Philosophical Notions Concerning metaphysics
As mentioned before, the Nahj al-balaghah adopts two kinds of approach to the problems of theology. The first kind of approach calls attention to the sensible world and its phenomena as a mirror reflecting the Knowledge and Perfection of the Creator. The second approach involves purely rationalistic and philosophical reflections. The latter approach accounts for the greater part of the theological discussions of the Nahj al-balaghah. Moreover, it is the only approach adopted in regard to the discussion about the Divine Essence and Attributes.As we know, the value of such discussions and the legitimacy of such reflections have been always questioned by those who consider them improper from the viewpoint of reason or canon, or both. In our own times, a certain group claims that this kind of analysis and inference does not agree with the spirit of Islam and that the Muslims were initiated into such kind of speculations under the influence of Greek philosophy and not as a result of any inspiration or guidance effused from the Quran. They say that if the Muslims had adhered closely to the Quranic teachings they would not have entangled themselves with these tortuous clebates. For the same reason, they view with suspicion the authenticity of such speculations found in the Nahj al-balaghah and their ascription to Imam 'Ali ('a).
In the second and third centuries a group of people opposed such kind of discussions and questioned their legitimacy, raising doctrinal objections. They insisted that it is obligatory for Muslims to be satisfied with the literal and commonly understood meaning of the words of the Quran, and regarded every kind of inquiry into the meaning of the Quran as an innovation (bid'ah) in religion. For instance, if someone inquired about the meaning of the Quranic verse "The All-compassionate sat Himself upon the Throne " [20:5], he was confronted by the displeasure of those who regarded such questions as not only improper but distasteful. He would be told: "The exact meaning is unknown and questioning is heresy".
During the 3rd/9th century, this group, which later came to be called Ash'arites, overwhelmed the Mu'tazilites, who considered such speculations to be within the bounds of legitimacy. This victory of the Asharites delivered a severe blow to the intellectual life of Islam. The Akhbaris, who were a Shi'i school which flourished during the period between the 10th/16th and the 14th/20th centuries-and particularly during the 10th/16th and 11th/17th centuries-followed the Asha'irah in their ideas and beliefs. They raised doctrinal objections against ratiocination. Now we shall proceed to discuss the objections raised from a rationalist point of view.
As a result of the triumph of the empirical and experimental method over the deductive approach in Europe, especially in the physical sciences, the view began to prevail that rational speculation was unreliable not only in the physical sciences but also in all scientific disciplines and that the only reliable method was that of empirical philosophy. The result of it was that tne problems of theology were viewed with doubt and suspicion, because they lay beyond the domain of experimental and empirical observation.
The past victories of the Ash'arites, on the one hand, and the amazing triumphs of the empirical method, which followed one another in quick succession, on the other hand, drove some non-Shi'ite Muslim writers to the extremes of excitement. The outcome was the eclectic opinion that from the religious (Shar'i) as well as the rational point of view the use of deductive method even in problems of theology should be discarded. From the Shar'i viewpoint, they made the claim that according to the outlook of the Quran the only approach valid in theology was the empirical and experimental method and the study of the natural phenomena and the system of creation; the rest, they declared, is no more than an exercise in futility. They pointed out that in scores of its verses, the Quran in most unequivocal terms has invited human beings to study the phenomena of nature; it considers the keys to the secrets of the origin and workings of the universe to be concealed within nature itself. In this way they echoed, in their writings and speeches, the ideas expressed by the European proponents of empirical philosophy.
Farid al-Wajdi in his book 'Ala atlal al-madhhab al-maddi (On the Ruins of Materialism), and Sayyid Abu al-Hasan al-Nadawi, in his Madha khasira al-'alam bi-inhitat al-Muslimin ("What the World Lost Through the Decline of Muslims") and the writers belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan al-Muslimin) such as Sayyid Qutb and others, have supported this view, vehemently attacking the opposite viewpoint.
Al-Nadawi, in his above-mentioned book, says:
The prophets informed men about the existence of God and His Attributes and informed them about the origin and beginning of the world and the ultimate destiny of man, putting this free information at his disposal. They relieved him of the need to understand and discuss these problems the basics of which lie beyond our reach (because these problems belong to the sphere of the supra-sensible and our knowledge and experience is limited to the physical and the sensible). But men did not value this blessing and entangled themselves in debates and speculations about these problems, and strode into the dark regions of the hidden and the unknowable.
The same author, in another chapter of the same book, where he discusses the causes of the decline of Muslims, under the heading "The Neglect of Useful Sciences," criticizes the muslim 'ulama' in these words:
The Muslim scholars and thinkers did not give as much importance to practical and experimental sciences as they gave to debating about metaphysics, which they had learnt from Greek philosophy. The Greek metaphysics and theology is nothing more than Greek's polytheistic mythology presented in a philosophical outfit, and is no more than a series of meaningless conjectures expressed in an absurd jargon. God has exempted Muslims from debate, speculation and analysis in these matters, which are not much different from the analytic pursuits of the Alchemists. But out of ingratitude for this great blessing, the Muslims wasted their energy and genius in problems of this sort.
Without doubt, the views of the like of Farid al-Wajd; and al-Nadawi should be regarded as a kind of return to Ash'arism, though dressed in contemporary style akin to the language of empirical philosophy.
Here, we cannot enter into a philosophic discussion about the value of philosophic reflection. In the chapters entitled "The Value of Information" and "Origin of Multiplicity in Perception" of the book The Principles and Method of Realism, we have discussed the matter in sufficient detail. Here, we shall confine ourselves to the Quranic aspect of this problem, and investigate whether the Holy Quran considers the study of nature to be the only valid method of inquiry into theological problems, or whether it allows for another approach besides the above-mentioned.
However, it is essential to point out that the disagreement between the Ash'arites and the non-Ash'arites is not about the legitimacy of the use of the Book and the Sunnah as sources in the problems of theology; rather, the disagreement concerns the manner of their utilization. According to the Ash'arites, their application should not exceed mute acceptance. According to them, we assign the various Attributes like Unity, Omniscience, Omnipotence and the rest to God because they have been ascribed to Him by the Shar'iah, otherwise we would not know whether God is such or not, because the basic principles and essentials dealing with God are beyond our reach. Therefore, according to them, we are forced to accept God as such, but we cannot know or understand that God is such. The role of the religious texts is that they prescribe for us the way we ought to think and believe so that we may follow it in our thought and beliefs.
According to the contestants of this view, these issues are amenable to human understanding, like any other rational concept or idea. That is, there exist certain principles and essentials which if known properly enable man to understand them. The role of the religious texts lies in their capacity to inspire, motivate, and guide human reason by putting understandable principles and essentials at its disposal. Basically servitude in intellectual matters is absurd. It is like ordering one to think in a certain fashion, and asking him to derive certain prescribed conclusions. It is like ordering someone to see a thing in a certain fashion and then asking him, "How do you see it? Is it big or small? black or white?" Servitude in thinking does not mean anything other than absence of thinking and acceptance without reflection.
In short, the question is not whether it is possible for man to go beyond the teachings of the Revelation. God be our refuge, there is nothing that lies beyond them; because that which has reached us through Revelation and the Household of the Revelation (i.e. the Ahl al-Bayt [A]) is the utmost limit of perfection concerning knowledge of the Divine. Here our debate centres upon the capacity of human thought and reason, whether it can, when supplied with the basic principles and essentials, undertake an intellectual journey through the world of theological problems or not.
As to the invitation of the Quran to study and inquiry about the phenomena of creation, and its emphasis on nature as a means for attaining the knowledge of God and the supra-natural, it should be said that it is, indubitably, a basic principle of the Quranic teachings. It is with extraordinary insistence that the Quran asks human beings to inquire into the nature of the earth, the sky, the plants and animals, and man himself, and urges them to study them scientifically. It is also indubitable that the Muslims did not take enough worthy steps in this direction. Perhaps the real reason behind it was Greek philosophy, which was deductive and based on pure speculation, and they used this approach even in the field of the physical sciences. Nevertheless, as the history of science bears testimony, the muslim scientists did not altogether abandon the experimental method in their studies like the Greeks. The Muslims were the pioneers of the experimental method, not the Europeans, as is commonly thought, who followed on the tracks first laid by the Muslims.
The Value of Study of the Natural Phenomena
Aside from all of this, the question worthy of consideration is whether the Quran, besides its emphasis on the study of the creatures of earth, water, and air, allows other ways of approaching the issue, or if it closes all other doors. The question is whether the Quran, even as it invites people to study the signs of God (ayat), also welcomes other modes of intellectual endeavour. Basically, what is the value of inquiry into the works of creation (an inquiry which the Quran urges us, explicitly or implicitly, to undertake), from the viewpoint of initiating us into the awareness and consciousness which this heavenly Book aims to cultivate?The truth is that the measure of assistance provided by the study of the works of the creation in understanding the problems explicitly pointed out by the Holy Quran is quite restricted. The Quran has propounded certain problems of theology which are by no means understandable through the study of the created world or nature. The value of study of the system of creation is limited only to the extent to which it proves that the world is governed by a Power which knows, designs, plans, and administers it. The world is a mirror, open to empirical experiment, only to the extent that it points towards something that lies beyond nature and discloses the existence of a Mighty Hand which runs nature's cosmic wheels.
But the Quran is not content that man should only know that a Mighty, Knowing, and Wise Power administers this universe. This may perhaps be true of other heavenly scriptures, but is by no means true of the Holy Quran, which is the final and ultimate heavenly message and has a great deal to say about God and the reality transcending nature.
Purely Rationalistic Problems
The most basic problem to which the mere study of the world of creation fails to provide an answer is the necessity of existence and uncreatedness of the Power which transcends nature. The world is a mirror in the sense that it indicates the existence of a Mighty Hand and a Wise Power, but it does not tell us anything more about Its nature. It does not tell us whether that Power is subservient to something else or not, or if it is self-subsisting. And if it is subject to something else, what is that? The objective of the Quran is not only that we should know that a Mighty Hand administers the world, but that we may know that that Administrator is "Allah" and that "Allah" is the indefinable: (There is nothing like Him), whose Essence encompasses all perfection, or in other words, that "Allah" signifies Absolute Perfection and is the referent of, (His is the loftiest likeness). How can the study of nature give us an understanding of such notions and concepts?The second problem is that of the Unity of God. The Quran has stated this issue in a logical form and used a syllogistic argument to explain it. The method of argument it has employed in this regard is what is called 'exclusive syllogism' or 'reductio ad impossible' (burhan al-tamanu'). On occasion it eliminates the possibility of multiplicity in the efficient cause as in the following verse:
If there had been (multiple) gods in them (i.e. the earth and the heaven) other than God, they would surely go to ruin ... (21:22)
At other times it argues by eliminating the possibility of multiplicity in the final cause:
God has not taken to Himself any son, nor is there any god besides Him; for then each god would have taken off that he created and some of them would have risen up over others ... (23:91)
The Quran never suggests that the study of the system of creation can lead us to the knowledge of the Unity of the Godhead so as to imply that the essential knowledge of the transcendental Creator be considered attainable from that source. Moreover, such a suggestion would not have been correct.
The Quran alludes to various problems as indicated by the following examples:
No thing is like Him ... (42:11) And God's is the loftiest likeness ... (16:60) To Him belong the Names most Beautiful. (20:8) And His is the loftiest likeness in the heavens and the earth ... (30:27) He is God, there is no god but He. He is the King, the All-holy, the All-peaceable. the All-faithful, the All-preserver, the All-mighty, the All-compeller, the All-sublime ... (59:23) And to God belong the East and the West; whither so ever you turn, there is the Face of God ... (2:115) And He is God in the heavens and the earth; He knows your secrets, and what you publish ... (6:3) He is the First and the Last, the Outward and the Inward; He has knowledge of everything. (57:3) He is the Living, the Everlasting ... (2:255) God, is the Everlasting, [Who] has not begotten, and has not been begotten and equal to Him is not any one. (112:2-4)
Why does the Quran raise such issues? Is it for the sake of propounding mysterious matters incomprehensible to man, who, according to al-Nadawi, lacks the knowledge of its essential principles, and then asking him to accept them without comprehending their meaning? Or, the Quran actually does want him to know God through the attributes and descriptions that have come in it? And, if this is true, what reliable approach does it recommend? How is it possible to acquire this knowledge through the study of the natural phenomena? The study of the creation teaches us that God has knowledge of the things; that is, the things that He has made were created knowingly and wisely. But the Quran expects us not only to know this, but also stresses that:
Indeed God has the knowledge of everything. (2:231) And not so much as the weight of an atom in earth or heaven escapes from thy Lord, neither is aught smaller than that, or greater, but in a Manifest Book. (10:61) Say: "If the sea were ink for the Words of my Lord, the sea would be spent before the Words of my Lord are spent, though We brought replenishment the like of it." (18:109)
This means that God's knowledge is infinite and so is His power. How and wherefore is it possible through perception and observation of the world of creation to reach the conclusion that the Creator's Knowledge and Power are infinite? The Quran, similarly, propounds numerous other problems of the kind. For instance, it mentions al-lawh al-mahfuz (the Protected Tablet), lawh al-mahw wa al-'ithbat (The Tablet of Expunction and Affirmation), jabr and ikhtiyar (determinism and free will), wahy (revelation) and ilham (intuition), etc.; none of which are susceptible to inquiry through the empirical study of the world of creation.
It must be admitted that the Quran, definitely, has raised these problems in the form of a series of lessons and has emphasized their importance through advice and exhortation. The following verses of the Quran may be quoted in this connection:
What, do they not meditate in the Quran? Or is it that there are locks upon their hearts? .... (47:24) (This is) a Scripture that We have revealed unto thee, full of blessing, that they may ponder its revelations, and that men of understanding may reflect. (38:29)
Inevitably, we are forced to accept that the Quran assumes the existence of a reliable method for understanding the meaning of these truths, which have not been revealed as a series of obscure incomprehensibles which lie beyond the reach of the human mind.
The scope of problems propounded by the Quran in the sphere of metaphysics is far greater than what can be resolved or be answered through the study of physical creation. This is the reason why the Muslims have pursued these problems, at times through spiritual and gnostic efforts, and at other times through speculative and rational approach.
I wonder whether those who claim that the Quran considers the study of nature as the sole, sufficient means for the solution of metaphysical problems, can give a satisfying answer in regard to the multifarious problems propounded by it, a characteristic which is special to this great heavenly Book.
'Ali's sole source of inspiration in his exposition of the problems mentioned in the previous chapters is the Holy Quran, and the sole motive behind his discourses is exegetical. Perhaps, had it not been for 'Ali ('a) the rationalistic and speculative aspects of the Quran would have forever remained uninterpreted.
After these brief introductory remarks on the value of these issues, we shall go on to cite some relevant examples from the Nahj al-balaghah.
The Divine Essence and Attributes
In this section we shall cite some examples of the Nahj al-balaghah's treatment of the problems of theology related with Divine Essence and Attributes. Later we shall make a brief comparative study of the issue in various schools and conclude our discussion on this aspect of the Nahj al-balaghah.However, before proceeding further, I ask for the reader's pardon that the discussion in the last three sections became a bit technical and philosophical, which is not very welcome for those not used to it. But what is the remedy? Discussion on a book such as the Nahj al-balaghah does entail such ups and downs. For this reason, we shall limit ourselves to giving only a few examples from the book on this subject, and refrain from any elaborate discussion. Because, if we were to comment on every sentence of the Nahj al-balaghah, the result will be, as is said: My mathnawi requires seventy maunds of paper.
The Divine Essence
Does the Nahj al-balaghah have anything to say about the Divine Essence and how to define it? The answer is, Yes, and a lot. However, much of the discussion revolves around the point that the Divine Essence is Absolute and Infinite Being, without a quiddity. His Essence accepts no limits and boundaries like other beings, static or changeable, which are limited and finite. A changeable being is one which constantly transcends its former limits and assumes new ones. But such is not the Divine Essence. Quiddity, which may qualify and confine Him within limits of finitude, is not applicable to Him. None of the aspects of being are devoid of His Presence, and no kind of imperfection is appllicable to Him, except absence of any imperfection whatsoever: the only thing amiss in Him is absence of defect or inadequacy of any kind. The sole kind of negation applicable to Him is the negation of all negations. The only kind of non-being attributable to Him is the negation of any kind of imperfection in relation to Him. He is free from all shades of non-being which characterize the creatures and effects. He is free from finitude, multiplicity, divisibility, and need. The only territory that He does not enter is that of nothingness and non-being. He is with every thing, but not in any thing, and nothing is with Him. He is not within things, though not out of them. He is over and above every kind of condition, state, similarity, and likeness. For, these qualities relate to limited and determinate beings characterized by quiddity:He is with everything but not in the sense of [physical] nearness. He is different from every thing but not in the sense of separation. (Sermon 1 )
He is not inside things in the sense of physical [pervasion or] penetration, and is not outside them in the sense of [physical] exclusion [for exclusion entails a kind of finitude]. (Sermon 186)
He is distinct from things because He overpowers them, and the things are distinct from Him because of their subjection to Him. (Sermon 152)
That is, His distinctness from things lies in the fact that He has authority and control over them. However, His power, authority and sovereignty, unlike that of the creatures, is not accompanied with simultaneous weakness, subjugation, and subjection. His distinction and separateness from things lies in the fact that things are totally subject to His power and authority, and that which is subject and subordinated can never be like the one who subjugates and commands control over it. His separateness from things does not lie in physical separation but is on account of the distinction which lies between the Provider and the provided, the Perfect and the imperfect, the Powerful and the weak.
These kind of ideas are replete in 'Ali's discourses. All the problems which shall be discussed later are based on the principle that Divine Essence is Absolute and Infinite, and the concepts of limit, form and condition do not apply to it.
