Islamic Philosophy from Its Origin to the Present: Philosophy in the ...

Philosophy in Azarbaijan and the School of Shiraz 193
Persian was used as an intellectual, as well as mystical, language even
more than in Persia itself, although again Arabic was not by any means
neglected in India any more than it was in Persia.
In leaving the School of Azarbaijan to travel south to Shiraz, it is
important to note that here, as in the schools of Baghdad, Khurasan,
and Andalusia, the main concern of philosophers was not only to
provide an intellectual vision and a means to understand the nature
of things within an intelligible framework but also to respond to the
reality of revelation, the knowledge it made possible, including illuminative
knowledge, and the challenges it posed to philosophers as an
authentic and even the most authentic channel for the attainment of
ultimate knowledge by the human mind.
THE SCHOOL OF SHIRAZ
The devastation caused by the Mongol invasion and its aftermath not
only obliterated numerous centers of learning in Central Asia,
Khurasan, and Iraq but also inaugurated a period of unsettled and
chaotic conditions that was to last for a couple of centuries. Thanks to
the Atåbakån rulers of Fars, Shiraz was spared the fury of the Mongol
invasion, and from the seventh/thirteenth to the tenth/sixteenth centuries
when the Safavids united Persia, the city and its environs remained
a relative oasis of peace. During this period the later dynasties
of ≈l-i Jalåyir, ≈l-i Muπaffar, and ≈q-Quyünlü succeeded in preserving
the atmosphere of peace and in encouraging learning. Already
during the fourth/tenth century during the B¨yid period, Shiraz had
become a major center of Islamic learning and was given the title dår
al-‘ilm or “abode of knowledge.” It even vied with Baghdad in the
domain of scholarship and science. On that historic basis, the Atåbakån
and the later dynasties mentioned above strengthened the tradition of
learning in Shiraz to the extent that after the conquest of Persia by
Tamerlane, his governors and later on successors continued to honor
the class of learned people in that city. In fact Shiraz continued to be
the dår al-‘ilm of the day into the Safavid period when the center of
learning including philosophy was transferred to Isfahan. But one
can never forget that the greatest figure of the School of Isfahan,
|adr al-D¥n Shiråz¥, was not only from Shiraz but also had received
his early education in that city. In fact he might be considered the
final major product of the School of Shiraz and his journey to Isfahan
the point of transfer of the main center of Islamic philosophy to that
city, even if in the latter part of his life, Mullå |adrå was to return