It has been often said that after Ibn Sīnā (d. 1037) physicians concentrated on commenting on his Canon of Medicine and only reproduced his thoughts. However, the genre of commentary does not necessarily mean the lack of original contribution. In this paper, by examining al-Tuḥfa al-Saʿdīya by Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī (d. 1311), one of the most widely-known commentaries on the Canon, I shed light upon the condition of the study of medicine in the thirteenth-century Islamic world.

In al-Tuḥfa, al-Shīrāzī referred to commentaries by his predecessors such as Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 1210) and Ibn al-Nafīs (d. 1288) and criticized their annotations. Although he declared in the introduction to al-Tuḥfa that al-Rāzī’s commentary was a “calumny (jarḥ),” not a “commentary (sharḥ), ”he frequently cited al-Rāzī’s arguments and the responses to them made by other commentators. It is apparent that al-Rāzī’s commentary occupied an important position in the tradition of commentaries on the Canon.

In Book 1, Part 1, Lesson 1, Section 1 of the Canon, Ibn Sīnā set forth a philosophical definition of medicine. Al-Shīrāzī explained the structure of this definition, then summarized the doubts which al-Rāzī raised in his commentary and the responses to them. Then, he criticized and refuted the arguments of al-Rāzī and other predecessors. Although al-Rāzī found Ibn Sīnā’s definition inadequate and proposed another definition, al-Shīrāzī defended it against doubts. In commenting on the Canon, al-Rāzī aimed at finding the truth rather than being loyal to Ibn Sīnā, but al-Shīrāzī tried to defend his words by solving the difficulties involved in his definition. This difference of attitude towards Ibn Sīnā between al-Rāzī and al-Shīrāzī shows that the commentators did not merely expound the text of the Canon. They discussed medicine eagerly, examined arguments by predecessors, and criticized each other.

In this article, the author tries to illuminate the characteristic features seen in the socio-military relations in late 19^th-century Iran through the examination of a manuscript entitled Daftar-e estekhdām-e sarbāz, a register stored at the Library of Iran Parliament that gives personal information about the soldiers belonging to the Sixth Shaqāqī Regiment based in the eastern part of Azerbaijan Province.

After the introduction of relevant research till date, the problems therein, and the overview of the army of the Qajar Dynasty and attempts to reform it during the 19^th century, the author first explains the nature of the manuscript by providing information on its physical appearance and manner of presenting information along with its shortcomings as historical material; the author then points out its importance in studying the socio-military history of modern Iran.

In the next part, the author attempts to elucidate the socio-military relations in late 19^th-century Iran based on the information obtained from the manuscript. As a result, the following points become clear: 1) even in that period, when a quasi-Western style army had been established in the area for nearly a century, the army was formed and operated by utilizing the existing social system; 2) contrary to the findings of a lot of relevant research till date, peasants owning means of production (farming tools and draft animals), instead of agricultural laborers, tended to be inducted as soldiers; the government and society’s intention behind this move was possibly to exempt the impoverished laborers from army service, for preserving the society’s production capacity as a whole; 3) the nature of military service seems to have been relatively “loose” for the soldiers, allowing them to nurture their own families, in spite of long-term service, by conducting side businesses, or to escape from the regiment without providing substitutes.

In previous studies concerning the effects of Islamic philosophy on the thought of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 1240), the field of ontology tended to be the focus. However, it is seldom considered how Ibn ʿArabī adopted philosophical theories and concepts of psychology, which is also a central topic in the mystical tradition to which he belongs. In the psychology of Islamic philosophy, the soul (nafs) is divided into three kinds, namely, the rational soul (nafs nāṭiqa), the animal soul (nafs ḥayawānīya), and the vegetative soul (nafs nabātīya), based on the Aristotelian conception. Previous researchers have understood Ibn ʿArabī’s discussions using these terms within the framework of the psychology of Islamic natural philosophy. However, this recognition is not based on sufficient research on his magnum opus, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkīya, or consideration of his intellectual relationship with natural philosophy, comparing it with philosophical texts.

In this paper, I examine Ibn ʿArabī’s discussions on the three kinds of soul in al-Futūḥāt, comparing these with the psychology of natural philosophy as organized in the representative philosophical text written before him, namely, Kitāb al-shifāʾ by Ibn Sīnā (d. 1037). In particular, Ibn ʿArabī’s descriptions of the vegetative soul show the strong effects of natural philosophy. Concerning the rational soul and the animal soul, Ibn ʿArabī —suffering not only the effects of natural philosophy but also the effects of the Sufi psychology, in which theories of the superiority of aspects of the human psyche in terms of nearness to God are advanced—tends to contrast the two souls, giving the former superiority over the latter. Thus, his discussions of the above cannot be fully comprehended only in the framework of natural philosophy. Ibn ʿArabī’s historical role of synthesizing philosophy and mysticism is seen in not only his ontology, but also his psychology.