On the Persian Translations of Avicenna’s Ilāhiyyāt

Abstract

The present study is intended to give a brief description of the translations from Arabic to Persian of Ilāhiyyāt ([Science of] Divine Things) of Kitāb al-Šifāʾ (Book of The Healing) by Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna), with particular reference to the manuscripts that are currently preserved in Iran and India. A complement to the present research will be a systematic survey of other possible testimonia of the translations in question, preserved in the geographical areas of the Middle East. The second objective of the article is to present some hypotheses relating to the manuscripts consulted, mostly dating from the period of the Safavid dynasty (XVIXVIII c.), an epoch of extraordinary cultural vitality testified to by the large number of comments and glosses on the works of the ‘great teachers’, as well as by the major circulation of manuscripts in Iran and in the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent.