The problem of motion in the philosophy of Mahmoud Shabistari

Appendix: Mahmud Shabistari. On the manifestation (ta‘ayyun) of motion and the renewal of manifestations (ta‘ayyunat) (from the treatise by Mahmud Shabistari 'Haqq al-Yaqin fi Ma‘rifat Rabb al-‘Alamin')

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the interpretation of the problem of motion by Mahmud Shabistari – one of the prominent medieval Persian Sufi thinkers. The main source for the study was his philosophical treatise “Haqq al-Yaqin fi Ma’rifat Rabb al-’Alamin”. The article includes the first translation into a European language (Russian) of a chapter from this treatise – “On the Manifestation of Movement and the Renewal of Manifesta­tions”. Ancient authors also dealt with the problem of motion comprehension. The inves­tigation of the way Shabistari solves this problem is particularly interesting because, striving for the affirmation of strict monotheism, he proposed a monistic model of the uni­verse where only the One First Principle exists. He considered the existence of everything else as an illusion. However, such a statement makes any change impossible, and conse­quently movement as well. Meanwhile, Shabistari, on the contrary, states the constant circular motion of the First Principle with itself as the center. It generates its numerous virtual images in non-being, that move constantly around the One. These images include everything – from the Universal Reason to the individual human being. Shabistari con­structs a system of virtual images motion based on a fractal principle: the circle around the point of the One represents the motion trajectory of the first creature – the Universal Reason. Each point of this circle is the Universal Reason’s manifestation at each individ­ual moment in the form of one of the forty existence levels. In its turn, each level of exis­tence becomes also a center of the circular motion of its virtual copies – individual things.