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Hikma muta‘aliya in Qajar Iran: Locating the Life and Work of Mulla Hadi Sabzawari (d. 1289/1873)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Sajjad H. Rizvi
Sajjad H. Rizvi*
Affiliation:
Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter where he directs the Centre of Islamic Philosophy
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Extract

The Qajar period witnessed a revival of traditional Islamic philosophy based on the philosophical method of the Safavid sage Mulla Sadra Shirazi. This was philosophy as a way of life, an ethical commitment born of a method that combined both rational discourse and mystical intuition, deployed to defend the intellectual and cultural norms of the old learning against the new European inspired centers in Qajar Iran. A prominent figure in this process of revival was Mulla Hadi Sabzavari, who trained in the seminaries of Mashhad and Isfahan and became the most famous teacher of the works of Mulla Sadra and of philosophy in the second half of the nineteenth century. This paper examines his life and intellectual and pedagogical contribution, and traces some lines of his impact on seminarian philosophy into the twentieth century through the many students who came to study with him in his hometown, including his influence on modern trends within Shi‘i jurisprudence and legal theory.

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Articles
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Iranian Studies , Volume 44 , Issue 4 , July 2011 , pp. 473 - 496
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Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2011

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References

1 The reference is to Qur'an 18:46 (and also 19:76).

2 Sabzavari, Hadi, Sharh al-manzuma: qism al-ḥikma, ed. Talibi, Mas‘ud (Tehran, 1374s./1995), I: 37–8Google Scholar.

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7 There are now a number of studies on the functioning of the Shi‘i seminary both at the shrine cities of Iraq and in Iran, and on the three stages of becoming a jurist: preliminaries (muqaddimat), intermediate jurisprudential training (sutuh), and advanced independent reasoning based on responses to the work on a living model of emulation (marja‘) known as bahth (or dars) al-kharij. See Mervin, Sabrina, “La quête du savoir à Naǧaf: Les études religieuses chez les chiʿites imāmites de la fin du XIXe siècle à 1960,” Studia Islamica, 81 (1995): 165–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mallat, Chibli, The Renewal of Islamic Law: Muhammad Baqer as-Sadr, Najaf and the Shi‘i International (Cambridge, 1993), 35–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mughniyyah, Muhammad Jawad, Ma‘ ‘ulama’ al-najaf al-ashraf (Beirut, 1992)Google Scholar; al-Shahrudi, Nur al-Din, Ta'rikh al-haraka al-‘ilmiyya fi Karbala’ (Beirut, 1990)Google Scholar; Mottahedeh, Roy, The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran (London, 1987)Google Scholar; Fischer, M. M. J., Iran: From Religious Dispute to Revolution (Cambridge, MA, 1980), 12–103Google Scholar; Litvak, Meir, Shi‘i Scholars of Nineteenth-century Iraq: The ʿUlamaʾ of Najaf and Karbala (Cambridge, 1998)Google Scholar; ‘Abd al-Hadi al-Fadli, Dalil al-Najaf al-ashraf (Najaf, 1966).

8 Although there is a considerable literature on Sabzawari in Persian, there is very little in European languages. A few useful studies are: Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, “Renaissance in Iran: Ḥājī Mullā Hādī Sabziwārī,” A History of Muslim Philosophy, ed. Sharif, M. M. (Wiesbaden, 1966), II: 1543–56Google Scholar; Izutsu, Toshihiko, “The Fundamental Structure of Sabzawârî's Metaphysics,” in Sabzawari, , Sharh Ghurar al-fara'id ma‘ruf bih Sharh-i Manzuma-yi hikmat: qismat-i umur-i ‘amma wa jawhar wa ‘araz, ed. Izutsu, T. and Mohaghegh, M. (Tehran, 1969), 1–152Google Scholar; and Akhtar, Wahid, “Sabzawārī's Analysis of Being,” Al-Tawḥīd, II, no. 1 (1984): 29–70Google Scholar.

9 See Rizvi, Sajjad, Mullā Ṣadrā and Metaphysics: Modulation of Being (London, 2009), 21–26Google Scholar.

10 See “Isfahan, School of,” Encylopaedia Iranica, XIV, 119–25. On the notion of the school of Isfahan and later of Tehran, see Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, Islamic Philosophy from its Origin to the Present: Philosophy in the Land of Prophecy (Albany, NY, 2006), 209–57Google Scholar.

11 Sabzawari's modern biographer Ghulam-Husayn Riza-Nizhad “Nushin” argues on the basis of a chronogram of the author in which he alludes to his year of birth with the term “gharib” that he was born in 1212 AH—see Hakim-i Sabzawari: zindagi—athar—falsafa (Tehran, 1371s./1992), 35. An important source is his own autobiography that was written in Sabzawar around 1280/1863–64 and published by Qasim Ghani in Yadgar, I, no. 3 (1944): 45–47. A short introduction is Seyyed Hossein Nasr, “Hādī Sabzavārī,” EIr. The biographical sources on his life are: Khan, Riza-quli ‘Hidayat’ (d. 1871), Tadhkira-yi riyaz al-‘arifin (Tehran, 1316s./1937), 417–20Google Scholar (Asrār-i Sabzawari); Muhammad Hasan Khan I‘timad al-Saltana (d. 1896), Matla‘ al-shams: tarikh-i arz-i aqdas wa Mashhad-i muqaddas (Tehran, 1363s./1965), III: 984; Ma‘sum-‘Ali Shah Shirazi (d. 1926), Tara'iq al-haqa'iq, ed. M. J. Maḥjub (Tehran, 1339s./1960), III: 465–66; Muhammad Hirz al-Din (d. 1946), Ma‘arif al-rijal fi tarajim al-‘ulama’ wa-l-udaba' (Qum, 1985), III, 220–23; Sayyid Muhsin al-Amin (d. 1952), A‘yan al-shi‘a, ed. S. H. al-Amin (Beirut, 1983), X: 234; Muhammad ‘Ali Mu‘allim-i Habibabadi, Makarim al-athar dar ahwal-i rijal-i dawra-yi Qajar (Isfahan, 1958–63), II: 450–52; Mudarris-i Tabrizi (d. 1954), Rayhanat al-adab (Tehran, 1326–33s./1947–54), II: 156–58; Shaykh ‘Abd Allah Ni‘ma, Falasifat al-shi‘a: hayatuhum wa-ara'uhum (Beirut, 1961), 621; Saduqi, Manuchihr ‘Suha’, Tarikh-i hukama' wa ‘urafa’-yi muta'akhkhirin az Sadr al-muta'allihin (Tehran, 1980), 109–55Google Scholar.

12 Browne, E. G., A History of Persian Literature Volume 4 (Cambridge, 1924), 411Google Scholar; idem, A Year among the Persians (London, 1983), 133Google Scholar.

13 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 54; Mas‘ud Talibi, ‘Introduction’, to Sabzawari, Sharh al-manzuma, 4.

14 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 40. Murtaza Mudarrissi Chahardahi argues that he died in Mecca during the Hajj—see Zindagani wa falsafa-yi Hajj Mulla Hadi Sabzawari (Tehran, 1334s./1955), 16.

15 This madrasa no longer exists but was located on the north side of the khiyaban-i haram-i mutahhar between the Madrasa-yi Baqiriyya where Muhammad Baqir Sabzawari (d. 1683) had taught law and jurisprudence and the Madrasa-ye Nawwab. The western side of the Baqiriyya was next to the eastern side of Hajj Hasan. It had some one hundred students housed in about twenty-five rooms. With the modern expansion of the shrine complex, these two madrasas have been demolished. Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 46.

16 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 40–41.

17 Browne and Habibabadi suggest that he only stayed in Mashhad for five years but this seems to be incorrect—see Habibabadi, Makarim al-athar, II: 451; cf. Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 43–46.

18 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 47.

19 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 55.

20 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 57.

21 Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 29; Mirza Abu-l-Qasim Muhammad Mahdi Kashmiri Lakhnawi, Nuju al-sama’ (Qum, 1976), 68.

22 Tabataba'i, Hossein Modarressi, An Introduction to Shīʿī Law: a Bibliographical Study (London, 1984), 93, 99Google Scholar.

23 Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 29. For some reason unclear to me, Riza-Nizhad does not mention him.

24 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 58–65.

25 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 65–69.

26 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 69–74.

27 For example, he defended Fayd Kashani against Ahsa'i's criticism of his treatise on knowledge in al-Muhakamat wa-l-muqawamat in Rasa'il-i hakim-i Sabzawari, ed. S. J. Ashtiyani (Tehran, 1376s./1997), 581–601. For a discussion of these texts, see Lawson, Todd, “Orthodoxy and heterodoxy in Twelver Shiʿism: Aḥmad al-Aḥsāʾī on Fayḍ Kāshānī,” Religion and Society in Qajar Iran, ed. Gleave, R. (London, 2005), 127–54Google Scholar.

28 Mohaghegh, “Introduction,”, to Sabzawārī, Sharh Ghurar al-fara'id, 11.

29 Browne, A Year among the Persians, 132 mentions a stay of seven years; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 52.

30 Talibi, “Introduction,” 4; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 220.

31 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 82.

32 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 83–84, 257; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 220.

33 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 82; personal interview with Prof. Ghulam Husayn Ibrahimi Dinani at the University of Tehran on 3 January 1996.

34 Browne, A Year among the Persians, 132; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 85–86.

35 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 87.

36 Arthur de Gobineau, Religions et philosophies dans l'Asie centrale (Paris, 1933), 95–97Google Scholar.

37 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 259–61; Amanat, Pivot of the Universe, 416.

38 Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 15; Mohaghegh, “Introduction,” 14.

41 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 36.

39 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 35–39.

40 Browne, A Year among the Persians, 133; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 265; Mohaghegh, “Introduction,” 21.

42 Talibi, “Introduction,” 4.

43 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 96–97; Fanari, Hamza, Misbah al-uns sharh Miftah al-ghayb, ed. Khajawi, M. (Tehran, 1996)Google Scholar; Qaysari, Dawud, Matla‘ khusus al-kalim fi ma‘ani Fusus al-hikam, ed. Sa‘idi, M. H., 2 vols. (Tehran, 1995)Google Scholar; Turka, Sa'in al-Din, Tamhid al-qawa‘id, ed. Ashtiyani, S. J. (Tehran, 1976)Google Scholar. On Sa'in al-Din, see Lewisohn, Leonard, “Sufism and Theology in the Confessions of Ṣāʾin al-Dīn Turka Iṣfahānī,” Sufism and Theology, ed. by Shihadeh, Ayman (Edinburgh, 2007), 63–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Bihbahani, Sayyid ‘Ali Musawi, “Ahwal wa athar-i Sa'in al-Din Turka Isfahani,” Collected Papers in Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism, ed. Landolt, H. and Mohaghegh, M. (Tehran, 1971), 97–132Google Scholar.

44 Mohaghegh, “Introduction,” 14.

45 I‘timad al-Saltana, Matla‘ al-shams, III: 197–201; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 111–13.

46 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 244–49.

47 Nasr, “Sabziwārī,” 1544.

48 Qazvini, Kayvan, Razgusha: bihin sukhan (Tehran, n.d.), 24Google Scholar.

49 Ma‘sum-‘Ali Shah, Tara'iq al-haqa'iq, I: 240; Humayuni, Mas‘ud, Tarikh-i silsila-hā-yi tariqa-yi Ni‘matullahi (Tehran, 1980), 132–36Google Scholar; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 124; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 105–7; Lewisohn, Leonard, “An Introduction to the History of Modern Persian Sufism Part I: The Niʿmatullāhi Order—persecution, revival and schism,” BSOAS, 61 (1998): 450–52CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ‘Ali Tabanda ‘Mahbub-‘Ali Shah’, Khurshid-i tabanda (Tehran, 1377s./1998), 47–50; Shah, Sultan ‘Ali, Bayan al-sa‘ada fi maqamat al-‘ibada, 4 vols. (Tehran, 1344s./1965)Google Scholar; idem, Walayatnama (Tehran, 1380s./2001).

50 Cf. Ahmadi, Ahmad, “‘Irfān and taṣawwuf,” Al-Tawḥīd, 1 (1984): 63–76Google Scholar.

51 Diwan-i Asrar, ed. Amin, S. H. (Tehran, 1993)Google Scholar.

52 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 140; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 116.

53 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 145; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 116.

54 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 143; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 116.

55 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 146; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama', 116.

56 Sadra, Mulla, Mafatih al-ghayb ma‘ ta‘liqat Mulla ‘Ali Nuri, ed. Khajawi, M. (Tehran, 1984)Google Scholar.

57 Ashtiyani, Sayyid Jalal al-Din, “Muqaddima,” Sadra, Mulla, al-Shawahid al-rububiyya fi-l-manahij al-sulukiyya (Mashhad, 1967)Google Scholar, cliv.

58 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 150–55; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 222–23; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 63; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 115. The text was supplanted by ‘Allama Tabataba'i's Bidayat al-hikma and Nihayat al-hikma (Qum, 1984). The former is available in an excellent translation: The Elements of Islamic Metaphysics, trans. ‘Ali-quli Qara'i (London, 2003Google Scholar).

59 There are two editions of the text—one is complete in four volumes edited by Talibi with the marginal glosses of the contemporary hakim Aqa Hasan Hasanzada Amuli of Qum and published in 1995, and another edition of the two sections on metaphysics edited by Mehdi Mohaghegh and Toshihiko Izutsu and originally published in the 1970s by the Tehran branch of the McGill Institute of Islamic Studies—Sharh Ghurar al-fara'id ma‘ruf bih Sharh-i manzuma-yi hikmat: qismat-i umur-i ‘amma wa jawhar wa ‘araz (Tehran, 1969)Google Scholar; trans. Izutsu, T. and Mohaghegh, M. as The Metaphysics of Sabzavari (Tehran, 1983)Google Scholar; Sharh Ghurar al-fara'id, maqsad-i siwwum fi-l-ilahiyyat bi-l-ma‘na l-akhass, ed. M. Mohaghegh (Tehran, 1999).

60 Asrar al-hikam, ed. H. M. Farzad (Tehran, 1982); Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 173; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 115. This work is the basis of the assessment of Sabzawari's contribution to philosophy in Muhammad Iqbal's doctoral dissertation at Heidelberg, The Development of Metaphysics in Persia (London, 1908), 176–79.

61 Nasr, Seyyed Hossein, “The Metaphysics of Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī and Islamic Philosophy in Qajar Persia,” in Qajar Iran, ed. Bosworth, C.E. and Hillenbrand, C. (Edinburgh, 1983), 190Google Scholar.

62 Hadi al-mudillin mansub bih Hajj Mulla Hadi Sabzawari, ed. ‘A. Awjabi (Tehran, 1383s./2004); Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 172.

63 Sharh al-asma', ed. N. Habibi (Tehran, 1375s./1996); Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-e Sabzavārī, 164; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 115.

64 Al-Kaf‘ami, , al-Balad al-amin (Tehran, 1963), 402Google Scholar; Majlisi, , Bihar al-anwar (Beirut, 1982), XCI: 382–97Google Scholar.

65 Sharh du‘a’ al-sabah (Beirut, 1997); Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 148–49; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223.

66 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 163; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, 223; Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 68; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 115. It has been recently published: Sharh-i mathnawi, ed. M. Burujirdi, 3 vols. (Tehran, 1374–77s./1995–98).

67 For a study of this text, see Cooper, John, “Rūmī and ḥikmat: Towards a reading of Sabziwārī's commentary on the Mathnawi,” in The Heritage of Persian Sufism I: Classical Persian Sufism from its Origins to Rumi, ed. Lewisohn, L. (Oxford, 1999), 409–33Google Scholar.

68 Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 121–22; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 114; Munibur Rahman, “Adīb Pīšāvarī,” EIr.

69 Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 44.

70 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 123; Abdol-Hadi Ha'iri, “Ākhūnd Korāsānī,” EIr, I, 732–34.

71 For a useful sketch of the history of usul al-fiqh in the Shi‘i seminary, see al-Hakim, Sayyid Mundhir, “Tatawwur al-dars al-usuli fi-l-Najaf al-ashraf,” Mawsu‘at al-Najaf al-ashraf, ed. al-Dujayli, Ja‘far (Beirut, 1997), VII: 173–216Google Scholar.

72 Mervin, Sabrina, “La quête du savoir à Najaf,” Studia Islamica, 81 (1995): 181Google Scholar.

73 “Al-bahth al-falsafi fi usul al-fiqh,” Mawsu‘at al-Najaf al-ashraf, VIII: 61–66; Gharawi Kumpani, Nihayat al-diraya fi sharh al-kifaya, 6 vols. (Qum, 1998).

74 ‘Allama Al-Hilli, Mabadi’ al-wusul ila ‘ilm al-usul, ed. ‘Abd al-Husayn al-Baqqal (Qum, 1983).

75 Khurasani, Kifayat al-usul (Qum, 2001), 384–495. Similarly, roughly half of Ansari's text concerns these procedural principles.

76 Muhammad Jarfadaqani, ‘Ulama’-yi buzurg-i shi‘a az Kulayni ta Khumayni (Qum, 1364s./1985), 295–6; Hirz al-Din, Ma‘arif al-rijal, I: 270; Tabrizi, Rayhanat al-adab, IV: 325; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 132–33; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 134–35.

77 On Tabataba'i and his lineage, see Tihrani, Ayatollah Husayni-yi, Mihr-i taban: yadnama wa musahibat-i tilmidh wa ‘Allama Tabataba'i (Mashhad, 1996)Google Scholar; Dabashi, Hamid, Theology of Discontent: The Ideological Foundation of the Islamic Revolution in Iran (New York, 1993), 273–323Google Scholar; Algar, Hamid, “ʿAllāma Sayyid Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ṭabāṭabāʾī: Philosopher, Exegete, and Gnostic,” Journal of Islamic Studies, 17 (2006): 326–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The spiritual lineage of Tabataba'i, which survives through his student Husayni-yi Tihrani and his circle in Mashhad as well as his disciples in Qum, is a continuation of the lineage of Husayn-quli Hamadani which traces back to the famous Sufi Qutb al-Din Nayrizi in the following manner: Hamadani—Sayyid ‘Ali Shushtari (d. 1283/1866)—Sayyid Sadr al-Din al-Kashif (d. Sha‘ban 1257/1841)—Aqa Muhammad Bidabadi (d. 1197/1783)—the Dhahabi Sufi Sayyid Qutb al-Din Muhammad Nayrizi (d. 1173/1760)—see Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 151–3. On Nayrizi himself, see Lewisohn, Leonard, “An Introduction to the History of Modern Persian Sufism, Part II,” BSOAS, 62 (1999): 36–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hidayat, Riyaz al-‘arifin, 482–6; Ma‘sum-‘Ali Shah, Tara'iq al-haqa'iq, III: 97–8; Khavari, Asad Allah, Dhahabiyya: tasawwuf-i ‘ilmi wa athar-i adabi (Tehran, 1362s./1983), 297–307Google Scholar. The Hamadani lineage survives in Karbala and its most prominent twentieth century figure was Sayyid Hashim al-Haddad (d. 1984)—see Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Husayni Tihrani, Ruh-i mujarrad (Mashhad, 1375s./1996). One of the texts of this lineage that is taught is Risala-yi sayr wa-suluk attributed to Sayyid Mahdi Tabataba'i ‘Bahr al-‘Ulum’ who was a disciple of Nayrizi (ed. H. Mustafawi, [Tehran, 1367s./1988]).

78 Jarfadaqani, ‘Ulama’-yi buzurg-i shi‘a, 354–5; Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 133–34.

79 Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 121; Nasr, Islamic Philosophy, 246; Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 112.

80 Chahardahi, Sabzawari, 28.

81 Cf. Sadra, Mulla, al-hikma al-muta‘aliya fi-l-asfar al-‘aqliyya al-arba‘a, ed. A‘wani, G. and Muhammadi, M., 3 vols. of the first safar (Tehran, 1380–83s./2001–05)Google Scholar.

82 Riza-Nizhad, Hakim-i Sabzawari, 208–25.

83 On Sayyid Kazim ‘Assar, see the account of his daughter Guppy, Shusha, The Blind Horse: Memories of a Persian Childhood (London, 1988)Google Scholar, especially 39–47. One collection of treatises was published in his lifetime: Thalath rasa'il fi-l-hikmaa al-islamiyya (Tehran, 1971). Other posthumous publications include: Majmu‘a-yi athar-i ‘Assar, ed. S. J. Ashtiyani (Tehran, 1376s./1997); Durus-i mantiq wa falsafa (Qum, 1383s./2004).

84 Two elementary paraphrases by jurists in Arabic need not detain us much: one by the late marja‘ Sayyid Muhammad Husayni Shirazi (d. 2001), and another by the London-based Sayyid Fadil Milani.

85 Mutahhari, Murtaza, Sharh-i mabsut-i manzuma, 4 vols. (Tehran, 1404/1983)Google Scholar.

86 Tabataba'i, Usul-i falsafa wa rawish-i ri'alizm, ed. with notes of Mutahhari, 4 vols. (Qum, 1368s./1990).

87 Ta‘liqat al-Hidaji ‘ala-l-Manzuma (Tehran, 1363s./1984).

88 Amuli, Shaykh Muhammad Taqi, Durar al-fawa'id fi sharh ghurar al-fara'id (Tehran, 1960)Google Scholar.

89 Sayyid Rida Sadr, Saha'if min al-falsafa [ta‘liqa ‘ala Sharh al-manzuma] (Qum, 1379s./2000).

90 Ashtiyani, Mahdi, Ta‘liqa bar Sharh-i manzuma-yi hikmat-i Sabzawari, ed. Falaturi, J. and Mohaghegh, M. (Tehran, 1352s./1973)Google Scholar.

91 Sabzawari, Asrar al-hikam, 36–57. The Avicennian tradition held to the three-fold division of the ontological (philosophers), cosmological (theologians) and from motion (natural philosophers) proofs for the existence of God that one finds mentioned in Nasir al-Din Tusi, Sharh al-isharat wa-l-tanbihat, ed. M. Shihabi (Qum, 1375s./1996), III: 66. Sabzawari is faithful to Sadra's language: he describes the argument as a “way” and not as a demonstration (burhan), which is the common mode of referring to it in modern secondary discussions.

92 Sabzawari, Asrar al-hikam, 372.

93 Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 45–174; Nasr, Islamic Philosophy, 239–46; ‘Ali-quli Qara'i, “Post-Ibn Rushd Islamic philosophy in Iran,” Al-Tawḥīd, III, no. 3 (1985): 24–55. For a useful sketch of the history of philosophy from the circle of Nuri to the later Qajar period, see Ashtiyani, “Muqaddima,” cxxiv–cxliv.

94 Another thinker who was a student of Nuri and who later taught Qumshihi and moved to Tehran was Sayyid Razi Larijani (d. 1270/1853–54). The Nuri circle and the study of Mulla Sadra did not die in Isfahan after the middle of the nineteenth century but continued with Jahangir Khan Qashqa'i (d. 1328/1910) and Mirza Rahim Arbab—see Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 84–90. Famous students in the next generation of this school included the prominent jurisprudent Diya' al-Din ‘Iraqi (d. 1942), the jurist and model of emulation Sayyid Husayn Burujirdi (d. 1962), and Aqa Najafi Quchani.

95 Badayi‘ al-hikam, ed. A. Va‘izi (Tehran, 1376s./1997). The collected works of Zunuzi have been published: Majmu‘a-yi musannafat-i hakim-i mu'assis Aqa ‘Ali Zunuzi Tihrani, ed. M. Kadivar, 3 vols. (Tehran, 1378s./1999).

96 Ashtiyani, Mahdi, Ta‘liqa bar Sharh-i manzuma-yi hikmat-i Sabzawari, ed. Falaturi, J. and Mohaghegh, M. (Tehran, 1352s./1973)Google Scholar; idem, Asas al-tawhid (Tehran, 1952).

97 Nasr, Islamic Philosophy, 247–48. Shi‘rani edited some crucial works including Asrar al-hikam of Sabzawari and the theological treatise Kashf al-murad sharh tajrid al-I‘tiqad of ‘Allama al-Hilli (d. 1325). Ja‘fari was a prolific writer and taught at the hawza in Qum for many years as well as Tehran University, engaging with contemporary European philosophy and theology. He is best known for his voluminous commentaries on the Mathnawi of Rumi and the Nahj al-balagha, the famous collection of sermons, letters and sayings of Imam ‘Ali. Mutahhari was a prominent thinker of the revolution and professor in the theology department of Tehran University. As an ideologue, he wrote an influential work on theodicy, ‘Adl-i ilahi, as well as important glosses and explanations on the Sharh-i manzuma and the Usul-i falsafa of Tabataba'i. Falaturi taught in Germany for many years. Ha'iri received his doctorate in philosophy from the University of Toronto in 1978. He has written some important analyses of Islamic philosophy from the perspective of an Anglo-American analytical philosopher: Kavush-ha-yi ‘aql-i nazari (Tehran, 1968), Kavush-ha-yi ‘aql-i ‘amalī (Tehran, 1982), ‘Ilm-i kulli (Tehran, 1980), Knowledge by Presence (Tehran, 1982). Ashtiyani was the most prolific of this group as an editor and has produced far too much to mention in detail.

98 Nasr, Islamic Philosophy, 248–49.

99 Ghawsi dar bahr-i ma‘rifat, ed. Hasanzada Amuli (Tehran, 1376s./1997). The volume includes a treatise that criticizes Mulla Sadra's notion of intellection by union (ittihad al-‘aqil bi-l-maʿqūl).

100 Nasr also wrote a useful article on Qajar philosophy—“The Metaphysics of Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī and Islamic philosophy in Qajar Persia,” Qajar Iran, 177–98.

101 Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 157.

102 Suha, Tarikh-i hukama’, 167–69.

103 For a further examination, see Sajjad Rizvi, “Being (wujūd) and sanctity (wilāya): Two poles of intellectual and mystical inquiry in Qajar Iran,” Religion and Society in Qajar Iran, 113–26.

104 Sabzawari, Sharh al-asma’, 552.

105 Zunuzi, Badayi‘ al-hikam, 173–83.