Abstract

Muhammad Husayn Tabataba’i (1904-1981), popularly known as ‘Allamah’, is one of the most important Muslim thinkers of the last hundred years, particularly amongst the Shi’a. While known especially for his ’tafsir’, Tabataba’i was also a highly regarded expert in Islamic philosophy, and his two textbooks (’Bidayat al-Hikmah’ and ’Nihayat al-Hikmah’) are required reading in the Shi’a religious schools (popularly known as the ’hawzah’). This paper will look at how Tabataba’i expounds in his advanced textbook on a proof for the existence of God called the proof of the veracious (’burhan al-siddiqin’), which starts with existence itself and not any specific existent. It is hoped that the reader will gain insight not only into one important way certain Muslim philosophers have argued for the existence of God, but also get an idea how these proofs are presented to students of the ’hawzah’