"Sadr al-Din Muhammad Shirazi, more commonly called Mulla Sadra (1572-1640), was one of the grand scholars of the later period of Islamic philosophy and has become one of the best known Muslim philosophers. Originally composed in Arabic, Iksir al-arifin, or Elixir of the Gnostics, may well be unique among Sadra's writings because it reworks and elaborates on an earlier work in Persian, the Jawidan-nama (The Book of the Everlasting) by Afdal al-Din Kashani, commonly known as Baba Afdal." "The underlying theme of Elixir is a teaching that stands at the heart of Mulla Sadra's writings and those of many other Muslim thinkers: the importance of self-knowledge in each person's journey of "Origin and Return." Each soul originates with God, and one's journey is completed only when the soul has returned to Him. Self-knowledge is the means by which the soul, having been created in the divine image, must realize its full and final potential; and philosophy, in Sadra's view, is the most direct path to that end. Sadra sees the soul's climb to perfection as a gradual dis-engagement from all embodiment and materiality and a return to her transcendent essence. The returning soul comes to se that all realities and essences are found in the Intellect from which all things have descended, and that their corporeal appearance is a temporary affair."--BOOK JACKET.