A Religious-Philosophical Reading of Mulla Sadra’s Notion of Human Soul’s Fall

Abstract

Human fall is one of the key issues of anthropological concern in religious studies and philosophical investigations; it not only accounts for the nature of human soul rather it refers to the latter’s origin and its emergence. Although fall has been discussed in some prophetic traditions and sayings; for Mulla Sadra it is of philosophical interest and has been discussed along with the issues of soul’s origination. Thus this essay seeks to study the issue of human soul’s fall in the context of Mull Sadra’s philosophical discussions of soul as a whole and in view of a set of certain prophetic traditions. It aims at providing a picture of fall from a religious and philosophical point of view. Taking a problem-oriented approach, this research struggles to explain the bodily emergence and spiritual eternity of human soul and demonstrate that origination and fall are not of a contradictive or differentiated nature in Sadra’s view rather they are totally coherent; it also studies the philosophical, mystical and exegetical attitudes of Sadra on the existential status of human soul and its knowledge. Finally it seeks to offer a rational interpretation of ontological aspects of the fall of human soul drawing upon Sadra’s ideas concerning human realization.

Keywords

• fall
• human soul
• bodily originated
• coherence
• mulla sadra