In the year 1924 I had the privilege of studying for a few months under Dr. Duncan B. Macdonald of Hartford Theological Seminary, and of reading with him the Arabic creed of An-Nasafi, a concise statement of the tenets of the Sunnite Muslims. Before leaving Hartford, I asked Dr. Macdonald to outline a course of study which I might profitably follow after returning to my work in Persia. He suggested that I should try to find a Shi‘ite creed, similar to that of An-Nasafi, and translate it into English, since no adequate statement of Shi‘ite doctrines was available for English readers.

Persian Sources

1. Amuzish Aqaed; Muhammad Taqi Misbah Yazdi; Tehran; Sazman Tablighat Islami; 8th edition; 1371.

2. Ashnai ba Ulum Islami; Murtadha Mutahhari; Tehran; Sadra; 6th Edition; 1367.

3. Amuzish Falsafah; Muhammad Taqi Misbah Yazdi; Tehran; Sazman Tablighat e Islami; 3rd Edition; 1367.

4. Akhlaq; Pierre Jeane; Tr. Badrudin Kitabi; Isfahan” Amuzish wa Parwarish; 1373.

5. Akhlaq; Spinoza; Tr. Muhsin Jahangiri; Tehran: Markaz e Nashr Danishghahi; 2nd Edition; 1376.

Introduction

Another one of the most important discussions in the Philosophy of Ethics that has extraordinary practical effects for individuals and societies is whether ethical rules and values are absolute or relative. In other words, are ethical values, rules and principles the product of social, psychological, cultural and other factors and the likes of these such that the former would change and vary with changes and variations [that should happen to occur] in the latter? Or are ethical values stable and perennial things such that the changes in time and place would have no effect upon them?

Another one of the concepts that has long drawn the attention of the philosophers of ethics towards itself is the concept of ‘ethical responsibility’. We will also attempt to point out some of the dimensions of this problem in this chapter and to answer some of the [fundamental] questions that have been mentioned regarding this topic. Some of those problems are the following: What it is the meaning of responsibility? Does being responsible mean that one deserves praise and or scorn?

In the beginning it will be beneficial to remind our readers that the term ‘ethical value’ and ‘value concepts’ in the works dealing with ethics have at least two different usages. In the midst of the preceding discussions, we became acquainted with one of these terms and that is the division of the predicates used in ethical propositions into value concepts and concepts that are of an imperative nature.

In the first chapter we stated that the most important discussions of the Philosophy of Ethics are the following three general discussions: (1) discussions revolving around the meanings [of ethical concepts], (2) the logical connections [between ethical propositions] and (3) epistemological discussions surrounding ethical propositions. The main axis around which the discussions that we have conducted up till now have revolved have been the meaning of ethical concepts.

We previously stated that the concepts that are employed as predicates in ethical statements can be divided into two universal categories: obligations and values. In the previous chapter we discussed in detail concepts that serve as obligations (must and must not). Now we intend to examine value concepts.

In the previous chapter, we mentioned some general points regarding the predicates of ethical propositions and explained some theories regarding the definability and source of ethical concepts. It is only fitting that we now separately examine both those concepts that convey ethical values and those that serve as commands in ethical propositions. The reason for this is that the ideas that serve as predicates in ethical propositions can be divided into these two groups and manifold opinions have been expressed with regards each of them.

Ethical Concepts