ʿadam

عدمʿadam

Preferred translation: non-existence
Also rendered contextually as: absence, non-attainment, privation
Grammatical variants: privative
Technical sense: privation
Distinguish from: wujūd (existence) — wujūd is existence; ʿadam is its privation, the non-existence of what is of a kind to exist.

General Technical Meaning

Privation/non-existence is the absence of what is of a kind to exist.

In ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī’s Works

In the account of good and evil, ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī relates evil to the absence of a perfection a thing ought to possess. Not every use of ʿadam in the treatise is this privative kind; some uses are unqualified non-existence.

Source: Risālat al-Manāmāt wa-l-Nubuwwāt

Read in context

Open a passage in the edition where this term is linked.

On Dreams and Prophecies · Chapter Three — Effects Issuing from the Human Being by Will Differ in Strength and Weakness · passage 4
On Dreams and Prophecies · Chapter Five — On Good and Evil, the Beneficial and the Harmful · passage 1
On Dreams and Prophecies · Chapter Six — That Among Human Acts There Is Mutual Crowding · passage 5
On Dreams and Prophecies · Chapter Six — That Among Human Acts There Is Mutual Crowding · passage 6
On Dreams and Prophecies · Chapter Eight — How Knowledge Is Acquired by the Human Being · passage 1
Tafsīr al-Mīzān · al-Aʿrāf 7:180–186
Tafsīr al-Mīzān · Author’s Introduction

Canonical address: /glossary/adam/