KHERADNAME-YE SADRA
Year:2008 | Volume:13 | Issue:3 (51)|Papers Count:13

In this paper, a number of general issues have been presented in order to familiarize readers with Mulla Sadra's philosophy of beauty and aesthetics and, in this way, clarify his gnostic views. It reveals that, like other prominent figures of Iranian and Islamic gnosis and sufism, particularly those of the school of love and beauty, Mulla Sadra also dealt with the issue of beauty and viewed the Almighty Truth as absolute beauty. He also maintained that love is born out of beauty. He considers God to be the true love, the true lover, and the true beloved and, following the theory of the "oneness of being", introduced the whole being as the manifestation and image of that Infinite Beauty. He believed that, like in existence and light, there are certain levels that are manifested in the perfect man after the Truth and continue down to the lowest levels of being. For him, every single particle of being enjoys beauty. He also believed that all terrestrial and metaphorical loves and beauties, provided that they walk in the divine route, are valuable.

Most of the people who are involved with research on the Transcendent Philosophy have dealt with Mulla Sadra’s specific anthropologymerely within the framework of the book “Soul” of al-Asfar al-arba’ a (4th book, 4th journey). They have, in fact, limited themselves to his explanations in that book and their relation with early philosophers’ discussions of the soul. Mulla Sadra himself has referred to them all through al-Aslar’ s book of Soul, which is itself a kind of translation rather than a research book and source of reference for the issue of absence of effect. Neither is it an independent work or research reference on the anthropologyof the Transcendent Philosophy.In this paper, based on a comprehensive and general study of the Transcendent Philosophy and Mulla Sadra’s philosophical method, as well as through resorting to his particular works and methodology, the writer has tried to explore his anthropology.The main purpose of this inquiry is, firstly to develop a deeper and more thorough understanding of philosophical anthropology in the Transcendent Philosophy, secondly, to explain the relations between Mulla Sadra’s philosophical anthropology and the other parts of his philosophy; thirdly, to infer and derive the related philosophical terminology, concepts, and meanings and, in other words, the ontological realities of anthropology in order to use them for man’s perfection at present and in future, and, fourthly, to propound a number of principles and laws that can be useful in learning about the fundamental features and elements of Mulla Sadra’s philosophical anthropology.

Ibn Arabi believes that there is a perceptive power in human beings which is other than the intellect and whose domain of activity is the realm of “imagination”. Although empirically and rationally impossible, the gathering of opposites is possible in this realm. The world of imagination is the clearest indication of the Truth, since He is the First, the Last, and the Appearance, and the Hidden. Therefore, a gnostic is not known unless through the gathering of two opposites. Ibn Arabi maintains that imagination is an all-embracing station of affinity for the Truth and creation. He also believes that it is the very form based on which man has been created and considers this knowledge the most powerful one by which gnostics perceive the Oneness of the Truth in the Plurality of creation.According to him, imagination only keeps what enjoys a sensible form or is a composite of sensible parts which are combined by the form-giving faculty. In this way, it provides a form that does not exist in the senses but is sensible for the viewer. He refers to the world of imaginationas the way of knowing God in his gnostic theory. In this paper, we try to portray this world in a systematic manner.

The present paper consists of three parts. The first part deals with the oneness-plurality relation and provides an answer to the question of what Mulia Sadra’s idea concerning the subject and abode of oneness and plurality is, and how it differs from those of early philosophers. Apparently, he is the only person who has specified one thing as their abode, i.e. the very reality of being. In the view of the Transcendent Philosophy, the reality of being, whether in the outside or in the mind, enjoys oneness while being plural, and plurality while being one. Peripatetic philosophers believe that the abode of plurality is matter and quiddity. In order to justify plurality, Ishraqi philosophers, too, have to resort to darkness and dark configurations.The second part discusses the realization of plurality in disconnected images and tries to provide an answer to the difficult question of how it is possible for the plurality of individuals to come into existence without the presence of matter, and how all these material individuals could enjoy ideal fonns. The answer is that, based on the precedence of being to quiddity and the gradational oneness of being, plurality is established through existence and the agent, rather than through quiddity and recipient. This is because a quiddity that causes the plurality of individual at a specific level is one that originates in existence and is merely the manifestation of existence and the sign of its plurality rather than its source.The third part deals with two types of plurality: the plurality of the connected imagination of each individual and plurality in the world of connected images, which is a collection of those connected imaginations. It also concludes that the plurality of each individual’s connected imagination is due to both the plurality of their worldly bodies and the plurality of the fonns existing in each connected imagination; those fonns the origin of which is sometimes the world above and the world of intellects, sometimes the lower world and the world of matter, sometimes the forms existing in the disconnected imagination, and sometimes the creativity of the faculty of imagination. Whenever any of the connected imaginations enjoys plurality, it will also be created in the world of connected imagination. The subject and abode of oneness and plurality in connected imagination is one thing, i.e. the existence of the soul at the imaginal level; a level that Mulla Sadra considers to be disengaged. The demonstration of this disengagement demonstrates the realization of the plurality of particular souls after death. In this way, a world formed by the collection of intermediate state bodies before or after death, i.e. the world of connected imagination, is a world enjoying plurality of individuals. In this way, through demonstrating this type of the disengagement of the soul and this kind of individual plurality, the problem of Peripatetic and Ishraqi philosophers regarding the demonstration of the survival of intermediary souls after death is solved.

Ethics is one of the cognitive branches of practical wisdom. This field examines the quality of human behavior and provides some recommendations concerning how to attain the sublime ends of ethics. Like other branches of knowledge, ethics is based on a number of conceptual and judgmental principles. However, since it is not a universal science, some of its premises are theoretical and discussed in different sciences.The philosophy of ethics is a theoretical deliberation upon “ethics”. The development of ethics and its underlying basis is possible only when we can answer certain questions and analyze certain concepts. Since the principles of a science represent a kind of theoretical deliberation upon it, we can say that what is known as the “principles of ethics” in Islamic philosophy conforms to what is known as the “hilosophy of ethics” in Western philosophy. Accordingly, we can seek for a kind of philosophy of ethics among Islamic philosophers which is based on their views of the principles of ethics. Mulla Sadra is no exception in this regard, either. In many of his works, we can find the answers to many of the fundamental questions about ethics upon which is formed the Sadrian philosophy of ethics. Of course, a review of Mulla Sadra’s ideas in this regard can never provide the answers to all the related questions. This is because the formation of the philosophy of ethics belongs to the contemporary period, and there are certain questions to which he has not given an explicit answer. However, through a study of Sadrian principles, we can provide a kind of philosophy of ethics which is quite necessary. Considering this purpose, the writer has examined Mulla Sadra’s ideas concerning virtue and happiness.

The present paper deals with Wittgenstein’s influence on theology considering the concept of “logical atmosphere”, which connects his earlier and later philosophical ideas.It reveals that the concepts underlying his earlier and later philosophies have had numerous impacts upon theology. Accordingly, they have been discussed under two groups of actual and potential ones.

In his philosophical book called The Ethics, Spinoza has extensively discussed God. In his view, God is a unique substance with infinite attributes. He is self-subsistent and has no cause. He believes that because of His being infinite, there is nothing in the world in which there is no trace of God. Otherwise, His infinity would be challenged.There have been various judgments concerning this idea. After presenting a brief but clear explanation of Spinoza’s idea and clarifying the existing views concerning the oneness of being, the purpose of the present paper is to acquit him of the charge of believing in “pantheism” and “the oneness of existent” and attribute to him the belief in a kind of oneness of being which has not yet attained the necessary maturity. This feature is the result of the unidimentionality of Spinoza’s rational approach.