,
the birth of prime matter, the end of world,
the annihilation of matter, and, basically,
cosmology. It is true that the
collection of such verses and their
interpretations, which had been given by the Prophet (p.b.u.h), Imam Ali (AS)
and Muhammed's descendants, planted the seeds for the growth of Shi'ite
theology and, later, for the so-called science of theology; however, it was
not limited to theologians' use. The gate of knowledge and teaching in the Qur'an has always been open to all, as it became a source of inspiration for Mulla Sadra,
too. Our great philosopher, who always criticized theologians' ideas, viewed Qur'anic verses and the interpretations
given by Muhammed's (P.b.u.h) descendants
with utter respect, relied on them, and was inspired by their heavenly
words. The other point to
be emphasized here is Mulla Sadra's power of intuition in the sense
of communicating with the hidden world
and unveiling the realities. This was a power possessed by all prominent
masters of Ishraqi philosophy. In some of his books, Mulla Sadra
emphasizes that he first perceives the truth of every philosophical and
rational problem through intuition, and then demonstrates it on the basis of
rational and philosophical arguments. He claims that he is
the only philosopher who has been able to transform the issues that Ishraqi philosophers had perceived through unveiling and intuition, and presented
as undemonstrated theories into logical and philosophical arguments. He does
this so conversantly that even those who
do not believe in intuitive perception surrender to his ideas. As we will discuss
later, a great number of his well-known
theories and ideas had been previously
stated by Ishraqi sages; however, they had not been philosophically proved. Mulla
Sadra has profoundly benefited from Peripatetic, Ishraqi, theological, and
sophist schools of thought and can be said to owe a great part of this knowledge
to the masters of these schools. Apart from the Qur'an, the
Prophet (p.b.u.h), Imam Ali (As), and the Prophet's
descendants, he has a deep-rooted belief in Muhyaddin, Ibn-Sina, Aristotle,
Plotinus, Suhrawardi, Tusi, Sadr al-Din, Qiyath al-Din Dashtaki, Dawani, and
pre-Socratic philosophers, particularly Pythagoras
and Empedocles. He also agrees with Qazzali's ideas concerning ethics,
and favors Fakhr Razi's method of analyzing theological and philosophical problems; nevertheless, he doea not consider them as philosophers and refutes their
philosophical ideas in many respects. However, in cases where he agrees with their views, he never hesitates to
praise them, and, in order to show his confirmation and acceptance of their
ideas, he quotes from them verbatim, as if he himself has originally uttered
those words. One
of the sources of Mulla Sadra's philosophy is the pre-Socratic history of philosophy.
The philosophers of that time mainly consisted of Ishraqi
sages, who followed Oriental and Iranian ancient philosophies to a great extent. Generally
speaking, unlike the case with Peripatetic philosophy,
Mulla Sadra's sources of philosophy were not merely confined to the
intellect, so that he would ignore other
sources such as revelation and inspiration. In the same way, he did not limit
himself only to inspiration and illumination, so that, like gnostics and sophists,
he would regard the intellect as being
incapable of the perception of realities.
He even considered revelation as the most important, valid, and reliable
source of knowledge, and, as we mentioned previously, he also
attached too much importance to what can
be learnt from the Qur'an and hadith. Mulla
Sadra is one of the exceptional philosophers who has graded these sources. He
believes that the first basis for accessing truth is the intellect; however, he
does not consider it as being capable of
solving the subtle problems of metaphysics.
Therefore, a philosopher or sage should not stop halfway through seeking the reality and deprive himself from
intuition and using prophets' revelation. He states that man's
intellect confirms revelation, and revelation completes the intellect. One
who has a religion and depends on revelation must accept the role of the
intellect in discovering the truth; likewise, one who follows the intellect
and wisdom, must confirm and accept revelation. Intuition and illumination can be demonstrated by means of argumentation
and reasoning and, as a result, grant universality to personal experiences, exactly in the same way that the hidden principles of nature could be
proved by resorting to mathematical laws. However, one must
admit that the power of wisdom is limited, but intuition and love have no boundaries and can aid man
in attaining the truth. The vastness and
breadth of Mulla Sadra's domain of views, and the plurality of the origins of
his thoughts granted more freedom to him
to expand the realm of philosophy. As
a result, there is no trace of different types of narrow-mindedness witnessed in other schools of philosophy in his philosophy. |
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