Mulla Sadra

Mulla Sadra was a Persian Islamic philosopher whose transcendent theosophy integrated Avicennan philosophy, Shi‘i theology, and Sufi metaphysics. His doctrines include the primacy of existence and substantial motion.

Avicenna: Avicenna was a Persian polymath whose works shaped medieval Islamic philosophy and medicine. Sadra inherited Avicenna’s metaphysical vocabulary while revising its account of existence.
Primacy of existence: The doctrine that existence is fundamental in reality, while quiddities are conceptual distinctions imposed on existing things. Sadra makes existence, rather than essence, the foundation of his metaphysical system.
School of Isfahan: The School of Isfahan was a Safavid-era center of philosophy, theology, and the arts in Iran. Sadra emerged from the intellectual networks associated with this Safavid center.
Essence-existence distinction: The essence-existence distinction separates what a thing is from the fact that it exists. Sadra reverses the usual metaphysical priority by treating existence as fundamental.
Mulla Hadi Sabzevari: Mulla Hadi Sabzevari was a nineteenth-century Iranian philosopher and commentator on Mulla Sadra’s works. His influential teaching and commentary helped make Sadra’s philosophy central to later seminaries.
Suhrawardi: Suhrawardi was a Persian philosopher who founded the Illuminationist school, emphasizing light as a metaphysical principle. Sadra drew on illuminationist ideas while rejecting the primacy Suhrawardi gave to quiddity.
Substantial motion: The doctrine that substances themselves undergo continuous motion, rather than merely changing in their accidental properties. It explains how material beings can develop inwardly toward new forms of existence.
Safavid Iran: Safavid Iran was the Persian empire ruled by the Safavid dynasty from 1501 to 1736. Sadra’s life and work unfolded within a state that fostered Twelver Shi‘i scholarship.
Peripatetic philosophy: Peripatetic philosophy is a tradition based on Aristotle’s teachings, developed in the Islamic world by thinkers such as Avicenna. Sadra criticizes and extends its arguments rather than simply accepting its conclusions.
Allameh Tabataba'i: Allameh Tabataba'i was a twentieth-century Iranian philosopher and Qur’anic scholar. He renewed modern study of Sadra’s philosophy through teaching and philosophical writing.

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