Issues in Islamic philosophy

A critique of Avicennian essentialism

Mulla Sadra is notoriously known for his denial of Avicennian essentialism and positing instead that there's only one modulated reality: existence. But what does this mean? In the following, I'll try to make sense of what this exactly amounts to.

Before getting into it, I want to begin by cashing out Avicenna's essentialism, starting with his tripartite theory of essence. There are three ways an essence, X, can be considered. These ways are the following:

1) negatively conditioned

2) positively conditioned

3) unconditioned

So, for example, the human essence can be considered in itself devoid of any accidental characteristic (unconditioned). In this case it is neither taken to be universal nor particular, existent nor non-existent, abstract nor concrete, etc. (Note: for Avicenna, the unconditioned essence is impressed in a transcendental intellect¹, and ultimately in the intellect of God. This will be a crucial point to consider when contrasting his view with that of Sadra’s). Furthermore, it can be considered as a concept (negatively conditioned); this is when it is abstracted from particulars and takes on its universal characteristic. For example, the concept human is universal insofar as it encompasses its instances. And lastly, it can be considered as a concrete particular, which is when an essence exists in or constitutes a particular (e.g., humanity constitutes Alex).

We are now in a better position to see how Mulla Sadra radically departs from Avicenna’s understanding of essentialism. For Sadra, only existence is real, and differences in existence are accounted for in terms of existential gradation. For instance, the distinction between two waves of an ocean is not essential, as they're both essentially water; rather, it is a difference, amongst others, between, say, the degree of intensity or weakness of one wave with respect to the other. Likewise, the distinction between any two existents is understood in terms of their degrees of existence — or, say, in terms of how much they participate in existence — and not in terms of what is essential to them, as they both are essentially existence. With this in mind, it becomes clear that Sadra's analysis of essences ends up in existence. The essence of all existents is ultimately nothing but existence itself in which such existents participates to some degree. On this analysis, a universal essence (e.g., humanity) is nothing more than a self-subsisting existent that is universal only insofar that it relates to its participants in the same way. It's important to distinguish this understanding of a universal essence from Avicenna's immanentist one, which is what I take to be one of the main differences between the two philosophers.

Going back then to Avicenna’s tripartite theory, Sadra would clearly reject (2), since essences do not constitute their particulars. Now, given the reason for the rejection of (2), it's natural for Sadra to have rejected (1) as well, since particulars do not constitute a common essence which, according to Avicenna, is understood to be the basis for our abstraction of concepts. Following Plato², Sadra was instead committed to the fact that our grasping of concepts is due to a higher intelligible universal essence. He would also reject (3), which is basically the denial of the Avicenna's view that an unconditioned essence is a reality impressed in a higher intellect.

It's clear, therefore, that what Sadra's denial amounts to is a denial of immanentism. Universal essences are not immanent in their instances, or, in other words, do not exist in them. They are — as Plato would say — ante rem. They exist prior to the many; and the many in turn participate in them. Moreover, we've seen how these essences, under analysis, basically amount to existence, which is sole fundamental reality by virtue of which all things exist.

1. Fazlur Rahman, The Philosophy of Mullā Ṣadrā (Albany: SUNY Press, 1975), ch. 2, p. 46-47.

2. Ibid, p. 47, line 14.