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MULLĀ SADRĀ BETWEEN MYSTICAL PHILOSOPHY AND QURĀN INTERPRETATION: THROUGH HIS COMMENTARY ON THE “CHAPTER OF EARTHQUAKE”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 June 2005

Shigeru Kamada
Shigeru Kamada
Affiliation:
University of Tokyo E-mail [email protected]
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Abstract

This article explores the interpretation of the Qurān presented by Mullā Sadrā (d. 1050AH/1640), a mystic philosopher of Ithnācasharī Shīca Islam in Iran. First, in his Keys to the Unknown (Mafātīh al-ghayb), we know the general mechanism of how reading the Qur'ān realizes spiritual perfection. Mullā Sadrā considers the Qurān as the source of spiritual wisdom with a multi-layered structure of meaning. Through concentration on Qur'ānic texts, a reader's soul will be open to a deeper layer of meaning with an awareness of a higher level of spiritual perfection. As a concrete example, we examine his commentary on the Chapter of Earthquake (Sūrat al-Zalzalah), which depicts the catastrophic events on the Last Day. In the literal meaning, or the surface layer of meaning, he intuits as a hidden deeper meaning the incessant re-creation and dynamic flux of existence towards perfection, which also explains different transformations of human beings in the hereafter. We find here another spirituality of Islam, which differs from that of the Islam built on the surface meanings of the Qur'ān.

Type
INDEPENDENT PAPERS
Information
International Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , July 2005 , pp. 275 - 289
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2005

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Footnotes

The present paper combines, with revisions and abridgment, my two previous studies originally published in Japanese: “Fukachikai e no sannyū – Morrā Sadorā no seiten kaishakuron” [Penetration into the Divine Secret – Mullā Sadrā's Interpretation of the Sacred Texts –], in Ichikawa and Kamada, ed. 1998, pp. 206–23 and “Chūshaku ni okeru kakushin – Morrā Sadorā no Kuruān chūkai – [Innovation in Commentary – Mullā Sadrā's Qurān Commentary],” Bungaku (July–August, 2000), pp. 49–66.