What does it really mean to say Assalamu’alaikum?

It is not a cultural pleasantry. It is not a polite ritual. It is a prayer—and a promise. Peace be upon you. Not upon an abstraction. Not upon “society” as a statistic. But upon you: the concrete human being standing before me—historical, vulnerable, anxious, hopeful, struggling.

Salam is always addressed to real existence.

This is precisely where Mullā Ṣadrā becomes profoundly relevant. His central metaphysical insight—the primacy of existence (ashālat al-wujūd)—insists that what is most real is not our concepts, but being itself. Existence precedes essence. Reality comes before definition.

If that is true, then the mission of the khalifah—the steward, the bearer of peace—cannot be built upon imaginary “ideal societies” detached from lived experience. It must begin with human beings as they are: fragile yet luminous, restless yet capable of ascent.

Philosophy as a Journey, Not an Escape

Mullā Ṣadrā was not an ivory-tower thinker. In what he called Transcendent Philosophy (al-Ḥikmah al-Muta‘āliyah), he integrated revelation, rational inquiry, and spiritual experience into a single vision. For him, thinking was never neutral. Philosophy was part of the soul’s journey.

In his monumental work, The Four Journeys (Asfār al-Arba‘ah), he maps human existence as a movement:

• from creation toward God,
• with God,
• back to creation, and finally
• guiding others toward God.

This is not mystical poetry detached from reality. It is a framework for responsibility. We are not meant to flee the world in search of private illumination. We are meant to return to it—bearing light.

True salam is not spiritual escapism. It is the courage to descend into reality.

The Human Being Is Becoming

The Qur’an portrays the human being with striking honesty: anxious, easily shaken, inclined toward greed, socially and psychologically fragile. Yet revelation does not end with diagnosis. It offers a path of transformation: prayer that disciplines the inner life, charity that repairs social structures, belief in accountability that orients moral choice, and self-restraint that cultivates freedom from impulse.

Here Ṣadrā’s doctrine of substantial motion (al-ḥarakah al-jawhariyyah) becomes decisive. The human soul is not static. It is in continuous ontological motion. Every act of knowledge, every moral choice, every just or unjust public policy alters the quality of human existence itself.

To be human is not to be fixed. It is to be in motion.

At this point, a cross-civilizational dialogue becomes illuminating.

Martin Heidegger also returned philosophy to the question of Being. He rejected abstract metaphysics and called us back to lived existence—Dasein—thrown into the world, conscious of death, defined by finitude. Here he converges with Ṣadrā in taking existence seriously. But their trajectories diverge. For Heidegger, becoming unfolds under the shadow of nothingness. For Ṣadrā, becoming is ascent—an ontological intensification toward perfection.

Alfred North Whitehead similarly described reality not as static substance but as process. The world is not a collection of inert objects but a web of becoming. Ṣadrā would agree—yet add something decisive: process is not blind. It has orientation. Change is not random; it moves toward fulfillment.

Then comes Friedrich Nietzsche, perhaps the most disruptive voice. He suspected religion of weakening life and declared the “death of God.” His critique of hollow, power-serving religiosity cannot simply be dismissed. Ṣadrā, too, opposed dogma frozen into domination. But his answer was not to abandon transcendence; it was to purify it. Human flourishing requires two wings: disciplined reason and a heart refined through spiritual struggle.

And from another horizon stands Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī—not arguing, but witnessing. His poetry reminds us that beneath these philosophical tensions lies a shared human restlessness. Some call it conscience. Some call it will. Some call it destiny. Ṣadrā calls it the soul’s journey toward its Source.

Direction Changes Everything

The crucial difference between Ṣadrā and many modern thinkers is not whether humans are “becoming.” It is whether becoming has direction.

For Ṣadrā, it does.

There is a horizon. There is an axis. There is a telos—ultimate perfection.

This insight transforms the meaning of the khalifah mission.

Our task is not to force instant perfection upon flawed people. It is to build ecosystems that enable ascent. Education must cultivate depth, not just productivity. Economic systems must protect dignity, not merely generate growth. Public policy must widen the path toward justice. Culture must nourish clarity of heart.

Every social structure is ontologically consequential. It either accelerates ascent—or accelerates decline.

Salam, then, is not merely a greeting. It is civilizational design.

The Question We Cannot Avoid

If existence is more real than our slogans, then a difficult question confronts us:

• Does our salam reach real human beings?
• Do our institutions elevate the soul—or exhaust it?
• Does our knowledge illuminate—or merely inform?
• Does our faith enliven—or domesticate transcendence?

As Rūmī whispers:

“There is a candle within your heart, ready to be lit”

“There is a void within your soul, ready to be filled.”

This cross-temporal conversation does not hand us a final conclusion. It offers a map.

The rest is an existential decision.

To reaffirm the mission of salam is to approach human beings as they truly are—and, with patience, knowledge, and action, to help them become who they are meant to be.

The journey does not begin in theory.

It begins when we say:

Assalamu’alaikum.

And mean it.

Notes:

A broader and more in-depth explanation can be found in Caliphate as Cosmic Synthesis: The Fusion of Mula Sadra’s Wisdom and Global Responsibility (Uzair Suhaimi, forthcoming, Nasmedia). The PDF version is available at this [link].