Imāmī Theology: The Contribution of Ibn Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī (d. 726/1325) and a New Series of Publications

 The main intention of this blogpost is to say something about the Al-Mahdi Institute Press' new series of editions and translations of the works of the major Imāmī theologian al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī. The translation of Taslīk al-nafs ilā ḥaẓirat al-quds - rendered as Clearing the Soul for Paradise - is the first of this series. And I should declare an interest as someone who has been consulted on the series and the whole production and its academic content. 

But before saying something about this publication, it would be useful to locate it within a broader history of the development of Imāmī theological traditions from the classical period to the current age. 

We still have a long way to go in filling out an intellectual history of the course of theological traditions and especially philosophical theology in the Imāmī tradition. A sketch of a periodisation of rational (and increasingly systematic) theology known as ʿilm al-kalām among the Twelver Shiʿa might go something like this:

1) The period of the companions of the later Imāms, the mix of traditionalisms as well as the encounter with other traditions (aṣḥāb al-maqālāt, al-milal) and faiths on the ground of rational debate that was increasing - for which the translation of Aristotle's organon into Arabic was critically important. The key point about this period is the absence of fixed terminologies and technical discussions but the emergence of different modes of 'rationality' or intellectual inquiry, and not a simplistic opposition of 'traditionalism' and 'rationalism' - even the texts from the early generations such as al-Mufaḍḍal b. ʿUmar al-Juʿfī (d. c. 183/799), Hishām b. al-Ḥakam (d. 179/795), through to al-Faḍl b. Shādhān (d. 260/874) as well as the texts attributed to the Imām themselves (as in this study of Abrahamov). They are known for their views on creation and cosmology as a foundational metaphysics, determinism and human free will, the nature of prophecy and the imamate, and other issues - although most of their texts have not survived outside of doxographies and heresiographies like the works of hostile reporters like al-Intiṣār of al-Khayyāt (d. c. 300/913) and Maqālāt al-islāmīyīn of Abūʾl-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (d. 324/936). 

 

2) The immediate period after the onset of the occultation of the Twelfth Imam and the Shiʿi moment under the Buyids that brought the Imāmī tradition even more into dialogue with the Muʿtazilī tradition. This is the period from the 'traditionalist' influenced by Muʿtazilī categories and responding to their themes, Ibn Bābawayh al-Qummī known as al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq (d. 381/991) followed by his students and the first generation of serious Imāmī Muʿtazilī thinkers, al-Shaykh al-Mufīd (d. 413/1022) and his students al-Sharīf al-Raḍī (d. 406/1015) and al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044) - the former was more closely aligned with the Baghdādī Muʿtazila since he had studied with ʿAlī b. ʿĪsā al-Rummānī, the main figure of the Ikshīdī branch of the Baghdādīs and engaged with the thought of Abūʾl-Qāsim al-Kaʿbī (d. 319/931), and al-Murtaḍā was more in line with the Basran Muʿtazila. The latter engaged with the school of Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 321/933) and entered into polemics with the prominent Qāḍī ʿAbd al-Jabbār al-Hamadānī (d. 415/1024). Al-Mufīd had also studied with the first major Muʿtazilī Imāmī thinker Abū Sahl al-Nawbakhtī (d. 311/924) whose lost Kitāb al-ārāʾ waʾl-diyānāt also demonstrated knowledge of Aristotelian science and philosophy. The classic studies here are the following studies of McDermott and Abdulsater:

This MA is also important:

And the locus classicus of the development from al-Ṣadūq to al-Mufīd is the famous 'correction' by the later of his teacher's creed:

This period is marked by the 'rational', Muʿtazilī turn as well as the development of an Imāmī rationalism as well as finding space for arguments that are scripturally based especially pertaining to the main doctrine of the imamate. One also finds in that rationalist spectrum the importance of intra-Shiʿi disputation with the Zaydīs and the Ismailis.

3) This is followed by that first classical period from al-Shaykh al-Ṭūsī (d. 460/1067) to Sālār al-Daylamī (d. 448/1057) who wrote a work on atoms and cosmology through Sadīd al-Dīn al-Ḥimmaṣī al-Rāzī (d. 600/1204) and his al-Munqidh min al-taqlīd through to the 13th century school of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 1274) and his student Ibn al-Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī known as al-ʿAllāma (d. 726/1325). This period has recently been studied by Sabine Schmidtke and Hasan Ansari (although the period from al-Ḥimmaṣī to Ṭūsī is not so well known perhaps due to the uncertainties of the early Mongol age and the survival of texts and knowledge networks). Four important figures of the 12th century are the contemporaries Abu ʿAlī al-Faḍl al-Ṭabrisī (d. 548/1153) and Abūʾl-Futūḥ al-Rāzī (d. after 552/1157) authors of significant theologically inflected exegeses on the Qurʾan and Quṭb al-Dīn Rāwandī (d. 573/1177) and ʿAbd al-Jalīl Qazwīnī Rāzī whose Kitāb al-naqḍ is an invaluable source on kalām positions among the Shiʿa and others in Iran. This period is marked by the increasing influence of the Muʿtazilī thinker Abūʾl-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī (d. 436/1044) and his follower Rukn al-Dīn Ibn al-Malāḥimī (d. 536/1141) as well as the rising impact of metaphysics of Ibn Sīnā (d. 428/1037). This is sometimes considered the truly classic period of Imāmī rational theology but also marked by different trends of reception, response and engagement with the Muʿtazila and the philosophical traditions. 

4) Perhaps the most important phase - and we will return to this in the description of the book - is Ṭūsī and al-Ḥillī that established the parameters of Imāmī kalām through some key texts such as Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād (on which see my previous posts part 1, part 2, and part 3) as well as al-Ḥillī's famous creed al-Bāb al-Ḥādī ʿashar best read through the commentary al-Nāfiʿ yawm al-ḥashar by Miqdād al-Siyūrī (d. 826/1423). This then became the 'school of al-Ḥilla' in theology. 

5) Alongside that school, there was a more esoteric turn which engaged with maximalist Imamology, lettrism and the occult sciences as well as the increasing influence of the school of Ibn ʿArabī and here one thinks of a diverse set of 14th and 15th century thinkers from Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī (d. after 1385) to Rajab al-Bursī (d. 813/1411) [see my earlier blogpost on him] and onto Ibn Abī Jumhūr al-Aḥsāʾī (d. 1502) especially in his massive al-Mujlī that attempts to 'reconcile' Imāmī kalām with the philosophical schools of Ibn Sīnā and Suhrawardī and the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 1240), and Taqī al-Dīn Ibrāhīm al-Kafʿamī (d. c. 1499), compiler of a famous sets of devotions entitled al-Miṣbāḥ. 

6) The Safavid theologians developed the esotericist line along with the Ṭūsī-Ḥillī school and also spread the schools through translation and composition in Persian. The best examples are the philosophical theology of Mullā Ṣadrā Shīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) as well as the commentary on the Tajrīd of his student ʿAbd al-Razzāq Lāhījī (d. 1070/1661) as well as his Persian work Gawhar-i murād. 

Other works that tried to extend the reconciliation of philosophical theology with scripture were penned by Mullā Ṣadrā's other major student and son-in-law Muḥsin Fayḍ Kāshānī (d. 1090/1680). 

7) In the post-Safavid period, one finds the development of distinct parallel and rival branches (and that is without considering those who eventually self-identified outside of Imāmī Shiʿism such as the Bahais):

a) a deepening of Shiʿi Sufi theologies with figures such as ʿAbd al-Raḥīm Damāvandī (d. 1757) and Sayyid Quṭb al-Dīn Nayrīzī (d. 1761) that drew upon the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ʿArabī

b) continuation of the main Safavid tradition culminating in the work of Hādī Sabzawārī (d. 1289/1873) and Hādī al-muḍillīn

c) a more extended esotericist Imāmology in the work of Sayyid Jaʿfar Kashfī (d. 1843) through to ʿAlī al-Ḥāʾirī al-Yazdī (d. 1333/ and his Ilzām al-nāṣib

d) the best known esotericism of the Shaykhī school starting with Shaykh Aḥmad al-Aḥsāʾī (d. 1241/1826), his disciple Sayyid Kāẓim Rashtī (d. 1259/1844) and then the two traditions that developed in Kerman and Tabriz. Henry Corbin famously thought that the Shaykhī school represented the final esotericism of Imāmī Shiʿism. What was clear is that it represented a metaphysics and theology of presence that was critical of Ibn Sīnā and Mullā Ṣadrā and that found a more extended metaphysical role for the Imams as Aristotelian causes for the existence of the cosmos. A major feature of their work is philosophical theological exegesis on the Qurʾan and sayings of the Imams and devotional texts. 

8) In the modern period, alongside the continuation of Safavid esotericism and the school of al-Ḥilla (as well as the Shaykhīya), there are at least another three distinct trends:

a) Reformists who criticised and increasingly attacked the core positions on the imamate from the time of Aḥmad Kasravī (d. 1946) and Sharīʿat-Sangalajī (d. 1944) through to Ḥaydar ʿAlī Qalamdārān (d. 1983), and more recently I would include the likes of ʿAbdolkarīm Sorūsh, Moḥsen Kadivar, Moḥammad Mojtehed Shabastarī, Moṣṭafā Malekiyān and others - though there are differences in their positions on hermeneutics and the nature of religion.

b) The School of Separation (the maktab-e tafkīk) and their fideist rejection of philosophical theology in favour of insisting upon scripturalism and eschewing philosophical arguments since they 'bring into question' innate beliefs that all humans hold (such as the existence of God, and the necessity of prophecy and the imamate and so forth)

c) The New Theology (kalām-e jadīd) was one attempt starting with thinkers in Najaf such as Muḥammad Ḥusayn Iṣfahānī Kumpānī (d. 1942) and developing through his student ʿAllāma Sayyid Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ṭabātabāʾī (d. 1981) and his student Murtażā Mutahharī (d. 1979) to deploy the philosophical method and system of Mullā Ṣadrā to respond to the theological and intellectual challenges of forms of idealism, materialism, and dialectical materialism as well as atheism in the 20th century. This school is now one might say morphing into an 'analytical Sadrianism' which brings the philosophical theology of Mullā Ṣadrā into conversation with modern anglo-American analytic philosophy of religion and theology. 

Now returning to the Ṭūsī-Ḥillī school, the publication of a dual text edition of Ḥillī's Taslīk al-nafs in a translation by Jari Kaukua, who heads up the ERC-funded Epistemic Transitions in Islamic Philosophy, Theology and Science project, is a major event. Up to now, there are hardly any Imāmī theological text available in such an attractive design and binding - or even in translation. I can see how it will become essential for teaching purposes even within Shiʿi circles. The fact that the translation came out of the ERC-funded project also means that the digital copy is available online on a Creative Commons license. The text is also the first in a new series of translations of the works of al-Ḥillī.

This work in a sense falls between the shorter creedal al-Bāb al-Ḥādī ʿashar and al-Ḥillī's more extensive works such as his commentary on the Tajrīd, Kashf al-murād, as well as his incomplete work on kalām (of which the metaphysics section is extant), Nihāyat al-marām fī ʿilm al-kalām and his well known Manāhij al-yaqīn.

The Arabic text follows the earlier critical edition of Fāṭima Ramaḍānī - the translator cites Schmidtke on the 8 manuscripts of the text although there are many more that are extant. 

Ramaḍānī's edition is based on the two earliest manuscripts: 1) MS British Library Or 10971 dated 18 ṣafar 716/May 1316 in the life of the author in the hand of (probably his sister's son) Sayyid ʿAlī b. al-Ḥasan al-Ḥusaynī al-Aʿrajī - and the codex also includes an ijāza to his son Fakhr al-muḥaqqiqīn and some of his marginal glosses 2) MS Maktabat Āyatullāh al-Ḥakīm in Najaf 929 dated 22 ṣafar 722/March 1322 also in the lifetime of the author and it says it is based on the autograph (which has not survived). But this is a rough copy with mistakes that are corrected in the margins. 

It is unfortunate that the translation omits the detail of which Arabic text has been used or any of the critical apparatus. But the intention of the series is not to produce critical editions. 

The introduction that follows does a decent job of outlining the importance of the text and the contribution of al-Ḥillī's ideas and his influence but independence from Muʿtazilī and Avicennian ideas. But much of it is based on Schmidtke's earlier published Oxford DPhil. One wonders whether there is more to say? 

The structure is as follows:

As with most later theological compendia, much of the text is taken up with metaphysics of general terms (general things seems a bit vague and it seems that one means the way in which we use terms like one and many and universal and particular - so the semantics of being) and categories of beings (substances and accidents and their properties). Another large chunk is on the nature of God and her attributes including the famous proofs for the existence of God. Here the important discussion of limited and compatibilist human free will as well as evil and the question of pleasures and pains as well as the very significant theological issue of God's facilitating grace (luṭf) are discussed in the section on theodicy. He consistently presents kalām arguments alongside the philosophical ones. Interesting on the major dispute on the eternity of the world he presents both arguments but does not adjudicate - elsewhere he does in favour of the theological position on creation out of nothing in time. The shortest section is on the imamate which is consistent with the other works of this genre. Given his extensive work on that topic of dispute, that is not surprising - and forthcoming titles in this series will engage with those such as the controversial Minhāj al-karāma currently being translated. The final section on the return includes the discussions on resurrection as well as the philosophical problem of how one can return to existence something that has become non-existent. It also ends with a brief discussion on the nature of faith (īmān) that takes up on old kalām debate - interestingly this section is entitled 'on names and judgements'.

The text is well designed and presented. 

The translation itself is readable if at times rather literal or interpretative (in a manner with which I disagree - for example, charge for taklīf that is often rendered as legal or moral obligation). But at least we have a translation that is workable especially alongside the Arabic. 

On the whole there is little doubt that this is a contribution that is wonderfully produced and deserves to be widely disseminated, known and used. An essential step in the study of post-classical kalām and especially Imāmī kalām.