Abstract

Ghiyas-ul-din Mansour Dashtaki was a famous thinker who wrote on issues ranging from jurisprudence,logic,philosophy,gnosis and interpretation to literature, mathematics, medicine and astronomy. He is well known for his rebuttals to the opinions held by Jalal-ul-din Dawani reflecting his juvenile, quarrelsome attitude in them. Dashtaki developed a much milder attitude later in his life and adopted a less controversial view in debates. This shift of attitude made him even praise Dawani in some of his later books.Dashtaki cannot be regarded as a first-rate philosopher but undoubtedly he contributed a lot to the school of Shiraz which came into existence between the 7th and 9th centuries and reached its highest status at his time.His mastery of wisdom, however, is beyond question. Concentrating his efforts on moderating the schools of Illumination and Peripateticism, Dashtaki was inclined to observe illuminationist considerations in his works, although he also taught peripatetic Principles at all levels. This led him to say that many truths became known to him through intellectual intuition.As for theology,Dashtaki advocated a purely demonstrable analysis lashing out at theologians including Imam Mohammad Ghazali for what he called "the inflexibility and shallowness" of their debates.Turning to gnosis,Dashtaki has elaborated on the unity of being and unity of divine acts and in quite a few cases speaks of spread of love in all beings thus revealing the deep influence of gnostics such as Muhy-al-din Ibn Arabi on him. Finally,his interpretation contains a theological perspective focusing on the Quran and traditions. To conclude,one can say that transcendent wisdom is clearly manifested in Dashtaki's works. Yet,he had to wait for Mulla Sadra to introduce a new school in which his ideas could gain solidity and perfection.