Document Type : Research
Author
Assistant Professor, Department of Islamic Philosophy, Iranian Institute of Philosophy, Tehran, Iran
Abstract
The problem of Tashkīk (gradation of being) is among the most fundamental issues in Islamic philosophy, playing a decisive role in the formation of Transcendent Theosophy and the transition from the principiality of quiddity (Aṣālat al-Māhiyyah) to the principiality of existence (Aṣālat al-Wujūd). This concept was a focal point of precise reflection and profound philosophical debate in the School of Shiraz, particularly among philosophers such as Jalāl al-Dīn al-Dawānī, Ghiyāth al-Dīn al-Dashtakī, and ʿAllāmah Mullā ʿAbd Allāh al-Yazdī. Employing a descriptive-analytical approach and based on a study of Mullā ʿAbd Allāh Yazdī’s treatise Al-Tashkīk and his glosses on Qūshjī’s commentary on Tajrīd al-Iʿtiqād, the present research examines the evolution of his view from an inclination toward the principiality of quiddity to his final emphasis on the principiality of existence. The research method is comparative textual analysis based on a comparison of the views of al-Dawānī, al-Dashtakī, and al-Yazdī, along with an extraction of al-Yazdī’s final position from his philosophical and logical glosses. The findings indicate that Mullā ʿAbd Allāh was initially aligned with his teacher, Ghiyāth al-Dīn al-Dashtakī, in accepting Tashkīk in quiddities. However, in his final reflections, he explicitly affirmed the principiality of existence and the conventionality (Iʿtibārī) of quiddity, confining the domain of Tashkīk exclusively to the external reality of existence. This shift in perspective laid the groundwork for connecting the intellectual currents of the School of Shiraz to the foundations of Ṣadrian Transcendent Theosophy. Consequently, al-Yazdī’s theory can be regarded as one of the evolutionary links in Islamic philosophy’s transition from conceptual Tashkīk to existential Tashkīk—a link whose role in connecting the ideas of the School of Shiraz with the School of Isfahan and the formation of Mullā Ṣadrā’s philosophy is fundamental.
Keywords
- Principiality of Quiddity (Aṣālat al-Māhiyyah)
- Principiality of Existence (Aṣālat al-Wujūd)
- Gradation of Being (Tashkīk)
- ʿAllāmah al-Yazdī al-Bihābādī
- Ghiyāth al-Dīn al-Dashtakī
Main Subjects
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