Mir Fendereski

Mir Fendereski or Mir Findiriski (Persian: میرفِنْدِرِسْکی)‎ (1562–1640) was a Persian[1] philosopher, poet and mystic of the Safavid era. His full name is given as Sayyed Mir Abulqasim Astarabadi (Persian: سید ابولقاسم استرآبادی), and he is famously known as Fendereski. He lived for a while in Isfahan at the same time as Mir Damad, spent a great part of his life in India among yogis and Zoroastrians, and learnt from them. He was patronized by both the Safavid and Mughal courts.[2] The famous Persian philosopher Mulla Sadra also studied under him.[3]

Bust of Mir Fendereski

Life

Mir Fendereski remains a mysterious and enigmatic figure about whom we know very little.[2] He was probably born around 1562-1563 and died age of eighty.[2]

Mir Fendereski was trained in the works of Avicenna as he taught the Avicennian medical and philosophical compendiums of al-Qanun (The Canon) and Al-Shifa (The Cure) in Isfahan.

Works

A number of works are attributed to him, although these have not been studied in detail. In his extensive commentary on the Persian translation of the Mahabharata (Razm-Nama in Persian) and the philosophical text of the Yoga Vasistha he complains about the quality of the translation, which implies that he was familiar with Sanskrit. He was among a group of Persians at the Mughal court to engage with Indian thought.

Some of his most famous works are "Resâle Sanaie", "Resâleh dar kimiyâ" and "Šahre ketabe mahârat", in Persian language. He was also a poet and composed a long philosophical ode (qaṣida ḥekmiya) in imitation of and response to the Persian Ismaʿili thinker Nasir Khusraw. His best-known work is titled al-Resāla al-ṣenāʿiya, an examination of the arts and professions within an ideal society. The importance of this treatise is that it combines a number of genres and subject areas: political and ethical thought, mirrors for princes, metaphysics, and the critical subject of the classifications of the sciences.[2]

See also

Notes
  1. Hossein, Nasr, Seyyed. "Findiriskī". Encyclopedia of Islam, second edition, Brill. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  2. Encyclopedia Iranica, "Mir Fenderski" by Sajjad. H. Rizvi
  3. Fazlur Rahman, The Philosophy of Mullā Ṣadrā (Ṣadr Al-Dīn Al-Shirāzī), SUNY Press, 1975

Further reading


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