God, Science and Islam
By Khalid A.
London , UK
The religious zealots have highjacked our political scene. They are gleefully dragging the nation towards medieval era using Islam as a slogan of the so-called piety and Puritanism.
One cause of decline of the Islamic civilization was the mixing of religion with politics. But I would like to state that an equally important reason for our historical decline has been the false belief of Muslim clerics that anything modern is essentially un-Islamic. Here I may quote the following examples:
1. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan's epic struggle for educating the Muslim masses was strongly opposed by the clerics who believed that the English language was inherently un-Islamic. They refused to believe that all languages are Allah's creation. They failed to realize that Allah had sent numerous Prophets who delivered the Divine message in numerous languages.
2. Modern gadgets like loudspeakers, cameras and radio were considered 'satanic', about 50 years ago.
3. The printing press was initially banned by the Ottoman Empire. The Guild of Writers declared that it was a 'devil's invention'. Subsequently, they allowed it with the condition that printing will be allowed only in Hebrew.
4. TV Channel 4 in UK recently showed a copy of the Holy Qur’an in Venice, printed 500 years ago. They reported that this is perhaps the last and only copy left, because the Muslim clerics of that era refused to accept the mechanically printed version of the holy book.
The following major events can be considered as 'milestones' in our disastrous journey towards regression, degeneration and decay:
1. 1258 AD. Muslims' failure to protect their treasure of knowledge when Baghdad was ransacked by the Mongols.
2. Circa 1492 AD. Muslims' failure to protect Hispania from the Europeans who were culturally still living in the dark ages. This was the time when Columbus discovered America and his discovery provided vast natural resources to the Europeans.
3. 18th & 19th Century. Ottomans and other Muslim nations ignored the Industrial Revolution and considered modern science as anti-God.
4. Printing process was more difficult in Eastern languages because the scripts did not allow easy typecasting. Even so, when the Arabic Qur’an was printed 500 years ago, there was no enthusiasm on our part to publish our great treasures of knowledge in the fields of Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics and Chemistry. Allama Iqbal says:
Magar woh ilm ke moti, kitabein apne aabaa ki
Jo dekhein un ko Europe mein to dil hota hai see paara!
Our apathy towards Science is based on the fallacy that the Sciences are in competition with God. In fact, all the laws of Sciences are Allah's creation. Man is only trying to understand the Divine laws of nature. As soon as Allah created the earth and heavens, the laws of Sciences were born. Then Adam was taught 'names' by the Almighty (See Sura Baqr) . That was the start of our lessons in Science. Need one say that neglecting Sciences is un-Islamic?
