A Road Map for the Islamization for the Human Sciences

Republished : An Interview with Allameh Misbah Yazdi

(Part One)

Subject of the event: Islamic Human Sciences

Location: Imam Khomeini Educational and Research Institute, Qom, Iran

Date: 1389 S.H. (2010)

Abstract

Allameh Misbah Yazdi takes up the topic of the interview by expanding on three principal points. The first point is the definition of "the human sciences." The definition of the human sciences takes the first place, for it functions as a necessary conceptual presupposition (mabda' taswwuri) in relation to the other two points and as such logically precedes them. The second point concerns the fact that certain human sciences form the matrix in which the other human sciences may develop. The third point deals with the role and function of religion vis-a-vis the human sciences.

Elaborating on the first point' Allameh Misbah Yazdi remarks that the definition and precise boundaries of the human sciences are a matter of convention, and hence it would be absurd to endeavor to determine them scientifically or philosophically. This means that every individual or institution may offer a distinct definition of the human sciences based on the peculiar purpose and objective involved. Thus, to speak of the various definitions offered of the human sciences is largely a historical examination and assessment of the various conventions and agreements that undergird these diverging definitions.

Misbah Yazdi continues by explaining that the basic sciences that provide the framework for the development of other sciences vary in scope. Some basic sciences serve as the basis of all other sciences. Traditional philosophers maintain that metaphysics and epistemology form the basis of all other sciences, human and non-human alike. According to these same philosophers, there are certain sciences, however, that precede and underlie only a certain number of other sciences-such as philosophical anthropology, which is the basis on which all other human sciences develop but is irrelevant to non-human sciences.

Concerning the third point, Allameh Mibah Yazdi explains that based on those definitions of religion that place it in the same category with myth, magic, and superstition or, at the very best, hold it to be a body of unfounded beliefs, religion is detrimental to science. But based on our definition-that is, a set of beliefs whose content partake of objective truth and         are supported by rational reasoning, an assertion that is true even of its purely dogmatic content in that even this portion of religion is ultimately supported by reason and rational reasoning-religion, on the one hand, complements the sources on which the human sciences draw and, on the other hand, enriches empirical and non-empirical knowledge.

Interviewers:

Dr. Mohammad Fanaei, PhD in Philosophy of Religion, Full professor of Imam Khomeini Educational and Research Institute

Dr. Ali Mesbah, Doctor of Philosophy of Religion, Associate Professor of Imam Khomeini Educational and Research Institute

Dr. Mahmoud Namazi Esfahani, PhD in Philosophy of Religion, Assistant Professor of Imam Khomeini Educational and Research Institute

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