The subject of this study is Mír Dámád's theory of perpetual creation and the trifold division of existence into time, perpetuity, and eternity, as explained in Dámád's greatest philosophical work, Kitáb al-Qabasát , which he completed about six years before his death. Mír Dámád (d. 1631) was one of the founders of the "School of Isfahán," a term used to describe the group of Islamic philosophers who contributed to the philosophical renaissance that blossomed under the Safavid dynasty in early seventeenth century Iran. Mír Dámád was the teacher of one of Iran's best known philosophers, Mullá Sadrá. Unlike his student, who has been the subject of numerous books and articles in European languages, Mír Dámád is less well known, and of his many works only al-Qabasát has been critically edited. Given the importance of Mir Dámád as one of the greatest philosophers of the Safavid Renaissance, who is known for his unique contributions to the study of time and creation, this first full-length study and analysis of al-Qabasát fills a gap in the academic literature on the period and will help to make Mír Dámád's thought better understood and appreciated in the West.
In al-Qabasát , Mír Dámád sets out to demonstrate on the basis of Peripatetic principles that the universe as a whole, in both its immaterial and material dimensions, is created and preceded by real non-existence, not in time, but at the level of perpetuity, which is a domain that, encompasses and causes time. He takes this position against both the philosophers who adovcated the eternity of the world and the theologians who advocated its creation in time. In this dissertation, the historical background of the debate over the universe's creation versus its eternity is first introduced. Each stage of Mír Dámád's demonstration, which actually consists of a series of demonstrations, as it occurs in the first seven chapters of al-Qabasát is then explained and analyzed, after which selected subsidiary topics introduced by Mír Dámád in the last three chapters of al-Qabasát are presented and explained. My contention is that Mír Dámád succeeds in demonstrating, on rational grounds, the need for a perpetual dimension existing between time and eternity where the perpetual creation of all contingent existents takes place. He does not succeed, however, in proving the creation of the prime matter of the universe.
