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Argumentation and Arabic Philosophy of Language

Linguistic philosophy in modern uṣūl al-fiqh: al-Ākhund al-Khurāsānī (d. 1911) on seeking something without willing it to be

La philosophie linguistique dans l'uṣūl al-fiqh moderne. Al-Ākhund al-Khurāsānī (m. 1911) : chercher quelque chose sans vouloir qu’il soit
Ali-Reza Bhojani

Résumés

Dans un ouvrage moderne fondateur de uṣūl al-fiqh, al-Ākhund al-Khurāsānī (m. 1911) soutient que les deux termes ṭalab (recherche) et irāda (volonté) sont forgés pour désigner un seul concept. Dans l'argument, il implique que les Ashʿarīs, et certains Duodécimains Shīʿa modernes penchant vers leur position, tombent sous le coup d'un sophisme linguistique lorsqu'ils affirment que ṭalab et irāda sont distincts. Pour al-Khurāsānī, ṭalab et irāda peuvent être utilisés dans deux modes distincts, un mode réel (ḥaqīqī) ou un mode initiateur (inshāʾī). Le premier dénote une recherche ou une volonté réelle dans l'essence d'un acteur, tandis que le second cherche simplement à initier le sens de la recherche ou de la volonté. En conséquence, un ṭalab initiateur peut être distinct d'un véritable irāda, et un véritable ṭalab peut être distinct d'un irāda initiateur, sans remettre en cause la position selon laquelle ṭalab et irāda sont conceptuellement identiques. L'analyse des arguments d'al-Khurāsānī, et de certaines critiques de celui-ci par des érudits modernes et contemporains ultérieurs de uṣūl al-fiqh, viseront à élargir notre compréhension de la catégorie d'inshāʾ en arabe, analysée jusqu'à présent à travers le prisme de la notion de performativité de J. L. Austin. Plus généralement, l'article prend le traitement de cette question linguistique comme un exemple affirmant l'importance continue de l'uṣūl al-fiqh moderne et contemporain pour s'engager dans la philosophie arabe de la langue et de l'argumentation.

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I would like to thank Syed Mohammad Ghari S. Fatemi who, in his typically engaging and provocative style, first introduced me to al-Khurāsānī’s treatment of the issues discussed in this article. I also note my deep gratitude to Rahim Nobahar who has spent many hours helping me read and understand something of the linguistic discussions in Kifāyat al-uṣūl. Errors, of course, are entirely my own. Thanks are also due to Walter Young and Sais Mandjee. Finally, I am grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their helpful and gracious comments on an earlier version of the paper.

1This paper examines an argument in modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh (legal theory) regarding a contested linguistic distinction between ṭalab and irāda, or seeking and willing. The debate arises within the discussion of a typical uṣūl al-fiqh position holding ṭalab to be the meaning of command as a substance of words (maʿnā māddat al-amr). In his seminal Kifāyat al-uṣūl, al-Ākhund al-Khurāsānī (d. 1911) argues that the two terms ṭalab and irāda are coined to refer to a single concept. Within the argument he implies that the Ashʿarīs, and some modern Twelver Shīʿa who lean towards their position, fall foul of a linguistic fallacy when they assert that ṭalab and irāda are distinct. For al-Khurāsānī, both ṭalab and irāda may be used in two distinct modes, a real (ḥaqīqī) mode or an initiating mode (inshāʾī). The former denotes a real seeking or willing within the essence of an actor, whereas the latter simply seeks to initiate the meaning of seeking or willing. Accordingly, an initiating ṭalab may be distinct from a real irāda, and a real ṭalab may be distinct from an initiating irāda, without undermining the position that ṭalab and irāda are conceptually identical. Analysis of al-Khurāsānī’s distinction between inshāʾī and ḥaqīqī, and some criticisms of it, will aim to broaden our understanding of the category of inshāʾ in Arabic, affirming the continued importance of uṣūl al-fiqh for engaging with Arabic philosophy of language and argument.

  • 1 Exploring the theological nature of Islamic Legal Theory is an established research avenue within I (...)

2Although within the context of a seminal work of uṣūl al-fiqh, al-Khurāsānī’s concerns in this discussion are typically not solely jurisprudential.1 As many of his subsequent commentators have stated, his aim seems to be a refutation of the theory of internal speech (kalām nafsī) developed by Ashʿarī thinkers and discussed further below. His theological position is justified through pointing towards an alleged linguistic fallacy, provoking further linguistic analysis and argument amongst subsequent scholars of uṣūl al-fiqh. As is typical of al-Khurāsānī’s contributions within uṣūl al-fiqh, his ideas continue to be a platform for extensive deliberation and discussion amongst Shīʿī seminarians. On this particular issue al-Khurāsāni’s ideas have been widely criticised. Few scholars endorse his strategy for defending the core theological question at hand, the implications of his approach, or the linguistic position which is the crux of his argument. Analysis of al-Khurāsānī’s arguments and some of the criticisms raised against them, will however demonstrate the vibrancy of late modern and contemporary uṣūl al-fiqh as a forum for theological discourse which continues to be an impetus for argument and discussion of issues of philosophy of language in Arabic.

  • 2 For example, see contributions to the volume of Adamson, Peter (ed.) (2019), Philosophy and Jurispr (...)
  • 3 For example, see the collection of essays in Germann, Nadja and Mostafa Najafi (eds.) (2021), Philo (...)
  • 4 For example, see Gleave, Robert (2000), Inevitable Doubt: Two Theories of Shīʿī Jurisprudence, Leid (...)
  • 5 Gleave, Robert (2019), “Sectarianism and Integration: Contemporary Categories and the Prospects for (...)

3Scholars of Islam and Arabic are now increasingly cognisant of the broad philosophical contributions made within the writings of uṣūl al-fiqh.2 Still more recent scholarship, has emphasized its importance for understanding Arabic philosophy of language in particular.3 As is typical of the study of Islamic philosophy and Islamic legal theory, the emphasis has however been on pre-modern Sunnī thought. Study of modern and contemporary Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh is still in its infancy, with the few dedicated monographs tending to focus on issues of epistemology.4 Gleave has noted the value and importance of integrating studies of Shīʿī legal thought for the benefit of our wider understanding of Islamic legal thought, and emphasized the dynamism and novel contributions of contemporary Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, particularly in its discussion of the epistemology and ontology of law.5 The study here will aim to show that the vibrancy of modern and contemporary Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh extends to its treatment of the issues of linguistic philosophy, and that our understanding of Arabic philosophy of language will be much enriched by serious attention to these contributions.

  • 6 Kāẓim Khurasānī, Muḥammad (1431), Kifāyat al-uṣūl, Qum, Majma‛ al-Fikr al-Islāmī, 1:23-24.

4Issues of linguistic philosophy have never been alien to uṣūl al-fiqh. Al-Khurāsānī defines uṣūl al-fiqh as an art through which principles capable of being “employed within the process of inferring [sharīʿa] rulings, or those that lead to rulings in practice, are known”6. The complexity of al-Khurāsānī’s definition, itself subject to considerable critique, is partly directed towards justifying a broader remit for uṣūl al-fiqh than a narrow focus on the famous four sources, or ‘roots of understanding’ (literally the uṣūl al-fiqh). The discipline’s broader concerns with questions of the method and methodology of Sharīʿa inference, which has almost always privileged linguistic evidence, prompted not only deliberation over linguistic questions but also a recognised dependence upon both first order and second order questions of linguistic theory.

  • 7 al-Sīstānī, Sayyid Alī al-Ḥusaynī (1993/1414), al-Rāfid fī ʿilm al-uṣūl, transcribed by M (...)
  • 8 Cited in Sayyid Alī al-Ḥusaynī al-Sīstānī, (1993/1414), al-Rāfid, p. 64.

5Sayyid ʿAlī al-Ḥussainī al-Sīstānī (b.1930), one of the leading Shīʿī jurists of the day, evidences the intimacy between uṣūl al-fiqh and the broader literary sciences (al-ʿulūm al-adabiyya) in light of both historical precedent and the content of contemporary uṣūl discourse.7 In terms of historical precedent, evidence enough for him is to note a practice of scholars that brought together the study of uṣūl al-fiqh principles alongside the study of literary principles within a single treatise. His key example is the Tamhīd al-Qawāʿid of Zayn al-Dīn al-ʿĀmilī (d. 1559), which compiles a hundred uṣūl al-fiqh principles alongside a hundred literary principles, noting the jurisprudential implications of each. Al-Sīstānī, citing Zayn al-Dīn himself, notes that the introduction of the work explains that “the most important preliminaries to jurisprudence are the science of its principles and the science of Arabic, for the former entails its rules and its evidence, and the latter its method and its way”.8 As for the contemporary approach to legal theory, al-Sīstānī suggests that it relies upon three principal categories of engagement with linguistic discussions:

    • 9 I have chosen to render ḥaqīqī as ‘real’, and majāzī in opposition to it as ‘non-real’, avoiding th (...)

    Discussions pertaining to usage (mabāḥith al-istiʿmāl). For example, the nature of meaning assignment, the nature of usage itself, usage as either real (ḥaqīqī) or non-real (majāzī), the signs of real and non-real, and discussion of conflicting states.9

  1. Discussion of the meaning of individual concepts, irrespective of whether these [meanings] are independent (istiqlāliyya)—like discussion of the meaning of command itself, of prohibition itself, of obligation, proscription, and of indeterminates such as relative pronouns and demonstrative pronouns—or whether they are relational (ḥarfiyya); like discussion around the meaning of particles, or individual structures such as the structure of a derivative, or the forms of the imperative and the prohibitive.

    • 10 As al-Sistanī himself notes, this list only refers to the initial chapters of legal theory concerne (...)

    Discussion of the meaning of compound concepts, such as discussion of assertoric and non-assertoric sentences (jumla khabariyya wa inshāʾiyya), and discussion of implicit meanings.10

As a debate emerging out of consideration of the meaning of command, al-Khurāsānī’s argument for the identity of seeking and willing falls most squarely into al-Sīstānī’s second category. As shall be seen, however, his treatment presumes a particular understanding of the difference between assertoric and non-assertoric sentences, a distinction that is, for him, ultimately a function of usage. Through analysis of al-Khurāsānī’s argument, this paper aims to emphasise that linguistic discussions within modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, described by al-Sīstānī as having such a firm place within the history and current content of the discipline, continue to be an important forum for the consideration and elaboration of ideas relevant to the philosophy of language.

Al-Khurāsānī and the Kifāyat al-uṣūl

  • 11 See Farzaneh, Mateo Mohammad (2015), The Iranian Constitutional Revolution and the Clerical Leaders (...)

6Muḥammad Kāẓim, born in Khurāsān in 1839 to a family whose origins were of Herat, is often referred to simply as al-Ākhund. His mature years, as both student and professor, were spent in the Shrine city of Najaf in Ottoman Iraq. He died suddenly at the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf on the morning of 24th November 1911, amidst preparations to return to Iran in order to bolster the defensive jihad against the Russian invasion. His political interventions have become of increasing interest, with the key clerical support that he provided for the Iranian constitutional revolution of 1906-11 well known.11 The importance of this support rested first and foremost on his scholarly credentials built out of his role as a teacher and an author, and it was in the field of uṣūl al-fiqh that he left the deepest impression.

  • 12 al-Amīn, Muḥsin (1983/1407), Aʿyān al-Shīʿa, Beirut, Dār al-taʿāruf lil-maṭbūʿāt, 9:5-6.
  • 13 Gleave, Robert (2018), “Imami Shi’i Legal Theory: From its Origins to the Early-Twentieth Century,” (...)

7Scholars of the very highest rank flocked to his classes of uṣūl al-fiqh, which became the most famous within Najaf after the departure of Mīrza Ḥasan al-Shīrāzī (d. 1895) to Samarra and remained so until al-Khurāsānī’s death.12 His Kifāyat al-uṣūl, rightly described as “the central uṣūl text of modern times”13, continues to direct the contours of the field as a base text for the study and teaching of uṣūl al-fiqh at the very highest levels of Shīʿī scholarship. His approach and work are typically characterised as concise yet exceptionally incisive, analytically and critically identifying points of controversy and offering his views on right resolution. Al-Khurāsānī’s approach also marks a high point in the integration of the dominant mode of falsafa philosophy of his era into the discourse of Shīʿī legal theory. His study of the rational sciences included a period of tutelage under the leading exponent of Sadrian philosophy in his day, Hājj Mullā Hādī Sabzawārī (d. 1873), before coming to Najaf. Al-Khurāsānī’s integration of this particular philosophical discourse into both the method and substance of his uṣūl al-fiqh stands as testament to the continued influence of such training.

  • 14 There have been subsequent efforts to modernize the curriculum with the introduction of more recent (...)

8The Kifāya continues to be taught, often alongside the Farāʾid al-uṣūl of Murtaḍā al-Anṣārī (d. 1864), as one of the most advanced textbooks in the field. Its content also still frames the critical research deliberations of leading scholars at the khārij level of study aimed at completing the training of independent scholars (mujtahids).14 In these courses, instructors often seek to demonstrate their own independence through the manner in which they can either build on al-Khuraṣānī’s views or move away from them through successful critique.

  • 15 Robert Gleave (2018), “Imami Shi’i Legal Theory”, p. 228.

9The importance of Kifāyat al-uṣūl at both of these levels, as an advanced textbook and framework for critical research deliberations, is reflected in the number and nature of commentaries on the text that have been produced over the hundred or so years since the book was first written. The number of these commentaries is, as Gleave suggests15, innumerable and thus unsurprisingly of many different styles. Some are written first and foremost to assist the student and teacher of the text itself, limiting the extent of critical engagements with the ideas within it. Although testament to the nature of Shīʿī scholarship of this level, even these teaching texts do not shy away from pointing out perceived problems and differences with al-Khurāsānī’s views. Important examples of this type of commentary include the Ḥaqāʾiq al-uṣūl of Muḥsin al-Ṭabāṭābāʾī al-Ḥakīm (1889-1970), who was himself a student of al-Khurāsānī, and the more recent Muntahā al-dirāya fī tawḍīḥ al-Kifāya of Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murrawwij (d. 1999). Then we have the more voluminous works recording the research deliberations of leading scholars that are framed around the Kifāya, sometimes written as commentaries and other times recorded and published by students as dictations from their teachers’ classes. Among the most important of these are works that resulted from three other of al-Khurāsānī’s first generation students—the transcribed lessons of Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Nāʾīnī (1862-1937) and Ḍīyāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿIrāqī (1861-1942), and the commentarial work Nihāyat al-dirāya fī sharḥ al-Kifāya of Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Iṣfahānī (1878-1942). The account of al-Khurāsānī’s argument for the identity of ṭalab and irāda that follows here is framed by the analysis of these thinkers. Beyond the clarity of explanation and elaboration that they offer, it is their critical engagement with his core position that makes them so relevant here, demonstrating the ongoing vibrancy of uṣūl al-fiqh in matters of Arabic linguistic philosophy and argument.

Stakes in the debate

10Al-Khurāsānī discusses the relationship between seeking (ṭalab) and willing (irāda) within his analysis of the meaning of command as an individual independent term. This consideration of what ‘command’ itself means, as mentioned above, falls into al-Sīstānī’s second category of the three core linguistic concerns of modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh. As we shall see ‘command’ (amr), in its technical sense, is understood to mean a particular mode of seeking. The deliberations that follow from this, regarding the relationship between seeking and willing, might also be assumed to be linguistic. For al-Khurāsānī, however, there is clearly much more at stake. Identifying these different concerns at the outset will help frame the exposition of al-Khurāsānī’s core linguistic argument for the identity of seeking and willing and set the ground for appreciating the critique that it faced from his commentators.

  • 16 al-Iṣfahānī, Muḥammad Ḥusayn (1998/1418), Nihāyat al-dirāya fī sharḥ al-Kifāya, Beirut, Muʾassat Āl (...)

11Al-Khurāsānī’s analysis and deliberations on the relationship between seeking and willing move between what might be considered a rational question of philosophy and theology, a question of legal theory and an issue of linguistics. Accordingly, al-Iṣfahānī, in his Nihāyat al-dirāya, opens his engagements with the Kifāya’s treatment of ‘seeking and willing’ by identifying exactly how the issue, and the core controversy, can be considered from each of these perspectives. If the controversy is fundamentally about establishing either an internal attribute (ṣifa nafsāniyya) or an internal action (fiʿl nafsānī), in addition to the willing of something when it is commanded, then for al-Iṣfahanī this is a rational question, and hence the subject matter of philosophy or theology. If what is at stake are questions pertaining to the indication of a command, i.e., whether a command indicates the existence of a will towards the referent of the command or only initiates a seeking of it, then the controversy is jurisprudential. If the controversy is simply about the synonymity of the words ṭalab and irāda, without considering the existence of an internal attribute or the indication of the imperative form, then it is linguistic.16 As will be become clear in what follows, al-Khurāsānī not only sees these three aspects as related, but also holds that a proper understanding of the linguistic relationship between seeking and willing allows for a sound understanding of both the jurisprudential and the theological questions at hand.

The meaning of command

  • 17 This is not distinctive of modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, for an account and analysis of these themes i (...)

12Al-Khurāsānī discusses the relationship between ṭalab and irāda as the fourth aspect of his consideration of issues pertaining to the meaning of command as a substance of words (maʿnā māddat al-amr). This is a prelude to the core uṣūl al-fiqh discussion of the meaning indicated through the structure or form of the imperative (ṣīghat al-amr), that is the imperative mood, and the discussion of the former often slides into the latter.17 The first three aspects discussed by al-Khurāsānī under the rubric of māddat al-amr consider the meaning or notion of command itself, the assumed criterion of superiority within this notion and the pivotal jurisprudential idea that the literal sense of command indicates obligation. A brief outline of al-Khurāsānī’s view in each case will help contextualise our closer examination of his treatment of the fourth aspect, the relationship between ṭalab and irāda.

  • 18 al-Khurāsānī points out a range of more delicate examples, including that in the sentence ʾa Zayd (...)
  • 19 Here the rendering of fī al-jumla, as ‘in a particular sense’, follows the distinction between this (...)
  • 20 Accordingly, if and when the word amr is used to refer to other than the imperative form of the ver (...)
  • 21 As discussed below and elaborated upon in his key argument for the identity of ṭalab and irāda, for (...)

13First is the discussion of the meaning of the word amr itself: in language, in custom and in its technical sense within uṣūl al-fiqh. In its linguistic and conventional usage, al-Khurāsānī notes that there are numerous possible meanings that have been mentioned for the word amr. These include seeking (al-ṭalab), affair (al-shaʾn), act (al-fiʿl), an astonishing act (al-fiʿl al-ʿajīb), thing (al-shayʾ), occurrence (al-ḥāditha) and purpose (al-gharaḍ). However, some of these result from confusing an instance with a concept, for example ‘occurrence’ is simply an instance of ‘thing’ and not a separate concept.18 Ultimately, he deems most plausible the view that the literal or real sense of the word amr is only either ‘seeking’ (ṭalab)—in a particular sense (fī al-jumla) 19—or ‘thing’ (shayʾ). Here al-Khurāsānī’s concerns start to shift from the linguistic to the jurisprudential, for the particular sense of ṭalab that he advocates as most plausible for the literal sense of the word is a seeking at the level of obligation (ṭalab wujūbī), rather than a more general unqualified seeking (ṭalab muṭlaq). When it comes to the technical meaning of the word amr in uṣūl al-fiqh, as opposed to its use in language and convention, al-Khurāsānī reports an agreement that it refers to a “specific utterance (al-qawl al-makhṣūṣ)”, understood to be the imperative form of the verb (ifʿal).20 In al-Khurāsānī’s view, this is only ever employed in the meaning of ṭalab, although, as we shall return to, this ṭalab or seeking is not in an unqualified sense.21

  • 22 Possible positions within the debate include: 1) holding that the meaning of the substance of the a (...)
  • 23 Kifāya, 1:91.

14The second aspect relates to a famous debate about a contested criterion regarding the superiority of the one issuing a command.22 Al-Khurāsānī prefers the position that considers superiority to be an assumed element within the meaning of command, such that a ṭalab from an inferior or a peer does not constitute a command. Nor, in al-Khurāsānī’s view, is it necessary that the seeker should maintain or have to demonstrate their superiority on utterance of a command—if they are actually superior, even if they humble themselves, their call is still considered a command.23

  • 24 Kifāya, 1:91.
  • 25 See his notes on tabādur as a sign of literal assignment Kifāya, 1:35.
  • 26 Within these further comments al-Khurāsānī could be read as making reference to the two other signs (...)

15The third aspect relates to another classical debate in uṣūl al-fiqh, the literal indication of command with regards to obligation, recommendation or both. Here al-Khurāsānī details and seeks to justify that which he alluded to above when he stated that one of the literal or real meanings of command is seeking in a particular sense (ṭalab fī al-jumla). For al-Khurāsānī this particular sense is most likely an obligatory sense, due to this being “the foremost occurring understanding of the word when it is expressed (insibāqihī ʿinda iṭlāqihi)”.24 The foremost occurring understanding of a word, often referred to as tabādur, is deemed by al-Khurāsānī to be the primary sign of literal assignment (waḍʿ) and thus an indicator to the real or literal meaning.25 Al-Khurāsānī further supports this position by citing various texts of the Qurʾān and reports of the Sunna, as well as responding to some other views and objections, further details of which will do little to aid the focus of enquiry here.26 Instead, with this baseline conception of al-Khurāsānī’s views regarding the meaning of the substance of command, we turn to his deliberations on the relationship between seeking (ṭalab) and willing (irāda).

Command as an initiation of seeking: ṭalab inshāʾī

  • 27 Kifāya, 1:93.
  • 28 Ḍiyā al-Dīn al-‛Irāqī (1435), Nihāyat al-afkār, transcribed by Muḥammad Taqī al-Burūjirdī, Qum, Muʾ(...)

16After having argued that the literal or real technical sense of the word amr is an obligatory mode of seeking, al-Khurāsānī goes on to elaborate on his earlier remarks that this seeking is not in an unqualified sense. The seeking, which is the meaning of amr, for al-Khurāsānī, is what he describes as a ṭalab inshāʾī, an initiation of seeking, rather than a ṭalab ḥaqīqī or real seeking.27 Here, inshāʾī as a qualification to the meaning of command is used in contrast to ḥaqīqī, where the latter is something internal, inhering at the level of the soul or the self (ʾim bi-l-nafs). A ṭalab is understood to be inshāʾī when it is employed with the intention of initiating its meaning.28

  • 29 See Larcher, Pierre (1998), “Une pragmatique avant la pragmatique: « médiévale », « arabe » et « is (...)
  • 30 Austin does however note that words spoken seriously, “consist in their being uttered as (merely) t (...)

17Before unpacking al-Khurasāni’s own explanation and use of the category of inshāʾ in this way, the rendering of inshāʾī as initiating deserves some qualification and analysis. It contrasts with the rendering of the term as performative in a manner that evokes the category of utterances described by J. L. Austin, a framing which has been employed by Larcher and Vishanoff to analyse the emergence and employment of the category of inshāʾ within pre-modern Sunnī uṣūl al-fiqh.29 Reading inshāʾ through an Austinian lens both highlights and elides some of the particular nuances of how this category is employed by al-Khurāsānī in the context of debates on seeking and willing. For Austin, performatives are utterances used to do things with words; they “do not describe, report or constate anything”, and thus, like the typical description of the Arabic inshāʾ, they are not said to be true or false.30 However, it should be noted that Austin did not offer, or at least did not discuss, commands as examples of his performatives.

  • 31 Bernard G. Weiss (2010/1992), The Search for God’s Law, p. 324.

18As both Larcher and Vishanoff note, scholars of uṣūl al-fiqh have been deeply concerned about how to do things with words. What’s more, in Arabic the linguistic formulas employed to sell, or to marry, are typically performed with the use of words, such as biʿtu or ankaḥtu, that are capable of being simply assertoric or indeed performative in the Austinian sense. It is thus unsurprising that legal theorists were concerned with identifying when the use of such words simply inform that a sale or marriage has occurred, and when their use is to initiate the occurrence of a sale or a marriage. Yet analysis of the nature of commands is arguably even more important to the theorisation of inshāʾ in uṣūl al-fiqh, and certainly more central to our concern here. As Bernard Weiss notes, it is the command that is the most common of the subcategories of inshāʾ.31 Thus it seems Weiss’s choice of rendering inshāʾ as “non-assertoric speech” rather than a specifically Austinian sense of performative may allow for a clearer analysis of how this linguistic category is employed in Arabic generally and in modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh more particularly. In what follows, we will see that al-Khurāsānī’s reference to inshāʾ, within an argument for the identity between ṭalab and irāda, is partly directed towards understanding how a speaker may seek something through uttering a command without actually willing it to be. Whether or not this evokes an Austinian infelicity—an abuse of the command—may be a question that tests the limits of such comparative architecture, particularly where the speaker might be God. The aim here, however, is not concerned with exploring any such limits. It is, instead, to deepen an emic understanding of the way the category of inshāʾ itself has been employed within an argument in a paradigmatic work of late modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh.

  • 32 Ṣanqūr, Mūḥammad ʿAlī (2011/1432), al-Muʿjam al-Uṣūlī, Beirut, Muʾassasat al-tārikh al-ʿarabī, 1 (...)
  • 33 Mūḥammad ʿAlī Ṣanqūr (2011/1432), al-Muʿjam al-Uṣūlī, 1:376-377, and 1:620-621.

19Exactly what is meant by inshāʾ is something which has been a point of dispute amongst later modern Shīʿī legal theorists. It is typically contrasted, first and foremost, with ikhbār, the function of an assertoric sentence. The prevalent view amongst modern Shīʿī scholars regarding the assertoric sentence is that it is a structure assigned to indicate or relay either the occurrence or non-occurrence, in reality, of a relationship between its subject and predicate.32 On the other hand, a sentence is described as inshāʾī when, through a linguistic utterance, it creates a real conceptual meaning (maʿnā iʿtibārī). Rational communities, as a group, assume or subscribe to certain mental postulates and considerations which emerge out of both individual and societal life, religious or otherwise. Examples of these mental postulates include marriage, propriety, guardianship, obligation, prohibition, hope and so on. Each of these, although they may relate to things in the external objective realm, actually only inhere as mentally postulated concepts. A non-assertoric sentence (jumla inshāʾiyya) creates instances of such mental considerations. The utterances ankaḥtu and qabiltu, when delivered in a non-assertoric sentence and with all appropriate conditions recognised as required for the initiation of a marriage within a given community, create a real instance of what that community considers to be marriage. Likewise, expression of the word ṣalli, an imperative verbal form commanding prayer, actualises or initiates a real instance of seeking the performance of prayer within the realm of mental consideration.33

  • 34 Kifāya, 1:27-28.

20For al-Khurāsānī, the fundamental difference between inshāʾ and ikhbār is not necessarily in terms of a difference in assigned meaning, but rather it is in the different uses a meaning may be assigned for, such that “the khabar is assigned to be used to relay the affirmation of its content… and the inshāʾ is assigned to be used for intending its actualisation and occurrence, whilst both may concur in terms of the meaning for which they are employed”.34 So, when a speaker uses the word biʿtu and intends by it to relay that a sale has occurred, this is a case of ikhbār. If, however, the speaker intends to bring about a sale through the utterance of the same word it is a case of inshāʾ. The purpose of usage is different in each case, although the meaning that is used is the same.

  • 35 Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:428.

21With this sense of inshāʾ in mind we can return to al-Khurāsānī’s conception of the specific sense in which, he argues, the word amr means seeking. We noted above that he claims the sense of seeking at play here is a ṭalab inshāʾī, an initiation of seeking, rather than a ṭalab ḥaqīqī or real seeking. It is the use of an amr to create a real instance of seeking in the mind of a listener, and hence it is inshāʾī. This is distinct from a ṭalab ḥaqīqī, a real seeking at the level of the self or the soul. In his commentary on the Kifāya, al-Murawwij gives a classic pre-modern example to help clarify the difference between these two modes of using the meaning seeking. Consider the statement of a master to his slave; “Quench my thirst with water” whilst, in his self, the master does not really seek water. His command is simply to test the slave. This would be a case of what al-Khurāsānī terms a ṭalab inshāʾī without any ṭalab ḥaqiqī; it is the initiation of seeking without any real seeking. 35The master creates a real instance of seeking in the mind of his slave, despite not really seeking water. It is this inshāʾī type of seeking that is, for al-Khurāsānī, the literally assigned meaning of the word amr.

  • 36 Kifāya, 1:93.
  • 37 An oft cited example is when ‘the water’ is mentioned to Iraqis their mind thinks not of water per (...)
  • 38 Kifāya, 1:93 and Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:428-9.

22Al-Khurāsānī further argues that even if one denies this, claiming that the word amr is assigned for seeking per se when the word is used in an unqualified sense, its apparent meaning is nonetheless inshāʾī as a result of a type of cognitive specification referred to as inṣirāf.36 Inṣirāf is understood within modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh as being the priority for a specific meaning of a word within the mind despite the assigned meaning of that word being broader than that which is deemed prior, or the evoking within the mind of some particular instances of a notion on hearing the unqualified expression of the word for that notion.37 al-Khurāsānī is saying that even if it is conceded that the word amr is not literally assigned specifically for the initiation of seeking, being assigned for a meaning that is more general than both the initiation of seeking or an actual seeking, the oft-usage of the word in the sense of initiation leads to such an inṣirāf.38 So on hearing the word amr, and understanding from it ṭalab, the foremost instance of this notion occurring to the mind is the initiation of seeking, rather than a real seeking. This confirms that it is the inshāʾī mode which is the apparent meaning.

  • 39 Maintaining the fundamental distinction between ṭalab and irāda seems to have become a mainstream v (...)

23The cognitive specification of the meaning of ṭalab to an initiating sense, rather than a real sense, is reversed when it comes to the meaning of the word irāda or willing. That which is cognitively specified, from the unqualified expression of the term, is a real willing (irāda ḥaqīqiyya). This willing is something not merely performed by words or actions, it actually inheres at the level of the soul or the self. For al-Khurāsānī, it is this difference between the two terms, namely, that the unqualified usage of one is cognitively specified to being an initiation and the other to a real function of the soul or the self, which has led some Twelver Shīʿī scholars to mistakenly lean towards a position which distinguished fundamentally between ṭalab and irāda.39 This, however, is due to a category mistake:

  • 40 Kifāya, 1:94.

Know that the correct position, as we find, is the position of the people of truth: consistent with the Muʿtazila and at odds with the Ashʿarīs, that ṭalab and irāda are identical, in the sense that the two words are literally assigned for a single concept. That which is the referent for one of them in the objective, is the very referent of the other… This, however, as you know, does not mean that the ṭalab inshāʾī, which is the cognitively specified understanding resulting from its utterance [that is ṭalab], is identical with an irāda ḥaqīqiyya which is the cognitively specified understating of its utterance. 40

  • 41 Kifāya, 1:94.
  • 42 Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:432.

Put differently, when we hear the word ṭalab, we ordinarily assume the initiation of seeking, and when we hear the word irāda, we usually assume a real willing. The difference between these two is, as al-Khurāsānī puts it, “more obvious than the sun and clearer than yesterday”.41 This, however, does not mean that conceptually ṭalab and irāda are not one. They are indeed identical when employed in the same mode or, as al-Murawwij puts it, when employed at the same level (rutba).42 The perception of difference between the words ṭalab and irāda arises when one is understood as, or used in, the inshāʾī mode and the other in the ḥaqīqī mode.

The fundamental identity of ṭalab and irāda

  • 43 Kifāya, 1:94.
  • 44 Kifāya, 1:95

24For al-Khurāsānī, this fundamental identity of ṭalab and irāda are justified intuitively. As he puts it: simply “considering one’s own inner thoughts (murājaʿat al-wujdān)” is sufficient to establish the truth of the case, “there is no need for more explanation, or the putting forth of a demonstration”43. On his account, within ourselves, people cannot find any attribute of the soul beyond irāda, and those things that may be a preliminary to the actualisation of the irāda, that might be termed ṭalab. Here he acknowledges that on considering our cognition process we might be able to distinguish irāda or will from the conception of possible benefit in a thing, a judgement that there is benefit in it, and an inclination or movement of desire towards that thing. These, however, are preliminaries to the actualisation or coming about of an irāda within us; beyond these preliminaries, we find no further distinct function within the self that we might call ṭalab.44

  • 45 Kifāya, 1:95.

In summary, it cannot be conceived that there is any attribute that we might term seeking (ṭalab) that occurs at the level of the soul other than these known attributes [i.e., the preliminaries] and the willing (irāda) - thus there is no room but for the unity of willing and seeking.45

Al-Khurāsānī’s focus has now clearly shifted from what might be deemed a purely linguistic question arising out of concerns in legal theory, to what al-Iṣfahānī described as the rational, or philosophical, question regarding the existence of an internal attribute (ṣifa nafsāniyya) or an internal action (fiʿl nafsānī) in addition to the willing of something when it is commanded. Accordingly, he draws out of his analysis of the relationship between irāda and ṭalab at the level of the soul or the self, a broader point. He argues that the principle established here, that in the case of a command there is no internal attribute in addition to willing and its pre-requisites, applies to all utterances:

  • 46 Kifāya, 1:95

This is the case in all non-assertoric structures (ṣiyagh inshāʾiyya) and assertoric sentences (jumal khabariyya), for there is no further internal attribute beyond the known internal attributes, like hoping, wishing, knowing and the like, that is indicated by the word, as it is claimed by those who state: “Surely speech is in the hearts, and the tongue is only made an indicator to the heart.”46

To restate al-Khurāsānī’s point, just as there is no further internal attribute within the self beyond irāda that can be termed ṭalab, there is no internal attribute beyond the conceptualisation, and determination to speak in any of our utterances, be they assertoric or non-assertoric.

  • 47 See for example, ʿAbd al-Malik bin ʿAbd Allah bin Yūsuf al-Juwaynī (2009/1430), Kitāb al-Irshād ilā (...)

25The further attribute al-Khurāsānī wishes to negate here is the notion of internal speech (kalām nafsī) posited by the Ashʿarīs. Penned by Christian poet al-Akhṭal (d. 710), the line of poetry quoted by al-Khurāsānī above aims to represent the Ashʿarī position and is cited by numerous defenders of the doctrine as a part of more elaborate justifications.47 Before detailing how al-Khurāsānī’s linguistic position on the identity between ṭalab and irāda is used in an argument against the tenability of some of these Ash‛arī justifications, a few additional words about the conception of internal speech itself are in order.

Internal speech and the distinction between ṭalab and irāda

  • 48 Most important among commentaries on the Tajrīd is the Kashf al-murād fī Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād of ʿAllā (...)
  • 49 Sʿad al-Dīn al-Taftāzānī (1998), Sharḥ al-Maqāsid, 4:145-146.

26The theory of internal speech arose out of one of the most contested, formative and famous issues of ʿilm al-kalām. A typical source of Ashʿarī views for modern Twelver Shīʿī scholars is the commentary of ʿAlī b. Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (d. 1474) on the famous Tajrīd al-ʿAqāʾid of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 1274). That the Tajrīd is still the base text for commentaries used in the teaching of kalām theology in contemporary Shīʿī seminaries explains why they often refer to al-Qūshjī.48 After noting that there is no dispute amongst the Muslims regarding the notion that God is a speaker (mutakallim) and that the difference is with regards to what it means for Him to speak, al-Qūshjī moves to explain the source of tension. Closely following the famous Māturīdī Sharḥ al-maqāṣid of al-Taftāzānī (d. 1390)49, he highlights the scope for different views on the issue by identifying two apparently conflicting syllogisms placing God’s speech as either unoriginated (qadīm) or originated (ḥadīth):

1.His speech is an attribute of Him,

everything that is an attribute of Him is unoriginated,

therefore, His Speech is unoriginated.

2.His speech is composed of interdependent parts in existence,

everything of this nature is originated,

therefore, His speech is originated.

  • 50 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī ʿalā Tajrīd al-ʿaqāʾid li-l-Ṭūsī: mabḥath al-i (...)

As al-Qūshjī puts it, theologians were thus forced to reject one of these two syllogisms, denying some of their premisses, due to the law of non-contradiction; God’s speech cannot be both unoriginated and originated at the same time.50 The Ashʿarī stance within this dilemma is described as follows:

  • 51 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī, p. 67.

They say, His speech is not of the same genus as sounds and letters, rather it is a meaning that inheres in His sublime essence, and which is referred to as internal speech (kalām nafsī). It is this [internal speech] which is indicated by linguistic speech (kalām lafẓī) composed of letters, and it is unoriginated. 51

  • 52 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī, p73.

In al-Qūshjī’s terms, they validate the first syllogism and reject the minor premise of the second syllogism. For Ashʿarī scholars, just as one who brings about motion in another is not called moving, one who simply brings speech about in another is not necessarily a real speaker. Speech is that which inheres within the self and a speaker is one within whom such speech inheres. Furthermore, “the speech which inheres through the essence of God, may He be Exalted, cannot be sensual (ḥissī), i.e., composed of heard sounds, because these are necessarily originated, with a beginning and an end… and it is impossible that something originated inheres within the sublime essence of God”.52 Thus, for the Ashʿarīs, speech proper is an attribute that inheres as a meaning in God and it must be unoriginated.

  • 53 Nāṣir Makārim al-Shīrāzī (1414), Anwār al-uṣūl, transcribed by Aḥmad al-Qudsī, Qum, Intishārāt Nasa (...)
  • 54 Qurʾān, 4:58.
  • 55 Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāẓī (1426), Maḥṣūl, 2:19.

27Among the core questions Imāmī Shīʿī scholars, and for that matter Muʿtazilī scholars, raised in response to these ideas was the relationship between this internal speech and God’s other known attributes, most importantly His knowledge and His Power.53 Is the kalām nafsī something distinct from His knowledge of universal concepts and is it distinct from his ability, or power, to bring about sounds? More specifically relevant to the core concerns here, in the case of non-assertoric utterances (al-inshāʾiyyāt), does the theory imply that there is something beyond irāda within a speaker when they hope, wish, or command? Consider God’s speech with regard to the Quranic statement “Surely Allah commands you to fulfil the trusts to those whom they are due”.54 Does this utterance indicate something within the self of God, other than His will that people fulfil their trusts? For the Ashʿarīs, the answer was yes. Ṭalab, which is the essence of command, is an internal attribute, and this is distinct from the other entirely separate internal attribute, irāda.55

The fallacy in distinguishing between ṭalab and irāda

28Al-Khurāsānī argues that his linguistic distinction between the two modes inshāʾī and ḥaqīqī clarifies the error within a key Ashʿarī justification for this claimed distinction between ṭalab and irāda. This justification makes reference to instances where one may seek something through a command without actually willing it to occur, i.e., where there is ṭalab but apparently no irāda. This may be with the purpose of testing (ikhtibār) the obedience of the recipient of a command, or it may be for the purpose of an excuse (iʿtidhār) on the part of the one issuing the command. The first of these is more straightforward than the second: it consists of a command where the aim is to test the obedience of the commanded rather than fulfilment of the command. A typical example is the earlier cited case of a master calling to his slave “Quench my thirst with water”, whilst the master does not really seek water. The command is simply to examine the obedience of the slave. The more complicated case of a command used as an excuse is again best explained with an example. An employer may seek an excuse for her reprimanding of an employee by issuing a command which she knows he will fail to meet, such that her actions towards him are excused. Again here, despite the command and thus the presence of ṭalab, there is no real will or irāda for its fulfilment. Accordingly, ṭalab and irāda are demonstrated to be distinct.

29For al-Khurāsānī the fallacy in the Ashʿarī argument should be clear after his exposition of the difference between the inshāʾī mode of seeking and the ḥaqīqī mode of seeking. In commands issued simply as tests and those issued to establish an excuse, just as there is no real will, there is no real seeking. All we have is the initiation of seeking, i.e., ṭalab inshāʾī. The only thing that the Ashʿarī demonstration establishes is the distinction between a real will and the seeking initiated by the form of a command. Al-Khurāsānī accepts this distinction, but in his view it does nothing to undermine the fundamental identity of seeking and willing; it only points out the difference between a real seeking and the initiation of seeking. The fallacy in the Ashʿarī argument is in the equivocation of two different uses of the terms irāda and ṭalab, terms whose meaning is otherwise identical.

The reception of Al-Khurāsānī’s ideas amongst later modern Shīʿī scholars

  • 56 Kifāya, 1:98-99.

30Al-Khurāsānī’s ideas on ṭalab and irāda have been deeply contested, and largely rejected. The prevalent criticisms consider his linguistic position flawed, both in and of itself, and in its utility to clarify the underlying theological contentions upon which the Ashʿarī position is built. In fact, according to his critics, al-Khurāsānī’s analysis itself leads to an unacceptable theological slip towards determinism (jabr). Al-Khurāsānī clearly recognised that some might read him this way, and he offered a brief pre-emptive response to such potential criticism. He notes however that these clarifications take him to a point that is “beyond the scope of most people’s understanding”.56 Irrespective of whether his students managed to understand him correctly or not, it is clear that many were not satisfied with his account.

  • 57 Notwithstanding their emphasis on God’s unqualified agency, it should be noted that the Ashʿarī sch (...)
  • 58 al-ʿIrāqī, Ḍiyāʾ al-Dīn (1435), Nihāyat al-afkār, p. 163-165.

31For Ḍīyāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿIrāqī, even if al-Khurāsānī’s analysis is sufficient in explaining an apparent linguistic difference between the unqualified use of ṭalab and the unqualified use of irāda, it does nothing to actually account for the range of theological views of the Ashʿarīs which are the real basis for their distinguishing between seeking and willing. The range of theological views al-ʿIrāqī claims are at play here are rooted in the Ashʿarī rejection of moral rationalism and their tendency towards determinism.57 Although al-Khurāsānī’s distinction between the ḥaqīqī mode and the inshāʾī mode offers a possible interpretation for the apparent distinction between ṭalab and irāda advocated by the Ashʿarīs in their attempt to reconcile the issuance of commands from God which He does not desire, it leads to other problems.58 Perhaps the most fundamental of these for a legal theory context is that this distinction problematises the very duty of obedience. If commands from God are not always things that God actually desires or wills to occur, how can such commands be subject to a rational demand for obedience? Rephrased, if God does not necessarily want the things He commands, why should I follow them?

  • 59 As an example, see al-Khūʾī’s extensive discussion on the nature of God’s speech within the context (...)

32Responding to such theological questions continues to occupy much of the space afforded to advanced discussions amongst Shīʿī scholars of uṣūl al-fiqh, be that in commentaries on the text of the Kifāya itself or in the advanced lecture courses framed around al-Khurāsānī’s treatment. Of course, the theological issue to which al-Khurāsānī most directly relates the whole debate is the Ashʿarī idea of internal speech. Some of the most sophisticated modern Twelver Shīʿī engagements with this notion, and their refutations of it, are thus encountered in the context of uṣūl al-fiqh. So, it is not in kalām theology, but within such works of legal theory, in chapters first and foremost positioned to discuss the linguistic meaning of command, that we find the most extensive discussions regarding the nature of God’s speech in contemporary Shīʿī thought.59 These deliberations are typically pitted not only against the Ashʿarī views themselves, but also against al-Khurāsānī’s attempts at undermining them. Accordingly, they are deeply concerned with the linguistic issues and arguments relevant to the case. A comprehensive analysis of the theological deliberations that al-Khurāsānī’s interventions have evoked is, as should now be clear, beyond the scope of this paper. However, our core aim of demonstrating the continued importance of uṣūl al-fiqh for appreciating Arabic linguistic philosophy and argument will be served by looking at one particularly influential line of critique of the tenability and utility of al-Khurāsānī’s core linguistic claim regarding the identity of seeking and willing.

  • 60 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, Qum, Muʾassasat al-nashr al-islāmī, 1:134.

33Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Nāʾīnī, who was a leading confidant and disciple of al-Khurāsānī, offers a relatively concise refutation of al-Khurāsānī’s core argument, identifying flaws in his distinction between seeking and willing as being either real (ḥaqīqī) or initiating (inshāʾī). These flaws arise from a category mistake. According to al-Nāʾīnī, irāda, or will, is a quality of the self (kayfiyya nafsāniyya), unlike ṭalab or seeking, and hence does not fall within the categories of action (maqūlat al-fiʿl).60 Al-Khurāsānī’s view regarding the identity of ṭalab and irāda, which is justified only by way of a claim to intuition, is described by al-Nāʾīnī as not only being intuitively wrong, but also demonstrably so:

  • 61 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:131.

For it should be clear that a state of being provoked (inbiʿāth) cannot come about without provocation (baʿth), and provocation is amongst the categories of action (maqūlat al-fiʿl), whilst will (as acknowledged above) is amongst the qualities of the soul (kayfiyyāt nafsāniyya). Therefore, if there is no other identifiable act of the soul (fiʿl nafsānī), it would necessitate that something can be provoked without provocation.61

  • 62 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:133.
  • 63 For al-Nāīʾnī, ṭalab and irāda are unlike the synonymous terms bashar and insān, which both transla (...)

As a quality of the soul, irāda cannot seek or provoke anything; seeking and provoking are actions. Furthermore, as a quality, irāda is involuntary. In al-Nāʾīnī’s analysis then, if actions are the effects of will, and will is the effect of its prior pre-requisites and there is no other act of the soul or intent of the soul beyond will, then there is no way to reject the aforementioned doubt regarding determinism.62 It is accepted that the pre-requisites to will, such as conception and assent, are non-volitional. Will itself, as a quality of the soul, is also non-volitional. This implies that all resulting acts would be non-volitional. The problem of determinism can only be avoided if it is accepted that there is something internal, that falls within the category of actions that is distinct and separate to will. It is this distinct function that is referred to as ṭalab; it is ṭalab which provokes, and it is ṭalab which initiates. More generally, irrespective of this philosophical argument, he argues there is no scope to claim the identity of ṭalab and irāda when both language and convention reject the claim—the terms are simply not synonymous.63

  • 64 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:133.

34For al-Nāʾīnī, ṭalab, distinct from both irāda and its preliminaries at the level of the soul, is an expression for the “directing of the soul towards that which is sought and the carrying of the soul towards it”. As an act of the soul (fiʿl nafsānī), it is this directing of the soul which is the criterion in volition. Irāda and emphatic desire are thus simply preliminaries to seeking, and not identical with it. They are, instead, amongst those things which may be preferential factors for the soul seeking or directing itself towards something. Neither is it, however, a complete cause for seeking and directing. For just as the soul may seek and direct itself towards something it has will for, it may also choose to restrain itself from that thing.64

35Al-Nāʾīnī notes that this foregoing analysis, although first and foremost pertaining to the irāda and ṭalab of an agent with regard to existential acts, applies equally to cases of legislative will (irāda tashrīʿiyya):

Ultimately, seeking in existential things is an expression for the directing of one’s soul to move one’s limbs towards that which is sought. In legislative affairs it is an expression of the directing of the commander, through his command, to the movement of the limbs of the one commanded towards that which is sought. At least with respect to the meaning of seeking, there is no difference between them in both situations (existential and legislative), it [i.e., ṭalab] is in the sense of directing towards.

Ṭalab, understood as a volitional directing towards something, is an internal act (fiʿl nafsānī) that is distinct from irāda, understood as a non-volitional quality of the self (kayf nafsānī). They are categorically distinct and thus, al-Khurāsāni’s employment of the distinction between a ḥaqīqī usage and an inshāʾī usage to resolve the apparent difference between ṭalab and irāda is seen by al-Nāʾīnī as a non-starter.

  • 65 Abū al-Qāsim al-Mūsawī al-Khūʾī (1422), Misbāh al-uṣūl, transcribed by Muḥammad Surūr al-Wāʿiẓ, Qum (...)
  • 66 Mūḥammad ʿAlī Ṣanqūr (2011/1432), al-Mu‛jam al-Uṣūlī, 1:620-621.
  • 67 Miṣbāh al-uṣūl,1:255.

36Al-Nāʾīnī’s critique is largely followed, and expanded on, by his own student Abū al-Qāsim al-Khūʾī (d. 1992).65 Al-Khūʾī—whose influence on contemporary Shīʿī legal thought is second to none—employs in his analysis a novel linguistic conception of non-assertoric sentences, taking us back to the discussion about the nature of inshāʾ itself. For al-Khūʾī, a non-assertoric sentence (jumla inshāʾiyya) does not “do things with words” in any sense. It creates neither actions, nor meanings. It is instead assigned to make manifest an internal affair (mawḍūʿa li-ibrāz amr nafsānī). Linguistic convention accepts that whenever one wants to manifest an internal affair or a mental postulate, such as propriety, marriage, or indeed seeking, this is through a non-assertoric sentence.66 Ṭalab is a title for action, be it mental or extra-mental, and thus not capable of being inshāʾī at all.67

Conclusions

37Al-Khurāsānī’s use of the category of inshāʾ, understood as a mode of speech which creates conceptual meaning, allows for him to argue for the identity of ṭalab and irāda despite the phenomenon of commands that seek something without willing it to be. Seeking and willing can be either ḥaqīqī, that is real at the level of the soul of the actor, or they may be inshāʾī, employed to initiate meaning. In the case of seeking something without willing it to be, there is a ṭalab inshāʾī but no ṭalab haqīqī. For al-Khurāsānī, this is exactly the same as saying that in such cases we have irāda inshāʾiyya and no irāda ḥaqīqiyya. The difference between ṭalab and irāda is only in that which is most often associated with the unqualified usage of the two terms, the unqualified usage of ṭalab is usually understood as inshāʾī and the unqualified usage of irāda is usually understood as haqīqī. This accounts for the apparent difference, and fallacious distinction, that is made between ṭalab and irāda by the Ashʿarīs and those who incline towards them from amongst the Twelver Shīʿa.

  • 68 Most notable within this trend, sometimes referred to as ‘the philosophers’ from amongst modern and (...)

38This linguistic argument, arising within the context of uṣūl al-fiqh discussions regarding the meaning and implications of command and the imperative mood, is tied up with al-Khurāsānī’s attempts to problematise the Ashʿarī positing of an internal speech (kalām nafsī) which inheres eternally within the essence of God. The utility and substance of al-Khurāsānī’s arguments in this regard are widely contested by many of his most important students. For example, Ḍīyāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿIrāqī and Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Nāʾīnī argued that al-Khurāsānī’s linguistic argument was neither philosophically tenable nor a sufficient refutation of the theological premises which ground the Ashʿarī view on the nature of God’s speech. In fact, they hold that al-Khurāsānī’s view itself leads to an unacceptable slip to determinism. For more sympathetic readings of al-Khurāsānī’s ideas we would need to turn attention to those who follow in his commitment to and mastery of Sadrian philosophy.68 Whether or not further analysis would take us to the place that al-Khurāsānī described was “beyond the scope of most people’s understanding”, it would be firmly beyond the scope of this paper.

39Here the fundamental aim was simply to emphasise the continued importance and vibrancy of discussions within uṣūl al-fiqh for engaging with Arabic philosophy of language and argument. More specifically, we have seen that the conception and employment of the category of inshāʾ in modern and contemporary uṣūl al-fiqh demonstrate both the usefulness and the limits of reading inshāʾ through the Austinian lens of performatives. For al-Khurāsānī, a command which seeks something without willing it to be is not infelicitous. Irrespective of whether it conforms to the inner state of the speaker, something is inshāʾī for al-Khurāsānī when it creates or initiates meaning—not action. For al-Khūʾī, inshāʾ is neither concerned with the creation of action nor meaning, it simply makes manifest an internal affair. It is now becoming well recognised that pre-modern uṣūl al-fiqh is important for understanding Arabic philosophy generally and linguistic philosophy in particular. The emic account here of al-Khurāsānī’s views on the identity of ṭalab and irāda, and the very lively debates arising from these ideas, should serve to demonstrate that uṣūl al-fiqh continues to be an important forum for Arabic philosophy of language and argument. Finally, it is important to note that the majority of scholars discussed here are not Arabs, emphasizing that the breadth and depth of discussions on Arabic philosophy of language, typical within uṣūl al-fiqh, transcend the ethnic confines of any particular group.

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Notes

1 Exploring the theological nature of Islamic Legal Theory is an established research avenue within Islamic Legal Studies. For an overview of major formative contributions and guiding questions to a body of scholarship that continues to grow see Gleave, Robert (2014), “Deriving Rules of Law”, in Rudolph Peters and Peri Bearman (eds.), The Ashgate Research Companion to Islamic Law, Farnham, Ashgate, p. 66. The focus within this scholarship has, however, been on the interplay between theological doctrines and theories employed for the justification of law and its method, rather than recognising the additional role uṣūl al-fiqh plays as a forum for theological deliberation itself. Just as there is now increasing impetus to recognising the value of reading uṣūl al-fiqh as philosophy, it seems there is still space for reading uṣūl al-fiqh as theology.

2 For example, see contributions to the volume of Adamson, Peter (ed.) (2019), Philosophy and Jurisprudence in the Islamic World, Berlin, De Gruyter, noting the editors’ comments in the introduction: “Jurists often made philosophical contributions. The genre of works devoted to the “principles of jurisprudence” (uṣūl al-fiqh) is the closest thing we have in Islamic civilization to a sustained reflection on philosophy of law,” (p. viii).

3 For example, see the collection of essays in Germann, Nadja and Mostafa Najafi (eds.) (2021), Philosophy and Language in the Islamic World, Berlin, De Gruyter.

4 For example, see Gleave, Robert (2000), Inevitable Doubt: Two Theories of Shīʿī Jurisprudence, Leiden, Brill; Dahlen, Ashk (2003), Islamic Law, Epistemology and Modernity: Legal Philosophy in Contemporary Iran, Abingdon, Routledge and Bhojani, Ali-Reza (2015), Moral rationalism and Sharīʿa: independent rationality in modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, Abingdon, Routledge. For a brief account of Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, including a select bibliography of modern works of Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, see Modaressi Tabātabā’i, Hossein (1984), An Introduction to Shīʿī Law, London, Ithaza Press, p. 7-12.

5 Gleave, Robert (2019), “Sectarianism and Integration: Contemporary Categories and the Prospects for Islamic Legal Studies”, in Sohaira Z.M. Siddiqui (ed.), Locating the Sharī‛a: legal Fluidity in Theory, History and Practice, Leiden, Brill, p. 28-45.

6 Kāẓim Khurasānī, Muḥammad (1431), Kifāyat al-uṣūl, Qum, Majma‛ al-Fikr al-Islāmī, 1:23-24.

7 al-Sīstānī, Sayyid Alī al-Ḥusaynī (1993/1414), al-Rāfid fī ʿilm al-uṣūl, transcribed by Munīr Qaṭīfī, Qum, Maktabat Āyatullāh al-Sīstānī, p. 64-65.

8 Cited in Sayyid Alī al-Ḥusaynī al-Sīstānī, (1993/1414), al-Rāfid, p. 64.

9 I have chosen to render ḥaqīqī as ‘real’, and majāzī in opposition to it as ‘non-real’, avoiding the overly simplistic literal. This choice reflects Gleave’s concerns that the term ‘literal meaning’ has been used ‘generally uncritically’ in the wider secondary literature on uṣūl al-fiqh. Using ‘real’ here also helps maintain consistency in what follows with my rendering of ṭalab ḥaqīqī as ‘real seeking’. On translations of ‘literal meaning’ see Gleave, Robert (2013), Islam and Literalism: Literal Meaning and Interpretation in Islamic Legal Theory, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, p. 55-60. Note that available translations of modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh have generally preferred the more typical rendering of ḥaqīqī as literal, see Bāqir al-Ṣadr, Muḥammad (2007), Lessons in Islamic Jurisprudence, trans. Roy Parvaiz Mottahedeh, Oxford, Oneworld and Bāqir al-Ṣadr, Muḥammad (2013), Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence According to Shi’i Law, trans Arif Abdul Hussain, London, Islamic College of Advanced Studies Press.

10 As al-Sistanī himself notes, this list only refers to the initial chapters of legal theory concerned with textual analysis and referred to as mabāḥith al-alfādh. He does indicate that there is a “further heavy relationship between legal theory and literary concepts” including in the chapters of legal theory that deal with authoritative sources and evidence (buḥūth al-ḥujaj wa al-amārāt) and those that deal with procedural principles (uṣūl al-ʿamaliyya), al-Rāfid, p. 65.

11 See Farzaneh, Mateo Mohammad (2015), The Iranian Constitutional Revolution and the Clerical Leadership of Khurasani, New York, Syracuse University press and Hermann, Denis (2013), “Akhund Khurasani and the Iranian Constitutional Movement”, Middle Eastern Studies 49(3), p. 430-453.

12 al-Amīn, Muḥsin (1983/1407), Aʿyān al-Shīʿa, Beirut, Dār al-taʿāruf lil-maṭbūʿāt, 9:5-6.

13 Gleave, Robert (2018), “Imami Shi’i Legal Theory: From its Origins to the Early-Twentieth Century,”, in Anver M. Emon and Rumee Ahmed (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law, Oxford, Oxford University Press, p. 207-230.

14 There have been subsequent efforts to modernize the curriculum with the introduction of more recent works of uṣūl al-fiqh. Most notable of these are the two-volume work of Muḥammad Riḍā al-Muẓẓafar (d. 1964), titled simply Uṣūl al-fiqh, and the three-volume course by Muḥammad Bāqir al-Ṣadr (d. 1980), titled Durūs fī ʿilm al-uṣūl. Both now play an important role in the training of Shīʿī scholars, but more often than not, these are still approached as preliminaries to studying the Kifāya and its commentaries.

15 Robert Gleave (2018), “Imami Shi’i Legal Theory”, p. 228.

16 al-Iṣfahānī, Muḥammad Ḥusayn (1998/1418), Nihāyat al-dirāya fī sharḥ al-Kifāya, Beirut, Muʾassat Āl al-Bayt li-iḥyā al-turāth, 1:261-2.

17 This is not distinctive of modern Shīʿī uṣūl al-fiqh, for an account and analysis of these themes in pre-modern Sunnī uṣūl al-fiqh see : Weiss, Bernard (2010), The search for God’s Law: Islamic Jurisprudence in the Writings of Sayf al-Dīn al-Āmidī, Salt Lake City, University of Utah Press, p. 322-381; Hallaq, Wael B. (1997), Islamic legal Theories: An introduction to Sunnī uṣūl al-fiqh, Cambridge, Cambridge University press, p. 48-56 and more recently, Farahat, Omar (2018), “Debating the Imperative Mood in Uṣūl al-fiqh: Collective Deliberation and Legal Validity”, ORIENS 46, p. 159-185.

18 al-Khurāsānī points out a range of more delicate examples, including that in the sentence ʾa Zayd li-amr, possibly rendered ‘Zayd came for a purpose’, the word amr has not been used in the meaning of purpose. Actually, it is the particle lām (appearing as li) which indicates purpose, and hence the sentence may be better rendered as ‘Zayd came for the purpose of some thing’. Kifāya, 1:89-90.

19 Here the rendering of fī al-jumla, as ‘in a particular sense’, follows the distinction between this phrase and the contrasting bil-jumla, which might be rendered ‘in a general sense’.

20 Accordingly, if and when the word amr is used to refer to other than the imperative form of the verb it has been used in a non-real or non-literal sense.

21 As discussed below and elaborated upon in his key argument for the identity of ṭalab and irāda, for al-Khurāsānī the ṭalab of an imperative form of the verb is what he calls inshāʾī, it is an initiation or creation of a sense of calling, and does not necessarily indicate a real seeking (al-ṭalab al-ḥaqīqī) at the level of the soul of the speaker Kifāya, 1:100.

22 Possible positions within the debate include: 1) holding that the meaning of the substance of the amr is seeking per se, i.e., it is unqualified (muṭlaq), 2) that the seeker be superior, 3) that the seeker position themselves as superior, 4) the seeker is actually superior and positions themselves as superior, or 5) the seeker is superior and does not lower their own status. See al-Murrawwij, Muḥammad Jaʿfar (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya fī tawḍīḥ al-Kifāya, Qum, Nashr al-fiqāha, 1: 417.

23 Kifāya, 1:91.

24 Kifāya, 1:91.

25 See his notes on tabādur as a sign of literal assignment Kifāya, 1:35.

26 Within these further comments al-Khurāsānī could be read as making reference to the two other signs of literal assignment, widespread occurrence (al-iṭṭirād) and the non-validity of negating the predication (ʿadam ṣiḥḥat al-salb), see Kifāya, 1:36-37.

27 Kifāya, 1:93.

28 Ḍiyā al-Dīn al-‛Irāqī (1435), Nihāyat al-afkār, transcribed by Muḥammad Taqī al-Burūjirdī, Qum, Muʾassasat al-nashr al-islāmī, 1:164.

29 See Larcher, Pierre (1998), “Une pragmatique avant la pragmatique: « médiévale », « arabe » et « islamique »”, Histoire Épistémologie Langage 20(1), p. 101-116 and Vishanoff, David (2021), “Informative and Performative Theories of Divine Speech in Classical Islamic Legal Theory”, in Nadja Germann and Mostafa Najafi (eds.), Philosophy and Language in the Islamic World, Berlin, De Gruyter, p. 191-208.

30 Austin does however note that words spoken seriously, “consist in their being uttered as (merely) the outward and visible sign… of an inward and spiritual act”. So, although the veracity of such utterances cannot be considered with reference to something in the objective, they can be considered against the subjective. For as he goes on to state “it is but a short step to go on to believe or to assume without realizing that for many purposes the outward utterance is a description, true or false, of the occurrence of the inward performance”, Austin, J. L. (2018), How to Do Things with Words, Eastford, Martino Fine Books, p. 9-11. Although a dissonance between outward utterance and inward performance does not usually allow for terming the performative false, when the outer utterance of a performative does not correspond with the inner performance something has gone wrong with the act. Such infelicities, the focus of Austin’s work, manifest in what he terms either misfires or abuses.

31 Bernard G. Weiss (2010/1992), The Search for God’s Law, p. 324.

32 Ṣanqūr, Mūḥammad ʿAlī (2011/1432), al-Muʿjam al-Uṣūlī, Beirut, Muʾassasat al-tārikh al-ʿarabī, 1:376-377 and 1:623-633.

33 Mūḥammad ʿAlī Ṣanqūr (2011/1432), al-Muʿjam al-Uṣūlī, 1:376-377, and 1:620-621.

34 Kifāya, 1:27-28.

35 Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:428.

36 Kifāya, 1:93.

37 An oft cited example is when ‘the water’ is mentioned to Iraqis their mind thinks not of water per se, but of the Euphrates. See Muḥammad Riḍā al-Muẓaffar (1990/1410), Uṣūl al-fiqh, Beirut, Muʾassasat al-ʿalamī, 1:165-166 and Mūḥammad ʿAlī Ṣanqūr (2011/1432), al-Muʿjam al-Uṣūlī, 1:377-381.

38 Kifāya, 1:93 and Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:428-9.

39 Maintaining the fundamental distinction between ṭalab and irāda seems to have become a mainstream view among Shīʿī Uṣūlīs after al-Khurāsānī, and as shall be seen in what follows, it is a position that has been advocated even by a number of al-Khurāsānī’s own students. The reference here, however, is generally read as a pointing to the position of one of his forerunners, Muḥammad Taqī al-Rāẓī al-Iṣfahānī (d. 1833). See Muḥammad Taqī al-Rāẓī al-Iṣfahānī (1429), Hidāyat al-Mustarshidīn fī sharḥ Uṣūl maʿālim al-dīn, Qum, Muʾassasat al-nashr al-islāmī, 1:582-592.

40 Kifāya, 1:94.

41 Kifāya, 1:94.

42 Muḥammad Jaʿfar al-Murawwij (2015), Muntahā al-dirāya, 1:432.

43 Kifāya, 1:94.

44 Kifāya, 1:95

45 Kifāya, 1:95.

46 Kifāya, 1:95

47 See for example, ʿAbd al-Malik bin ʿAbd Allah bin Yūsuf al-Juwaynī (2009/1430), Kitāb al-Irshād ilā qawāṭiʿ al-adilla fi uṣūl al-iʿtiqād, Cairo, Maktaba al-thaqāfa al-dīnīyya, p. 99; Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāẓī (1426), al-Maḥṣūl fī ʿilm uṣūl al-fiqh, Beirut, Muʾassasa al-Risāla, 2:27 and Sʿad al-Dīn al-Taftāzānī (1998), Sharḥ al-Maqāsid, Beirut, ʿĀlam al-kutub, 4:150.

48 Most important among commentaries on the Tajrīd is the Kashf al-murād fī Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād of ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī (d. 1325).

49 Sʿad al-Dīn al-Taftāzānī (1998), Sharḥ al-Maqāsid, 4:145-146.

50 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī ʿalā Tajrīd al-ʿaqāʾid li-l-Ṭūsī: mabḥath al-ilāhiyyāt, Alexandria, Dār al-Wafāʾ, p. 66.

51 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī, p. 67.

52 ʿAlī bin Muḥammad al-Qūshjī (N. D.), Sharḥ al-Qūshjī, p73.

53 Nāṣir Makārim al-Shīrāzī (1414), Anwār al-uṣūl, transcribed by Aḥmad al-Qudsī, Qum, Intishārāt Nasal Jawān, 1:222.

54 Qurʾān, 4:58.

55 Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāẓī (1426), Maḥṣūl, 2:19.

56 Kifāya, 1:98-99.

57 Notwithstanding their emphasis on God’s unqualified agency, it should be noted that the Ashʿarī scholars do not see themselves as proponents of determinism. Instead, they advocate theories of acquisition (kasb), whereby the creation of all acts is directly attributed to God and only acquired by humans at the point of performance. On Kasb, see Claude Cahen and Louis Gardet (2012), “Kasb”, in P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs (eds.), Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1573-3912_islam_COM_0457. On the moral rationalism of Twelver Shīʿī scholars and their rejection of divine command theory see Ali-Reza Bhojani (2015), Moral rationalism and shari‘a and Hashem, Morvarid (2021), “The muʿtazila’s arguments against divine command theory,” Religious Studies, p. 1-18.

58 al-ʿIrāqī, Ḍiyāʾ al-Dīn (1435), Nihāyat al-afkār, p. 163-165.

59 As an example, see al-Khūʾī’s extensive discussion on the nature of God’s speech within the context of his comments on the relationship between ṭalab and irāda; Abū al-Qāsim al-Mūsawī al-Khūʾī (1434), Muḥāḍarāt fī uṣūl al-fiqh, transcribed by Muḥammad Isḥāq al-Fayyāḍ, N.P., Muʾassasat Khūʾī al-Islāmī, 1:362-385.

60 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, Qum, Muʾassasat al-nashr al-islāmī, 1:134.

61 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:131.

62 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:133.

63 For al-Nāīʾnī, ṭalab and irāda are unlike the synonymous terms bashar and insān, which both translate the English word man. Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:131.

64 Muḥammad ʿAlī Al-Kāẓimī (1414), Fawāʾid al-uṣūl, 1:133.

65 Abū al-Qāsim al-Mūsawī al-Khūʾī (1422), Misbāh al-uṣūl, transcribed by Muḥammad Surūr al-Wāʿiẓ, Qum, Maktabat al-Dāwarī, 1:254-260.

66 Mūḥammad ʿAlī Ṣanqūr (2011/1432), al-Mu‛jam al-Uṣūlī, 1:620-621.

67 Miṣbāh al-uṣūl,1:255.

68 Most notable within this trend, sometimes referred to as ‘the philosophers’ from amongst modern and contemporary Shīʿī scholars, are the aforementioned Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Iṣfahāni, ʿAllāma Muḥammad Ḥusayn al-Ṭabaṭabāʾī (d. 1981) and the leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (d. 1989).

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Ali-Reza Bhojani, « Linguistic philosophy in modern uṣūl al-fiqh: al-Ākhund al-Khurāsānī (d. 1911) on seeking something without willing it to be »Methodos [En ligne], 22 | 2022, mis en ligne le 24 mai 2022, consulté le 06 juin 2023. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/methodos/8985 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/methodos.8985

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Ali-Reza Bhojani

University of Birmingham

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