Suhrawardi
Description
Shihāb al-Dīn Abū al-Futūḥ Yaḥyā ibn Ḥabash ibn Amīrak al-Suhrawardī 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 Platonistic critique of the peripatetic school of Avicenna that was dominant in his time, writing on logic, physics, epistemology, psychology, and metaphysics.
Facts
| Title | Shaykh al-Ishraq, Shaykh al-Maqtul |
| Born | 1154, Sohrevard, Seljuk Empire |
| Died | 1191 (aged 36–37), Aleppo, Ayyubid Sultanate |
| Other names | Sohrevardi, Shihab al-Din |
| Religion | Islam, Shafi Sunni |
| School | Illuminationism, Perennial philosophy |
| Based in | Suhraward |
| Period in office | 12th century |
Life & work in brief
Summarised by section — one row per topic, for fast reading.
| Topic | Summary |
|---|---|
| Life | Of Persian stock, Suhrawardi was born in 1154 in Suhraward, a village located between the towns of Zanjan and Bijar Garrus in Iran. |
| Influences on Suhrawardi | Suhrawardi was a strong defender of Peripatetic philosophy, until he was influenced by those whom he described as those who "have traveled the path of God", like - as noted by Suhrawardi - Plato from the Greek tradition, Hermes (Thoth) from Egypt, and Pythagoras the Phoenician, and also figures in the Persian tradition. |
| Teachings | Arising out of peripatetic philosophy as developed by Ibn Sina (Avicenna), Suhrawardi's illuminationist philosophy is critical of several of Ibn Sina's positions and radically departs from him in creating a symbolic language (mainly derived from ancient Iranian culture or Farhang-e Khosravani) to give expression to his wisdom (hikma). |
| Influence | Suhrawardi's Illuminationist project was to have far-reaching consequences for Islamic philosophy in Shi'ite Iran. |
| Suhrawardi and pre-Islamic Iranian thought | Suhrawardi thought of himself as a reviver or resuscitator of the ancient Persian wisdom. |
| Suhrawardi and Illumination school | 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. |
| Scholarly views on Suhrawardi | There are different and contradictory views regarding the character of Suhrawardi's school. |
| Writings | Suhrawardi left over 50 writings in Persian and Arabic. |
Prophecies
Key prophetic utterances and visions attributed to Suhrawardi, with sources.
| Prophecy / vision | Source |
|---|---|
| The Philosophy of Illumination — being is light upon light; darkness is mere privation, not a thing | Hikmat al-Ishraq |
| The cosmos is a hierarchy of lights; the planets and stars are governing lights that image the supreme Light of Lights | Hikmat al-Ishraq |