The Sustaining Presence of God in the World from Ibn Sina's Point of View

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 PhD student of comparative philosophy, Shahid Mutahari University, Tehran, Iran.

2 Professor of Islamic philosophy and theology, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran, Iran.

3 Associate professor, Department of philosophy, Faculty of literature and humanities, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran.

10.22059/jpht.2024.361362.1005985

Abstract

One of the divine attributes is God's omnipresence in the universe. God's presence can be understood in various ways. One such interpretation is God's "sustaining" presence, signifying His general agency in relation to the world. According to this notion, God is the cause of both the existence and the persistence of the universe. Ibn Sina assigns a special place to the efficient cause among the four Aristotelian causes and elevates the concept of the efficient cause from a mere triggering cause to one that bestows existence. He offers two elaborations to elucidate God's effective causality with respect to the world, which are intrinsically related. These two explanations can be titled: "God's bestowal of existence upon essences" and "God's conferring of necessity upon essences." Using analytical approach in reading Ibn Sina’s works, in this article, after elucidating these two explanations, their interrelation is also clarified. Ultimately, considering Ibn Sina's hierarchical structure of beings, a kind of graded and tentative sustaining presence is derived from his philosophical system.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Philosophy of Religion

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 20 April 2024

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics