Suhrawardi as an Avicennian Sciartist

Document Type : Original Article

Abstract

Fleshing philosophical issues out by allegory, Suhrawardi constitutes the founder of the Illumination School. And his allegorical issues are deemed Avicennian all the way down the line, requiring us to point his other face out: Avicennian Suhrawardi.
I set forth three issues of sense perception, emanation, and cosmology which ever since Aristotle’s age has captured the attention of philosophers.
In the field of sense perception, ten interior and exterior senses are allegorized by ten towers, ten wide straps, ten graves, ten flyers, ten wardens, five chambers and five gates.
In the theory of emanation, the ten Separate Intellects are allegorized by the ten old men, whereas the Active Intellect by the father, the master, and the Red Intellect.
In cosmology, the spheres are symbolized by nine shells, eleven layers of a basin, eleven mountains, sons, and mills.
Ten sense perceptions, ten intellects, and nine or eleven spheres are modules of Avicenna’s philosophy, forcing us to reckon Suhrawardi as an Avicennian sciartist.

All of these allegories allude to Avicenna’s views. That being the case, Suhrawardi is reckoned as an Avicennian sciartist writ large, due to encrypt Avicenna’s stance by allegory, in lieu of his own illumationist views.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

-      Al-Jami, Abd al-Rahman, 1979, The Precious Pearl Al-Jami’s Al-Durrah al Fakhirah, Nicholas Heer (trans. and notes), Albany: State University of New York Press.
-      Cachey, Theodore, 2015, “Cosmology, geography, and cartography”, Dante in Context, Zygmunt G. Barański and Lino Pertile (eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
-      Chittick, William C., 2001, The Heart of Islamic Philosophy: The Quest for Self-Knowledge in the Teachings of Afdal Al-Din Kashani, New York: Oxford University Press. 
-      Freedman, Paul, 2007, Food: The History of Taste, Berkley: University of California Press.
-      Furness, Horace Howard, 1880, "King Lear", Shakespeare 5 (7th ed.), Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co.
-       Garfield, Eugene, 1989, “Art and Science”, part 2, Current Contents 9: 62-67.
-      Grünzweig, Walter (ed.), 2012, The Sciartist: Carl Djerassi’s Science-in-Literature Transatlantic and Interdisciplinary Context, Berlin: LIT Verlag.
-      Heath, Peter, 2011, “Allegory in Islamic Literatures”, The Cambridge Companion to Allegory (2nd ed.), Rita Copeland and Peter T. Struck (eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 83-100.
-      Ibn Sina, Hussein Ibn-Abdullah, 1953, Daneshnameh Alayi, Tehran: Society of  National Works.
---, 1997a, Isharat va Tanbihat, vol. 2, Qum: Nashr al-Balaqah.
---, 1997b, Isharat va Tanbihat, vol. 3, Qum: Nashr al-Balaqah.
---, 1985, Mabda va Maad, Tehran: Institute of Islamic Studies.
 ---, 1986, Nejat, Tehran: University of Tehran.
---, 1983, Shifa, Qum: Ayatollah Marashi Library.
---, 1937, The Treatise on Psychology, Tehran: Khayam Library.
-      Lewis, Clive Staples, 1990, "Sense", Studies in Words (2nd ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
-      Kreisel, Howard, 2009, “From Esotericism to Science: The account of the chariot in maimonidean philosophy till the End of the Thirteenth Century”, The Cultures of Maimonideanism: New Approaches to the History of Jewish Thought, James T. Robinson (ed.), Leiden: Brill, 21-56.
-      Maftouni, Nadia, 2014, Fārābī and the Philosophy of Religious Art, Tehran: Sorush Press.
 ---, 2015, Negarehay-e Ishraqi, Tehran: Vaya Publication.
-      Marcotte, Roxanna, 2012, “Suhrawardi”, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
-      Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, 1993, An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines, New York: State University of  New York Press.
-      Reichert, Michelle, 2014, Between Courtly Literature and Al-Andaluz: Oriental Symbolism and Influences, London: Routledge.
-      Suhrawardi, Shahāb al-Dīn, 2002a, Majmū’a-i Musannafāt-i Shaykh-i Ishrāq, vol. 2, Tehran: Pajūhishgāh-i ‘Ulūm-i Insānī Wa Mutāli’āt-i Farhangī Press.
---, 2002b, Majmū’a-i Musannafāt-i Shaykh-i Ishrāq, vol. 3, Tehran: Pajūhishgāh-i ‘Ulūm-i Insānī Wa Mutāli’āt-i Farhangī Press.
---, 1999, The Philosophical Allegories and Mystical Treatises, W. M. Thackston (ed. and trans.), Costa Mesa: Mazda Publishers.
-      Walbridge, John, 2011, “The Devotional and Occult Works of Suhrawardi the Illuminationist”, Ishraq: Islamic Philosophy Yearbook 2: 80-97.

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics