Critique of the Argument of Divine Hiddenness based on Positive and Negative Rules of Existence in the Transcendental Wisdom of Sadra

Abstract

In his divine hiddenness argument, John Schellenberg argues that God's Intentional negligence to provide convincing evidence has put some of his sincere seekers in a state of reasonable nonbelief. According to Schellenberg, this is violate evidence of the absolute love of God, and further concludes from the absence of such an attribute, the absence of that essence. According to him, reassuring religious experiences and providing more empirical evidence can prevent such a situation. But Mulla Sadra, in his transcendental wisdom, by analyzing the characteristics of existence and essence and finally proposing the argument of the “Sedighin”, believes that God is existence and not existent, and according to the causal relationship between existence and existent, all beings are manifestations of existence. Analyzing the negative rules of existence such as not having other, not having essence not having opposite, and not have the same and some positive rules such as simplicity, limitlessness and conceptuality of existence, can reveal the secret of divine Hiddenness. Therefore, contrary to Schellenberg's view of orginality of essence, human beings are faced with a multitude of evidences and manifestations of the existence of God and Presentation of some arguments such as divine Hiddenness argument due to the lack of proper knowledge of God's attributes and consequently incorrect epistemological expectations about Him. The advantages of Sadra's view include explain the divine appearance at the same time as his hiddenness, Using self-evident and rational foundations, matching with the traditional theology of religions, introduce some positive and negative attributes of God, presenting a proper picture of the relationship between God and the world, correcting and modifying human epistemological expectations from God and ease of understanding. In this article, an attempt has been made to present two novel deductive interpretation based on Mulla Sadra's views so that based on their results.

Keywords

• divine hiddenness
• pure existence
• existent
• essence
• reasonable nonbelief
• nonresistant nonbelief