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This book is a comparative study of two major Shii thinkers Hamid al-Din Kirmani from the Fatimid Egypt and Mulla Sadra from the Safavid Iran, demonstrating the mutual empowerment of discourses on knowledge formation and religio-political authority in certain Ismaili and Twelver contexts. The book investigates concepts, narratives, and arguments that have contributed to the generation and development of the discourse on the absolute authority of the imam and his representatives. To demonstrate this, key passages from primary texts in Arabic and Persian are translated and closely analyzed to highlight the synthesis of philosophical, Sufi, theological, and scriptural discourses. The book also discusses the discursive influence of Nasir al-Din usi as a key to the transmission of Ismaili narratives of knowledge and authority to later Shii philosophy and its continuation to modern and contemporary times particularly in the narrative of the guardianship of the jurist in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
List of contents
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction.- CHAPTER TWO: H amid al-Din Kirmani on the Human Soul and Knowledge.-CHAPTER THREE: Kirmani's Discourse on the Imamate and its Influence.- CHAPTER FOUR: Mulla S adra on Knowledge and the Imamate.- CHAPTER FIVE: Mulla S adra's Legacy and Concluding Remarks.
About the author
Sayeh Meisami is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at University of Dayton in Ohio, USA. She has also taught at the University of Toronto and Queen's University in Canada. She published
Mulla Sadrain 2013 and has several journal articles in the area of Islamic philosophy and religion.
Summary
This book is a comparative study of two major Shīʿī thinkers Ḥamīd al-Dīn Kirmānī from the Fatimid Egypt and Mullā Ṣadrā from the Safavid Iran, demonstrating the mutual empowerment of discourses on knowledge formation and religio-political authority in certain Ismaʿili and Twelver contexts. The book investigates concepts, narratives, and arguments that have contributed to the generation and development of the discourse on the absolute authority of the imam and his representatives. To demonstrate this, key passages from primary texts in Arabic and Persian are translated and closely analyzed to highlight the synthesis of philosophical, Sufi, theological, and scriptural discourses. The book also discusses the discursive influence of Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī as a key to the transmission of Ismaʿili narratives of knowledge and authority to later Shīʿī philosophy and its continuation to modern and contemporary times particularly in the narrative of the guardianship of the jurist in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
