Divine Agency/Action

The Iranian Association for the Philosophy of Religion, in cooperation with Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), presents:

Theme: Divine Agency/Action Conference Themes Divine Agency/Action in the History of Thought and Religions

• Divine agency/action in Western philosophy (Aristotle, Plato, the Neoplatonists, etc.)
• Divine agency/action in Eastern philosophy (Indian philosophy, Chinese philosophy, etc.)
• Divine agency/action in Islamic philosophy (Avicenna [Ibn Sīnā], Suhrawardī, Mīr Dāmād, Mullā Ṣadrā, etc.)
• Divine agency/action in Islamic theology and Jewish and Christian theology
• Divine agency/action in mysticism
• The semantics of divine actions

Semantics of Divine Action

• Conceptual analysis of action in the divine and human realms (equivocity, univocity, etc.)
• The semantics of direct and indirect divine action
• The semantics of general and particular divine action
• The conceptual distinction between action and related concepts in the divine realm (causality, origination, creation, etc.)
• The conceptual relationship between divine agency/action and opposing concepts (hiddenness, silence, etc.)
• The semantics of propositions concerning divine actions

Ontology of Divine Agency/Action

• Models of divine agency/action (agency/action by manifestation, agency by intention, agency by consent, etc.)
• God and causality (quantum indeterminism models, top-down causation, vertical and horizontal causality, etc.)
• Theories of general and particular divine action and their relation to the laws of nature
• Divine agency/action and human beings (theories of free will, divine decree and destiny, kasb [acquisition], etc.)

Epistemology of Divine Agency/Action

• Naturalistic and non-naturalistic accounts of divine agency/action
• Cognitive biases in attributing actions to nature or to God
• Criteria for identifying divine agency/action

Methodology of the Study of Divine Agency/Action

• Modeling divine agency/action (primary and secondary causation, divine interaction, continuous creation, quantum models, etc.)
• Challenges in modeling divine agency/action and criteria for evaluating models
• Methods of critical interaction between science and theology in the study of divine agency/action
• Source-based approaches to the study of divine agency/action (revelation, tradition, experience, etc.)
• Phenomenological approaches to the study of divine agency/action

Competing Theories of Divine Agency/Action

• Naturalism
• Deism
• Pantheism

Academic Board

1. Rahim Achar (Marmara University, Turkey)
2. Khalil Rahman Achar (Ankara University, Turkey)
3. Mehdi Akhavan (Allameh Tabataba’i University, Iran)
4. Reza Akbari (Imam Sadiq University, Iran)
5. Amir Abbas Alizaman (University of Tehran, Iran)
6. Saeed Anvari (Allameh Tabataba’i University, Iran)
7. Mohammad Asghari (University of Tabriz, Iran) (now correctly placed)
8. Ahmad Asgari (Shahid Beheshti University, Iran) (now correctly placed)
9. Hamidreza Ayatollahi (Allameh Tabataba’i University, Iran)
10. Ebrahim Azadegan (Sharif University of Technology, Iran)
11. Reza Berenjkar (Farabi Campus of University of Tehran, Iran)
12. Ghodratollah Ghorbani (Kharazmi University, Iran)
13. Abdolrazzagh Hesamifar (Imam Khomeini International University, Qazvin, Iran)
14. Hossein Houshangi (Imam Sadiq University, Iran)
15. Mansour Imanpour (Shahid Madani University of Azerbaijan, Iran)
16. Mohsen Javadi (University of Qom, Iran)
17. Ramazan Mahdavi Azadboni (University of Mazandaran, Iran)
18. Jahangir Masoudi (Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran)
19. Tedeus Metz (University of Pretoria, South Africa)
20. Narges Nazarnejad (Alzahra University, Iran)
21. Rasoul Rasoulipour (Kharazmi University, Iran)
22. Mehdi Saatchi (Shahid Motahari University, Iran)
23. Mohammad Saeedimehr (Tarbiat Modares University, Iran)
24. Klaus von Stosch (University of Bonn, Germany)
25. Gholamhossein Tavakoli (University of Isfahan, Iran)
26. Aydin Topaloglu (Istanbul University, Turkey)
27. Edward Wierenga (University of Rochester, USA)

Conference Chair: Reza Akbari

Scientific Secretary: Majid Mollayousefi

Conference Dates: 17–18 November 2026

Abstract Submission Deadline: 18 September 2026

Notification of Acceptance: 9 October 2026

Venue: Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU)

The conference will be held in a hybrid format (both virtually and in person)

Submission Guidelines

To register for CPR2026, you must first submit your abstract through the conference submission page. (here)

To submit an abstract, you should prepare the following:

• An abstract of 200–350 words
• At least three keywords
• Author information, including:
  • Full name(s)
  • Current academic status or highest academic degree
  • Institutional affiliation (authors who prefer not to list an institution may use the designation “Independent Scholar”)
  • Email address(es)
  • Contact phone number(s)

Submitted abstracts will be reviewed by the conference referees and will receive one of the following decisions: Accepted, Rejected, Accepted subject to revisions

The registration fee is payable only after the abstract has been accepted. Authors must send a scanned copy or photograph of the payment receipt in reply to the acceptance email.

Authors whose papers are selected for oral presentation are expected to submit an extended abstract of approximately 2,000 words to the conference secretariat before the conference.

Authors may submit multiple abstracts. However, after peer review and acceptance, only one single-authored paper and one co-authored paper per author will be published.

Registration Fees

• University faculty members, seminary instructors, and non-student participants: 100 €
• University students and seminary students: 50 € (upon presentation of student identification)

Note: Payment instructions will be provided to authors of accepted abstracts. Catering costs during the conference will be calculated separately and announced to participants before the conference.

High-resolution conference poster

Conference Secretariat Contact

Phone: +98 902 908 0340

Email:[email protected]