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The Soul of the Earth - Towards an Ecological Ontology

Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This essay argues that the ecological crisis demands a reconstruction of the classical concept of soul — and, independently of it, a jurisprudence of rights extending to non human beings. It rethinks six commitments of the Aristotelian soul-hierarchy and shows Deloria's critique of the "Greek" lineage ( essence-first, dead-matter, human-as-measure). Mulla Ṣadrā's revolution of existence over essence had partially addressed these issues in the Islamic philosophical tradition, while the Qurʾānic doctrine of universal glorification (Q 17:44, "but you do not understand their glorification") grounds an epistemology of reverent attention, convergent with Deloria's method. The essay's central claim is juridical: in both traditions the non-human world is not material awaiting valuation but witness already speaking and testimony finds its home in the court. Drawing on the Twelver hadith corpus and Javadi Amoli's Mafātīḥ al-Ḥayāt, it documents this covenantal structure at three levels — the fiqh of animal rights (food, rest, lineage, friendship, and the ḥurma of the face that "glorifies God with praise"), and further shows that the awaited Mahdī's renewal (rajʿa) to be not a supernatural supplement but a restoration of the rights of the earth. On animal souls it proposes a Ṣadrian settlement: survival itself is graded, individual continuance remains open, yet no suffering is metaphysically inconsequential, since all accounts are settled. It concludes with a pluriverse (ontologies bound by shared juridical structure and mutual corrections): liability and restitution to the wronged population, the daily ṣadaqa of the commons, and environmental enforcement (ḥisba) re-founded on the rights of water, air, and soil.
DOI: 10.17613/sv2f9-nqb13
Author: Ali, Altaf
Language: English
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7208715545
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