Suhrawardi

Suhrawardi’s logic of the Hikmat al-Ishraqis basically modal. So to understand his modal logic one first has to know the non-modal part upon which his modal logic is built. In my previous paper ‘Suhrawardi on Syllogisms’(3) I discussed the former in detail. The present paper is an exposition of his treatment of modal syllogisms. On the basis of some reasonable existential presuppositions and a number of controversial metaphysical theses, and also by confining his theory to alethic modality, Suhrawardi makes his modal syllogism simple in a way that is without precedent

In the classical Greek thought, the notion of “right” was concomitant with the “truth”. In the modern era, however, the notion of “right” became intertwined with the primacy of   “possessive individuality”. This primacy was, however, from the outset intellectually challenged. In the light of challenges posed, and by invoking the commonalities between Shahaboddin Suhrawardi and Martin Heidegger, the right to excellence is envisioned here as a maximal theory of “human rights”.

شیخ شهاب الدین سهروردی موسس حکمت اشراق، در رساله های متعدد داستانی، دیدگاه های خویش را به زبان هنر، رمز و نماد بیان کرده است. لذا او را هنر-دانشمند می نامیم. بررسی این نمادسازی ها نشان می دهد که سهروردی در زبان سمبلیک، روی آوردی سینوی دارد. این روی آورد در سه مساله اساسی فلسفی قابل بررسی است: حواس ادراکی، مساله صدور، و کیهان شناسی. در مساله ادراکات، ده حس ظاهری و باطنی توسط ده برج، ده بند، ده گور، ده پرنده، ده موکل، پنج حجره و پنج دروازه تمثیل شده اند. در مساله صدور، عقول عشره با ده پیر خوب سیما، و عقل دهم با نماد پدر، استاد و عقل سرخ تجسم شده اند. در مساله کیهان شناسی، افلاک توسط نه طبقه و رکوه یازده لایه، یازده کوه، پسران و آسیاها تصویر شده اند. حواس ادراکی دهگانه، عقول عشره و افلاک نهگانه و یازده گانه، متفاوت با آرای سهروردی در حکمت اشراق و منطبق بر آرای شیخ الرییس بوعلی سینا است.

Trying to understand the reality of the soul and its result (Self Knowledge Theology) has always attracted philosophers’ attention and has been regarded as one of the concerns of philosophical thinking. In this article, it is specified that the peripatetic philosophers, whether Greek or Islamic, have considered the soul as a chapter of naturalia and try mostly to comment on the soul’s powers and activities; they have not had any epistemological view of it. In contrast, Sheikh Eshragh closes the psychology to the theological discussions and looks at it from the epistemological point of view. His discussion is not about soul’s powers, but he provides a way to save the soul from the prison of the body and emancipate the human being from the darkness of material world. In the illuminationist philosophy, the theory of intuition was proposed for the first time (The substantial form), so it has discussed the nature of the soul from this viewpoint. Suhrawardi’s psychology isn’t a consequence of theoretical discussion, but it results from introspection and self-awareness that is possible only through the asceticism and controlling the dragon of carnal soul. It is soul which shows not only the Light of Lights, but it becomes divine and finally through this path he founds his luminous system. The system of being is realized through the epistemology of soul.

The question of what is the soul is one of the fundamental questions in philosophical psychology and the answer to it, along with other psychology questions, has been and is one of the most important and first concerns of philosophers. Among the philosophers, Ibn Sina and Suhrawardi have offered a novel view of the identity of the soul in comparison with their predecessors. In order to know the identity of the soul, Ibn Sina mentions the experience of human beings suspended in space in some of his works, and Suhrawardi, while expressing and modifying Ibn Sina's experience, speaks of other experiences. Through this research, it becomes clear that the efforts of the two in recognizing the soul are not the same, because Ibn Sina comes into existence in the experience of a human suspended in space, which is a hypothetical experience, and Suhrawardi in the experience of liberation from the body and experience in sleep and wakefulness. There are some realities and not assumptions about oneself that both views have been interpreted and evaluated in this article.

Considered the second face of Illumination philosophy after the Shaykh al-Ishraq Suhrawardi (1154-1191), Muhammad Ibn Mahmud Shams al-Din al-Shahrazuri (d. after 1288), in most part, hold fast to Suhrawardi’s illuminationist doctrines. As a case study on celestial bodies, the allegiance may well be at question level.The nine celestial spheres and sublunary world held managed by ten separated intelligences. Suhrawardi depicted the celestial spheres in his allegorical works. Suhrawardi usually speaks of eleven symbols, for instance, eleven mountains in “The Red Intellect” and the eleven layers of a basin in “The Sound of Gabriel’s Wing”. But the eleven celestial bodies, including ether and zamharir rule out Divine Pedestal (al-kursi) and Divine Throne (al ’arsh) of Muhyiddin al-Andalusi. Surprisingly, in his mystic work called Kitab al-Rumuz wa-l-Amthal al-Lahutiyya fil-Anwar al-Mujarradat al-Malakutiyya, Shams al-Din al-Shahrazuri nor except in passing has considered the celestial bodies. In al-Rumuz of Shahrazuri, the number of celestial beings has not been mentioned. Speaking of Divine Pedestal (al-kursi) and Divine Throne (al ’arsh) of Ibn Arabi, Shahrazuri does not consider zamharir and ether.

Developing the empirical method based on observation and experiment, Alhazen is considered the greatest Muslim physicist and the most significant figure in the history of optics between antiquity and the seventeenth century. Inventing a camera obscura, Alhazen rebuilt our conception of eyesight. His theory of vision was enormously prominent and much of our understanding of optics and light is based upon his groundbreaking discoveries. He began his criticism of emission by describing what happens when people are exposed to bright lights. No matter what the light source, the effect of bright lights was always the same. What this indicates to Alhazen is that light entering into the eye from an external source had some serious function in eyesight. Respecting observation, experiment and empirical method, Suhrawardi, the father of Illumination School, argues all theories of vision and rejects them just by mere reasoning. Suhrawardi validates his own Illuminationist method by scientists’ empirical method. So, I will argue, he is not to deny empirical aspect of Alhazen’s theory of vision. In an allegory, I will use the camera, representing the whole process of a human vision, while I use “beyond camera” for the embodiment that allows for the unfolding of a human soul’s position in the process of vision. What Alhazen is speaking of, we might call the process within the camera; while what Suhrawardi is speaking of, we could name the process behind the camera.