Saeed Moghadas; ahmad behashti
Volume 5, Issue 2 , November 2014, , Pages 89-112
Abstract
Are ‘Divine freedom’ and ‘necessity of His will and action’ compatible? There are two different answers to this theological question: compatibilism, which confirms the compatibility of these doctrines, and incompatibilism, which claims that those beliefs are incompatible. Compatibilists ...
Read More
Are ‘Divine freedom’ and ‘necessity of His will and action’ compatible? There are two different answers to this theological question: compatibilism, which confirms the compatibility of these doctrines, and incompatibilism, which claims that those beliefs are incompatible. Compatibilists advocate their position through two distinct approaches; the first approach presents five reasons that why necessity of divine will and action are consistent with His freedom, while the second, without arguing directly, claims that incompatibilism implies attribution of contingency to God, so accepting compatibilism is the only way to avoid such a false consequence. These two approaches, however, have not been immune from the criticisms of contemporary incompatibilists. In this article I want to explain compatibilist views and review their contemporary criticisms.
Mohammad Saeedimehr; Saeed Moghaddas
Volume 3, Issue 2 , October 2013, , Pages 99-123
Abstract
There are two main philosophical theories concerning the explanation of the relation between the causal necessity and the human freedom: 1. Compatibilism, which believes that the causal necessity is compatible with the human freedom, and incompatibilism, which sees these two incompatible. Allamah Tabatabaii ...
Read More
There are two main philosophical theories concerning the explanation of the relation between the causal necessity and the human freedom: 1. Compatibilism, which believes that the causal necessity is compatible with the human freedom, and incompatibilism, which sees these two incompatible. Allamah Tabatabaii proposes a specific version of compatibilism based on the notion of “comparative contingency” (al-imkan al-bilqiyas). According to his theory, the principle of causal necessity does not require more than that the human free action possess comparative contingency in comparison with the human agent and comparative necessity in comparison with its complex perfect cause (al-illah al-tammah). Moreover, the very nature of the human freedom is nothing but the action’s being contingent in relation to his agent. Therefore, the causal comparative necessity of the action in relation to its complex perfect cause does not contradict its being free. This compatibilist view has been challenged by some contemporary philosophers. In this paper we first give a short explication of Tbatabaii’s theory and then examine the arguments of its critics.
