Divine Manifestations: Concerning the Secrets of the Perfecting Sciences Hard cover

Divine Manifestations (Al-Mazahir al-Ilahiyyah fi Asrar al-‘Ulum al-Kamaliyyah) is Mulla Sadra’s final work on divine metaphysics. He wrote it in order to elucidate a new rational theology in which he demonstrated the most controversial topics in Islamic theology. Although he does not explicitly refer to orthodox Islamic theologians’ approaches, his book is replete with indirect criticism and commentary on the deficiency of their methods. In this book, he discusses the existence of God, His attributes, His acts, and the Resurrection as well as the nature of the non-material worlds. His approach is both philosophical and textual, in that he bases his discussion on verses of the Holy Qur’an as well as hadith. It is a valuable work for anyone interested in knowing how in a systematic method of rational thinking, philosophy, theology and religion harmoniously and rationally can meet one another.

Sadr al-Din Shirazi, known as Mulla Sadra (1571-1640), is the principal figure of the major revival of philosophy in Iran in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He is perhaps the single most important and influential philosopher in the Muslim world for the last four hundred years. He authored over forty works including his magnum opus, the seminal al-Asfar in nine volumes, the Qur’anic commentary and a critical commentary on the Shi‘i hadith collection, Usul al-Kafi.