25-Qur’¡n, S£rat al-°ijr 29: 15 and S£rat ¯¡d 72: 38.

26-That is, a¦¡d¢th or reports from the Prophet and the Sh¢‘ite Im¡ms.

Intentionality in Mull¡ ¯adr¡

Gholamreza A‘w¡n¢, °ikmat Association, Iran

 

Abstract

This paper considers the nature of intentionality in the thought of Mulla  Sadra. By examining his proofs and arguments for the existence of a mental realm of being, one elucidates his doctrine of intentionality and how those cognitive mental states relate to cognisable objects. One alludes to some features of the Sadrian account that are similar to Husserlian phenomenology’s postulation of two levels of cognitive objects. Existence and knowledge are intimately connected. It is only through an account of existence, especially of mental existence, that one can give an account of how the mind cognises extra-mental existence. It is this relationship and the very nature of consciousness that lie at the heart of Sadrian epistemology. One accesses this account through considering his doctrine of intentionality.

Mulla Sadra (d. 1641), one of the great Islamic philosophers, has dealt extensively with the problem of mental existence (al-wuj£d al-dhihn¢). Apart from dedicating an important section in his magnum opus, al-Asf¡r, ¹ in which he deals extensively with the justificatory proofs and the philosophical significance of this issue, he has an elaborate discussion on the same issue in the sixth volume of al-Asf¡r. ² One of the proofs for the separate and independent existence of the mind is that we conceive universal concepts in our minds, whereas everything whatever, in the external world is particular and the universal as such does not exist in the outer world. ³ Another proof is that we sometimes make affirmative judgements about non-existent entities such as a gryphon (‘anq¡) or about logical contradictions which by definition cannot have a concrete existence other than in our minds.⁴ Another name for mental existence in Mulla Sadra is cognitive existence (al-wuj£d al-‘ilm¢). The latter term is applied either to the existence in the mind or to the relationship between the knower (the cognitive subject, al-‘¡qil) and the known (the cognitive object, al-ma‘q£l). This paper will consider the relationship between this mental mode of being and extra-mental reality and examine the resultant theory of intentionality in Mulla Sadra.

Knowledge, in the true sense of the word, according to Mulla Sadra is the presence of something to something else and in order that such a presence to another can be realized, it is necessary that it should be present to itself.

So the more a thing is in possession of self-presence, the more it partakes of being and knowledge.

Knowledge in Sadra’s view is analogous to being (inna l-‘ilm k-al-wuj£d); indeed, knowledge and being are one and the same thing. ⁶ So knowledge, like being is sometimes applied to the real and concrete thing, and sometimes knowledge is said of an abstract, relative (rational) and derivative object, and it is from the latter that the relational terms such as knowledge, the knower and the known are derived. Moreover, since knowledge and being are co-extensive and coterminous, one could say that when being is weak (in the intensity of existence) such that it borders on non-existence and is tinged with all sorts of deficiency and imperfection, then it is deprived of all faculties of perception. In such a state it is absent to itself. This is due to the fact that it lacks unitive existence (al-wuj£d al-j¡mi‘) and presential reality (¦aq¢qa ¦u¤£riyya). These beings, therefore, are deprived of any cognitive being. So even if existence is attributed to them, such correlative terms as knowledge, knower and known are not predicated of them.

The axis of knowledge and ignorance – and also of light and darkness, manifestation and self-concealment and of presence and absence – revolves around the intensity and the weakness of being. So whenever being has stronger reality and more intense actuality and more complete and total ipseity, it has stronger self-revelation (inkish¡f), more intense self-manifestation and is more all-encompassing with respect to things. But when being is weak and deficient, it is more deficient in manifestation. ⁷

Moreover, Mull¡ ¯adr¡ makes a very significant distinction with respect to the object of knowledge, which makes him a predecessor of Husserl concerning the distinction the latter makes between the content of the thing known, on the one hand, its object on the other. ⁸ According to Mull¡ ¯adr¡, there are two kinds of object of knowledge or the thing known (ma‘l£m). ⁹ The first kind is that whose very existence in itself is identical to its existence for the percipient (or the subject of perception). In other words, its objective form is exactly the same as its cognitive form. Mull¡ ¯adr¡ calls this kind of ma‘l£m or object, the object known essentially (al-ma‘l£m bi l-dh¡t) or the essential object of knowledge.

The second kind of object of knowledge (ma‘l£m) is that whose very existence in itself is other than its existence for the percipient. Or in other words, its objective form is not identical to its cognitive form. Such an object is known as al-ma‘l£m bi l-‘ara¤ or the object known accidentally, or the accidental object of knowledge. So knowledge too, has two different senses with reference to these two objects of knowledge. In the first instance (the object known essentially) knowledge consists of the presence of the form perceived in (the mind) of the percipient. By this presence, one means that knowledge is identical to the object known. In the second instance, knowledge consists of the acquired form of the thing known in the percipient which refers to an object outside the perceptive faculty such as the heaven, the earth, a tree, a horse and so on. We can, therefore, say that when we look at a tree, the tree that is in the external world and outside our mental reality, is known accidentally by the mind. But its idea in the mind, which is present in the mind and is identical to the perceiver’s mental content is known essentially or in other words, is an essential object of knowledge.

Here Mull¡ ¯adr¡ draws a very daring metaphysical conclusion. If, as we said, the mind’s knowledge of itself and of the content of consciousness, constitute essential knowledge (whereas the mind’s knowledge of the objects in the external world is accidental), then we can divide being into perceptual and non-perceptual being and divide the world into the visible and the invisible. In accordance with our division of knowledge into the essential and the accidental, it follows that our knowledge of the external world, being accidental, lacks the apriority that we normally ascribe to it. On the contrary, obscurity and being absent to itself are the attributes of this world.

From what we said it is evident that being is divided into two kinds, namely the perceptual and the non-perceptual and again there are two worlds accordingly namely, the visible and the invisible. They are what we call this world and the next. Naming the next world, the invisible and this world, the visible is only with respect to the weakness of our vision and not with respect to things as they are in themselves, because absence and obscurity are among the essential concomitants of this worldly existence, whereas presence and true vision are among the essential concomitants of other-worldly existence, with the multifarious degrees and ranks of the paradise. Every rank, which is more remote from this world, and more freed and elevated from matter is more intense in manifestation and possesses more presence, unity and integrity. ¹⁰

According to Mulla Sadra, knowledge by presence (al-‘ilm al-¦u¤£r¢), in which the existence of the object in itself is the same as its existence for the percipient, is the sine qua non of knowledge by acquisition (al-‘ilm al-¦u¥£l¢) in which our knowledge of a thing is mediated by a mental concept which refers to that thing outside ourselves. ¹¹ So in the ultimate sense, without knowledge by presence, in which knowledge is identical in the mind to the thing known, no knowledge would be possible. In the words of Mulla Sadra,

In both kinds of knowledge, that which is really known and essentially revealed is the form whose being is a perceptual and luminous being, pure from all material paraphernalia and uncontaminated by any kind of non-existence and darkness. ¹²

Mulla Sadra then goes on to elaborate on the point that our self-knowledge is something objective and real and that we know our selves by a form, which is our very being, and not by a form, which is extraneous or super added to our being. Everybody perceives himself by himself in a manner that does not allow participation by other persons. Were our perception of ourselves to be mediated by an acquired and extraneous concept in ourselves, that concept would be universal and a conglomeration of universals would not be able to constitute our concrete ipseity to which we refer by expressions such as ‘I’ (an¡’).

So our knowledge of ourselves is the same as the being of our proper selves and our personal ipseity. ¹³

Mulla Sadra puts forth some arguments to prove not only that the soul knows itself by itself without the intervention of an intermediary concept, it also knows its own faculties, such as those of perception and locomotion immediately and without recourse to intermediary concepts.

The first proof

The soul administers its proper body and utilizes its personal faculties. The soul, for instance, uses the cogitative faculty (mutafakkira) to differentiate and combine the particulars and to arrange the middle terms of a syllogism. They are necessarily particular forms, which exist in the spectacle of the soul, being present and exemplified in it. The soul is able to change these particular forms as it wishes. Its can change their order; it can add to or subtract from them. All these alterations and changes made by the soul are concrete and personal, and not universal or ambiguous. The same is also true about the organs deployed to bring about such arrangements and alterations. So the soul perceives all its faculties, whether they be physical, imaginal, retentive, re-collective or otherwise, and witnesses them as they are in themselves and not through conceptualization. Otherwise, it would need an infinite sequence of concepts.¹⁴

The second proof

If the perception of such things were through the intermediary of mental concepts, which are derived and abstracted from things, then we would have to perceive them in a general and universal fashion. But the consequent is false and so is the antecedent.¹⁵

The third proof

It sometimes happens that some disease afflicts us, or we experience the dispersal of unity in an organ, through which we feel extreme pain. But this feeling of pain is not through an accidental form, which supervenes over the organ, but the very dispersal of unity is the cause of pain and its mere presence is sufficient cause for the perception of pain. ¹⁶

The fourth proof

When we perceive something that is outside our mind and our mental faculties, we perceive it through a corresponding (conceptual) form, which obtains in our minds. But we perceive that obtained form by itself and not through another supervening form. Otherwise it would follow that an indefinite number of conceptual forms would occur in the same locus (mind) for one and the same thing.¹⁷

According to Mulla Sadra, the primary knowledge of our soul (mind) is its self-knowledge, the knowledge it has of itself and then its knowledge of its faculties and again the organs of those faculties, which are the internal and the external senses. These too are kinds of knowledge by presence. When the soul uses an organ, it is not through any cogitation or deliberation, but it is an intentional and volitional act, not disengaged or separated from knowledge. On the contrary, according to Mulla Sadra, in the intentional act, knowledge and volition are one and the same thing. Moreover, knowledge and volition are not supervenient elements in the soul, but constitute its very essence. So the mere intentional attention of the soul (iltif¡t al-nafs) towards something is sufficient cause for the presence of its form in the mind.

So perception is nothing but the intentionality of the soul towards the thing perceived and its immediate vision (mush¡had¡tuh¡) and the latter is not through a universal, but through a particular form. So the soul necessarily possesses an illuminative knowledge by presence. It is in need of a supervenient mental form, only when the existence of the perceived object is not luminous perceptual existence, such for example, as physical bodies and their accidents. ¹⁸

Mulla Sadra makes a clear-cut distinction between the first or primary intention (al-qa¥d al-awwal) and the second or secondary intention. These two terms which go back to such medieval philosophers as St. Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274), can be traced back to Avicenna and as a matter of fact are used in his magnum opus, Kit¡b al shif¡’. ¹⁹ There a distinction is made between the first intention (primum intentio, al-qa¥d al-awwal) and the second intention (secundum intentio, al-qa¥d al-th¡n¢). The referents of the primum intentio exist outside the mind, such as one’s idea of a horse. The objects of the secundum intentio such as a universal horse, exist primarily in the mind and secondarily (or by second intention) in the external world.

Mulla Sadra, making use of such a distinction, ties it up with another distinction he has already made concerning the object of knowledge. But here the two terms get a different significance from the medieval usage. The primary object of knowledge which he calls al-ma‘l£m bi l-dh¡t, is known essentially and by the first intention of the soul (bi l-qa¥d al-awwal). The things existing outside the mind are known accidentally and by a second intention of the mind.

That which is known in reality is the same as the form that is present in the mind and not what exists outside the mind. When we say concerning a thing which exists outside the mind, that it is known to us, it is known by a second intention (bi-qa¥din th¡nin) just as "existent" is sometimes said of the reality of an existent quiddity. What is really existent, is the former which is determined and distinct in reality, contrary to the quiddity which is in itself something ambiguous and undetermined. So when we predicate existence of a quiddity it is only by the second intention (bi-qa¥din th¡nin). ²⁰

One of the features of the essential object of knowledge, which, according to Mull¡ ¯adr¡ is the object known by the first intention (ma‘l£m bi l-qa¥d al-awwal), is that the percipient and the perceived, the objective and the subjective poles of existence are one and the same thing. Or in other words, the existence of the known object is identical to its existence for its subject. This principle does not only apply to the faculty of intellection in which the act, the subject and the object of intellection are one and the same, a Porphyrian principle to which Avicenna had objected (Mulla Sadra tried to reinstate and demonstrate the Porphyrian principle as a necessary condition for the sheer possibility of knowledge). ²¹ It also applies to all levels of consciousness, to imagination, sensation and even to the estimative faculty.

It should be known that the object of intellection (al-ma‘q£l) qua an object of intellection (which is an object of intellection in essence and reality) is such that its existence in itself, and its existence for the agent of intellection (‘¡qil) and its intelligibility (ma‘q£liyya) are one and the same thing, without any difference in their modality. In the same way the sensible qua sensible, which is the essential object of sensation, the sensible form exemplified in the sensible substance, is such that its existence in itself and its existence for the sensible agent are one and the same thing without any difference in modality.²²

We might ask what are the metaphysical grounds whereby the human soul (mind) acquires attributes such as knowing, willing, intending, creating and so on. We should not, as philosophers, take such phenomena for granted, and must have some ontological justification for such phenomena, otherwise we have not explained them at all. This question is one with which a phenomenologist is not concerned, because he reminds us always of his philosophical slogan ‘back to phenomena themselves’ (sozein ta phainomena). So he has to explain everything with reference to phenomena alone. Such is not the case with philosophers such as Plato and Mulla Sadra for whom philosophy is concerned with answering the ultimate questions. Why is there consciousness (knowledge) rather than nothing?

Answering this question is one of the main concerns of Mulla Sadra. For him, such attributes as consciousness, knowledge, power, creation and so on are possible, if possible at all, because the human mind or soul, has a theomorphic nature. All its qualities and attributes are divine by nature. God does not have a peer or an equal like unto himself (mithl) but God can have an image (mith¡l) like unto Himself. The human soul is that very image.

He created the human soul as an image for His Essence, Attributes and Acts. Because He, the Almighty is far transcendent to have an equal, but not from having an image. So He created the soul as His image with respect to essence, attributes and actions. So the knowledge of the soul is a ladder to his knowledge. So He made the essence of the soul free from the contamination of the worldly existence and from place and the four directions. He made her possessed of power, knowledge, volition, life, hearing and sight and made for her a kingdom and sight and made for her a kingdom similar to that of the creator, so that she is able to create and choose whatever she wills. Except that, even if she is from the kingdom of spirit, the realm of power, and the mine of grandeur and majority, she is weak in existence and inborn nature, due to the fact that having been captivated in this cycle of descent there are now many intermediary veils between her and the creator. The multiplicity of intermediaries between a thing and the fountainhead of being causes its feebleness and weakness of being. ²³

As a corollary of the deformed nature of the human mind, Sadra reiterates that one should explain the efficient causality of the soul, in line with its theomorphic nature. The human mind is not an affective receptacle for the material forms of things. He totally rejects the impression theory of philosophers like Hume or other Muslim adherents of such a theory. Human mind is more like the creative origination of forms than their passive receptacle. In other words, the subsistence of forms in the human mind is not the so-called immanentist subsistence (qiy¡m ¦ul£l¢). It is another kind of subsistence, which he calls originating subsistence (qiy¡m ¥ud£r¢). To understand this theory, an explanation is in order.²⁴

There are two rival theories of vision among Muslim philosophers. According to the first theory, vision consists in the rays of light emanating from the envisioned object that affect or impress the retina and as a consequence, vision occurs. This is called the impressionist theory of vision, held by Muslim physicists (hence called the physical theory). According to the second theory, when we see an object, rays of light emanate from our eye, or better our soul, and reaching the object make it visible. This theory was held by some Muslim mathematicians and hence is called the mathematical theory of vision.

Suhraward¢, made the latter a metaphysical theory and put forth the theory of the illuminative relation (i¤¡fa ishr¡qiyya) by which he tried to expound the reality of divine knowledge and which Mull¡ ¯adr¡ used to explain the intentional nature of consciousness and developed it into its more refined form of the theory of originating subsistence (qiy¡m ¥ud£r¢). ²⁵ According to Suhraward¢, in such relations as paternity and fraternity, it is necessary that the two terms should exist beforehand, so that the relation can be realized. A father is a father for an existing son. A brother is a brother for an existing sister, without being its cause. But there is another kind of relationship, such as luminosity, in which, one term of the relation is enough for the relation to be realized. Such is for example when a source of light illuminates its whereabouts and originates the other term of relation, that is light. This kind of relation is called the illuminative or luminous relation (i¤¡fah ishr¡qiyya) and he utilizes it to explain the creative and the causal relationship of God.²⁶

It is evident that things exist outside us and so we cannot be their originating cause when we perceive them. But according to Mulla Sadra, when we encounter an object the mind immediately creates the image identical with the object without being impressed by it. The subsistence of the image in our mind is not by impression or by immanence (¦ul£l) but by origination (¥ud£r).

Notes:

1-Al-°ikma al-muta‘¡liya f¢ l-asf¡r al-‘aqliyya al-arba‘a, ed. R. Lu§f¢ et al, 3^rd edition, 9 vols., Tehran: Mu’assasat d¡r i¦y¡’ al-tur¡th al-‘arab¢ 1981, vol. I, pp. 363-95.

2-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 149-306.

3-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. I, p. 272.

4-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. I, pp. 269-70.

5-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. III, p. 383.; cf. vol. I, pp. 53, 61, 412-13.

6-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. III, p. 336; cf. vol. I: 290, vol. III, pp. 402, vol. VI, pp. 125, 150.

7-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. III, p. 383.

8-Cf. Levinas, "Intentionality and metaphysics," in Discovering existence with Husserl, trs. R.A. Cohen & M.B. Smith, Evanston: Northwestern University Press 1998, pp. 122-29.

9-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 151 ff.

10-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. Vi, pp. 151-52.

11-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 163. Cf. Mehdi Ha’iri Yazdi, The principles of epistemology in Islamic philosophy: knowledge by presence, Albany: State University of New York Press 1992, pp. 43-56.

12-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 155.

13-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 157.

14-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 157-58.

15-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 158-59.

16-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 159-60.

17-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 160-61.

18-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 162.

19-Avicenna, al-Shif¡’: al-il¡hiyy¡t, eds. I. Madk£r et al, Cairo: al-hay’a al-‘¡mma 1960, p. 126.

20-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 163.

21-Cf. Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. III, p. 323, vol. VI, pp. 165-6.

22-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 165-66.

23-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, p. 252.

24-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 170-74.

25-Mull¡ ¯adr¡, al-Asf¡r, vol. VI, pp. 249-52. Cf. Suhraward¢, °ikmat al-ishr¡q [The philosophy of Illumination], eds.trs. H. Ziai & J. Walbridge, Salt Lake City: Brigham Young University Press 1999, p. 106.

26-Suhraward¢, °ikmat al-ishr¡q, pp. 46-7, 52, 114.

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Proofs for the Existence and Unity of God in Greek and Islamic Thought, with an Emphasis on Ibn ‘Arab¢’s Barzakh and its Role in Proving God’s Existence and Unity

Salman H. Bashier, University of Utah, USA

Abstract

This paper considers the proofs for the existence and unity of God in the thought of the Andalusian Sufi master Ibn ‘Arab¢ (d. 1240) by analyzing his concept of the ontological mediatory entity that is the barzakh. After considering rational proofs for the existence of God in the Hellenic tradition and in the classical Islamic traditions exemplified by Ibn S¢n¡ (d. 1037) and Ibn Rushd (d. 1198), the author considers Ibn ‘Arab¢’s proof for God derived from the revelation and argues for a rational proof based upon the concept of the barzakh as the Limit.

In introducing the barzakh, as the concept on the basis of which Ibn ‘Arab¢ established his proofs for the existence and the unity of God, I follow the same procedure that I carried out in my doctoral dissertation. ¹ I start with a discussion of the proofs for God’s existence and unity in Greek philosophy, especially in the thought of the two great philosophers, Plato and Aristotle. I proceed with the discussion of the proofs for God’s existence and unity in medieval Islamic theological and philosophical traditions. On the basis of these discussions, I introduce Ibn ‘Arab¢’s thought about the subject. To some readers an elaborate reference to the philosophers in this context might require some sort of justification, since Ibn ‘Arab¢ rarely mentioned the philosophers in his writings. It should be noted, however, that the goal of this paper is not merely to provide a detailed historical account of the philosophers’ proofs for the existence and the unity of God. Rather, it is to present their thought on this subject as a suitable background for presenting Ibn ‘Arab¢’s view.²

The Pre-Socratic philosophers searched for first principles to account for the element of unity in the changing plurality of appearances. Consequently, they established a fundamental distinction between appearances and their reality, which is represented by ‘first principles’. Despite this fundamental distinction, a logical connection was called for to relate appearances to their principles as effects are related to their causes. As Lloyd Gerson points out, Parmenides showed that establishing this kind of connection would be impossible if appearances and the source of their reality were considered as completely separated from each other. According to Gerson, Parmenides’ arguments were so convincing that the history of Greek philosophical theology could be seen as a series of responses to his challenge.³

Plato articulated one of the most serious responses to Parmenides’ challenge. Gerson points out that Plato did not provide a systematic exposition of his thoughts on theology. Nevertheless, he thinks that theological themes affected every important entity in Plato’s philosophy, and that his theological thought can be approached effectively through his theory of the Forms. An argument for a Platonic Form is like an argument for God. ⁴ In both cases, the argument is to the effect that in dealing with plurality and change, we are compelled by epistemological considerations to postulate the existence of a unifying principle that makes the practice of acquiring knowledge possible. This should become clear from the following Platonic argument for the existence of the Forms:

(1) Scientific practice exists.

(2) Central to scientific practice is the making of hypotheses.

(3) Scientific hypotheses are inductive generalizations where we make predictions about the future behaviour of an unobserved sample by extending our observations from an observed sample.

(4) Such inductive generalizations are only rationally justified if we assume that the observed sample and the unobserved sample have some one thing in common.

(5) This one thing that the observed and the unobserved samples have in common must not exist in space and time, since the samples occupy different areas of space/time and a single physical thing cannot exist in two places at the same time. Therefore,

(6) We are committed to the existence of some one thing that the two physical things have in common and this thing must not itself be physical.⁵

The argument states that the scientific practice of acquiring knowledge exists in reality, and that, in order to justify rationally the scientific generalizations that we perform in this practice, we are committed to the existence of the Forms. Furthermore, the argument shows that Forms must be ‘ones’ and incorporeal. The argument shows, therefore, that Forms must exist and that they must exist as ‘ones’ or unities. The main problem with the conclusion of this argument is that there seems to be a serious difficulty about presenting the Forms as genuinely ‘ones’ and, at the same time, as predicated of many things. This difficulty was raised by Plato himself against his theory of the Forms in Parmenides:

Parmenides: Then each thing that partakes receives as its share either the form as a whole or a part of it? Or can there be any other way of partaking besides this?
Socrates: No, how could there be?
Parmenides: Do you hold, then, that the form as a whole, a single thing, is in each of the many, or how?
Socrates: Why should it not be in each, Parmenides?
Parmenides: If so, a form which is one and the same will be at the same time, as a whole, in a number of things which are separate, and consequently, will be separate from itself. ⁶

The kind of criticism that Plato introduced against his own theory of the Forms restated Parmenides’ principal objection to positing an entity that is separated from, yet is the cause of its effects. In Parmenides, Plato confirms the claim that attributing absolute unity to the Forms, that is, investing them with an independent status results in serious difficulties. Moreover, if the logical relation between the Forms and the things that participate in them turns out to be problematic, then positing the Forms fails to account for the logical connections between the things that participate in them and, consequently, it fails to account for the practice of acquiring knowledge. From a skeptical point of view, one that characterizes Plato’s reasoning in Parmenides, this criticism must be destructive to the theory of the Forms. From a dialectical point of view, however, this need not be the case.⁷ For, from this point of view, endowing the Forms with independent traits ⁸ is meant to be one step in a dialectical argument that leads eventually to positing a higher principle of unity, a principle that provides for the unity of the Forms that is questioned in Parmenides. In the Republic, this higher principle of unity found its formulation in Plato’s concept of the Good, a supreme Form that is responsible for the existence and the unity of all other Forms:

In like manner, then, you are to say that the objects of knowledge not only receive from the presence of the good their being known, but their very existence and essence is derived to them from it, though the good itself is not essence but still transcends essence in dignity and surpassing power.⁹

The Good transcends existence and knowledge. But the transcendence stated in this passage is dialectical, in the paradoxical double sense that the Good preserves the specific unity of existence and knowledge through transcending them. The ambiguity surrounding this notion of transcendence creates a serious difficulty concerning the possibility of the rational comprehension of the Good, the highest Form of unity. The same ambiguity characterizes Plato’s introduction of the notion of the Receptacle in Timaeus. In this dialogue, ¹⁰ Plato stresses the limitations of reason in comprehending the notion of the Receptacle, as he stressed its limitations in comprehending the notion of the Good in Republic. In both cases, Plato makes it clear that positing higher forms of unity is necessary for coping with the epistemological difficulties that arise from reflecting on the relation between the Forms and the objects that participate in them. In order to safeguard the unity of the Forms, Plato was compelled to posit a yet higher form of unity. However, in order to do so, he had to conceive of this higher form of unity as free from the finitude or determinateness that was revealed in the nature of the Forms. But how can that which is infinite be comprehended? For we know that infinity means unlimitation and unlimitation means lack of definition. It was the positing of the actual existence of that which is infinite that led Aristotle to his principal objection to the theory of the Forms, a theory that made such positing necessary.

Aristotle reasserted the points of criticism introduced by Plato against his own theory of the Forms. His criticism can be based on the claim that whether we separate the Forms from the things that participate in them, or, whether we establish a relation between them, we face serious difficulties. If we reflect in terms of absolute separation on the ‘relation’ between the sensible things and the Forms, we can no longer speak about the Forms as causes of sensible things:

Above all one might discuss the question what on earth the Forms contribute to sensible things, either to those that are eternal or to those that come into being and cease to be. For they cause neither movement nor any change in them. But again they help in no way towards the knowledge of the other things (for they are not even the substance of these, else they would have been in them), nor towards their being, if they are not in the particulars which share in them; though if they were, they might be thought to be causes, as white causes whiteness in that with which it is mixed.¹¹

On the other hand, if we try to relate the Forms to the things that participate in them we end up with an infinite regress:

If that which is predicated truly of several things also exists in separation from these (this is what the believers in Ideas think they prove; the reason why, according to them, man-himself exists is that ‘man’ is predicated truly of the many particular men, and is other than they) – if this be so, there will be a third man. For, if the ‘man’ which is predicated is different from those of whom it is predicated, and exists independently, and ‘man’ is predicated both of particular men and of the Idea of man, there will be a third man apart both from particular men and from the Idea. On this basis, too, there will be a fourth man, predicated both of the third man, of the Idea, and of the particulars; and similarly a fifth, and so ad infinitum.¹²

For one thing, if the Forms are separated from sensible objects they cannot be their causes, because to be a cause of a thing is to cause movement in it, whereas the Forms cannot cause movement in sensible things due to their separation from them. For another, if the Forms are related to sensible things, an infinite regress results. Aristotle’s belief in the necessity of the existence of a causal relation between sensible things and the principle that moves them, ¹³ and his conviction that the relation between sensible things and the principle that moves them should not lead to an infinite regress play a major role in his proof for the existence of God. There are two premises on the basis of which Aristotle’s proof of the existence of God from motion is established: the premise that "everything that is in motion must be moved by something", ¹⁴ and the premise that "one thing cannot proceed from another, as from matter, ad infinitum. Nor…can efficient causes form an endless series." ¹⁵ Combining these two premises, we arrive at the conclusion that there must exist a First Cause, the Prime Mover of Aristotle. This was Aristotle’s proof for the existence of God from motion, which he established in the Physics and the Metaphysics.¹⁶

As Gerson points out, Aristotle’s physical proof for the existence of God from motion does not exclude the possibility of the existence of more than one prime mover, which must be disastrous as a metaphysical conclusion. ¹⁷ This metaphysical consideration is what led Aristotle for providing complementary proofs for the incorporeality and the unity of the First Cause. His proof for the incorporeality of the First Cause is the following:

It has been shown also that this substance cannot have any magnitude, but is without parts and indivisible. For it produces movement through infinite time, but nothing finite has infinite power. And, while every magnitude is either infinite or finite, it cannot, for the above reason, have finite magnitude, and it cannot have infinite magnitude because there is no infinite magnitude at all.¹⁸

Aristotle provides two arguments for the unity of the First Cause. The first argument is based on the incorporeality of the First Cause. Gerson provides the following summary of the argument:

If there are many distinct motions to be accounted for, then the unmoved movers will be many in number but one in form. But all things that are many in number but one in form have matter. The primary substance, however, cannot have matter because it is pure actuality. The unmoved mover must, therefore, be one in form and in number.¹⁹

Aristotle’s second proof for the unity of the First Cause is based on the continuous nature of motion:

It is evident also from the following that there must be some one mover which is eternal. Now we have shown that there must always be a motion, and if always, it must also be continuous; for also that which exists always may also be continuous, but what is in succession is not [necessarily] continuous. Further, if [a motion is] continuous, it is one. And it is one if both the mover is one and the thing in motion is one; for if now one thing causes it to move and now another, the whole motion will be not continuous but in succession.²⁰

As we can see, Aristotle’s arguments for the existence and unity of God are established on the basis of his belief in the impossibility of the actual existence of the infinite. The series of causes must have a first cause, since otherwise it will consist of an infinite number of intermediate causes, with no first cause to initiate motion. Aristotle admitted, however, that the assumption that the infinite does not exist in any way leads to impossible consequences. The most important of these consequences is that there will be a beginning and end of time. ²¹ But the existence of time cannot have limits, since the definition of time is the ‘now’ between ‘before’ and ‘after’. ²² There is a sense, however, in which the infinite exists. The infinite has a potential existence. Time exists as a potential infinite in the sense that its parts exist successively not simultaneously. Since time is potentially infinite, the world cannot have a beginning or end in time. This conclusion was not in harmony with the theological principles of Islamic theologians, who believed in the creation of the world in time, that is, in the finitude of the world’s time. Moreover, Islamic theologians established their proof for the existence of God on the basis of the assumption that the time of the existence of the world is finite.

As Herbert Davidson points out, in their proofs for the existence of God Islamic theologians followed the ‘Platonic procedure’ as it was introduced in Timaeus. Following this procedure, the theologians first indicated that the world is generated and then they argued that the generation of the world necessitates the existence of a generator or creator. ²³ Two main concepts were employed by the theologians in carrying out this procedure, the concept of particularization (takh¥¢¥) and the concept of tipping the scales (tarj¢¦). The concept of particularization implies that "when an object has a given characteristic but could conceivably have a different one, something must serve to particularize it, that is, to select the particular characteristic it does have from among all those that it might have."²⁴ Davidson cites Juwayn¢ (d. 1085), an Ash‘arite theologian, who employed the concept of particularization in his proof for God’s existence:

A particular agent must have selected out a moment for the world to emerge in preference to other times when the world might have emerged; and that a particularizing agent must have selected out existence for the world in preference to nonexistence.²⁵

As Davidson points out, Juwayn¢’s reasoning was influenced by Ibn S¢n¡’s analysis of the concepts possibly existent and necessarily existent. ²⁶ According to Ibn S¢n¡, the possible of existence for itself is that which may or may not exist, whereas the necessary of existence for itself is that which cannot not exist. When the possible of existence enters into actual existence, this must be because of something that provides it with necessary existence, since the possible of existence for itself is not capable of existing necessarily. The possible of existence in this case becomes necessary of existence only by the other. If this other is also a possible of existence for itself, the question might be raised as to what provides it with necessary existence or keeps it in actual existence. Thus, either we end up with an infinite regress or we conclude that there must exist something that gives actual existence to the possible of existence in preference to nonexistence, and that this something must be necessary of existence for itself. ²⁷ The difference between Juwayn¢ and Ibn S¢n¡ regarding this conclusion is that Ibn S¢n¡ did not think, as Juwayn¢ and the theologians in general did, that the necessary of existence for itself performs the act of particularization in time. For it turns out that, according to Ibn S¢n¡, the possible of existence exists always as necessary of existence by the other. Thus, although the concept possibly existent implies that the thing that is possible of existence may or may not exist, the thing that is possible of existence exists always. ²⁸ According to Ibn S¢n¡, the world is possible of existence in the sense that actual existence is given to it by God, but is necessary of existence in the sense that this giving of existence is eternal, that is, is not the outcome of a temporal process.

Ghaz¡l¢ (d. 1111), who was of the opinion that Ibn S¢n¡ made improper use of the concepts possibly existent and necessarily existent, employed the notion of tipping the scales (tarj¢¦) in arguing against Ibn S¢n¡’s argument that the world could not have been created in time since creation in time presupposes an infinite regress of causes of creation. He introduces Ibn S¢n¡’s argument in The Incoherence of the Philosophers as follows:

When the world begins in time, a new determinant either does or does not arise. If it does not, the world will stay in the same state of pure possibility as before; if a new determinant does arise, the same question can be asked about this new determinant, why it determines now, and not before, and either we shall have an infinite regress or we shall arrive at a principle determining eternally.²⁹

Ghaz¡l¢ argued that the proper conclusion to be drawn from the argument is not that the world could not have been created in time. The proper conclusion, according to him, is that since (rationally speaking) all moments of time before the existence of the world are equal candidates for its creation, there must exist an overriding agent to tip the scales in favor of the existence of the world in a specific time.

Ibn S¢n¡ was critical of Aristotle’s proof for God’s existence from motion in Physics. He was concerned with the cause that maintains the thing that is possible of