The Philosophy of Mulla Sadra | Dr. Fazlur Rahman

“The Philosophy of Mulla Sadra” is a book written by Dr. Fazlur Rahman, a Pakistani philosopher and Islamic scholar. The book is a study of the teachings of Mulla Sadra, a prominent philosopher and theologian of the Safavid period in Iran. The book provides a comprehensive overview of Mulla Sadra’s philosophy, including his views on metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. It also explores the influence of Mulla Sadra’s thought on later philosophers and theologians in the Islamic world. The book is considered to be an important resource for those interested in Islamic philosophy and the thought of Mulla Sadra.

This is one of the pioneering works on the life and works of Sadr al-Dīn Shirāzī (1572-1640), one of the greatest Islamic sages and philosophers, and marks the dawn of a wider perspective on Islamic philosophy; a perspective that corrects the classical view held in the West that Islamic philosophy constituted a passing phenomenon and was merely a bridge between the late antiquity and the Latin High Middle ages. It provides a scholarly and serious introduction of Mulla Sadra against the backdrop of the rich Islamic philosophic tradition; presents his essential teachings in a contemporary idiom; aims at a critical and analytical statement of his philosophy primarily con­tained in his monumental work Al-Asfār al-Arba‘a and shows that Sadra’s system, despite certain inner difficulties, is a highly original one revealing the extraordinary intellectual calibre of its author. The present work will further stimulate sorely needed philosophic research into this hitherto little explored but rich field of Islamic thought.

In thirteen densely written chapters the books covers all the fundamental issues of Ontology, Theology, Psychology and Eschatology (Man and his Destiny) as elucidated by Mulla Sadra in his magnum opus.