Seyyed Hossein Nasr ( / ˈ n ɑː s ər , ˈ n æ s ər / ; Persian : سید حسین نصر , born April 7, 1933) is an Iranian-American philosopher, theologian and Islamic scholar . He is University Professor of Islamic studies at George Washington University .
139-410: Fitra or fitrah ( Arabic : فِطْرَة ; ALA-LC : fiṭrah ) is an Arabic word that means 'original disposition', 'natural constitution' or ' innate nature'. The concept somewhat resembles natural order in philosophy, although there are considerable differences as well. In Islam , fitra is the innate human nature that recognizes the oneness of God ( tawhid ). It may entail either
278-537: A Jew , a Christian or a Magian , just as an animal is born intact. Do you observe any among them that are maimed (at birth)." According to a hadith qudsi, God says: "I created my servants Hunafa (i.e., monotheists ), then the Shayatin misled them from their religion." In another tradition, the Prophet is reported to have said: “The fitrah is five things, or five things are part of the fitrah: circumcision, shaving
417-528: A "materialistic century", this School provides Nasr with the keys to his spiritual quest: an esoteric doctrine and method within the framework of a Sufi path. For Patrick Laude : ... Seyyed Hossein Nasr's background is remarkable in at least three ways: first, he is a public figure who has been widely recognized in the media – in both the US and Europe – as a spokesman for perennialist ideas. [...] Second, he
556-575: A collection of related dialects that constitute the precursor of Arabic, first emerged during the Iron Age . Previously, the earliest attestation of Old Arabic was thought to be a single 1st century CE inscription in Sabaic script at Qaryat al-Faw , in southern present-day Saudi Arabia. However, this inscription does not participate in several of the key innovations of the Arabic language group, such as
695-412: A compilation "of wisdom writings of various historical traditions", which would have resulted in the conviction of the existence of common truths, but it is these very truths which, by "the practice of intellection, the use of the intellect" understood in a spiritual manner, are revealed to the human spirit which then observes "their presence in other times and climes and in fact in all the sacred traditions
834-435: A corpus of poetic texts, in addition to Qur'an usage and Bedouin informants whom he considered to be reliable speakers of the ʿarabiyya . Arabic spread with the spread of Islam . Following the early Muslim conquests , Arabic gained vocabulary from Middle Persian and Turkish . In the early Abbasid period , many Classical Greek terms entered Arabic through translations carried out at Baghdad's House of Wisdom . By
973-430: A deep but forgotten knowledge of God that nevertheless still exists within them". Even though humans have forgotten it, they still possess an innate knowledge of God that is often covered up by their disbelief. This is reflected in the term " kuffār ," which means "disbelievers" but which also etymologically refers to the idea of covering up the truth. The pretemporal covenant, along with God sending messengers to all people,
1112-1081: A dialect of Arabic and written in the Latin alphabet . The Balkan languages, including Albanian, Greek , Serbo-Croatian, and Bulgarian , have also acquired many words of Arabic origin, mainly through direct contact with Ottoman Turkish . Arabic has influenced languages across the globe throughout its history, especially languages where Islam is the predominant religion and in countries that were conquered by Muslims. The most markedly influenced languages are Persian , Turkish , Hindustani ( Hindi and Urdu ), Kashmiri , Kurdish , Bosnian , Kazakh , Bengali , Malay ( Indonesian and Malaysian ), Maldivian , Pashto , Punjabi , Albanian , Armenian , Azerbaijani , Sicilian, Spanish, Greek, Bulgarian, Tagalog , Sindhi , Odia , Hebrew and African languages such as Hausa , Amharic , Tigrinya , Somali , Tamazight , and Swahili . Conversely, Arabic has borrowed some words (mostly nouns) from other languages, including its sister-language Aramaic, Persian, Greek, and Latin and to
1251-482: A family at this point. His son, Vali Nasr, would go on to become an academic and specialist on the Islamic world. At thirty, Nasr was the youngest person to become a full professor at Tehran University. He was quickly recognized as an authority in Islamic philosophy, Islamic science and Sufism . For fifteen years he conducted a doctoral seminar in comparative philosophy and Islamic philosophy with Henry Corbin who
1390-487: A lesser extent and more recently from Turkish, English, French, and Italian. Arabic is spoken by as many as 380 million speakers, both native and non-native, in the Arab world, making it the fifth most spoken language in the world, and the fourth most used language on the internet in terms of users. It also serves as the liturgical language of more than 2 billion Muslims . In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked Arabic
1529-690: A millennium before the modern period . Early lexicographers ( لُغَوِيُّون lughawiyyūn ) sought to explain words in the Quran that were unfamiliar or had a particular contextual meaning, and to identify words of non-Arabic origin that appear in the Quran. They gathered shawāhid ( شَوَاهِد 'instances of attested usage') from poetry and the speech of the Arabs—particularly the Bedouin ʾaʿrāb [ ar ] ( أَعْراب ) who were perceived to speak
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#17327733106871668-604: A mission Nasr was himself following for the Islamic civilization . His doctoral dissertation entitled "Conceptions of Nature in Islamic Thought" was published in 1964 by Harvard University Press as An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines . Apart from mastering the Arabic and French he was initially taught in his childhood, during his student years Nasr also learned Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish and German. After receiving his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1958, Nasr
1807-594: A result, many European languages have borrowed words from it. Arabic influence, mainly in vocabulary, is seen in European languages (mainly Spanish and to a lesser extent Portuguese , Catalan , and Sicilian ) owing to the proximity of Europe and the long-lasting Arabic cultural and linguistic presence, mainly in Southern Iberia, during the Al-Andalus era. Maltese is a Semitic language developed from
1946-660: A scholarship. When he realized, after an encounter with the philosopher Bertrand Russell , that the study of physics would not bring answers to his questions, he enrolled in additional courses on metaphysics and philosophy with Giorgio de Santillana who introduced him to the works of René Guénon . From there, Nasr discovered the works of other Perennialist metaphysicians, notably Frithjof Schuon , Ananda Coomaraswamy , Titus Burckhardt , Martin Lings , and Marco Pallis . This school of thought has shaped Nasr's life and thinking ever since. The widow of Commaraswamy gave him access to
2085-462: A script derived from ASA attest to a language known as Hasaitic . On the northwestern frontier of Arabia, various languages known to scholars as Thamudic B , Thamudic D, Safaitic , and Hismaic are attested. The last two share important isoglosses with later forms of Arabic, leading scholars to theorize that Safaitic and Hismaic are early forms of Arabic and that they should be considered Old Arabic . Linguists generally believe that "Old Arabic",
2224-470: A single language, despite mutual incomprehensibility among differing spoken versions. From a linguistic standpoint, it is often said that the various spoken varieties of Arabic differ among each other collectively about as much as the Romance languages . This is an apt comparison in a number of ways. The period of divergence from a single spoken form is similar—perhaps 1500 years for Arabic, 2000 years for
2363-463: A solution to the contemporary environmental crisis. When he discovered the writings of the most influential members of what would become the Traditionalist or Perennialist school ( René Guénon , Frithjof Schuon , Ananda Coomaraswamy , Titus Burckhardt , Martin Lings ), the student Nasr fully aligned himself to their perspective founded on the philosophia perennis . I had discovered
2502-458: A straight and upstanding manner, neither inclining nor adhering to past religions that have been altered or abrogated". In the Quran, the term "Hanif" is often used in relation to Abraham, but in a broader sense, it refers to someone who turns away from misguidance and instead embraces faith in the unity of God. If the term "fitra" is understood to mean "divide", it might signify that God separates his creation into believers and unbelievers by means of
2641-507: A type of Arabic. Cypriot Arabic is recognized as a minority language in Cyprus. The sociolinguistic situation of Arabic in modern times provides a prime example of the linguistic phenomenon of diglossia , which is the normal use of two separate varieties of the same language, usually in different social situations. Tawleed is the process of giving a new shade of meaning to an old classical word. For example, al-hatif lexicographically means
2780-507: A variety of regional vernacular Arabic dialects , which are not necessarily mutually intelligible. Classical Arabic is the language found in the Quran , used from the period of Pre-Islamic Arabia to that of the Abbasid Caliphate . Classical Arabic is prescriptive, according to the syntactic and grammatical norms laid down by classical grammarians (such as Sibawayh ) and the vocabulary defined in classical dictionaries (such as
2919-476: A wider audience." In the wake of the industrial revolution and European hegemony and colonialism , pioneering Arabic presses, such as the Amiri Press established by Muhammad Ali (1819), dramatically changed the diffusion and consumption of Arabic literature and publications. Rifa'a al-Tahtawi proposed the establishment of Madrasat al-Alsun in 1836 and led a translation campaign that highlighted
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#17327733106873058-405: A worldview about which I felt complete certitude ( yaqın ). I felt that this was the truth that satisfied me intellectually and accorded with my life existentially. It was in harmony with the faith that I had. It was universalist in its metaphysical perspective and also critical of Western philosophy and science in a manner that spoke directly to my concerns. (interview) Thus, in the middle of
3197-737: Is a Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world . The ISO assigns language codes to 32 varieties of Arabic , including its standard form of Literary Arabic, known as Modern Standard Arabic , which is derived from Classical Arabic . This distinction exists primarily among Western linguists; Arabic speakers themselves generally do not distinguish between Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic, but rather refer to both as al-ʿarabiyyatu l-fuṣḥā ( اَلعَرَبِيَّةُ ٱلْفُصْحَىٰ "the eloquent Arabic") or simply al-fuṣḥā ( اَلْفُصْحَىٰ ). Arabic
3336-399: Is a "desperate attempt to substitute a set of horizontal, material causes in a unidimensional world to explain effects whose causes belong to other levels of reality". For Nasr, in accordance with "the traditional view of the anthrōpos ", the human being is a "bridge between Heaven and earth ( pontifex )". Responsible to God for his actions, he is the custodian and protector of the earth, "on
3475-590: Is a minimum level of comprehension between all Arabic dialects, this level can increase or decrease based on geographic proximity: for example, Levantine and Gulf speakers understand each other much better than they do speakers from the Maghreb. The issue of diglossia between spoken and written language is a complicating factor: A single written form, differing sharply from any of the spoken varieties learned natively, unites several sometimes divergent spoken forms. For political reasons, Arabs mostly assert that they all speak
3614-559: Is a sister language rather than their direct ancestor. Arabia had a wide variety of Semitic languages in antiquity. The term "Arab" was initially used to describe those living in the Arabian Peninsula , as perceived by geographers from ancient Greece . In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside the Ancient South Arabian family (e.g. Southern Thamudic) were spoken. It
3753-481: Is also "the Supreme Good or Perfection". Now, according to Nasr, the specificity of infinitude and of good in divinis requires that they exteriorize themselves, that is to say, that they manifest themselves in multiplicity, hence the world. A world that is imperfect despite the perfection of its source because, as Nasr explains, this exteriorization implies a distance from the "Good", hence the presence of evil;
3892-524: Is an illusion to consider the world, says Nasr, as "reality" in the same way as the Principle. Nasr holds that traditional wisdom or the sophia perennis "has always seen God as Reality and the world as a dream from which the sage awakens through [spiritual] realization ... and the ordinary man through death". To consider the world as "the reality ... as is done by most modern philosophy ... leads to nihilism and skepticism by reducing God to an abstraction, to
4031-787: Is at the same time "the goal of the path of knowledge and the essence of scientia sacra ". Nasr contends that this wisdom, which corresponds – beyond salvation -– to deliverance from the bonds of all limitation, "is present in the heart of all traditions", whether it be the Hindu Vedanta , Buddhism , the Jewish Kabbalah , the Christian metaphysics of an Eckhart or an Erigena , or Sufism . It alone "is able to solve certain apparent contradictions and riddles in sacred texts". Through such sacred knowledge, man ceases to be what he appears to be to become what he really
4170-478: Is believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages (non-Central Semitic languages) were spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hejaz , Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages. In Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested. In eastern Arabia, inscriptions in
4309-460: Is considered to have left an everlasting imprint on the human soul , with the Quran emphasizing that on the Day of Judgment no one will be able to plead ignorance of this event (7:172–173). Fitra is also associated with the divine spirit that God, according to the Quran, breathed into Adam (15:29, 32:9, 38:72). This means that the fitra represents the true essence of Adam, who was taught all
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4448-651: Is created on the cosmic level and what the Bible refers to as the celestial paradise where he is dressed with a luminous body"; "he then descends to the level of the terrestrial paradise and is given yet another body of an ethereal and incorruptible nature"; finally, "he is born into the physical world with a body which perishes" but he principially remains a reflection of "the Absolute not only in his spiritual and mental faculties but even in his body". Thus, Nasr rejects biology's modern evolutionary synthesis , which he thinks
4587-408: Is credited with establishing the rules of Arabic prosody . Al-Jahiz (776–868) proposed to Al-Akhfash al-Akbar an overhaul of the grammar of Arabic, but it would not come to pass for two centuries. The standardization of Arabic reached completion around the end of the 8th century. The first comprehensive description of the ʿarabiyya "Arabic", Sībawayhi's al - Kitāb , is based first of all upon
4726-472: Is credited with standardizing Arabic grammar , or an-naḥw ( النَّحو "the way" ), and pioneering a system of diacritics to differentiate consonants ( نقط الإعجام nuqaṭu‿l-i'jām "pointing for non-Arabs") and indicate vocalization ( التشكيل at-tashkīl ). Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi (718–786) compiled the first Arabic dictionary, Kitāb al-'Ayn ( كتاب العين "The Book of the Letter ع "), and
4865-828: Is in the eternal now and what he has never ceased to be. Terry Moore, in his introduction to a long interview that Seyyed Hossein Nasr gave to the Iranian philosopher Ramin Jahanbegloo , recalls that for Nasr, the Sacred is the Eternal Absolute Truth as It manifests Itself in our world. It is the appearance of the Eternal in time, the Center in the periphery, of the Divine in the world of space and time. The Sacred
5004-574: Is not present in the spoken varieties, but deletes Classical words that sound obsolete in MSA. In addition, MSA has borrowed or coined many terms for concepts that did not exist in Quranic times, and MSA continues to evolve. Some words have been borrowed from other languages—notice that transliteration mainly indicates spelling and not real pronunciation (e.g., فِلْم film 'film' or ديمقراطية dīmuqrāṭiyyah 'democracy'). The current preference
5143-855: Is official in Mali and recognized as a minority language in Morocco, while the Senegalese government adopted the Latin script to write it. Maltese is official in (predominantly Catholic ) Malta and written with the Latin script . Linguists agree that it is a variety of spoken Arabic, descended from Siculo-Arabic , though it has experienced extensive changes as a result of sustained and intensive contact with Italo-Romance varieties, and more recently also with English. Due to "a mix of social, cultural, historical, political, and indeed linguistic factors", many Maltese people today consider their language Semitic but not
5282-400: Is only its "reflection" and which "is identified with the analytical functions of the mind"; "the intellect is the light of the sacred shining upon our minds". The intellect, which "is the root and the center of consciousness" is also "the source of inner illumination and intellection", which Nasr, following Guénon, also calls "intellectual intuition", and that implies an "illumination of
5421-563: Is present in Itself and in Its manifestations. Still, according to Moore, it is this relationship with the sacred, through the channel of "Tradition" that anchors Seyyed Hossein Nasr's worldview. Nasr considers the sense of the sacred as inseparable from any spiritual quest. This sense emanates from the awareness of the eternal and immutable reality of the Divine, which is both transcendent and immanent to all universal manifestation, therefore also to
5560-473: Is said to serve as a "proof" against those who reject the prophetic messages. This is because they are denying something that they already know to be true deep within themselves, and are therefore acting in a capricious or cynical manner. According to William Chittick, "Fitra is the divine form that God bestowed upon Adam when He created him; or, it is the divine spirit that, according to the Koran, God blew into
5699-572: Is the third most widespread official language after English and French, one of six official languages of the United Nations , and the liturgical language of Islam . Arabic is widely taught in schools and universities around the world and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, governments and the media. During the Middle Ages , Arabic was a major vehicle of culture and learning, especially in science, mathematics and philosophy. As
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5838-631: Is the Supreme Substance compared to which all else is accident. It is the Essence to which all things are juxtaposed as form. It is at once Beyond Being and Being while the order of multiplicity is comprised of existents. It alone is while all else becomes, for It alone is eternal in the ultimate sense while all that is externalized partakes of change. It is the Origin but also the End, the alpha and
5977-749: Is the ego" and "the will can be debased to nothing other than the urge to do that which removes man from the source of his own being". "All traditional sciences of nature ... are also sciences of the self on the basis of the microcosmic-macrocosmic correspondence", therefore by virtue of an "inward link that binds man as the microcosm to the cosmos". This ideal man, underlines Nasr, is "primordial man ... perfect ... plenary reflection of all those Divine Qualities", who knew everything "in God and through God". According to Nasr, "man contains within himself many levels of existence" that "the Western tradition" synthesises in
6116-429: Is the only perennialist writer who is closely identified with a given religious tradition, both as being born in it and as being a world expert on many of its dimensions. [...] Thirdly, Nasr is the only foremost perennialist writer to have received an intensive and advanced academic training in modern sciences. [...] His familiarity and identification with Islam, his validation as a recognized scholar and respected member of
6255-590: Is the variety used in most current, printed Arabic publications, spoken by some of the Arabic media across North Africa and the Middle East, and understood by most educated Arabic speakers. "Literary Arabic" and "Standard Arabic" ( فُصْحَى fuṣḥá ) are less strictly defined terms that may refer to Modern Standard Arabic or Classical Arabic. Some of the differences between Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) are as follows: MSA uses much Classical vocabulary (e.g., dhahaba 'to go') that
6394-401: Is thus at the same time "Essence" and "Person" or "Supra-Being and Being". Understood in this way, God or the Principle, is Reality in contrast to all that appears as real but which is not reality in the ultimate sense. The Principle is the Absolute compared to which all is relative. It is Infinite while all else is finite. The Principle is One and Unique while manifestation is multiplicity. It
6533-519: Is thus directed towards this fundamental nature of humanity, ultimately seeking to revive and rejuvenate it. [The message of Islam] is a call for recollection, for the remembrance of a knowledge kneaded into the very substance of our being even before our coming into this world. In a famous verse that defines the relationship between human beings and God, the Quran, in referring to the precosmic existence of man, states, “‘Am I not your Lord?’ They said: ‘Yes, we bear witness’” (7:172). The “they” refers to all
6672-413: Is to avoid direct borrowings, preferring to either use loan translations (e.g., فرع farʻ 'branch', also used for the branch of a company or organization; جناح janāḥ 'wing', is also used for the wing of an airplane, building, air force, etc.), or to coin new words using forms within existing roots ( استماتة istimātah ' apoptosis ', using the root موت m/w/t 'death' put into
6811-718: Is to remind ( dhikr ) people of the knowledge they already have, while humans just need to remember (dhikr) it. Once they recall and acknowledge this knowledge, they can reconnect with their innate capacity for understanding reality. This capacity has always been a part of them, deeply embedded within their nature, and has never truly been separate from their being. The concepts of Fitra in Islam and Buddha-nature in Buddhism reveal striking similarities despite their different origins. Fitra denotes an inherent purity and natural inclination towards recognizing and worshipping Allah, emphasizing
6950-416: Is to say that it is necessarily associated with a path of spiritual realization, an approach foreign to modern philosophy, which has been instrumental in reducing the significance of metaphysics to just another mental activity. Metaphysical knowledge stems from the true understanding of symbolism. According to Nasr, man is "a theomorphic being living in this world but created for eternity" because his "soul
7089-404: Is to say, formal and established religion". For Nasr, in the vast majority of cases, this "inner revelation", or intellection, cannot become operative except by virtue of an external revelation which provides an objective cadre for it and enables it to be spiritually efficacious", hence the necessity of faith and spiritual practices associated with the realization of the virtues, with the aid of
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#17327733106877228-524: Is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the industrial and post-industrial era , especially in modern times. Due to its grounding in Classical Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic is removed over a millennium from everyday speech, which is construed as a multitude of dialects of this language. These dialects and Modern Standard Arabic are described by some scholars as not mutually comprehensible. The former are usually acquired in families, while
7367-404: Is usually translated as originator or creator , and thus fitra is also considered to refer to the "state of creation". According to The Study Quran , the fiṭrah or primordial nature mentioned in the Quran (30:30) refers to the inherent and natural recognition of the oneness of God that exists within every human being. This recognition represents the essence of what it means to be human in
7506-445: The Lisān al-ʻArab ). Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) largely follows the grammatical standards of Classical Arabic and uses much of the same vocabulary. However, it has discarded some grammatical constructions and vocabulary that no longer have any counterpart in the spoken varieties and has adopted certain new constructions and vocabulary from the spoken varieties. Much of the new vocabulary
7645-684: The Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy at the request of Empress Farah Pahlavi , which soon became one of the most prominent centers of philosophical activity in the Islamic world . During his time in Iran, he studied with several traditional masters of Islamic philosophy and sciences . The 1979 revolution forced him to exile with his family to the United States, where he has lived and taught Islamic sciences and philosophy ever since. He has been an active representative of
7784-517: The Islamic philosophical tradition and the perennialist school of thought . Nasr's works offer a critique of modern worldviews as well as a defense of Islamic and perennialist doctrines and principles. Central to his argument is the claim that knowledge has become desacralized in the modern period , meaning that it has become severed from its divine source – God or the Ultimate Reality – which calls for its resacralization through
7923-606: The Maturidi scholar Abu al-Layth al-Samarqandi , jinn are also endowed with fitra , and thus mandated to observe God's law . Fitra is an Arabic word that is usually translated as "original disposition", "natural constitution", or "innate nature". The root verb F-Ṭ-R means to split or cleave, also found in Iftar (breaking the fast), Eid al-Fitr , and in the 82nd chapter of the Quran ( Surah Al-Infitar - The Splitting ). Arabic lexicographers also relate it to create . Fatir
8062-551: The Maturidi scholar ( ʿĀlim ) Abu al-Layth al-Samarqandi , humans and jinn are created with fitra , and thus obligated ( taklīf ) to follow God's law. It encompasses the ideas that humans are born pure and innocent, and that they possess an innate capacity to choose or reject God's guidance. According to William Chittick , the Quran and the Hadith suggest that humans possess an innate capacity to understand reality as it is, but their environment obscures this ability. Prophets' role
8201-615: The United States , earning a bachelor's degree in physics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology , a master's in geology and geophysics , and a doctorate in the history of science from Harvard University . He returned to his homeland in 1958, turning down teaching positions at MIT and Harvard, and was appointed a professor of philosophy and Islamic sciences at Tehran University . He held various academic positions in Iran, including vice-chancellor at Tehran University and president of Aryamehr University , and established
8340-568: The Xth form , or جامعة jāmiʻah 'university', based on جمع jamaʻa 'to gather, unite'; جمهورية jumhūriyyah 'republic', based on جمهور jumhūr 'multitude'). An earlier tendency was to redefine an older word although this has fallen into disuse (e.g., هاتف hātif 'telephone' < 'invisible caller (in Sufism)'; جريدة jarīdah 'newspaper' < 'palm-leaf stalk'). Colloquial or dialectal Arabic refers to
8479-494: The northern Hejaz . These features are evidence of common descent from a hypothetical ancestor , Proto-Arabic . The following features of Proto-Arabic can be reconstructed with confidence: On the other hand, several Arabic varieties are closer to other Semitic languages and maintain features not found in Classical Arabic, indicating that these varieties cannot have developed from Classical Arabic. Thus, Arabic vernaculars do not descend from Classical Arabic: Classical Arabic
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#17327733106878618-617: The scientia sacra –, which is the intellectual foundation of the Traditionalist School, "is the science of the Real; of the origin and the end of things; of the Absolute and in its light, the relative" and, as a corollary, of the degrees of existence. It is therefore: the knowledge by means of which man is able to distinguish between the Real and the illusory and to know things in their essence or as they are, which means ultimately to know them in divinis . The knowledge of
8757-419: The "learned" tradition (Classical Arabic). This variety and both its classicizing and "lay" iterations have been termed Middle Arabic in the past, but they are thought to continue an Old Higazi register. It is clear that the orthography of the Quran was not developed for the standardized form of Classical Arabic; rather, it shows the attempt on the part of writers to record an archaic form of Old Higazi. In
8896-931: The "purest," most eloquent form of Arabic—initiating a process of jamʿu‿l-luɣah ( جمع اللغة 'compiling the language') which took place over the 8th and early 9th centuries. Kitāb al-'Ayn ( c. 8th century ), attributed to Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi , is considered the first lexicon to include all Arabic roots ; it sought to exhaust all possible root permutations —later called taqālīb ( تقاليب ) — calling those that are actually used mustaʿmal ( مستعمَل ) and those that are not used muhmal ( مُهمَل ). Lisān al-ʿArab (1290) by Ibn Manzur gives 9,273 roots, while Tāj al-ʿArūs (1774) by Murtada az-Zabidi gives 11,978 roots. Seyyed Hossein Nasr Born in Tehran , Nasr completed his education in Iran and
9035-448: The "true religion". According to Seyyed Hossein Nasr , Islam views humans as inherently possessing a primordial nature known as al-fitrah. Despite its existence, this nature can become obscured and deeply buried within individuals as a result of neglect and forgetfulness. The Quran recognizes that humans were created in the best possible form (ahsan altaqwim) (95:4), with the intelligence necessary to recognize and know God. Islamic message
9174-401: The 'unreal', and philosophy itself to the discussion of more or less secondary questions or to providing clever answers to ill-posed problems". For Nasr, "Ultimate Reality" is at once "above everything" and "omnipresent" in the universe, "transcendent and immanent". On the human plane, still according to Nasr, "The Reality" – or "The Truth" – lies in the heart of man "created in
9313-454: The 11th and 12th centuries in al-Andalus , the zajal and muwashah poetry forms developed in the dialectical Arabic of Cordoba and the Maghreb. The Nahda was a cultural and especially literary renaissance of the 19th century in which writers sought "to fuse Arabic and European forms of expression." According to James L. Gelvin , " Nahda writers attempted to simplify the Arabic language and script so that it might be accessible to
9452-571: The 4th to the 6th centuries, the Nabataean script evolved into the Arabic script recognizable from the early Islamic era. There are inscriptions in an undotted, 17-letter Arabic script dating to the 6th century CE, found at four locations in Syria ( Zabad , Jebel Usays , Harran , Umm el-Jimal ). The oldest surviving papyrus in Arabic dates to 643 CE, and it uses dots to produce the modern 28-letter Arabic alphabet. The language of that papyrus and of
9591-779: The 8th century, knowledge of Classical Arabic had become an essential prerequisite for rising into the higher classes throughout the Islamic world, both for Muslims and non-Muslims. For example, Maimonides , the Andalusi Jewish philosopher, authored works in Judeo-Arabic —Arabic written in Hebrew script . Ibn Jinni of Mosul , a pioneer in phonology , wrote prolifically in the 10th century on Arabic morphology and phonology in works such as Kitāb Al-Munṣif , Kitāb Al-Muḥtasab , and Kitāb Al-Khaṣāʾiṣ [ ar ] . Ibn Mada' of Cordoba (1116–1196) realized
9730-804: The Foundation for Traditional Studies which published the journal Sophia and works on traditional thought. He has authored over fifty books and over five hundred articles based on the principles of the philosophia perennis . He is regularly invited to give courses and conferences at various institutions and universities of the five different continents on the major themes for which he has become well known: Islam, philosophy, metaphysics, cosmology, anthropology, spirituality, religion, science, ecology, literature, art, etc. His works have been translated into twenty-eight different languages. Nasr's expertise encompasses traditional culture (wisdom, religion, philosophy, science and art), Western thought from antiquity to
9869-425: The Islamic philosophical tradition, which I have tried to revive and to which I also belong. And so I would say that for the first category, there are Guénon and Schuon ; if I had to name a third person, then Coomaraswamy ; and for the second category, Ibn Sina , Suhrawardı , Ibn Arabi , and Mulla Sadra ." According to Sarah Robinson-Bertoni, Nasr is one of the principal figures in Islamic philosophy, working at
10008-418: The Islamic tradition. In surah 30 of the Quran , the word fitra is used in the context of the following verse: "Set thy face to religion as a Hanif in the primordial nature from God upon which He originated mankind—there is no altering the creation of God; that is upright but most mankind know not." The above verse (30:30) links fitra to the concept of Hanif , which "is understood by most to mean in
10147-412: The Middle East and North Africa have become a badge of sophistication and modernity and ... feigning, or asserting, weakness or lack of facility in Arabic is sometimes paraded as a sign of status, class, and perversely, even education through a mélange of code-switching practises." Arabic has been taught worldwide in many elementary and secondary schools, especially Muslim schools. Universities around
10286-451: The Principle which is at once the absolute and infinite Reality is the heart of metaphysics while the distinction between levels of universal and cosmic existence, including both the macrocosm and the microcosm, are like its limbs. [...] metaphysics is the primary and fundamental science or wisdom which [...] contains the principles of all the sciences. True metaphysics, underlines Nasr, can only be assimilated by intellectual intuition, that
10425-690: The Qur'an is referred to by linguists as "Quranic Arabic", as distinct from its codification soon thereafter into " Classical Arabic ". In late pre-Islamic times, a transdialectal and transcommunal variety of Arabic emerged in the Hejaz , which continued living its parallel life after literary Arabic had been institutionally standardized in the 2nd and 3rd century of the Hijra , most strongly in Judeo-Christian texts, keeping alive ancient features eliminated from
10564-576: The Romance languages. Also, while it is comprehensible to people from the Maghreb , a linguistically innovative variety such as Moroccan Arabic is essentially incomprehensible to Arabs from the Mashriq , much as French is incomprehensible to Spanish or Italian speakers but relatively easily learned by them. This suggests that the spoken varieties may linguistically be considered separate languages. With
10703-600: The Study Quran, "this pretemporal recognition of God’s Lordship can be understood as creating an innate disposition in human beings toward recognizing and worshipping God during earthly life and toward accepting the prophets and the messages they bring as “ reminders ” of what human beings already know inwardly, but have merely forgotten." According to this perspective, those who reject the prophets are doing so out of willful ignorance, and are denying truths that "should, in any sincere and morally uncorrupted soul, resonate with
10842-724: The United States. Ismail al-Faruqi was his colleague during his time there. During the 1980 – 1981 academic year, Nasr delivered the Gifford lectures at the University of Edinburgh , which were later published under the title Knowledge and the Sacred . According to William Chittick, "three out of the four of his first books in English ( An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines , Three Muslim Sages , and Science and Civilization in Islam ) were published by Harvard University Press , and they immediately established him as one of
10981-410: The ability to comprehend and affirm the existence of God. However, over time, people tend to disregard and overlook their innate nature, causing it to become obscured and deeply buried within them. In that vein, Islam is perceived as a means to assist individuals in rediscovering and reconnecting with their original nature, ultimately re-establishing their primordial relationship with God. According to
11120-403: The assessment of modern technology and its impact on human society and the environment. During this time, he was also involved in the creation of the Islamic and Iranian studies departments at Harvard, Princeton , the University of Utah , and the University of Southern California . I belonged to a new generation and was able to exercise much influence not only at Tehran University but also in
11259-408: The children of Adam, male and female, and the “yes” confirms the affirmation of God’s Oneness by us in our pre-eternal ontological reality. Men and women still bear the echo of this “yes” deep down within their souls, and the call of Islam is precisely to this primordial nature, which uttered the “yes” even before the creation of the heavens and the earth. The call of Islam therefore concerns, above all,
11398-518: The clay of Adam in order to bring him to life". In the Qur'an, the spirit that was breathed into Adam by God is referred to with the pronouns "His" (32:9) and "My" (15:29, 38:72). This spirit is known as the "attributed spirit" (al-ruh al-idafi), which implies that it has both divine and human characteristics. The spirit that God blew into Adam possesses spiritual and angelic attributes such as luminosity, subtlety, awareness, and oneness. The fitra thus constitutes "the very self of Adam to whom God “taught all
11537-400: The condition that he remain faithful to himself as the central terrestrial figure created in the 'form of God' ... living in this world but created for eternity". This aspect of humanity, for Nasr, "is reflected in all of his being and his faculties". Among these faculties, Nasr underlines the primacy of intelligence, sentiments, and will: "as a theomorphic being", his intelligence "can know
11676-574: The conversion of Semitic mimation to nunation in the singular. It is best reassessed as a separate language on the Central Semitic dialect continuum. It was also thought that Old Arabic coexisted alongside—and then gradually displaced— epigraphic Ancient North Arabian (ANA), which was theorized to have been the regional tongue for many centuries. ANA, despite its name, was considered a very distinct language, and mutually unintelligible, from "Arabic". Scholars named its variant dialects after
11815-506: The crossroads of Western and Islamic intellectual traditions. Harry Oldmeadow considers Nasr to be "of the living traditionalists the most widely known in academic circles". For him, Nasr's works are characterized by "rigorous scholarly methodology, an encyclopedic erudition about all matters Islamic, a robustness of critical thought, and a sustained clarity of expression"; and he is "the foremost traditionalist thinker" to base himself on "eternal wisdom ( sophia perennis )" in order to provide
11954-419: The cultural and educational life of the country as a whole since I was a member of all the important national councils in those fields, [...] So there was a really formidable jihād on my hands to try to turn things around and to make Iranian society more aware of its own heritage. I tried to create a bridge between the traditional and the modern elements of our society. (interview) Nasr refused to engage in
12093-488: The direction of I. Bernard Cohen , Hamilton Gibb , and Harry Wolfson . At the age of twenty-five, Nasr graduated with a PhD from Harvard and completed his first book, Science and Civilization in Islam , the title being a direct tribute to Science and Civilization in China , the work by Joseph Needham which had for task to present to Westerners the complex developments of the history of science and technology in China ,
12232-654: The doctrines "of all traditions" attest that "the genesis of man, occurred in many stages: first, in the Divinity Itself so that there is an uncreated 'aspect' to man", hence the possibility of "supreme union"; then "in the Logos which is in fact the prototype of man and another face of that same reality which the Muslims call the Universal Man and which each tradition identifies with its founder"; after this, "man
12371-587: The emergence of Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include: There are several features which Classical Arabic, the modern Arabic varieties, as well as the Safaitic and Hismaic inscriptions share which are unattested in any other Central Semitic language variety, including the Dadanitic and Taymanitic languages of
12510-728: The eve of the conquests: Northern and Central (Al-Jallad 2009). The modern dialects emerged from a new contact situation produced following the conquests. Instead of the emergence of a single or multiple koines, the dialects contain several sedimentary layers of borrowed and areal features, which they absorbed at different points in their linguistic histories. According to Veersteegh and Bickerton, colloquial Arabic dialects arose from pidginized Arabic formed from contact between Arabs and conquered peoples. Pidginization and subsequent creolization among Arabs and arabized peoples could explain relative morphological and phonological simplicity of vernacular Arabic compared to Classical and MSA. In around
12649-607: The fact that they participate in the innovations common to all forms of Arabic. The earliest attestation of continuous Arabic text in an ancestor of the modern Arabic script are three lines of poetry by a man named Garm(')allāhe found in En Avdat, Israel , and dated to around 125 CE. This is followed by the Namara inscription , an epitaph of the Lakhmid king Imru' al-Qays bar 'Amro, dating to 328 CE, found at Namaraa, Syria. From
12788-510: The fourth most useful language for business, after English, Mandarin Chinese , and French. Arabic is written with the Arabic alphabet , an abjad script that is written from right to left . Arabic is usually classified as a Central Semitic language . Linguists still differ as to the best classification of Semitic language sub-groups. The Semitic languages changed between Proto-Semitic and
12927-444: The framework of a tradition, thus with the aid of a method, rites, symbols and other means sanctified by revelation. The truth, though veiled, is innate to the human spirit and its realization leads to what he calls "knowledge", that is to say gnosis or wisdom ( sophia ), hence the expression " sophia perennis ", common ground at the heart of all religions. Nasr clarifies that the notion of the philosophia perennis does not derive from
13066-430: The grace issuing from each revelation. Huston Smith summarizes, in an analysis of Nasr's works, that Nasr contends it is "God who knows Himself" through man. For Nasr, indeed, "discrimination between the Real and the unreal terminates in the awareness of the nondual nature of the Real, the awareness which is the heart of gnosis and which represents not human knowledge but God's knowledge of Himself", consciousness which
13205-404: The graduate program in geology and geophysics at Harvard University , where he received a Master of Science in both fields in 1956, and went on to pursue his PhD degree in the history of science and learning at the same university. He planned to write his dissertation under the supervision of George Sarton , but Sarton died before he could begin his dissertation work and so he wrote it under
13344-581: The heart and the mind of man", making possible a "knowledge of an immediate and direct nature, [...] tasted and experienced", which extends to "certain aspects of reality" up to "the Absolute Reality". The human intellect is "the subjective pole of the Word or of the Logos – the universal Intellect – by which all things were made and which constitutes the source of objective revelation, that
13483-435: The human being. The sacred manifests itself in "revelation, the sacred rites of various religions, spiritual and initiatory practices, sacred art, virgin nature", in fact everything that transmits "the presence of the Divine". It is possible for us to rediscover the sacred character of both knowledge and the world, and one might say that that has been the basic motif throughout my writings. For Nasr, true metaphysics –
13622-556: The image of God", whence the possibility of a "unitive knowledge which sees the world not as separative creation but as manifestation that is united through symbols and the very ray of existence". "The key to the understanding of the anthrōpos ", according to Nasr, is situated in "sapential teachings"; it is neither situated in "exoteric religious formulations", which relate essentially to "salvation", nor in what he considers to be "profane" science, generally evolutionary . Beyond his faith in " creationism ex nihilo " Nasr believes that
13761-597: The inclusion of new words into their published standard dictionaries. They also publish old and historical Arabic manuscripts. In 1997, a bureau of Arabization standardization was added to the Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization of the Arab League . These academies and organizations have worked toward the Arabization of the sciences, creating terms in Arabic to describe new concepts, toward
13900-944: The innate goodness and moral compass within every human. Buddha-nature, prominent in Mahayana Buddhism , signifies the inherent potential for enlightenment in all sentient beings, embodying pure consciousness, wisdom, and compassion. Both concepts highlight a universal attribute: Fitra and Buddha-nature apply to all humans and sentient beings, respectively, suggesting an intrinsic spiritual potential. They also acknowledge that this purity can be obscured—Fitra by sin and misguidance, and Buddha-nature by ignorance and defilements—but can be restored through spiritual practice and ethical living. Arabic language Arabic (endonym: اَلْعَرَبِيَّةُ , romanized : al-ʿarabiyyah , pronounced [al ʕaraˈbijːa] , or عَرَبِيّ , ʿarabīy , pronounced [ˈʕarabiː] or [ʕaraˈbij] )
14039-613: The language. Software and books with tapes are an important part of Arabic learning, as many of Arabic learners may live in places where there are no academic or Arabic language school classes available. Radio series of Arabic language classes are also provided from some radio stations. A number of websites on the Internet provide online classes for all levels as a means of distance education; most teach Modern Standard Arabic, but some teach regional varieties from numerous countries. The tradition of Arabic lexicography extended for about
14178-604: The late 6th century AD, a relatively uniform intertribal "poetic koine" distinct from the spoken vernaculars developed based on the Bedouin dialects of Najd , probably in connection with the court of al-Ḥīra . During the first Islamic century, the majority of Arabic poets and Arabic-writing persons spoke Arabic as their mother tongue. Their texts, although mainly preserved in far later manuscripts, contain traces of non-standardized Classical Arabic elements in morphology and syntax. Abu al-Aswad al-Du'ali ( c. 603 –689)
14317-420: The latter is taught in formal education settings. However, there have been studies reporting some degree of comprehension of stories told in the standard variety among preschool-aged children. The relation between Modern Standard Arabic and these dialects is sometimes compared to that of Classical Latin and Vulgar Latin vernaculars (which became Romance languages ) in medieval and early modern Europe. MSA
14456-447: The latter, contrary to the good, does not have its root in God. This "imperfect world" – the visible and tangible world of man – constitutes only the periphery of a hierarchy of increasingly subtle "worlds" according to their degree of proximity to Being. For Nasr, God is the only reality, and the world, which participates in his reality is therefore "unreal", not as "nothingness pure and simple" but as "relative reality"; it
14595-719: The library of her late husband, and Nasr spent much of his time there and worked to catalogue the library. He visited Schuon and Burckhardt in Switzerland while still a student and was initiated into the Alawi branch of the Shadhili Sufi order . He considered the works of Schuon, with central importance given to the practice of a spiritual discipline in addition to doctrinal knowledge, especially instrumental in determining his intellectual and spiritual life. After receiving an MIT B.S. degree in physics in 1954, Nasr enrolled in
14734-488: The major and original voices in Islamic studies. His strong endorsement of the writings of Schuon and Burckhardt in these books were in turn instrumental in bringing the Traditionalist school to the notice of official academia". Nasr left Temple University in 1984 to become a professor of Islamic studies at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., a position he holds to this day. That same year, he established
14873-449: The many manifestations of a timeless wisdom. Although Islam and Sufism are present throughout his writings, his universalist perspective, which is that of perennial philosophy , takes into account what he assumes to be the common essence of all orthodox religions beyond their formal particularities or their current state: "My philosophical world is a kind of synthesis between the perennial philosophy, which I espouse and represent, and
15012-883: The many national or regional varieties which constitute the everyday spoken language. Colloquial Arabic has many regional variants; geographically distant varieties usually differ enough to be mutually unintelligible , and some linguists consider them distinct languages. However, research indicates a high degree of mutual intelligibility between closely related Arabic variants for native speakers listening to words, sentences, and texts; and between more distantly related dialects in interactional situations. The varieties are typically unwritten. They are often used in informal spoken media, such as soap operas and talk shows , as well as occasionally in certain forms of written media such as poetry and printed advertising. Hassaniya Arabic , Maltese , and Cypriot Arabic are only varieties of modern Arabic to have acquired official recognition. Hassaniya
15151-435: The names by God (2:31). In the Quran, fitra is linked to the concept of hanif (30:30); a term that is often associated with Abraham but it also includes individuals who turn away from erroneous beliefs and instead embrace faith in the unity of God. This teaching is echoed in prophetic traditions that reiterate the existence of intrinsic human nature at birth. Hence, in Islamic belief, humans are deemed blessed to have
15290-438: The names” (2:31)". It is considered to be the foundation of human wisdom and knowledge, as it inclines naturally towards the belief in the oneness of God, which is the essence of tawhid. This belief is the basis for true understanding of God, the universe, and the self. In the prophetic traditions ( hadith ), the term gets new attention: "There is not a newborn child who is not born in a state of fitrah. His parents then make him
15429-782: The need for a lexical injection in Arabic, to suit concepts of the industrial and post-industrial age (such as sayyārah سَيَّارَة 'automobile' or bākhirah باخِرة 'steamship'). In response, a number of Arabic academies modeled after the Académie française were established with the aim of developing standardized additions to the Arabic lexicon to suit these transformations, first in Damascus (1919), then in Cairo (1932), Baghdad (1948), Rabat (1960), Amman (1977), Khartum [ ar ] (1993), and Tunis (1993). They review language development, monitor new words and approve
15568-545: The omega. It is Emptiness if the world is envisaged as fullness and Fullness if the relative is perceived in the light of its ontological poverty and essential nothingness. These are all manners of speaking of the Ultimate Reality which can be known but not by man as such. It can only be known through the sun of the Divine Self residing at the center of the human soul. God is not only "Absolute and Infinite", he
15707-424: The one whose sound is heard but whose person remains unseen. Now the term al-hatif is used for a telephone. Therefore, the process of tawleed can express the needs of modern civilization in a manner that would appear to be originally Arabic. In the case of Arabic, educated Arabs of any nationality can be assumed to speak both their school-taught Standard Arabic as well as their native dialects, which depending on
15846-549: The overhaul of Arabic grammar first proposed by Al-Jahiz 200 years prior. The Maghrebi lexicographer Ibn Manzur compiled Lisān al-ʿArab ( لسان العرب , "Tongue of Arabs"), a major reference dictionary of Arabic, in 1290. Charles Ferguson 's koine theory claims that the modern Arabic dialects collectively descend from a single military koine that sprang up during the Islamic conquests; this view has been challenged in recent times. Ahmad al-Jallad proposes that there were at least two considerably distinct types of Arabic on
15985-875: The politics of his country despite a number of offers for ministerial positions and ambassadorship. In 1974, Empress Farah Pahlavi commissioned him to establish and lead the Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy (now the Institute for Research in Philosophy ), the first academic institution to be conducted in accordance with the intellectual principles of the Traditionalist School . During that time, Nasr, Tabataba'i, William Chittick , Peter Lamborn Wilson , Kenneth Morgan, Sachiko Murata , Toshihiko Izutsu , and Henry Corbin held various philosophical discourses. The book Shi'ite Islam and
16124-444: The present day, and the history of science. He argues in favor of revelation , tradition , and what he considers " scientia sacra " , in opposition to rationalism , relativism , and modern western materialism . Nasr has not developed a new system of thought, but instead hopes to revive traditional doctrines that he believes have been forgotten in the modern world. He is content to recall what, according to him, corresponds to
16263-488: The pubic hairs, plucking the armpit hairs, clipping the nails and trimming the moustache.” The Mu'tazilites argue that Islamic law is rational and given to every born child, thus fitra is identified with Islam . This viewpoint was also adapted by several canonical traditions. In others however, fitra refers to the pre-Islamic religion, originating in Adam , before any religious obligations have been revealed. According to
16402-410: The region may be mutually unintelligible. Some of these dialects can be considered to constitute separate languages which may have "sub-dialects" of their own. When educated Arabs of different dialects engage in conversation (for example, a Moroccan speaking with a Lebanese), many speakers code-switch back and forth between the dialectal and standard varieties of the language, sometimes even within
16541-609: The remembrance of a knowledge deeply embedded in our being, the confirmation of a knowledge that saves, hence the soteriological function of knowledge in Islam. According to Quran 7:172-173, God called upon all souls to witness His lordship before being sent to the world so that no one could plead ignorance on the Day of Judgment. ""Lest you say on the Day of Resurrection, "As for us, we were heedless of this," or lest you say, "Our fathers associated others with God before us, and we were their offspring after them. What, wilt Thou destroy us for what
16680-458: The same sentence. The issue of whether Arabic is one language or many languages is politically charged, in the same way it is for the varieties of Chinese , Hindi and Urdu , Serbian and Croatian , Scots and English, etc. In contrast to speakers of Hindi and Urdu who claim they cannot understand each other even when they can, speakers of the varieties of Arabic will claim they can all understand each other even when they cannot. While there
16819-502: The scholarly community, and his conceptual proficiency in modern scientific languages have all contributed to make him a particularly apt interpreter of perennialist ideas in the contemporary public arena. For Nasr, the expression " philosophia perennis ", as understood by the Perennialist school, refers to both the universal metaphysical truth and to its spiritual realization. The latter can only be considered, according to Nasr, in
16958-458: The sole example of Medieval linguist Abu Hayyan al-Gharnati – who, while a scholar of the Arabic language, was not ethnically Arab – Medieval scholars of the Arabic language made no efforts at studying comparative linguistics, considering all other languages inferior. In modern times, the educated upper classes in the Arab world have taken a nearly opposite view. Yasir Suleiman wrote in 2011 that "studying and knowing English or French in most of
17097-563: The standardization of these new terms throughout the Arabic-speaking world, and toward the development of Arabic as a world language . This gave rise to what Western scholars call Modern Standard Arabic. From the 1950s, Arabization became a postcolonial nationalist policy in countries such as Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Sudan. Arabic usually refers to Standard Arabic, which Western linguists divide into Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic. It could also refer to any of
17236-431: The state of purity and innocence in which Muslims believe all humans to be born, or the ability to choose or reject God's guidance. The Quran states that humans were created in the most perfect form (95:4), and were endowed with a primordial nature (30:30). Furthermore, God took a covenant from all children of Adam , even before they were sent to Earth's worldly realm , regarding his Lordship (7:172–173). This covenant
17375-476: The ternary "spirit, soul, and body ( pneuma , psychē , and hylē or spiritus , anima , and corpus ". "The human spirit is an extension and reflection of the Divine Spirit", it coincides with the "intellect" and "resides at the center of the spiritual heart" of the human being. Nasr always uses the word "intellect" in "its original sense of intellectus ( nous )" and not "of reason ( ratio )", which
17514-501: The towns where the inscriptions were discovered (Dadanitic, Taymanitic, Hismaic, Safaitic). However, most arguments for a single ANA language or language family were based on the shape of the definite article, a prefixed h-. It has been argued that the h- is an archaism and not a shared innovation, and thus unsuitable for language classification, rendering the hypothesis of an ANA language family untenable. Safaitic and Hismaic, previously considered ANA, should be considered Old Arabic due to
17653-583: The traditionalist journal Sophia Perennis were products of this period. In 1978, he was named director of the Empress's private bureau, while continuing to teach philosophy at Tehran University, and serve as chancellor of Aryamehr University, and president of the Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy. In January 1979, the Iranian Revolution brought an end to the Pahlavi dynasty, and Nasr, who
17792-674: The truth as such", his sentiments "are capable ... of reaching out for the ultimate through love, suffering, sacrifice, and also fear", and his will "is free to choose ... it reflects the Divine Freedom". But, "because of man's separation from his original perfection", a consequence "of what Christianity calls the fall", itself followed by further declines, these faculties no longer operate invariably according to their "theomorphic nature". Thus, "intelligence can become reduced to mental play", "sentiments can deteriorate to little more than gravitation around that illusory coagulation which [...]
17931-463: The utilization of sacred traditions and sacred science . Although Islam and Sufism are major influences on his writings, his perennialist approach inquires into the essence of all orthodox religions, regardless of their formal particularities. His environmental philosophy is expressed in terms of Islamic environmentalism and resacralization of nature . He is the author of over fifty books and more than five hundred articles. Seyyed Hossein Nasr
18070-403: The vain-doers did?"". Some commentators, including al Razi , have argued that the inability of humans to recall the pretemporal covenant mentioned in Quran 7:172-173 implies that it is symbolic and therefore cannot be the basis of human responsibility. However, The Study Quran suggests that this event should be viewed within the wider context of the Quran and its prophetic history. According to
18209-451: The world have classes that teach Arabic as part of their foreign languages , Middle Eastern studies , and religious studies courses. Arabic language schools exist to assist students to learn Arabic outside the academic world. There are many Arabic language schools in the Arab world and other Muslim countries. Because the Quran is written in Arabic and all Islamic terms are in Arabic, millions of Muslims (both Arab and non-Arab) study
18348-625: The world over". The language of the perennial philosophy is symbolism. According to Nasr, the "Divine Reality" includes, metaphysically speaking, an "Impersonal Essence" and a personal aspect that the believer "ordinarily identifies with God", in accordance with the perspective of "most religions". Only the "esoteric dimension" within these religions take into account the "Impersonal Essence", as can be seen most notably in "the Kabbalah , Sufism , and among many Christian mystics such as Meister Eckhart and Angelus Silesius ". "God as ultimate Reality"
18487-665: Was at that time the director of the French Institute for Iranian Studies in Tehran. Five years later he would be made the dean of the faculty of letters and then vice-chancellor of the university. In 1972, the Shah chose him to become the president of Aryamehr University (now Sharif University of Technology ). There, Nasr created a faculty for the humanities in order to encourage the students not to focus exclusively on scientific matters. He also designed courses that focused on
18626-431: Was born on April 7, 1933, in Tehran to Seyyed Valiollah Nasr, who was a physician to the imperial family, philosopher and homme de lettres, and one of the founders of modern education in Iran . He is a descendant of Sheikh Fazlollah Nouri from his mother's side, is the cousin of Iranian philosopher Ramin Jahanbegloo , as well as the father of American academic Vali Nasr . The surname "Nasr", which means "victory",
18765-492: Was completing his first year of secondary school at Firooz Bahram High School , his father was hurt in a serious accident, so his mother sent him to continue his education in the United States so that he would not be present at the time of his father's imminent death. He would later say that there are three things that his father left him: "first of all, love of knowledge for our own Persian culture, our religious, literary, philosophical tradition; secondly, an avid interest in what
18904-614: Was given to his grandfather by the Shah. The title "Seyyed" indicates a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad. Nasr completed his primary education in Tehran. His education was supplemented by religious and philosophical discussions with his father and an entourage of theologians, ministers, scholars, and mystics. He immersed himself in the Koranic studies, Persian literature, Arabic and French languages at an early age. While he
19043-653: Was going on in the West in the realm of science and philosophy, literature and everything else; thirdly, a sense of serenity that he had within himself." In the United States, Nasr first attended Peddie School in Hightstown, New Jersey, graduating in 1950 as the valedictorian of his class. He then applied to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston to study physics and was accepted with
19182-603: Was offered the position of associate professor at MIT, as well as a three-year research position as a junior fellow followed by a formal teaching position at Harvard, but he decided to return to Iran. That same year, Tehran University hired him as associate professor of philosophy and the history of science. He continued his study of Islamic sciences with traditional Iranian masters and philosophers ( Muhammad Husayn Tabataba'i , Allameh Sayyed Abul Hasan Rafiee Qazvini and Sayyid Muhammad Kazim Assar ), completing his dual education, academic and traditional. He had married and started
19321-475: Was visiting London with his family at the time, was unable to return to Iran. As a result, he lost his possessions, including his manuscripts and library. His family later settled in Boston. After teaching for a few months at the University of Utah , Nasr was appointed a professor of Islamic studies at Temple University in Philadelphia, which had one of the largest Ph.D. programs in religious studies in
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