نوع مقاله : مقاله پژوهشی
موضوعات
عنوان مقاله English
نویسندگان English
In most studies that have been conducted so far on the subject of the Seven Principles, these principles have been defined with a reductionist perspective as seven motifs or seven decorative styles, which contain many ambiguous and contradictory points in the presentation of these definitions. In this article, while answering the question of why the seven principles were formulated as the desired artistic expression in the era of Shah Tahmasb Safavid, the difference between the concept of “principle” and “motif and style” is also analyzed in order to provide a basis for refining previous definitions, and specifically the two principles of “Abri” and “Fasali.” During the reign of Shah Tahmasb Safavid, the Shiite jurisprudential discourse broadly encompassed all the affairs of the Safavid monarchy, and focusing on the issue of principles and religious evidence became the primary issue of the government. From this perspective, examining the impact of the Shiite jurisprudential discourse on the issues of artists and artistic affairs is a topic that is of serious necessity in the field of Iranian art history studies. In 947 AH, the Tabriz royal workshop and library were declared dissolved, and according to what Qazi Ahmad Munshi Qomi has mentioned in Golestan-e-Honar, Shah Tahmasp expelled all scribes and painters from the library except for Maulana Dost Mohammad Heravi, who was teaching calligraphy to Shah Tahmasp’s sister at the time. In a preface written in 951 AH on the tomb of Bahram Mirza, Dost Mohammad Heravi speaks about illustration and its relation to Islamic law. Of course, before him, Abdi Beg Shirazi had also devoted a chapter to this matter in the second part of his Ayne-e-Eskandari poem and had spoken about the conformity of the artistic creation of the carvers with the “Asl Sharif.” The purpose of the present article is to examine the artistic developments of the era of Shah Tahmasb from the perspective of the Shiite jurisprudential discourse. Therefore, in this article, while analyzing the epistemological foundations of Imami Shiism, an attempt has been made to examine the relationship between the “Seven Principles” and the “Asl Sharif” in Imami Theology and to show how, in a period when the official discourse of the government was directed towards the semantic system of Imami Shiism, Asl Sharif, as an epistemological basis in the Imami theological tradition, was able to play a fundamental role in the development of the aesthetics of art of this period and provide a religious basis for the official art of the Shah Tahmasb period. In the Imami theological tradition, “Asl Sharif” refers to the two principles of “Reason” and “Narration” as two epistemological approaches, and in the following article, an attempt has been made to reinterpret the two principles of “Abri” and “Fasali” from the perspective of these two epistemological approaches. The Abri principle, with its characteristics such as formlessness, ambiguity, and interference, has been read in connection with the rationalist approach and Mu’tazilite deductive theology and in relation to the principle of reason in Imami theology. On the one hand, the genealogy of this principle in the context of Abbasid art, and on the other hand, the cause and semantic analysis of its emergence, show that the Abri principle is not simply a motif or artistic style but rather carries deep epistemological meanings in relation to rationalist ideas and observes the influence of theological structures on artistic form. In contrast, the Fasali principle, with its characteristics such as figurative and narrative expression, has been analyzed in connection with the principle of narration. By examining examples of 3rd- and 4th-century AH engraved vases and 6th-century AH enameled vases from Kashan, the article emphasizes the connection of this principle with the educational-propaganda method of the Karami Fasalis and the Kashan Hadith school and shows the path of transmission and utilization of the achievements of a different intellectual tradition in Shiite thought. From this perspective, the Fasali principle is a visual form of narrative-centered discourse based on the rule of narration that explains the narrative-figurative expression of Shiite art in terms of Sharia. Examining the two principles of the “Abri” and “Fasali” from the perspective of their relationship with the “Asl Sharif” reveals the semantic aspects and identity functions of the seven principles in relation to the epistemological foundations of Imami theology and shows that the seven principles, beyond the relationships of form and color governing the recurring visual elements (motif) and the rules and structure regulating these relationships (style), refer to deep epistemological meanings and concepts. It should be noted that the formulation of the seven principles in the era of Shah Tahmasb Safavid and at the time of defining national identity based on the Shiite jurisprudential discourse was also based on these semantic aspects. Relying on the analytical-descriptive method and emphasizing library sources, the article, while explaining the difference between “principle,” “method,” and “motif,” presents a new understanding of the essence and function of the seven principles and introduces the seven principles not merely as a formal structure but as a meaning-making structure that, through the mediation of its relationship with the two components of reason and narration, has an epistemological function in the field of Shiite art and transforms art into a tool for explaining the world and giving it meaning. The results of this study show that the seven principles are a structure formed in the heart of a semantic system based on Shia theology, and the comparison of the semantic aspects hidden in the two principles of “Abri” and “Fasali” with the two rules of reason and transmission in the Imami theological tradition reveals that these two rules have been influential as a denotative or semantic aspect in the formulation of these two principles. It is important to note that each of these principles, before undergoing transformation in connection with an “idea” and finding its final form, was prevalent at the level of motif or style and had precedents. For example, the component of “ambiguity and interference” as a prominent aspect expressing the relationships between form and color in the Abri motif and the Abri-making style had a frequent presence in Sansai pottery and Abri silk before finding its denotative aspect in relation to the deductive theology of Mu’tazilite thought and the worldview based on the indivisible element. But Mu’tazilite thought, by giving a semantic aspect to the element of “ambiguity and interference,” projected it within the framework of the rationality of this period and gave the combination of lines and colors a significative aspect that, beyond the visual rules governing the motif or the Abri style, refers to a thought-like dimension outside it. Or in the case of the Fasali principle and its reflection in the enameled pottery of Kashan, the emphasis on the transmission component in the Hadith school of Kashan as one of the prominent centers of Shia in non-Arab Iraq found its appropriate visual expression in the form of a narrative-figurative approach whose ancient roots go back to before the advent of Islam. This issue reveals that in the seven principles, formal relations are defined based on semantic implications, and it is basically this semantic aspect that, by regulating formal relations, elevates “motif” or “style” to the status of “principles” as a determining factor.
کلیدواژهها English
