Balancing between Obligation and Freedom: Mullā Ṣadrā on Gradation of Will

Abstract

Are conceptions about Omnipotent God and of Free agency of human incompatible? This puzzle almost as old as religions, has triggered a large literature in Islamic lands with various approaches that try to find a balance between omnipotence and freedom without leaving out the notions of an Omnipotent God and free agency of human. This research will present Mullā Ṣadrā’s theory as a fresh approach to the puzzle that tries to create an answer through primacy of existence and a monist philosophy that unite the concepts of will, tendency, action, agency and knowledge in the same pot as existence and the very being of the agent. Beginning of the article will present Ṣadrā’s evaluation, classification and elimination of the previous approaches in Islamic thought. And the later sections will discuss how in harmony with his general project of primacy of existence and gradational ontology places his own position on the issue.