, Ṣadr al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm Ḳawāmī S̲h̲īrāzī ( ca. 979-80/1571-2 to 1050/1640), known as Mullā Ṣadrā, the leading Iranian S̲h̲īʿī philosopher of the Ṣafawid period. After elementary studies in S̲h̲īrāz, he completed his education in Iṣfahān, where his teachers included three of the chief thinkers of his day: Mīr Muḥammad Bāḳir Astarābādī (Mīr Dāmād [see al-dāmād ]), S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ Bahāʾ al-Dīn ʿĀmilī [ q.v.] (S̲h̲ayk̲h̲-i-Bahāʾī), and—probably—Mīr Abu ’l-Ḳāsim Findiriskī [ q.v. in Suppl.]. Ṣadrā’s subsequent exposition of unorthodox doctrines, notably that of waḥdat al-wud̲…

[see mullā ṣadrā ].

[see mullā ṣadrā s̲h̲īrāzī ].

, Ṣadr al-Dīn [see mullā ṣadrā s̲h̲īrāzī ].

, leading scholar and mystic of early 18th-century Awadh and the consolidator of the Niẓāmī madrasa curriculum which came to be used through much of South Asia down to the 20th century. Niẓām al-Dīn was the third son of Mullā Ḳuṭb al-Dīn Sihālwī whose murder in 1103/1692 led to the emperor Awrangzīb recompensing him and his three brothers by assigning them the property of a European indigo merchant in Lucknow and by granting them pensions to support their scholarship; they and their descendants came to be known as the Farangī Maḥall family [ q.v. in Suppl.]. ¶ Niẓām al…

, Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ Mullā Hādī b. Ḥād̲j̲d̲j̲ Mahdī (1212-95 or 1298/1797-1878 or 1881), Persian philosopher of the Ḳād̲j̲ār period, best-known for his commentary on, and revival of the ideas of Saḍr al-Dīn al-S̲h̲īrāzī, Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1050/1640 [ q.v.]). Born in Sabzawār to a landowning merchant family, Mullā Hādī studied Arabic language and grammar in his home city and fīḳh , logic, mathematics and ḥikma in Mas̲h̲had. He then studied in Iṣfahān with such scholars as Mullā ʿAlī Nūrī (d. 1246/1830-1), the first of the Ḳād̲j̲ār-period scholars…

, Mīr Abu ’l-Ḳāsim b. Mīrzā Ḥusaynī Astarābādī , known in Persia as Mīr Findiriskī, Persian scholar and philosopher. He was probably born in Iṣfahān, where he studied and spent much of his life. He also travelled extensively in India, and died in Iṣfahān in 1050/1640-1. His tomb is located in the Tak̲h̲t-i Fūlād cemetery, and this shrine is visited by many devotees throughout the year. Mīr Findiriskī was one of the most famous of the philosophers and scientists of the Ṣafawid perio…

, Indo-Muslim poet, mystic and free-thinker of the 11th/17th century, who was executed by the Mug̲h̲al Emperor Awrangzīb [ q.v.] for going about naked and holding heterodox views. Originally he belonged to a Jewish family of Kās̲h̲ān but, later, he embraced Islam and received instruction in philosophy from Mullā Ṣadrā S̲h̲īrāzī [ q.v.] and Mīrzā Abu ’l-Ḳāsim Findiriskī [ q.v. in Suppl.]. In 1042/1632 he came to Sind as a merchant. In That́t́a he fell in love with a Hindu youth and suffered such emotional disturbance that he gave up his vocation, went ab…

the nisba of several eminent persons connected with Lāhīd̲j̲ān [ q.v.] in the Caspian region of Persia, among whom the following may be mentioned. 1. S̲h̲ams al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Yaḥyā Gīlānī , theologian, mystic, and poet of the Tīmūrid-Ṣafawid period and a renowned s̲h̲ayk̲h̲ of the Nūrbak̲h̲s̲h̲iyya Ṣūfī order in S̲h̲īrāz. He joined his master Sayyid Muḥammad Nūrbak̲h̲s̲h̲ in 849/1445, and during a period of 16 years, under Nūrbak̲h̲s̲h̲’s spiritual direction, accomplished considerable progress along the Ṣūfī path.…

, Āyatullah Murtaḍā (1920-79), Iranian religious thinker, writer, and close associate of Āyatullah K̲h̲umaynī, active in fostering the intellectual developments that contributed to the revolution of 1978-9. Born on 2 February 1920 in Farīman, about 60 km distant from Mas̲h̲had, to a religious scholar who was also his first teacher, Muṭahharī began his formal schooling in Mas̲h̲had at the age of twelve. He soon discovered the predilection for philosophy, theology and mysticism that stayed with him throughout his life. In 1937 he moved to Kum, where he remained for many years, studying f…

(a.), verbal noun from w-d̲j̲-d “to find”. 1. In philosophy. Here, it is one of the main words used to represent “being” in Arabic renderings of Greek ontological expressions, based on the present passive yūd̲j̲adu , with the past passive wud̲j̲ida , leading to the nominal form mawd̲j̲ūd . Al-mawd̲j̲ūd means “what is found” or “what exists”, and the maṣdar , wud̲j̲ūd , is used as the abstract noun representing existence. Wud̲j̲ūd and its related terms are frequently used to represent the copula ( al-rābiṭa ), sc. the English word “is”, in addition to being …

, Muḥammad b. Murtaḍā (1007-90/1598-1679), usually called Mullā Muḥsin or simply Fayḍ, the latter being a tak̲h̲alluṣ that was given to him by his teacher Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1050/1640 [ q.v.]); one of the greatest scholars of Ṣafawid Persia. Life. Fayḍ was born into a family that has continued to produce respected ʿulamāʾ down to modern times. He studied tafsīr , ḥadīt̲h̲ , jurisprudence, and related fields with his father and maternal uncle in Kās̲h̲ān. At the age of twenty, he went to Iṣfahān to further his studies; within a year he went on to S̲h̲īrāz to study ḥadīt̲h̲ and jurisprudence with…

, Muḥammad b. Ḥaydar , Ḥusaynī Ṭabāṭabāʾī Nāʾīnī (988-1083/1580-1673), Persian scholar of the time of the Ṣafawid S̲h̲āhs Sulaymān I and Ṣafī II (1077-1105/1666-92). He was versed in the S̲h̲īʿī religious jurisprudence, theology and literature as well as in the current philosophy of his time, and was regarded as the master of the philosophers and theologians of his time. He lived about 95 years and died in Iṣfahān on 3 S̲h̲awwāl 1083/22 January 1673, and was buried in the Tak̲h̲t-i Fūlād, the famous cemetery of the city. He was a pupil of Mullā ʿAbd Allāh S̲h̲us̲h̲tarī (d. 10 Muḥa…

, mīrzā , Persian philosopher, poet and recluse. He was born in 1238/1823 in Aḥmadābād, Gud̲j̲arāt, where his father, Mīrzā Sayyid Muḥammad, member of a sayyid family from Ardistān, was engaged in trade. After a brief period in Bombay, Ḏj̲ilwa was brought to Iṣfahān by his father at the age of seven and began his education. When his father died seven years later, he decided to devote himself to learning, conscious of the scholarly and literary traditions of his family: Mīrzā Rafīʿ al-Dīn Nāʾīnī (d.…

, “son-in-law”, an honorific title given to mīr muḥammad bāḳir b. s̲h̲ams al-dīn muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī al-astarābadī , Called also al-Muʿallim al-T̲h̲ālit̲h̲ , the “third teacher” in philosophy ¶ after al-Fārābī. This title properly belongs to his father who was the son-in-law of the famous S̲h̲īʿī theologian ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn b. ʿAbd al-ʿĀlī al-Karakī, called al-Muḥaḳḳiḳ al-T̲h̲ānī (Brockelmann, S II, 574), but it was extended to the son, who is more correctly called Dāmādī or Ibn al-Dāmād. Born at Astarābād, Mīr-i Dāmād spent h…

(a.). The two connotations of the root are g̲h̲āba ʿan , to be absent, and g̲h̲āba fī , to be hidden. In current usage, g̲h̲ayb (and especially g̲h̲ayba ) may signify “absence” (and g̲h̲ayba, correlated with s̲h̲uhūd , “presence”, may be a technical term of Ṣūfism); but more frequently g̲h̲ayb may indicate what is hidden, inaccessible to the senses and to reason—thus, at the same time absent from human knowledge and hidden in divine wisdom. It is to this second meaning that al-g̲h̲ayb refers, as a technical term of the religious vocabulary. It may then b…

(a.), the spoken word, utterance; can be extended to mean “discourse” and “poem”. The falāsifa prefer to limit their discussion to the problems of grammar and logic: thus in the preamble to the Nad̲j̲āt (Cairo 2.1357/1938, 11) Ibn Sīnā defines kalima as “a single word ( lafẓa ) which refers to an idea and the length of time that this idea is applied to any indeterminate subject whatsoever; for example, when we say ‘he walked’.” Cf. also Manṭiḳ al-mas̲h̲riḳiyyīn , Cairo 1328/1910, 57-8, and p. 66 where kalima is given as a synonym for “that which grammarians call fiʿl ”. But according to the Is̲h̲ā…

, an important school of speculative theology within Twelver S̲h̲īʿism, influential mainly in Persia and ʿIrāḳ since the early 19th century. Although at times its leaders have been excommunicated and its doctrines condemned as heretical, S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ism (also known as the Kas̲h̲fiyya) has accommodated itself fairly successfully with the majority Uṣūlī establishment and is generally regarded as a school ( mad̲h̲hab ) rather than a sect ( firḳa ). Bābism [see bāb , bābīs ] began in the 1840s as a radical development of S̲h̲ayk̲h̲ī heterodoxy. 1. Early history. The origins of S̲h̲ayk̲h̲…

, a technical term taken from the Greek ὕλη, “matter” as opposed to “form”, ṣūra (εἶδος), or more precisely “primary matter” in the philosophical sense. The corresponding Arabic word is mādda ; the sense that is sometimes very close to that of ʿunṣur , “element”, should also be noted. In the 3rd/9th and 4th/10th centuries, the term hayūlā ¶ is current in translations from the Greek, and in the researches and systems that draw their inspiration from these. According to the taste of the various schools and authors, hayūlā is sometimes substituted for mādda, and sometimes distinguished fro…

(a.), pl. maẓāhir , literally “place of outward appearance”, hence “manifestation, theophany”, a technical term used in a wide variety of contexts in ąīʿism, Ṣūfism, Bābism, and, in particular, Bahāʾism, where it is of central theological importance. At its broadest, the term may be applied to any visible appearance or expression of an invisible reality, reflecting the popular contrast between ẓāhir and bāṭin . In its more limited application, however, it refers to a type of theophany in which the divinity or its attributes are made vi…