مبانی غایت‌شناختی تکنولوژی و الگوی صدرایی صنعت با تبیین عقلانیت سوم در تناظر با رویکرد مدرن و پست‌مدرن

Technology, as the dominant paradigm and constitutive force of contemporary human existence, is no longer merely a collection of tools; it has become a mode of being and dwelling in the world that profoundly affects all ontological, epistemological, and ethical dimensions of human life. This pervasive domination has given rise to an existential crisis: modern technology, which defines its telos in terms of efficiency, power, and domination, has been emptied of any transcendent end and has confined humanity within an escalating crisis of meaning. Employing a descriptive-analytical method with a hermeneutic‑critical approach, this article seeks, by re-reading the philosophical foundations of al‑Hikmat al‑Mutaʿāliyya (Transcendent Theosophy), to offer a teleological account of technology that not only functions as a radical critique of modern instrumental rationality and postmodern nihilism but also opens a constructive horizon for overcoming current impasses. The analytical framework of this study rests on an examination of the “final cause” governing technology across three foundational domains:



1. The natural-philosophical and ontological foundations of technology: This section explicates the philosophy of craft/industry and the ideal model of human engagement with nature from the perspective of Transcendent Theosophy. Contrary to the modern view that regards nature as inert, raw matter and merely a resource for exploitation, Transcendent Theosophy, grounded in the principles of the primacy of existence and substantial motion, describes nature as a living, conscious, and continuously evolving reality. Every phenomenon in nature is an ayah (a sign) and a manifestation of Divine Being. From this standpoint, technology cannot be an activity grounded in domination and conquest; rather, it must be understood as a form of cooperation and synergy with nature in its substantial motion toward perfection. This study shows that Mullā Ṣadrā, by offering a coherent model of the philosophy of industry, presents three fundamental crafts—agriculture, textile production, and construction—not simply as economic activities but as wise responses to fundamental and innate human needs (food, clothing, and shelter). These crafts operate through an organic network of preparatory (antecedent) and complementary (subsequent) industries to form an integrated system whose telos is the preservation and elevation of human existence.



2. The epistemological foundations and valuation of the sciences: This domain analyzes the axiological status of the sciences that undergird technology. Modernity, by claiming the value‑neutrality of science, produced knowledge that in practice served power and domination, resulting in instrumental rationality—a reason concerned solely with the “how” of doing things while ignoring questions of “why” and ultimate ends. Transcendent Theosophy, by positing a hierarchy of knowledge, situates the sciences under wisdom and the heart’s intuitive insight. Accordingly, true knowledge is never detached from moral values and transcendent ends. Technology based upon such a epistemic stance will necessarily be morally oriented and serve human perfection rather than the accumulation of power.



3. The anthropological and ethical foundations of technology: This section explicates the desirable relation between technological arrangements, ethical values, and the necessity of balanced development of the human being’s innate dispositions. Sadraean anthropology conceives the human as a graded (multi‑tiered) being—bodily, psychic, rational, and spiritual—whose existential telos is the perfection and actualization of all these levels through substantial motion toward God. Desirable technology is an instrument in service of this journey of perfection: it must meet bodily needs insofar as necessary, while not obstructing a person’s spiritual and moral growth.



The findings of this study clearly demonstrate that Transcendent Theosophy offers a powerful alternative to the modern/postmodern dichotomy. Against the modern approach, which, by emphasizing “dominion over nature” and instrumental rationality, has desacralized the world and trapped humans in an iron cage of bureaucracy and a crisis of meaning, it proposes a model of “synergistic living” and the “sign‑like” character of nature. At the same time, in contrast to the postmodern reaction—which, despite its incisive critique of modern grand narratives, slips into extreme relativism, endless play of signifiers, and bewilderment within a system of simulacra, ultimately resulting in a passive nihilism—Transcendent Theosophy, grounded in a nature‑centered and ethical anthropology, supplies a stable criterion for valuing and orienting technology.



Finally, this article argues that the ends of technology in Transcendent Theosophy are grounded in a “sacred rationality”: a reason that recognizes intuition, ethics, and revelation alongside demonstrative argumentation and that is capable of apprehending the transcendent ends of being. This rationality provides the way out of the modern/postmodern impasse and a horizon for reconstructing the meaning of technology in the contemporary world—a technology that seeks not to dominate nature but to serve the flourishing of the human’s divine disposition and the elevation of human existence.