The beginning and the end

“The beginning and the end” is a treatise on “the Beginning and Resurrection” written by the pre- eminent scholar   “khajeh  Nasir  Tousi”.  

The author

Muhammad Ibn Muhammad Tusi, outstanding scholar, known as “Nasir al-Din”, “Khajeh Tusi”, “The master of man”, “the 11th intellect” and “The 3rd master” (1201 - 1247), Mashhad – Iran.
He was an astronomer and Shia politician, in 1256 lured the assassin leader Rukn al-Din Khurshah into the hands of the Ilkhan Hulegu, accompanied the latter to Baghdad and founded the observatory of Maragha.

He had a strong sympathy with the Twelver Shia, to him a certain degree of mercy was shown during the Mongol holocaust and whose sanctuaries were spared. He wrote on dogmatics, logic and philosophy, law and belles – lettres, and above all on the sciences, in particular on astronomy.
Khajeh Nasir was fully versed at all the common sciences of his own time: theology, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy and literature.
He also wrote some poems in Arabic and Persian. He followed the Peripatetic philosophers (pshilosophers who follow Aristotle) and his own philosophy was based on Avicenna’s.

His masters:
1-    Muhammad Ibn Hasan Tusi “his father” (in transmitted sciences)
2-    Ibn Meytham Bahrani
3-    Muhaghegh Helli
4-    Qutb al-Din Mesri
5-    Farid al-Din Damad

Students:
1-    Qutb al-Din Shirazi
2-    Allameh Helli
3-    Ibn Fuwati
4-    Ibn Heytham Bahrani
5-    Seyyed Rukn al-Din Astar Abaadi,  etc.

Works:
70 works in Arbaic and Persian have been attributed to him but it is doubtfull that some of them to be written by Khajeh Nasir. The following list are some of his works:

1-    Abstraction of beliefs (on theology)
2-    Explanation of the book “Isharat” (written by Avicenna, on philosophy)
3-    The rules of beliefs (on the principles of beliefs)
4-    The Tusi ethics (on ethics and the practical philosophy)
5-    The beginning and the end (on the creation and resurrection, in Persian)
6-    Almagest (on mathematics)
7-    Euclid (on geometry)
8-    Abstraction of logic
9-    The base of extraction (on logic, in Persian)

10- The Ilkhani astronomical tables (on astronomy)
11- The rules of discussions

The book structure

“The beginning and the end” includes subjects on the beginning of Creation. On paradise and Hell and the Day of Judgement, in a theosophical manner the book is composed in 20 chapters:

1- On Resurrection and the features

2- on the Beginning (Mabaa) and Resurrection, the Night of power (Qadr)

3- on the two worlds

4- On place and time

5- On resurrection of Creatures

6- On Paradise and Hell

7- On the straight Road

8- On descending the angels and evils on The Day of Judgement

9- On Reckoning and the ranks on the Day of Reckoning

10- On blowing the trumpet

11- on measuring deeds

12- on the events which will happen on the Day of   Judgement

13- on the doors of paradise and Hell

14-on the brooks existing in paradise and the ones in Hell

16- on dark-eyed damsels

17- Divine prize, justice and retribution, etc.

At the end of the book, the annotations written on each chapter are presented.

Sources

Keywords