From Essence to Being

From Essence to Being Synopsis

In a unique parallel analysis, Muhammad Kamal delves into the most controversial subjects of Islamic and Western existential philosophy. He explores the philosophical turn, ontological difference, becoming, and nothingness in the ontology of Mulla Sadra and Martin Heidegger. He shows how they both held Being as the sole reality and opposed Platos metaphysics as an established philosophical tradition, which led to in Heideggers words the oblivion of Being. As Kamal explicates, Heideggers opposition to Plato became manifest in his deconstruction of the history of ontology, while Mulla Sadras opposition to Plato was through his criticism of Suhrawardis doctrine of the principality of essence. These new interpretations of being by two philosophers brought new life to both Islamic and Western schools of philosophy and have formed the basis of much of modern ontology, epistemology, and philosophical psychology.