مطالب

With a rational reflection on possible beings, Farabi presents an analysis of the relationship between existence and essence, which requires a new philosophical system distinct from Greek philosophy. In his view, all possible beings are composed of two metaphysical aspects, i.e. existence and essence. By distinguishing constituents (muqawwamāt) from accidental things (‘araḍiyyāt) and using terms such as ‘āriḍ and lāzim, Farabi explores the structure of possible beings. In possible beings, existence is not the same or a part of essence; rather, it is an accident of essence, and since any accidental thing is subject to causality (mu‘allal), thus the possible things require something out of themselves for their existence. The main point is that the container of this distinction is not merely the world of the mind or the objective world; rather, it is the product of rational analysis. In other words, the distinction of existence and essence is neither a mental distinction nor a physical one; rather, it is a rational distinction which is called, in today’s metaphysics, metaphysical distinction. In metaphysical distinction, the existence and essence of the possible beings are two ontological principles and two metaphysical modes of the being that compose its identity. The metaphysical distinction designs the foundation of the non-Greek philosophical system based on which one can explain, from the theological viewpoint, proving the existence of the Necessary Being, the evolution of the ultimate causality, natural agency with the agentive causality and divine agency; from the cosmological viewpoint, proving the essential contingency of the universe and the philosophical explanation of the creation; from the ontological viewpoint, dividing beings into necessary and possible, and explaining the structure of possible beings; and from the epistemological viewpoint, evolution in dividing knowledge. This article is an applied study that attempts, by relying on the descriptive-analytical method with an exploration of the metaphysical distinction between existence and essence, to deal with applying that distinction in Farabi’s philosophical system and its products and results.

According to The Phenomenology of Spirit , the religion and philosophy are considered as important stages of the history of consciousness, and the absolute spirit is to become self-conscious of itself, as spirit, in the process of genesis of these two stages. The central issue of the present article is answering the following questions: “What relationship does Hegel establish between delicacies of religion and philosophy?” “Are religion and philosophy considered, in his thought, as double truths for each of which separate realms exist or these two are different stages of one single truth that express the spirit’s self-consciousness of itself in two stages?” To answer these questions, the writer attempts to show, through a descriptive-analytical method, how Hegel offers a theoretical explanation for substituting the image of national and ethnic religion for its traditional image by making the absolute affair to the ethnic spirit. Besides, it shows how Hegel – unlike the transcendental philosophy and exalted philosophy – on the one hand turns God and absolute spirit from non-understandable ideas to cognitive and conceptual ones, and on the other hand, removes – in this way – the duality of the realm between religion and philosophy and establishes an internal relationship between them. Through creating a dialectic relationship between religion and philosophy, he finds the possibility to remove the contrast between the myth and the realm of systematic knowledge. And by making it close to the framework of system of knowledge, he introduces the myth not in contrast to rational knowledge, but as the outset of the way whose truth the rational knowledge is going to explain.

School principals' ethical considerations and organizational decisions can improve schools' image and social credibility. This study designed and validated Lorestan principals' conceptual, ethical decision-making model. The study has an exploratory mixed-methods design. The qualitative section included grounded theory, paradigm-based theme analysis, and interpretive structural modeling. Exploratory, descriptive methods underpinned the quantitative section. Education experts with scientific experience in decision-making and ethics and one or more articles in those fields constituted the qualitative section's research field. The quantitative section's statistical population comprised Lorestan's nearly 1,000 school principals. Semi-structured interviews with 18 purposively selected school principals provided data for the qualitative section. Random cluster sampling and Krejcie and Morgan's table selected 181 people for the quantitative section. A researcher-made questionnaire was used to collect data in this section. The qualitative data were analyzed using thematic analysis based on the paradigm model and interpretive structural modeling in three stages (open, axial, and selective coding) using MAXQDA 18. Management experts' opinions and Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.95 ensured the questionnaire's content validity and reliability. Quantitative data was analyzed using SPSS-25 and SPSS Amos software for confirmatory factor analysis and partial square model. Qualitative findings identified 15 organizing and five overarching themes: contextual factors, causal factors, strategic factors, intervening factors, and outcomes. The quantitative results from structural equation modeling demonstrated that Lorestan school principals' ethical decision-making model fits well.