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Mulla Sadra’s Concept of the Soul:
The sperm in the womb is like a plant and the soul comes into being with the body when the sperm develops, at that moment the soul is vegetative (nafs-e-nabatiya) in actuality but possessing the potential of becoming an animal (nafs-e-haywaniya), as soon as the soul exits the womb it is an animal in actuality but possesses the potential to become a human (nafs-e-insaniya) and when it matures and develops it becomes a human in actuality having the potential to become a devil or an angel.
This transformation takes place through the process of trans-substantial motion (harkat-al-jawhariya).
There are three worlds or realms namely the spiritual world (alam-e-arwah) also known as the “Jabarut” or the intelligibilia, the intermediate world (alam-e-barzakh) also called the “malakut” or the imaginilia and the sensible world (mulk) also called sensibilia.
The intermediate world both connects as well as separates the spiritual and sensible worlds.
Mulla Sadra compares our existence in the sensible realm with the existence of a baby in its mother’s womb, while in the womb the baby is present in the sensible world but is unaware of its existence, and only comes to realize it when it comes out of the womb, similarly the intermediate world (alam-e-barzakh) is present in this world but we are unaware of its existence and only come to know of it posthumously after death.
In this material and sensible world the soul has a body of gross matter i.e. a material body however when the soul passes into the imaginal world from the sensible one on death it sheds off the material body and is given a subtle imaginal body (jism-e-mithali), similarly when the soul passes from the imaginal world into the “akhira” so it is given a material body but not of gross matter of the sensible world rather it is of a subtle material substance.
According to Mulla Sadra every existent or being found in the sensible world has had to travel a journey (safar/asfar) of descent travelling through the the imaginal world before entering the sensible realm, this is the journey of its origin (mabda), similarly every being or existent in its journey of ascent has to pass from the sensible world through the imaginal world in its journey of return (ma’ad), this completes the cycle of the origin and return (mabda-wa-ma’ad).
At each level or stage the soul is given a different body (jism) as has been stated above.
Everything that comes down into the sensible world from the heavens (including revelation, angels and sustenance) has to pass through the intermediate world of the imaginilia (alam-e-barzakh) before entering the sensible world of matter, similarly anything ascending upwards also has to pass through the intermediate world of the imaginilia, and at every level it takes on a different bodily form.
When the soul leaves the world of matter as a result of death and enters the imaginal realm so it is given a subtle body called “jism-e-mithali”, the form that this imaginal body takes, whether beautiful or ugly, depends upon the actions performed and the thoughts possessed by the soul during its existence in the sensible world.
Mankind combines within his existence aspects of the spiritual, imaginal and the sensible worlds such that the human existence is a composition of body (jism), soul (nafs) and spirit (ruh) where the body is an aspect of the sensible world, the soul is an aspect of the imaginal world and the spirit an aspect of the spiritual realm.
Man has been bestowed with faculties for perceiving all the three worlds, for instance, he has been given the faculty of sense perception (hawas-e-khamsa) for perceiving the sensibilia, the imaginative faculty (quwat-al-mutakhayala) capable of producing imaginal forms (khayal) for perceiving the imaginilia and the intellect (aql) for perceiving the intelligibilia.
In the sensible world there is an ontological disparity between the imaginal forms produced by the imaginative faculty (quwat-al-mutakhayala) and their objective existence in the external reality, in other words the forms imagined by the soul are other than their objective realities (e.g. the imaginal form of a date produced by the imaginative faculty cannot be consumed unlike its objective reality).
However according to Mulla Sadra in the intermediate realm of the imaginilia (alam-e-barzakh) the disparity between the imaginal forms and their objective existence ceases to exist as the forms imagined by the soul assume an objective existence.
It has been stated above that the form of the imaginal body (jism-e-mithali) will depend upon the thoughts and actions performed during the soul’s existence in the sensible world, in order to elaborate this further it can be said that the form taken by the imaginal body in the intermediate world (alam-e-barzakh) will depend upon the soul’s existence in the sensible world in all the three modes of being namely spiritual, imaginal and sensible.
In the imaginilia the imaginal forms contained within the soul as a result of its actions and thoughts performed during its existence in the world of matter will become objective realities being the cause of felicity and heavenly pleasures, in case of a pure soul, or pain and punishment of the infernal hell, in case of an impure soul.
According to Mulla Sadra from among the body and the soul it is the soul that has primacy because the body needs the soul for its existence and survival and not the other way round because the soul is immortal in nature, in other words the soul is independent of the body even though it originates and comes into being together with the body.
Pleasure or pain, felicity or suffering are embodied within the soul depending upon the actions performed in the sensible world but this does not mean that paradise and hell do not have objective existence.
The purpose of creation is for the soul to deliberately cultivate and develop within itself divine attributes (sifat-e-ilahiya) and to be able to reflect these divine attributes as best as possible, Mulla Sadra names this process “takhalluq-bil-sifat-e-ilahiya”.
The ascent towards the spiritual world (alam-e-arwah) through the intermediate world of the imaginilia signifies the return (ma’ad) to God.
In the sensible world the soul’s imaginative faculty (quwat-al-mutakhayala) requires a material substratum, the human mind, for producing imaginal forms (khayal) however in the intermediate realm of imaginilia (alam-e-barzakh) this dependency ceases to exist, and the soul is able to produce imaginal forms without requiring a material substratum. The soul on commencement of its journey of ascent (ma’ad) towards the imaginal world (alam-e-malakut) sheds of its robe of materiality and this phenomenon is known as “tajarrud-e-nafs”.
[X] . Islamic Phil Theo . (X)
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