Шихаб ад-Дин Сухраварди: Основоположник школы Ишракият

Persian philosopher and founder of the school of Illuminationism

"Shihāb ad Dīn" Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardī (شهاب‌الدین سهروردی, also known as Sohrevardi) (1154–1191) was a Persian philosopher and founder of the Iranian school of Illuminationism, an important school in Islamic philosophy. The "light" in his "Philosophy of Illumination" is the source of knowledge. He is referred to by the honorific title Shaikh al ʿIshraq "Master of Illumination" and Shaikh al Maqtul "the Murdered Master", in reference to his execution for heresy. Mulla Sadra, the Persian sage of the Safavid era described Suhrawardi as the "Reviver of the Traces of the Pahlavi (Iranian) Sages", and Suhrawardi, in his magnum opus "The Philosophy of Illumination", thought of himself as a reviver or resuscitator of the ancient tradition of Persian wisdom. Suhrawardi provided a new Platonic critique of the peripatetic school of Avicenna that was dominant at his times, and that critique involved the fields of Logic, Physics, Epistemology, Psychology, and Metaphysics.

Of Persian stock, Suhrawardi was born in 1154 in Suhraward, a village located between the towns of Zanjan and Bijar Garrus in Iran. which Corbin specifies in various ways as the "project of reviving the philosophy of ancient Persia". In 1186, at the age of thirty two, he completed his magnum opus, The Philosophy of Illumination. There are several contradictory reports of his death. The most commonly held view is that he was executed sometime between 1191 and 1208 in Aleppo on charges of cultivating Batini teachings and philosophy, by the order of al Malik al Zahir, son of Saladin.

Suhrawardi was a strong defender of Peripatetic philosophy, until he was influenced by those whom he described as those who "have travelled the path of God", like as noted by Suhrawardi Plato, Hermes, and Pythagoras in the Greek tradition, and also figures in the Persian tradition. His philosophical project aims to revive the lost hikma of east and west. In his work Alwah Imadi, Suhrawardi offers an esoteric interpretation of Ferdowsi's Epic of Kings (Shah Nama) in which figures such as Fereydun, Zahak, Kay Khusraw"Whoever knows philosophy (hikmat) and perseveres in thanking and sanctifying the Light of the Lights, will be endowed with royal glory (kharreh) and with luminous splendor (farreh), and—as we have said elsewhere—divine light will further bestow upon him the cloak of royal power and value. Such a person shall then become the natural ruler of the universe. He shall be given aid from the high heavens, and whatever he commands shall be obeyed; and his dreams and inspirations will reach their uppermost, perfect pinnacle." و هر که حکمت بداند و بر سپاس و تقدیس نور الانوار مداومت نماید، او را خرّه کیانی بدهند و فرّ نورانی ببخشند، و بارقی الاهی او را کسوت هیبت و بهاء بپوشاند و رئیس طبیعی شود عالم را، و او را از عالم اعلا نصرت رسد و سخن او در عالم علوی مسموع باشد، و خواب و الهام او به کمال رسد.»

According to Hossein Nasr since Sheykh Ishraq was not translated into Western languages in the medieval period, Europeans had little knowledge about Suhrawardi and his philosophy. His school is ignored even now by later scholars. Sheykh Ishraq tried to pose a new perspective on questions like the question of Existence. He not only caused peripatetic philosophers to confront new questions but also gave new life to the body of philosophy after Avicenna. According to John Walbridge, Suhrawardi's critique on peripatetic philosophy can be counted as an important turning point for his successors. Suhrawardi tried to criticize Avicennism in a new approach. Although Suhrawardi first was a pioneer of peripatetic philosophy, he later became a Platonist following a mystical experience. He is also considered as the one who revived the ancient wisdom of Persia by his philosophy of Illumination. His followers include other Kurdish and Persian philosophers such as Shahrazuri and Qutb al Din al Shirazi who tried to continue the way of their teacher. Suhrawardi made a distinction between two approaches in his Illuminationism: one approach is discursive and the other is intuitive.

There are different and contradictory views regarding the character of Suhrawardi's school. Some scholars such as Hossein Ziai believe that the most important aspects of his thought are his logic and critique of the peripatetic conception of definitions.

Suhrawardi left over 50 writings in Persian and Arabic.

The Philosophy of Illumination: A New Critical Edition of the Text of Hikmat Al Ishraq, edited by John Walbridge and Hossein Ziai, Provo, Brigham Young University Press, 1999. The Shape of Light: Hayakal al Nur, interpreted by Shaykh Tosun Bayrak al Jerrahi al Halveti, Fons Vitae, 1998. The Mystical & Visionary Treatises of Suhrawardi, Translated by W. M. Thackson, Jr., London, The Octagon Press, 1982.