PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION RESEARCH (NAMAH-I HIKMAT)
Year:2012 | Volume:9 | Issue:2 (18)|Papers Count:7

Al-Vahid rule is one of the most important philosophical rules which is supposed to be derived from the Neoplatonism. In his different works, Averroes has dealt with Al-Vahid rule and has tried to define the way of God’s acting and the problem of "Emanation". In his works, we can observe explicitly two different approaches to the Al-Vahid rule. It can be extracted that in his first works he defended this rule and, surprisingly, in his last works refused it. In a book like Talkhis Kitab al-Maba’ad al-tabiaah, he, like other Muslim peripatetic philosophers, believes in the hierarchy of intellects based on which the act of God is appeared as creation of hierarchal intellects in the universe. In spite of this, he, in books like Tahfut al-Tahafut and Tafsir Kitab al-Maba’ad al-tabiaah, has refused this rule and does not believe in the emanation of separated intellects’ hierarchal system from the first Being.

Ayatollah Mohammadali Shahabadi is of the founders of the theory of Fitrah (inborn disposition of human) in the last century. His approach to this subject is religious and mystical, but some of his theorizations are from philosophical and intellectual perspective. Shahabadi, resorting to characteristics of Fitrah, has proved existence of God and his attributes through various ways. Natural love to ultimate perfect, innate requirement, innate possibility, innate subjugation, innate scare, innate hope, innate love to the origin and hatred of deficiency are some of these ways. Most of these arguments are innovations of Shahabadi. I think that some of these proofs, such as the proof of subjugation, scare, love to the origin and hatred of deficiency cannot be defended in intellectual and philosophical discourse, but the others can be correct.

This article is going to trace the important subject of the affection of non-cognitive realms of the soul on its cognitive realm which is one of the current discussions in contemporary epistemology, with regard to some of al-Ghazali’s typical ideas. Al-Ghazali is one of the greatest thinkers who maintains the interaction between soul’s realms.These typical ideas are as follows: his belief in the impact of goals on the quality of forming cognitive realm, the impact of feelings and wills on the quality of mind’s function, the impact of estimation on believing, his view about the origin of well-known premises (mashhurat) and the roots of imitated beliefs.Through these ideas it has been shown that how human being’s feelings and wills affects his beliefs according to al-Ghazali.

It is clear that the logical positivism is result of Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. But Wittgenstein’s critique of his opinion about language in Philosophical Investigations opened the way for religion be free from the positivistic reductionism. Although religion has not play role in Wittgenstein’s later works but his remarks about religion in his lectures and conversations was effective so that someone speak of "Wittgenstein’s fideism".In this assay, I show that Wittgenstein’s argument on the impossibility of private language as a philosophical basis how can instate of inexpressibility of religious statements explains the role of concept of God in the human life.After Wittgenstein’s death, although, some introduce his opinion as "fideism", but I show that, according to the works, this interpretation is wrong.

Among considered solutions of the problem of evils, the theodicy of soul-making is the most important one. John Hick, the contemporary philosopher of religion, has offered this idea in his book "Evil and The God of Love". Hick has justified, both moral and natural evils, in his theodicy. He has pointed to two stages of man’s creation at the beginning of his theodicy. These two stages are "image of God" and "likeness of God". According to Hick, moral evil is the result of man’s autonomous and man’s freedom. First man and his offspring are been placed in a world where God reality is not manifest to him. Hick has called this the Epistemic Distance. This situation causes sin or moral evil. From the other hand, natural evils causes man to attain some spiritual and moral attributes like courage, forgiveness, sacrifice, patient and sympathy. Hick believes that, man gradually become closed to God and reach the "likeness of God", but nobody except Christ, will reach the likeness of God, in this world, which is the final perfection of man. According to Hick, Human beings will reach the likeness of God after death. Hick says man will reach the divine purpose not in the present life, but in the after-life. Man’s spiritual and moral evolution begins in this world, but finishes in here after.

Joan Bishop introduces a moderate version of fideism according to which we, in some circumstances, have moral right to hold a belief without evidence. His view is somehow a continuance of William James famous view that explained in his "The Will to Believe". Because this view is about moral permeation to have a belief, it already accepted that believing is a kind of voluntary action. The will can affect Belief indirectly and for this reason we have moral responsibility and duties concerning our beliefs. In this paper we focus on the issues of controlling belief and the ethics of belief in Joan Bishop’s moderate fideism and its background in William James’s view.

Evils found in our world are seemingly inconsistent with the three divine attributes: "omniscience", "omnipotence" and "absolute benevolence". In other words, the four propositions: 1) God is omnipotent. 2) God is omniscient. 3) God is wholly good. 4) Evil exists are seemingly inconsistent. Some of atheists deny the existence of God on the fact that evils exist. There are two versions for "The problem of evil": "The logical problem," and "the evidential problem." Logical problem investigates the consistency or inconsistency of the four propositions, and the evidential problem evaluates the probability of the existence of God according to the amount, intensity and variety of evils. Theists have answered to this problem at two levels: the level of "defense" where, through various reasons, they reject the inconsistency of the four propositions and the level of "theodicy" in which the existence of evils is justified. Evils in the world are divided to "moral evils" and "natural evils". In this article we will consider the theodicy of "natural laws" which is developed by Bruce R. Reichenbach, and try to illustrate its superiority to competing theories.