Pari Iranmanesh's Article 'An Analysis of the Personality Structure and Intellectual System of Shaykh al-Ishraq, Focusing on Their Influential Axes on Muslim Sages'

In a non-exhaustive division, the history of Islamic philosophy is divided into three approaches: Peripatetic, Illuminationist, and Transcendent Theosophy. The founder of Illuminationist philosophy is one of the most influential Muslim sages, who, both in terms of character and personality and in terms of the structure of his thought, exerted a tremendous influence on subsequent currents, especially Transcendent Theosophy, theoretical mysticism, and other fields of study such as comparative religion, the re-reading of pre-Aristotelian philosophy, and Iranian studies.

This influence can be delineated in three areas: 1) the specific personality and character of Shaykh al-Ishraq; 2) his methodology in philosophical and religious studies; and 3) his philosophical, logical, and epistemological achievements.

This paper, using a descriptive-analytical method, first identifies the Shaykh's personality based on the framework of Jung's personality theory and explores his most important personal influences on later sages; then, it proceeds to investigate his prominences in the areas of methodology and philosophical, logical, and epistemological achievements that are of significance in shaping intellectual currents, in order to, on the one hand, ascertain the aforementioned axes of influence with solid data, and on the other hand, to prove that the intellectual structure of Shaykh al-Ishraq is entirely separate from the intellectual structure of Peripatetic philosophy and possesses the characteristics of a distinct philosophical school.

Introduction

Islamic philosophy is divided into three general approaches, or schools, or doctrines, which are: Peripatetic philosophy; Illuminationist philosophy; and Transcendent Theosophy. Although such divisions are always a matter of dispute and cannot cover all the philosophical endeavors of Muslims in Islamic societies, at present, due to the lack of comprehensive research on the history of philosophy in the Islamic world, comparable to what Westerners have regarding the history of Western philosophy, it can be accepted with indulgence.

One of these three approaches or schools was created by a young sage named Shaykh Shihab al-Din Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardi, who, both in terms of his personal character and disposition and in terms of his philosophical, logical, and epistemological endeavors, exerted a tremendous influence on subsequent currents, especially Transcendent Theosophy, theoretical mysticism, and other fields such as comparative religion, the re-reading of the history of pre-Aristotelian philosophy, and Iranian studies (Corbin, 1380, 289), and from the early decades of the twentieth century, through the efforts of individuals like Henry Corbin, he also well attracted the deep attention of Orientalists (Leaman, 1389, vol. 2, 284).

As we said, this influence can be traced in three areas:

The specific personality and character of Shaykh al-Ishraq

His methodology in philosophical and religious studies

Philosophical, logical, and epistemological achievements

In this paper, we will briefly analyze the most important strands of these threefold influences.

1_ Influences of Personality and Character

Shihab al-Din Yahya ibn Habash ibn Amirak Abu al-Futuh Suhrawardi, titled Shaykh al-Ishraq, is, like Ya'qub ibn Ishaq al-Kindi, Abu Nasr al-Farabi, Bu Ali Sina (Avicenna), Khwaja Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, and Mulla Sadra, among the current-shaping philosophers whose scope of influence was not limited to their own time but extended to other ages as well. This phenomenon regarding Shaykh al-Ishraq is not limited to his intellectual structure and philosophical and logical achievements; rather, his personality type, character, and specific way of life, like those of figures such as al-Hallaj and Ayn al-Qudat al-Hamadani, have always been the focus of attention and have had a tremendous practical impact on currents after him. In other words, unlike philosophers such as Ibn Sina (Avicenna), who shaped currents solely through their intellectual apparatus, or thinkers whose scope of influence is summarized only in their books, for individuals like Shaykh al-Ishraq, their personal life and social existence have also been a model, and in addition to the emergence of a kind of intellectual apparatus and social existence based on their personality, they have also found numerous practical imitators who have based their own lives on his life or their practical instructions. Such a phenomenon occurs for only a few individuals in the history of human thought; although the scope of these objective and practical influences and their demographic penetration coefficient also vary.

What we know of the life of Shaykh al-Maqtūl (the Martyred Shaykh) comes mainly from the book Nuzhat al-Arwāḥ by Shahrazūrī, the commentator on Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq and one of the Shaykh’s staunch followers, who in turn drew most of it from Itmām al-Tatimma by Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Muwaffaq, and ʿUyūn al-Anbāʾ by Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿa (Yazdanpanah, 1391, 1, 11–13). We do not wish to repeat his biography here; therefore, we will only point out the headlines that help in analyzing his personality based on the framework of Jung’s theory (which is our chosen framework for analysis).

The most important matters narrated from his life in the three aforementioned books are as follows:

Birth in the sixth century (549 AH); the geographical region of Zanjan; Suhraward

Spending childhood in Maragheh and studying under Majd al-Dīn Jīlī

Migration to Isfahan and studying under Ẓahīr al-Dīn Fārsī; being a classmate of Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī

Strong inclination toward Peripatetic philosophy in Isfahan, in the second decade of his life, and the beginning of his inclination toward Illumination from the age of 30, as a result of a famous visionary experience known as the “Dream Narrative” (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, vol. 2, p. 10)

The beginning of extensive travels, keeping company with mystics, and personal mystical experiences as a result of severe ascetic practices

Delving into mystical discussions to confirm his illuminations; and also providing confirmatory proofs for his illuminations (a method that reaches its peak in Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq)

Arrival in Aleppo in 579 AH, and gaining a scholarly position at the court and becoming the tutor of Prince al-Malik al-Ẓāhir Ghāzī, son of Saladin Ayyubi.

Completing his philosophical system by the age of 33 and writing his most important books at the ages of 32 and 33 (Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq, al-Muṭāraḥāt, al-Talwīḥāt, and al-Muqāwamāt)

The envy and slander of the scholars of Aleppo, their correspondence with Saladin, and consequently his execution at the age of 38, i.e., the year 587 AH (Shahrazūrī, 1372, pp. 13–21). Another possibility is that his execution could also have been due to his specific political theory (Leaman, 1382, vol. 2, 273).

In addition to this, we know that he lived during the Seljuk period. In his era, opposition to Peripatetic philosophy had peaked with the emergence of two important figures, namely Ghazālī and Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī, the former making mysticism and the latter making theology important rivals to philosophy (Nasr, 1371, 62). Mysticism in his century was also flourishing with the emergence of great mystics. Suhraward itself had great mystics who influenced the thriving mystical atmosphere and life among its people. For example, Najīb al-Dīn Suhrawardī was a mystic who lived there before the Shaykh and influenced the flourishing of such a form of living. One can also name Shihāb al-Dīn ʿUmar Suhrawardī (542–632 AH), the author of ʿAwārif al-Maʿārif, who was a contemporary of the Shaykh.

1-1_ A Jungian Analysis of the Personality of Shaykh al-Ishrāq

To analyze personality, we need a theoretical framework to organize scattered data into an overall system. Here, we choose Jung’s theory of personality as our analytical presupposition.

The famous Swiss psychologist, Carl Gustav Jung, posited two attitudes (introversion and extraversion) and four functions (thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition), from the combination of which eight personality types emerge: extraverted thinking, introverted thinking, extraverted feeling, introverted feeling, extraverted sensation, introverted sensation, extraverted intuition, introverted intuition. Attitude is the readiness of each to act and react in a specific direction. Extraversion is the directing of psychic energy toward the outer world, and introversion is toward the inner world. These have equal value, and both exist relatively, but with the predominance of one, the other goes into the unconscious (1971, 1921). The function that predominates in consciousness is called the superior function, and its opposite, which goes into the unconscious and performs its operation there, is called the inferior function (1948), and the other two play an auxiliary role.

Thinking,^[1] is a rational process, which is either concrete or abstract. Jung considers only active, directed, and goal-oriented thinking as rational, and not passive thinking. Feeling,^[2] is a subjective process of valuation that occurs either based on externally accepted information and values or on subjective impressions. Intense feeling becomes affect (1921). Sensation,^[3] is the function of receiving material stimuli and converting them into perceptual consciousness, an awareness that is either quantitatively influenced by subjective attitudes and close to objectivity, or greatly influenced by subjective impressions and interpretations. Sensation also includes inner sensation. Intuition is a perception beyond the activities of consciousness, and in other words, it is a function that mediates perception of the world in an unconscious manner (1921), yielding immediate certainty and conviction. A part of intuition is more or less possessed by everyone, and another part is not accessible to all, such as the creativity of an inventor, the taste of a poet and artist, and the intuitive perception of a mystic. This intuitive perception is involved both in gathering data and in analyzing it. This intuition either pertains to external realities or to the subjective and internal (as with mystics and prophets). Neither sensation nor intuition has a rational basis; they are merely the immediate perception of inner and outer events (ibid.). Intuition and sensation are modes of perception and data gathering, and thinking and feeling are modes of judging them.

No personality type should consider the function of another personality type strange. Usually, one function, and in very exceptional cases, two or three functions, dominate in individuals. Those who achieve individuation and self-actualization bring all four functions to fruition and balance. The point is that each of these personality types has a particular efficacy and talent for a specific task (1921, 1971).

The concept of self-actualization or individuation (which is an endless process resulting from repeated rebirths) is the integration of opposing psychic factors and the balanced development of the four functions, introversion and extraversion, the courage to confront the unconscious, the shadow, the balance of the anima[4] and animus[5] tendencies, minimizing the persona, and the balanced dominance of the unconscious self over the personality. According to Jung, these events never occur before midlife. Success in creating balance among opposing tendencies, functions, and psychic forces requires a higher level of consciousness (1943).

Much work has been done on the similarities between Jungian views and mystical traditions (including Islamic Sufism). Jung's collective unconscious has been widely used in explaining revelation; however, some theologians, such as Seyyed Hossein Nasr and Schuon, criticize this usage (Malekian, Lessons on the Epistemology of Revelation, Session Thirteen).

Based on Jung's theory and the information we have about the personality of Shaykh al-Ishraq, we can divide his life into two periods in which the dominance of his tendencies and functions differs. His early period relates to the days when he was immersed in Peripatetic philosophy and the intuitive function did not dominate in him, and the second period relates to the time when a profound transformation occurred within him and his tendency was drawn inward.

It is noteworthy that we see a two-period life and the occurrence of a cognitive or emotional revolution in many of the world's influential thinkers. Although the occurrence of a personality transformation is unlikely, in these individuals this revolution is such that it is as if we are dealing with two personalities. Even Jung himself narrates such a two-sided personality in himself. During his school years, Jung became aware of personality number one (rationalist and extraverted) and number two (intuitive and introverted), and he counted every state or behavior of his as a reflection of one of the two, which alternately dominated him at any given time. The peak of Jung's introversion was during his severe midlife crisis (Feist & Feist, 2009). This duality of personality was also reflected in the duality of his interests, and this internal rift and war never left him. Between the ages of 16 and 19, with the dominance of his first personality, he turned to philosophy, and above all, the thoughts of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Goethe, and Kant attracted his attention. In the middle period, he gravitated toward intuition, introspection, mysticism, and Eastern traditions, and finally managed to strike a balance between them and, in his own words, self-actualize. He was interested in various fields of the empirical and human sciences: archaeology, linguistics, history, philosophy, natural sciences, alchemy, religious studies, mysticism, mythology, ethnology, Eastern philosophies, and so on; and of course, he used all of these in his theories.[6]

We see such a situation in Suhrawardī as well, and perhaps it is this very inner revolution that placed him among the influential thinkers who moved contrary to the prevailing thought of their time. Based on biographical information, the first period of his life can be called personality one, which, according to the Jungian framework, is the extraverted thinking type, and what dominates him, in order, are: extraversion, thinking, feeling, sensation.

But based on the same biographical information, in the second period of his life, Suhrawardī possesses the introverted sensation (intuitive) personality, whose dominant characteristics, in order of dominance, are: introversion, sensation, feeling, thinking.

The influence of Shaykh al-Ishrāq's personality type generally relates to the period when he departed from belonging to the official, dominant intellectual current and himself became a creative, generative, and influential personality. Therefore, the influences pertain to his second personality. In this personality, which we have called introverted sensation (intuitive):

a) Introversion: In his second personality, Yaḥyā ibn Ḥabash is primarily oriented toward his inner world. The dream-vision narrative and Aristotle's advice to begin knowledge with self-knowledge, as well as the intense ascetic practices of this period for the stripping away of the body, directed him toward this inner world of his own. Self-awareness is his most important goal (Leaman, ibid., 293-305). Of course, this inward journey ultimately leads to the return from the Real to creation, and the Shaykh fulfills his mission by turning outward and disseminating his inner findings. His avoidance of settling in one place, his strong inclination toward numerous travels and associating with various people, as well as his extensive efforts to express and promote his findings and thoughts, can be seen as signs of the emergence of his earlier extraversion alongside his intense introversion, which in the language of mystics can be called the journey from the Real to creation. But this final period can be called the period of flourishing and individuation of Shaykh al-Ishrāq, in which the tendencies of introversion and extraversion reach equilibrium in him; neither is the extraversion of the first period dominant over him, nor the introversion of the second; rather, the Shaykh achieves transcendence between the two. Perhaps it is this balance between introversion and extraversion that transforms him into a school-founding personality. It should not be overlooked that the Shaykh is among the few Muslim philosophers who, during his own lifetime, consciously and deliberately set about founding a philosophical school through travel, promoting his works and teachings, and training disciples (Collected Works, 1, 505; Yazdānpanāh, ibid., 17).

b) Sensation (Intuition): This tendency reaches its peak with the occurrence of the dream-vision narrative (Collected Works, 1, 70) and the question and answer with Aristotle about the nature of knowledge, self-awareness, and the characteristics of true sages, and it has such an impact on the Shaykh that it not only transforms his intellectual and philosophical structure but also stabilizes the intuitive tendencies in his personality and compels him toward a new style of life for attaining intuitive self-awareness (Leaman, ibid.).

Of course, his intense inclination toward intuition and mysticism was not something that occurred to him all at once. Traces of this inclination can perhaps be found in his childhood. Although we lack sufficient evidence for such a claim, and if we could access the books he claims to have written in his infancy, perhaps we could extract the atmosphere of his childhood and adolescence from them (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 12-13). Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, who was his contemporary and schoolmate in Isfahan, recounts his sharp mind and fiery inclination (Collected Works, S, 18-19, Editor's Introduction).

As we have said, the second personality of Shaykh al-Ishraq is the one that exemplifies trend-setting. Some important characteristics arising from this new personality—whose most significant features include attention to the inner self, self-awareness, intuition, and an ascetic lifestyle—have had a tremendous impact on the intellectual structure and lives of the sages who came after him, some of which are as follows:

1_ 1_ 1_ The Interconnection between Wisdom and the Personality of the Perceiver

As we will discuss in the section on epistemological achievements, the Shaykh considers the psychology of the perceiver's personality to be decisive in acquiring valid knowledge (Leaman, ibid., 293-395). He regards connection to the luminous world and the capture of luminous wisdom as dependent on the personality structure of the philosophizing individual. Although attaining such knowledge is possible for everyone, it requires changes in the individual's personality, some of which are positive and some negative. In this regard, he enumerates two sets of negative and positive characteristics that hinder or facilitate Illuminationist wisdom. The characteristics that must be cultivated lie in inner purity and the refinement of the heart, intellect, and intuition through asceticism, worship, and the practice of Illuminationist wisdom—in a word, preparing the mirror of the inner self to receive light from the source of the Light of Lights (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 38-39).

The obstacles are also numerous, and it is for this reason that Shahrazuri, after dividing true sciences into the dhawqi (tasted) or kashfi (unveiled) [direct observation of truths through the detachment of the soul from the body] and the bahthi (discursive) or nazari (theoretical) [wallowing in mere concepts], says in the introduction to Hikmat al-Ishraq that only a very small number attain divine wisdom (Collected Works, 2, 5). He considers the pre-Aristotelian sages to be the legends of such wisdom: Agathodaemon, Hermes, Empedocles, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato (ibid.).

Since the goal of philosophy is to reach reality, only those who find a path to the real world are philosophers or sages; the rest are merely pseudo-philosophers who "know but a page." Of course, the path to reality is both intuition (like the true mystics, Hallaj, Bayazid, and Tustari) and the intellect that arises from intuition.

Some of the most important obstructive characteristics are:

1_ The Histrionic and Narcissistic Personality

The histrionic personality is an unstable personality for whom gaining others' attention toward oneself is the firmest regulator of their states and actions. The narcissistic personality is also someone who considers themselves the center of the universe and is so mentally preoccupied with themselves that they lack the capacity to confront realities other than themselves. The major characteristic of both personalities is an intense outward focus, which prevents attention to the inner self and self-awareness. In Suhrawardi's view, one of the characteristics of those who feign wisdom is histrionic and narcissistic personalities whose goal is to attract others' attention through philosophical discussions, not to attain reality themselves. Shahrazuri, the commentator on Hikmat al-Ishraq, describes this characteristic intended by the Shaykh in the introduction to this book as follows:

"They [the followers of Peripatetic philosophy] busied themselves with discussing, refuting, and proving this opinion and that, questioning and answering one another, and matters of this sort, the common feature of all these affairs being that they prevented them from acquiring dhawqi matters" (Collected Works, Vol. 2, 5).

The personality disorders that obstruct illumination are not limited to these, and their induction requires another opportunity.

2_ The Personality Inclined Toward Domination and Control

Shahrazuri continues in the same text: "Especially since the love of leadership was also added to all those obstacles, and as a result, just as they grew, dhawq and the unveiling of truths grew weaker in them" (ibid.).

3. Entry into Political Power and the System of Social Authority

Just as jurisprudence in today's Muslim societies brings individuals political and social standing and authority, there was a time when this characteristic was the product of theology (kalām), and another time when it belonged to philosophy. Particularly since the natural sciences and medicine were also considered part of philosophy, philosophers and physicians were usually one and the same; hence, the ruling apparatus paid them considerable attention. As history shows, the Peripatetics after Avicenna held governmental positions and enjoyed a particular social standing that placed them at the center of attention (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 30). From the perspective of Shaykh al-Ishrāq, such political authority and social weight are an obstacle to attaining wisdom. On the one hand, the exigencies of such positions, and on the other, the expulsion of intellectual rivals through political authority (rather than intellectual power), distanced them from acquiring true wisdom (Quṭb al-Dīn Shīrāzī, 1376, p. 5). Thus, the Peripatetics had corrupted wisdom in two ways: through philosophical quibbles, objections, and disputations; and through entry into the cycle of political power and social authority. The product of such corruption is distance from traversing the sacred path and witnessing luminous truths (Collected Works, 1, 361), and the transformation of philosophy into pseudo-philosophy, and the philosopher into an arrogant and narcissistic individual who knows a few pages of books and sayings.

The experience of Shaykh Shihāb al-Dīn's entry into the court and his close observation of the atmosphere of power and its exigencies may not have been without influence on such a conclusion, and as we have said, some strongly believe that the cause of Suhrawardī's execution was his later political theory (Leaman, ibid., 273). The title Amīrak in his name may also indicate that he experienced living in a family holding governmental positions during his childhood.

4. Body-Worship

This statement of the Shaykh is among his most famous: "A person is not counted among the sages as long as he has not attained knowledge of the sacred leaven, and as long as he has not doffed and donned; so long as one does not attain that primordial leaven of wisdom and cannot divest himself of the body and then regain it, he is not considered among the company of sages" (Collected Works, 1, 503). And such an act should be so easy for him, and the body so under his control, that whenever he wishes, he can draw the spirit out of the body like a garment.

The sage is one whose thought and heart are in step and in harmony with one another, and this harmony is achieved only through weakening the bodily powers by means of spiritual exercises such as hunger, acts of worship, and also love. It is here that cognitive psychology once again gains importance in the attainment of authentic knowledge.

The characteristics that the martyred Shaykh enumerates for the personality of the sage gradually become a manifesto for attaining illuminative knowledge, which is pursued by sages and mystics for years and centuries after him (see Nasr, 1371; Yathribi, 1392, and 1397).

2. Methodological Influences

The bulk of Yaḥyā ibn Ḥabash's discussions on methodology appear in the introductions to the two works al-Mashāriʿ wa al-Muṭāraḥāt and Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq (Leaman, ibid., 274). As mentioned, Shaykh al-Ishrāq, around the age of 20 to 30, was "a fierce defender of the Peripatetic method" (Collected Works, vol. 2, p. 10; Shahrazūrī, 156), and the Peripatetic method of discussion, as well as the topics they accepted and rejected, can be observed in some of his books, even when he was immersed in Illuminationist discussions (Yazdanpanah, 1391, vol. 1, 14). For example, he wrote al-Talwīḥāt in the Peripatetic manner, albeit critically; for he is in search of reconstructing logic, epistemology, physics, and metaphysics through the Illuminationist method (Leaman, ibid., 275-276). Accordingly, in order to maintain a complete distinction from the Peripatetic school, theology, and even prevalent mysticism, the Shaykh, in addition to devising a new method for acquiring knowledge, also undertook the innovation of a new language.

2.1. Methodological Innovations

He, who considers Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq his supreme work in the new period of his life and thought in terms of structure, content, and pedagogical method, calls its method Illuminationist, which possesses the following characteristics:

Its contents were first disclosed to him through intuition and the heartfelt experience resulting from years of severe and continuous asceticism (Collected Works, vol. 2, 9).

He not only considers discrete revealed components, such as the World of Separate Imaginal Forms, or the fourfold enumeration of the universe of being (the world of intellects and dominating lights; the world of souls and governing species; the world of matter and body [elemental body and celestial body]; and the world of separate imaginal forms or suspended, dark and luminous forms), as arising from his intuitions (ibid., 232); but he also regards his entire new philosophical system, which he deems a metaphysics of light, as a single inspiration cast by the Holy Spirit on a wondrous day (Collected Works, vol. 2, 258).

Then, drawing upon his Peripatetic background and mastery of rational discussions, an effort is made to demonstrate these heartfelt intuitions through proofs and render them acceptable to people of theoretical inquiry (Collected Works, 2, 5, 10, 271; vol. 1, 121).

The proofs merely confirm his intuitions, and even if the reasoning is weak and rejected by others, what takes precedence are his personal mystical experiences, regarding whose validity he harbors no doubt whatsoever (ibid., vol. 2, 232, 10).

The basis of Shaykh al-Ishraq's view is that reason and intuition are not opposed to one another; for reality is one, and the paths to reach it are two: intuition and reason. Consequently, if a contradiction is found between the two, according to logical rules, one must doubt the correctness of one of them. Intuition cannot contradict rational certainties such as the principle of non-contradiction, and reason likewise cannot reject sound intuition (into which reason itself has no access). Established reason is the criterion for evaluating intuitions, and intuition is the ladder to the perfection of reason. The reason with which the Shaykh and other mystics were at odds is the reason confined to Peripatetic reason (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 45).

For the first time in the history of Islamic philosophy, he divided metaphysics into two parts, general and specific, which led to the foundation of an important methodological principle. General philosophy includes common discussions on subjects such as existence, unity, substances, accidents, time, motion, etc. Specific philosophy is a novel approach to analyzing supra-rational subjects such as the existence of God, divine knowledge, intuitive experiences, veridical dreams, and other attainments of the imaginal world (Leaman, ibid., 281).

From the perspective of Shaykh al-Ishraq, extraordinary experiences such as veridical dreams, personal unveilings, intuitive knowledge of the whole, foretelling the future, out-of-body experiences, reviving the dead, and other supernatural phenomena can be scientifically explained through the science of lights and the jurisprudence of lights (Collected Works, vol. 2, 10; Leaman, ibid., 280). Hence, in the final chapters of his major philosophical works, he undertakes such explanations (see: Leaman, ibid., 311, endnote 36).

A very important point must not be overlooked here, which is that Shaykh al-Ishraq, unlike the other two anti-Peripatetic currents of his era, does not deem philosophy futile; rather, he considers it insufficient and does not equate the objections raised against the Peripatetics with a negation of philosophy in its entirety. These two approaches were put forward by Ghazali and Fakhr al-Din al-Razi (as well as Shahrastani), in the first of which mysticism replaces philosophy, and in the second, theology replaces Peripatetic philosophy (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 25-27). From the Shaykh's perspective, the path to reality is not confined to the heart (mysticism) or reason (Peripateticism); rather, it lies in the joint effort of both and the simultaneous utilization of the intuitive and the discursive methods. Rational endeavor is also not confined to the flawed Peripatetic method, and alternative methods for philosophical thought can be created (ibid., 28).

Such a method is not strange. Not only do we see this in Western philosophy; in sciences such as psychology, one can also abundantly find traces of intuition (the world of separate imaginal forms) or introspection (the world of connected imaginal forms). For example, this intuition is seen abundantly in Jung. He says: "My ideas are not merely products of my intellect, but a great deal of them have come from my heart" (1953/1943, p. 116). Jung considered the contents of the unconscious to be universal, hereditary patterns called archetypes. Also, unlike Freud, he did not attribute to the unconscious merely the function of distorting reality and causing mental disorder; rather, he also attributed to it the function of creativity, genius, and mental health (something close to the separate imagination / the world of Ideas / imaginal world / barzakh / in Ibn Arabi's mysticism).^[7] It was on this basis that, in an encounter with his own unconscious and seeing an image of Europe in fire and blood, he predicted the outbreak of the First World War in his book entitled The Red Book.^[8]

The main structure and methodological claim of Illuminationist wisdom or the Science of Lights of Shaykh al-Ishraq had a tremendous influence on the generation of subsequent thinkers. This influence can be seen in three groups:

Mystics who pay attention to philosophical discussions. This new intellectual structure reaches its perfection in the seventh century AH, which is the peak era of Islamic mysticism, with the emergence of figures such as Ibn Arabi, Qunawi, Rumi, Farghani, Jandi, and others.

Philosophers inclined towards mysticism, such as Khwaja Nasir al-Din Tusi and Mir Damad.

The Transcendent Philosophy of Mulla Sadra (Yazdan Panah, ibid.).

2_ 2_ Linguistic Innovations

The Shaykh's second methodological innovation relates to the language of his philosophy. In addition to borrowing a new language in his philosophical explanations (by highlighting Iranian symbols), and also striving to create a common comparative language along with numerous linguistic correspondences of terms from various schools (based on the philosophical foundation of the experience of a single truth in different garments), he is also the founder of a new method in philosophical language: the language of allegory and metaphor (see: Corbin, 1380, Chapter Seven).

Although allegorical language was not prevalent in Islamic philosophy and most sages did not pay attention to the capabilities of language in expressing and understanding philosophical issues, (likewise, in Western philosophy until very recently); sometimes philosophers can be found who have paid attention to this capacity of language in understanding deep meanings and teaching them. Ibn Sina is one of these philosophers. At the beginning of the ninth namat of al-Isharat, he divides wayfarers into three categories: ascetics, worshippers, and mystics, and for mystics, he enumerates degrees and stations that they attain through spiritual discipline. To clarify this matter, he refers to the story of Salaman and Absal, which is his own composition. Salaman is the symbol of the human being and Absal is the symbol of the degrees that can be attained in mystical wayfaring. His three other works in which the use of allegorical and metaphorical language is prominent are: Risalat al-Tayr, Hayy ibn Yaqzan, and the Qasidah 'Ayniyyah.

Among the medieval philosophers, this method reaches its peak with Shaykh al-Ishraq. The influence of Ibn Sina's allegorical method can be seen in his translation of Risalat al-Tayr and the writing of numerous treatises using this method. For the first time in the history of Islamic philosophy, he wrote a large number of allegorical tales, mostly in Persian, for beginners, of which only a small number have survived (Leaman, ibid., 273). Some of these allegorical works are as follows: Qissat al-Ghurbat al-Gharbiyya, Avaz-i Par-i Jibra'il, Aql-i Surkh, Ruzi ba Jama'at-i Sufiyan, Fi Halat al-Sabuliyya, Fi Haqiqat al-'Ishq, Lughat-i Muran, and Safir-i Simurgh.

In addition to allegorical language, symbolic language is also one of the Shaykh's linguistic characteristics. We previously provided explanations regarding the symbol of light.

3_ Influence through Philosophical, Logical, and Epistemological Achievements

Shaykh al-Ishraq abandoned the Peripatetic philosophical discussions and built a new system with the nature of metaphysics or luminous wisdom, which he himself calls fiqh al-anwar or ‘ilm al-anwar (the science of lights) (Collected Works, vol. 2, 10). He traces the genealogy of this Illuminationist wisdom back to the ancient sages and considers Plato the chief of wisdom and the master of the sages (ibid.). (It is worth noting that he also repeats the historical error of the Muslims regarding the author of the Theology of Aristotle, with the difference that in Hikmat al-Ishraq he names Plato instead of Aristotle; see Yazdanpanah, ibid., 104).

Of course, it should not be forgotten that his philosophy is oriented toward Peripatetic wisdom, and even in certain discussions such as the soul and its faculties, the intellects, the categories, the elements, hyle, form, body, and the like, he presupposes the Peripatetic discussions and, without renewed debate, presents a new exposition of them based on his own principles. Therefore, one who does not know the Peripatetic tradition (especially the books of Ibn Sina, al-Basa’ir al-Nasiriyyah by Ibn Sahlan al-Sawi, and al-Tahsil by Bahmanyar) will not easily understand Illuminationism either (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 111-112; Leaman, ibid., 277-278). In his view, the logical foundations of Aristotelian metaphysics and epistemology have fundamental ruptures that must be reconstructed.

In Shihab al-Din’s view, wisdom consists of “the discussion of the separate entities and the principles of the world, that is, God, and universal discussions pertaining to existents (such as the discussion of existence which belongs to concrete entities), and such matters are not resolved and attained except through direct tasting (dhawq), witnessing (shuhud), and receiving light from the Light of Lights. From his perspective, the title of sage (hakim) applies only to one who witnesses transcendent matters, tastes the truth, and, in short, is a person of ta’alluh (deiformity)... Muta’allih means one who is in reality attributed to divinity... one who tastes the truth” (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 32; Collected Works, 1, 199).

It must be noted that light in his philosophy is a symbol for expressing the ontological foundations of gradational existence. Hence, for example, he calls the Peripatetic Necessary Existent the Light of Lights (Nur al-Anwar) and the separate intellects the immaterial lights (anwar mujarrada) (Leaman, ibid., 285). Lights, despite their difference in intensity and weakness, possess a single identity, and the degrees of luminosity are determined by proximity to and distance from the source of light, that is, the Light of Lights. Light, later in Sadrian philosophy under the influence of Shaykh al-Ishraq, was named existence (wujud) and became the axis of Transcendent Wisdom.

This luminous wisdom, which lies beyond Peripatetic philosophy, is attained through direct tasting (dhawq) and witnessing (shuhud). To reach these luminous realities, an element is necessary that is beyond the Peripatetic rational soul, which proceeds toward the acquisition of acquired knowledge (‘ilm husuli) through the rational faculty. This different element in the Shaykh’s philosophy is a luminous soul that, through spiritual discipline and love, joins the world of light and hunts luminous truths from there, and it constitutes the most important distinction between Peripatetic and Illuminationist philosophy.

Peripatetic philosophy is the product of the rational faculty of the rational soul and union with the Active Intellect, while Illuminationist philosophy arises from the connection of the luminous soul to the luminous world. Of course, the path to attaining Illuminationist philosophy is not confined to connection with the luminous world; rather, practice in Illuminationist philosophy itself also opens the path of illumination, witnessing, and connection to the system of lights for the learner (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 29; Collected Works, 2, 271). Such a difference can later be seen in the distinction between the two concepts of the attracted wayfarer (majdhub salik) and the wayfaring attracted one (salik majdhub).

Therefore, Peripatetic and Illuminationist psychology have fundamental differences, because the nature of the soul differs from the perspective of these two, and in the Shaykh’s view, the truth of the soul is also attained only through the Illuminationist method.

Shaykh al-Ishraq’s substantive innovations in the aforementioned areas, which possess a current-forming characteristic, are as follows (for a good account of these subsequent influences, see: Leaman, ibid., chapter twenty-nine):

3_1_ Witnessing as a Prelude to Demonstration and the Foundation of Philosophy

The first Muslim philosopher to take intuition, feeling, or experience in a particular sense is Suhrawardī (Yazdān Panāh, ibid., 45). In Islamic philosophy, intuition sometimes means 1) sensory experience; that is, our sensory experience is intuitive in form, and the object of intuition is the external, sensible thing itself (not their constructed form in the soul; Mullā Ṣadrā's theory); 2) sometimes it means presential knowledge of human states (such as hunger); 3) sometimes it means intellectual intuition or presential knowledge of concepts; 4) sometimes it means the intuition of the heart or seeing truths by transcending the material world; and sometimes it is spiritual intuition (Yazdān Panāh, ibid., 45-46). The first meaning was established for the first time by Shaykh al-Ishrāq and later, in Transcendent Philosophy, transformed into the intuition of the World of Images. He does not accept the third meaning.

As we know, in classical logic, only sensory intuitions (primary principles) are considered valid, and they deem the path of intellectual and heartfelt intuitions closed for acquiring demonstrative sciences. The Shaykh is among the first philosophers to claim that intuition can also be used for demonstration and to codify such a use. In his view, observations are broader than external sense, and also include inner sense and heartfelt intuition, and with both of them one can build demonstrative sciences. Just as primary principles possess intrinsic epistemic authority, heartfelt intuitions are likewise; they possess authority in themselves and can, like primary principles, serve as premises for demonstration and the foundation of philosophy, and a philosophical system can be established based on the intuition of the angelic realms (Collected Works, 2, 18, 13).

As in Peripatetic and Ṣadrian philosophy, and indeed in all philosophy, many of the most foundational discussions, including the proof of the principle of existence and reality (Ṭabāṭabāʾī, 1409, 4) or the immateriality of the soul (Ibn Sīnā, 1381, 292) or presential knowledge (Ṭabāṭabāʾī, 236) or even some premises of the principality of existence (Ṭabāṭabāʾī, 9) and dozens of other philosophical issues (such as motion, mental existence, causality, secondary intelligibles, etc.) are based on intellectual intuition and the perception of universal and intelligible truths, or that very philosophical encounter with the external world and external objects (Yazdān Panāh, ibid., 50-56). Such a use is also common in Western philosophy (see: Gilson, 1367, 289-290).

Shaykh al-Ishrāq takes a step beyond intellectual intuition as the most important tool of philosophy, and, believing in the existence of a faculty beyond the intellect that perceives universals, he puts forward a higher perceptive faculty called the heart, whose realized experiential knowledge results from spiritual discipline (such as constant remembrance, prayer, fasting, night vigils, recitation of the Quran, subtle thoughts, love, etc.) and the refinement of the spirit and the shedding of the body (Collected Works, 1, 113; Leaman, ibid., 281), and its findings are among the certainties and can serve as premises for demonstration and the foundation of philosophy; as such, the Shaykh makes his own intuition of the World of Images or the World of the Intellect (Platonic Forms, Intellects, and Separate Entities) the premise for philosophical discussion in this field (Collected Works, 2, 156). The heart sees or hears the truths of the world, and the intellect, which is a lower faculty, is illuminated by its light and, following the heart, confirms them, analyzes them, and establishes its own specific philosophy (Illuminative Wisdom) (Collected Works, 2, 271), which is, of course, distinct from mysticism and remains philosophy (Yazdān Panāh, ibid., 73-82).

This innovation can be considered the most fundamental basis of theoretical mysticism, as well as Transcendent Philosophy and philosophical phenomenology (Ibn Turka, 1360, 248; Qayṣarī, 1375, 70), about which Shaykh al-Ishrāq discusses extensively, and posterity in this field is indebted to him. It is not without reason that he considers himself the reviver of this perennial wisdom that had fallen into obscurity with the dominance of the Aristotelian method (Collected Works, 1, 503). Of course, his understanding of the heart is indebted to Quranic verses, religious tradition, and the illuminative strands in great Peripatetic philosophers like Ibn Sīnā, which reach their peak in the ninth and tenth chapters of the book al-Ishārāt (Yazdān Panāh, ibid., 100-105). Moreover, he is heavily indebted to the philosophy of Ibn Sīnā; albeit, a thoroughly critical indebtedness (Leaman, ibid., 277-278).

3_ 2_ Illuminative Psychology

As is evident from the dream-vision narrative, a fundamental problem for our Shaykh is the explanation of knowledge and the nature of science. He considered Peripatetic epistemology insufficient. Although his main problem is to present a new explanation of knowledge, he does not begin his philosophy with epistemology; for, as a result of his dream-vision and his question to Aristotle about the nature of knowledge, and Aristotle’s referral to self-knowledge/the soul, the Shaykh sees the untying of the knot of the problem of knowledge as lying in the study of the soul and self-consciousness. Since knowledge of the soul is presential and intuitive, it is self-subsistent and requires nothing else, and the individual becomes aware of himself through his own essence (the union of the knower and the known). The symbol of light is very illuminating here. God is the Light of Lights because He is the most self-conscious of beings, and it is through His archetypal lights that other things become illuminated and illumination/knowledge is attained.

On this basis, self-consciousness can become the foundation of all human knowledge. To understand the significance of finding such a foundation, consider the philosophy of Descartes, who, modeling himself on mathematics and geometry, sought in philosophy something to serve as the foundation of certain knowledge; as a result, he found it in the insufficient foundation of “I think, therefore I am.”

In the Shaykh’s view, if presential knowledge or the union of the knower and the known is the foundation of knowledge and the most certain form of knowledge, then in the knowledge of anything, it is the degree of correspondence between them that determines the validity of that knowledge. It is such a deduction that draws the martyred Shaykh onto the cognitive path of illuminative observation or observation-illumination. Valid knowledge of a thing means the direct experience of that thing, and the perception of the phenomenon as it is. To attain valid knowledge, a unity must occur between the knower and the known, and therefore, the psychological states of the knower are decisive in creating such a unity. This foundation is the richest form of methodological phenomenology, which we will discuss in the next section.

If the process of luminous wisdom consists of the shedding of the body, the ascent of the immaterial soul to the luminous world, the radiation of the archetypal lights upon the soul and the graded experience of light, the unveiling and observation of realities, the return to the body, and the analysis of observations by the intellect; then the primary instrument of such a philosophy is the soul. Hence, he begins his philosophy not from epistemology nor from ontology, but from the study of the soul based on presential knowledge and intuition. Luminous ontology, Illuminationist psychology, and the Illuminationist method are the three sides of a triangle in his luminous wisdom, which have a hermeneutic circle with one another. It is on this basis that the Shaykh 1) begins his luminous system from the study of the soul, 2) discovers its luminous identity in a summary manner through presential knowledge, 3) ascends toward the Light of Lights (God), and 4) observes the luminous identity of all things up to the Light of Lights; 5) in the arc of descent, he specifies the stations of the lights (i.e., the Proximate Light or the first effect; the Dominant Longitudinal Lights or the Intellects and Separate Substances; and the Dominant Equivalent Lights or the Platonic Forms) until he reaches the soul or the archetypal lights, and shows its station in this luminous system in detail, which is now trapped in the darkness of matter and must, through ascetic discipline, love, affection, and the like, be freed from this darkness or the Occident and connect to the world of light or the Orient and witness the realities (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 84). The terms Occident and Orient and the return to one’s homeland also originate from here and gain importance in his philosophy.

Before him, Ibn Sina, by writing the book al-Ḥikma al-Mashriqiyya (with two possible meanings: the wisdom of the sages of the East; and a philosophy with an Illuminationist method) and Manṭiq al-Mashriqiyyīn, had laid the foundation for such a view. However, Shaykh al-Ishraq considers him unsuccessful in reviving the wisdom of the East or the Khusrawānī sages (Collected Works, 1, 195) and severely criticizes Ibn Sina’s claim of founding an Oriental philosophy in an unknown book titled Karārīs fī al-Ḥikma (Leaman, ibid., 279-280).

3_ 3_ Logical Innovations

Suhrawardi was acquainted and intimate with al-Baṣāʾir al-Naṣīriyya by Umar ibn Sahlan al-Sawi (d. 540 AH). al-Baṣāʾir was among the first books to turn away from the customary ninefold division (the nine books of the Organon) and divided logic into two parts: material and formal. The Shaykh later used this innovation of al-Sawi in creating his own tripartite logic, which includes semantics, formal logic, and material logic (Leaman, 1382, 2, 272).

Among his logical influences one can mention his discussions on repeated modalities, the structure of the absolute necessary proposition, the problem of negation especially in logical conversion, the reduction of terms and the mother figure for the syllogism (from which the other figures of the syllogism are deduced), modal propositions (particularly the rejection of the unconditional value of the universal affirmative proposition in attaining certain knowledge due to future possibility), the theory of categories (which became the origin of Mulla Sadra's theory of substantial motion), and many other issues (ibid., 282).

Another area in which the Shaykh was influential is the domain of semantics or the signification of words, which is in a way a reconstruction of a weak narrative-Megarian strand in Islamic philosophy. The topics of naming, signification, types of signification, the relation of class titles to members, types of membership of individuals in classes including inclusion, exhaustive enumeration, insertion, comprehension, and so on are among these issues (ibid.).

Among his other logical and semantic innovations are his extensive critiques of the Peripatetic essentialist theory concerning definitions based on essence and also the complete definition, which considers the essential definition composed of genus and differentia of a thing to be the first and most important step in scientific explanation and philosophizing. Shaykh al-Ishraq deems essential definition impossible for several logical and semantic reasons (see: Leaman, ibid., 287-291), and as we said earlier, in a novel innovation and with a critique of Peripatetic epistemology, he founds knowledge upon self-knowledge based on presential and illuminative knowledge and intuitive experience, thereby reviving the Platonic current in Iranian philosophy (Leaman, ibid., 287). On this basis, an object is fully defined only when the individual apprehends it in his own self-consciousness.

3_ 4_ Epistemological Innovations

As we said, considering the dream narrative, the foundation of Suhrawardi's philosophy begins with the question of the nature of knowledge and a new explanation of it.

The fundamental aim of the Shaykh's philosophy is to present a philosophical framework that is a more precise and scientific tool for 1) investigating the nature of things; 2) attaining individual happiness; and ultimately 3) realizing a more scientific wisdom in the service of just governance (Leaman, ibid., 280). The influence of Plato can clearly be seen here. The issues raised by Shaykh al-Ishraq influenced not only the philosophy and mysticism after him, but also political thought (ibid., 283).

In addition to his epistemological innovations mentioned above, he can be counted among the first who delineated the methodological lines that centuries later became known as Husserlian methodological phenomenology (Yazdanpanah, ibid., 75). The similarities between the two are very striking (for a clear explanation of phenomenology, see Segal, 1390, translator's footnotes on the chapter on the phenomenology of religion).

By rejecting the logical and semantic possibility of the essential definition of phenomena by genus and differentia, Suhrawardi considers the way to define or know things to be "a return to sensible or apparent matters through another path" (Collected Works, 2, 210). A thing cannot be known by separating it into its uncountable, ambiguous, and tautological constituents (i.e., genus and differentia); rather, its totality must be observed and experienced as it is (Leaman, ibid., 291, 293).

Since, on the one hand, he does not want philosophy to be confined to a select few who illuminate the truth of the world, and on the other hand, philosophical issues do not solely comprise lofty subjects but also include lower matters such as physics; therefore, a definition of knowledge must be presented that is both accessible to everyone and effective in all epistemic matters. This knowledge is a spectrum that can be called the spectrum of illuminative observation or the spectrum of observation-illumination (Leaman, ibid., 279-305).

Illuminative observation is a primary state of immediate cognition that has a broader application than the observation of Platonic Forms, the suspended images of the imaginal world, or observations in mystical experiences. Knowledge based on observation is a spectrum that ranges from the phenomenological observation of the totality of a phenomenon to mystical and illuminative observations. The lower illuminative observation on this spectrum can be considered the same as the Husserlian phenomenological method, in which intuition and creativity play the main role (phenomenological observation in the continuous imagination), and its highest form is that through which Shaykh himself acquired the principles of his philosophy (observation of immaterial, imaginal entities possessing substance in the discontinuous imagination, with the guidance of the Giver of Forms) (Collected Works, vol. 2, 10). The essence of observation is a kind of experiencing the truth of phenomena in the form of a totality; that is, experiencing phenomena as they are, for everything itself possesses, to a greater or lesser degree, light from the Light of Lights and needs nothing else to become illuminated. Therefore, that which introduces itself does not need something else, such as genus and differentia, to be known. It suffices to observe and experience the light of the totality of a phenomenon: “A definition can only be attained through matters specific to the totality of a thing” (Collected Works, vol. 2, 210; adapted from: Leaman, ibid., 292). One must first abandon the world through spiritual exercises (akin to the phenomenological bracketing) so that, by strengthening the intuitive faculties, one becomes ready to receive this experience and observe the divine lights; and after acquiring illuminative knowledge, one conceptualizes, demonstrates, codifies, and writes down those presential observations, thereby founding illuminative science/philosophy. These four stages are possible for anyone (for further detail, see: Leaman, ibid., 293-395). He goes so far as to not even explain the phenomenon of vision/observation with the external sense through material processes of rays emanating from the eye, encountering visible objects, and the impression of the visible form in the eye; rather, he defines it phenomenologically as well: “Vision ... does not occur except through the direct confrontation of the illuminated object with a healthy eye” (Collected Works, 2, 134). Again, in this direct and unveiled encounter (a return to the things themselves, which was Husserl’s slogan) and opening oneself to receive the message of phenomena, one can see traces of philosophical phenomenology. It suffices for the individual seeking perception to attain a sound personality and have a direct confrontation with the object of perception, so that the light of knowledge from the Truth may shine upon them. Thus, the formula for phenomenological perception is as follows: the act of unveiled observation by a perceiver possessing a specific psychology, plus the light that shines from the Light of Lights, equals illuminative knowledge (Leaman, ibid.).

Another even more noteworthy resemblance of Shaykh al-Ishraq to the phenomenological approach is his emphasis on the role of poetry and other symbolic forms of language in expressing intuitive findings, the foundations of which Martin Heidegger, as a philosophical phenomenologist, developed well (Segal, ibid.).

Furthermore, since human light partakes most fully of existence, observing the truth of the human being greatly aids in knowing other phenomena (Leaman, ibid., 293).

Finally, it must be noted that our Shaykh’s epistemology, both in its observational and illuminative aspects, is a naïve realism that considers the attainment of certainty to be easy, even in sensory matters.

3_5_ The Imaginal World

As Henry Corbin states (1380, 300), Suhrawardi is the first philosopher to articulate an intermediary world called the imaginal world, which later sages and mystics elaborated upon. “The imaginal world is the intermediary world between the intelligible world of pure luminous existences and the sensible world, and the faculty that attains its perception is the active imagination. The imaginal world is not the world of Platonic Ideas; rather, it is the world of suspended images ... . The imaginal world plays a threefold role: resurrection is realized through this world, for it is the locus of subtle bodies; it is through the channel of this world that the symbols indicated by the prophets and all intuitive experiences are realized; and consequently, the hermeneutical interpretation of Quranic revelatory data is carried out through this world” (Corbin, 1380, 299-301).

3_6_ Perennial Wisdom

Shaykh al-Ishraq, alongside Abu Rayhan al-Biruni, can be considered one of the heralds of comparative religion and comparative philosophy, which unfortunately did not receive much welcome in the Islamic world and did not lead to the formation of independent scientific branches in these fields.

Moreover, the Shaykh is among the first to have originated the idea of ḥikmat-i khālida or perennial wisdom. Perennial wisdom or ḥikmat-i khālida is a term in mysticism and philosophy first used in the West by Augustinus Steuchus in 1540 and brought into currency by Leibniz in a letter written in 1715. Perennial wisdom, apart from the meaning understood by European philosophers after the Middle Ages, found its original sense in the writings of traditionalists such as René Guénon, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Frithjof Schuon, Titus Burckhardt, Martin Lings, William Stoddart, and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, and became an important intellectual current whose most significant features, in addition to the idea of the transcendent unity of religions, include the highlighting of intuitive intellect in the acquisition of knowledge (see: Malekian, 1381 [2002], chapter on the Traditionalists).

Other thinkers have also pursued such ideas through other methods. For example, Jung, by searching in the collective unconscious and also in Eastern religions, sought the roots of such a unity. Attention to dreams, attention to inner currents and insight into them, the journey toward wholeness, meaning and individuation, the discovery of the "Self" (as the source of wisdom and inner guidance and individual wayfaring), the collective unconscious (the unifying aspect of us humans), are among the Jungian ideas used in the books of the meaning-oriented current. Jung's views, especially the archetypes, have also been widely used to explicate the views of perennial wisdom (universal, global wisdom) concerning the underlying unity and the roots of all religions (Wolff, 1997).

Suhrawardī believes in the unity of truth, and therefore the knowledge and utilization of that reality, which is called ḥikmat-i ḥaqqa (true wisdom), is one and eternal. He considers the essence of the contemplations of Greek sages such as Plato to be one with the contemplations of Persian sages such as Kay Khusraw and Zoroaster and other sages of Iran like Jāmāsp, Frashōshtar, Buzurgmihr, and others. Their differences, on the one hand, stem from imaginal and archetypal forms in the world of imagination which, while possessing a single essence and individuality, due to substantial motion, appear to the wayfarer in various forms (Gabriel, Surūsh, Hātif, etc.) (Leaman, ibid., 299). Thereafter, the next difference goes back to the cultural element of language (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 2, 157, 10, 11). Of course, it should be noted that he distinguishes Iranian monotheistic wisdom from Manichaean dualism (ibid., 10-11; vol. 4, 92, 128) and considers his mission to be its purification and revival, a mission that reached its perfection in the book Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq (ibid., 128). Interestingly, later Zoroastrian philosophical interpretations have been influenced by the Shaykh (Corbin, 1380 [2001], 130).

From Suhrawardī's perspective, this wisdom is: 1) one; 2) fixed and integral; 3) pre-eternal and post-eternal; 4) sacred; and 5) bestowed by the Lord of the Species of humanity; 6) upon the wayfaring sage who has attained vision through the ability to divest and invest the body. According to his claim, the common essence of this wisdom, or the primordial leaven that began with Hermes Trismegistus or the prophet Idrīs, can be seen in Greece, India, Egypt, Persia, Babylon, and elsewhere (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 1, 464, 494, 502, 503). Through this primordial essence, he creates unity between the East and West of the world.

Also, Yaḥyā ibn Ḥabash here, under the title of Khusrawānī wisdom, makes mention of the Pahlavi sages, Kayūmarth, Farīdūn, and Kay Khusraw, whose wisdom reached others such as Bāyazīd Basṭāmī, Ḥallāj, Abū al-ʿAbbās Qaṣṣāb Āmulī, and Abū al-Ḥasan Kharaqānī; just as he counts Dhū al-Nūn al-Miṣrī and Sahl al-Tustarī as the heirs of the Pythagoreans (ibid., 502-503) and considers himself the heir of both paths (ibid., 503). He names another group who blended Pythagorean wisdom with Khusrawānī wisdom and contributed to the perfection of theoretical discussions (ibid.).

The claim of Shaykh al-Ishrāq concerning such a perennial wisdom is not merely an uninvestigated assertion. He draws upon Greek wisdom (especially Plato) and what preceded it (especially Hermes, Pythagoras, Empedocles, Agathodaemon [the prophet Seth], and Socrates) (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 1, 111, 112, 464, 460; vol. 2, 10, 156), Pahlavi Persian and Zoroastrian wisdom, Egyptian, Babylonian, Indian, and possibly Chinese wisdom in formulating his principles. This use is both in the study of subjects and in conceptual and assertoric principles, as well as in comparative discussions, and also as symbols and secrets that he himself unveils (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 1, 453; 2, 10).

Moreover, he draws many linguistic borrowings from Persian wisdom: aḍwāʾ mīnawiyya (celestial lights), khurra (spiritual flashes from the celestial realm), kayān khurra or kayān farr (the spiritual light and celestial majesty of an individual that descends upon a person); and terms denoting the lords of species, angels, and divine archetypes: Khordād (the lord of the species of water), Mordād (the lord of the species of trees), Ordibehesht (the lord of the species of fire), Esfandārmaz (the lord of the species of earth), Bahman (the nearest light, the first effect and first emanation), Ravānbakhsh (the Holy Spirit) (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, vol. 4, 157, 199, 128, 291, 149), as well as Hūrkhsh or the Sun, which he calls the Great Lord/Luminary (ibid., vol. 1, 494) and, like fire (ibid., vol. 1, 196), honors them for their luminous nature, considering these two, alongside the rational soul (isfahbad), as the symbol, manifestation, and sign of the Light of Lights in the material world, which are themselves light and also give light to others.

He considers the closest Islamic reading to this perennial wisdom to be mysticism (ʿirfān), and regards the mystics as those who have attained the source of light through presential knowledge (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 1, 113); just as in the dream-vision narrative, Aristotle deems only mystics such as Bāyazīd Basṭāmī and Abū Sahl Tustarī worthy of the name 'sage' (ḥakīm) (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 1, 73-74). Most of his allegorical, esoteric treatises, such as The Sound of Gabriel's Wing, The Red Intellect, The Simurgh's Cry, On the State of Childhood, The Tale of the Occidental Exile, and Intuitive Words, are concerned with mystical teachings and linguistic borrowings from them.

The Shaykh also draws upon Quranic sources and Islamic hadith, pursuing his own overarching theoretical framework, all of which is based on personal intuitions (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, vol. 2, 9). It is for this reason that he greatly benefits from the analogy of God to light (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, 2, 162), or considers Gabriel to be the very lord of the human species (ibid., 200), or borrows from narrations to prove the world of archetypes (ibid., 234).

Of course, we do not truly know to what extent he had access to the sources of the wisdoms he refers to, and how much his interpretations are based on the texts themselves rather than on common hearsay and speculation. Regarding Zoroastrian and Pahlavi wisdom, perhaps one can have greater confidence in his sources and interpretations due to his habitat; but concerning Egyptian, Babylonian, Indian, and Chinese wisdom, such confidence is difficult. The Shaykh's very general and vague references to these wisdoms (Majmūʿa-yi Muṣannafāt, vol. 2, 156, 217) attest to the claim that he makes such citations merely based on a speculation grounded in the existence of such a leaven of wisdom throughout the entire world. In general, we do not know what sources were available to him besides the common Peripatetic ones (Leaman, ibid., 285), although the influences of Suhrawardī's thought extend even to India (see: Leaman, ibid., chapters 28 and 29).

It should also be noted that the Shaykh al-Ishrāq, like other thinkers who, by accepting a general scheme, seek evidence for it, sometimes offers interpretations that are difficult to accept. Therefore, if the adaptation of Greek, Persian, and mystical themes in his works is sometimes crude, it is solely due to this very adaptation to his accepted general scheme, or the same perennial wisdom and leaven of wisdom, whose single essence he seeks to unveil by deciphering the propositions, metaphors, and symbolic language of the aforementioned wisdoms.

Conclusion

Shaykh al-Ishrāq can rightly be called a founder. Based on what has been discussed in the text and the data we have gleaned from history, personality analysis, and textual study of his works, he possessed all the necessary conditions for creating a new intellectual movement. The characteristics examined in the text were as follows:

Personality Traits Necessary for Founding an Intellectual Movement and Leadership:

Flourishing and individuation

Charisma

Individual importance and effort in disseminating thought

Characteristics Necessary for an Intellectual Structure

Innovation and novelty in subjects, problems, or answers

Order, coherence, and consistency

Rigor of discussions and arguments

Based on the evidence presented in the article, the perception held by some that the structure of his thought is merely a marginal gloss on Peripatetic philosophy and a novel yet failed exposition of it, or that he is solely a reviver of a kind of Iranian philosophy, a Zoroastrian Iranianism, or a form of eclectic thought, is incorrect (Leaman, ibid., 275-278). Like great thinkers such as Descartes, he begins his work with the nature of knowledge and the attempt to build a foundation of certain knowledge. He finds such a foundation in a kind of knowledge by presence and constructs his philosophical structure upon it. After building such a structure, based on his intuitions and the intellectual framework he has arranged, he necessarily arrives at the universality of his findings across all times and places, concluding that, based on the unity of truth and the solidity of the epistemic tool of heartfelt intuition, a single current of eternal wisdom exists throughout the universe which, despite possessing a single essence, has been rendered superficially diverse by cultural elements. He then sets out to compare this remarkable finding with the Western and Eastern philosophies known in his time, employing numerous linguistic correspondences to demonstrate such illumination—in which, naturally, due to his own milieu, the Iranian aspect is more pronounced. The Shaykh seeks the revival of this pre-eternal and everlasting wisdom, a wisdom that in our day has come to be called the perennial philosophy or philosophia perennis.

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Sources and References

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[1] thinking

[2] feeling

[3] sensation

[4] anima

[5] animus

[6] . The foregoing discussion of Jung is largely drawn from the book The Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, authored by Dr. Mohsen Zandi, which is in the process of publication, and he was kind enough to provide me with a portion of his findings. ([email protected]).

[7] See: Chittick, William, Imaginal Worlds: Ibn al-‘Arabi and the Problem of Religious Diversity. Translated by Qasim Kaka’i. Tehran: Hermes, 1385 [2006]. Hence, Jung initially thought he was suffering from a psychotic delusion; but since in psychotic delusions the patient confuses their imagination with reality, he realized that this was an encounter with his unconscious. He therefore established the method of active imagination for such encounters (see: Qorbani, 1393 [2014], p. 80).

[8] Jung died in 1961, and after his death, this book remained in his residence in Zurich and was deposited in a bank safe deposit box in subsequent years. According to his will, this book was to be opened several decades after his death. After 80 years, in October 2009, the book was put on display at a new museum in New York City. The book is in Jung’s handwriting and contains numerous illustrations to clarify his analyses, and this is the first time that researchers and the general public have been able to view it.

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PDF file of the article An Analysis of the Personality Structure and Intellectual System of Shaykh al-Ishraq

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An Analysis of the Personality Structure and Intellectual System of Shaykh al-Ishraq, Focusing on Their Influential Axes on Muslim Sages

Pari Iranmanesh (PhD graduate in Iranian Studies from the University of California)

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