For over fourteen centuries, the Holy Quran and the Hadiths (sayings) of our beloved Prophet (PbuH) has brought light into the lives of billions of people. Their magical (in the sense of breath taking) narration, timeless advice/warnings, and miraculous scientific correctness has put no doubt in Muslims’ mind that the Quran is a revelation from Almighty God (Allah) and Prophet Muhammad is the (final) messenger of God. The Bedouin Arabs of the pre-Islamic era (called the ‘Jahiliyah’ period in the Muslim world, meaning the era of ignorance and darkness) – who would bury their daughters alive due to the ‘shame’ they may bring in their adulthood, have become Master Mathematicians, Astronomers, Architects, Philosophers in a matter of a few centuries…
Islam’s enlightening effect did not only affect the Arabs but also the Turks who would embrace Islam in the 10th century and go on to found the Ottoman State (not an ’empire’) in 1299. The Ottomans would become ‘Super-power’ of the world for the large part of the six centuries they have been in existence. The Turks were known for their strength, brutality and anarchic nature before Islam. This barbaric population would then become a symbol of tolerance in the way that they allowed Christians and Jews to live alongside Muslims without any fear of harm and under the protection of the law – even when they had the strength to wipe them off the face of the Earth, just like the Roman Empire did. They did not do this because it would be against the peace advising religion they believed in.
Al Jazaari
So what has gone wrong? Why did the Muslims become what they have become today? From the days of Salahaddin Ayyubi, Sultan Mehmet ‘The Conqueror’, Sultan Suleiman ‘The Magnificent’, Halid bin Walid, Omar bin Hattab – leaders who were well ahead of their time, to the dictators we see in the Muslim world today and the near past. It is a broad question but to answer it simply, it is because the Muslims have forgotten what the Quran and the Prophet had advised them: Try to understand yourself and the things Allah has created; this way Muslims would always keep their faith alive while also making discoveries that would help mankind. A Muslim should always find a way to improve their Imaan (faith) and spread the love of Islam not just for his relatives but for the whole of creation…
Between the 9th and 14th centuries, just two centuries after Islam was founded in Arabia, Muslims were renowned as masters of a variety of scientific and sociological fields. Arabic had become the language of knowledge and every scientist of the era would learn it to communicate with their colleagues in their respective fields. Islamic city of Baghdad (present day Iraq) was the ‘home of knowledge’ and scientific literature from all over the world would be made available in the Arabic language in the ’House of Wisdom’ to visiting scientists along with many observatories and libraries. They would all try to understand the Creator through studying his creation. That is why they have made many discoveries as well as improving many of the theories of the past scholars of Greek, Indian and Chinese background.
This enthusiasm to understand the natural world among the Muslim ‘ummah‘ (community as a whole) seems to be lost for the good part of the last two centuries. This has coincided with the decline of the Ottoman Empire which is indicative of a need of a new leader in the Muslim world just like the Caliphs aforementioned. However, even though the performance of Muslims stalled in the natural sciences, the Holy Quran still shines like a star even with the latest scientific discoveries, standing the ‘age of science’ – the era we’re living in. Only the fact of not containing errors is a miracle on its own. Though, it is sad to see that it is not Muslims who are contributing to the findings of these important scientific facts. It has become common practice for Muslims to say that ‘the Quran had that fact in it all along’ straight after a discovery is made by Western (non-Muslim) scientists. This is why we have let the Quran and the Prophet down. If that fact was in the Quran all along why didn’t we discover it well before others have done so? This is why Muslims scientists should make it a priority to reunite and ask for scholars of all areas to come forward and build consortia where they would study the Quran, the Hadith and the other Islamic literature (such as the Masnawi of Mawlana Jalalladdin Rumi, Risalei Nur of Bediuzzaman Said Nursi) extensively and then come up with hypotheses which they could test…
A few questions that pops up in one’s mind:
1- It would be a breakthrough to find Prophet Noah’s Ark where the Quran has told it had landed (Mount Judi? Something to think for historians, geologists, archaeologists etc.)…
2- They could see if the evidence is still there about the Moon splitting in half (for astronomers, historians)…
3- Try to find out why milk-brother/sisters are considered real brother/sisters in Islam (something for biologists maybe)?
4- The fire Prophet Abraham was thrown into, what happened to it? Could the fish swimming in ‘Balikli Gol’ in Urfa (Turkey) be different than others (maybe for zoologist and geneticists)?
5- What is different about the ‘Hajarul Aswad’ (black) stone in Kaaba (for chemists)?
6- Solid proof about ‘Haman’ being the chief advisor and/or architect of Pharaoh at Prophet Moses’ time (for Egyptologists, archaeologists and ancient historians)? Although Maurice Bucaille has done some terrific research in to this, more is needed…
7- What is miraculous about the location and the configuration/structure of the Kaaba?
8- When and where did Prophet Adam live?
9- What is God trying to tell us with all the fossils – why has he created and then allowed them to become extinct (whether they are dinosaur fossils, trilobite fossils or human-like creatures)?
10- Who was Dhul-Qarnayn?
11- Why were certain animals’ names mentioned in the Qur’an in the context that they are in (click here)?
12- Trying to understand the mind of God using the timescales and types of creation e.g. approx. 10 billion years after the creation of the universe, the Earth is formed. Then half a billion years later the first life forms emerge (i.e. single celled organisms such as the first prokaryotes). Humans come into the scene only 100-200 thousand years ago (something for Islamic philosophers to discuss with scientists?)
and many more questions waiting to answered not just in life sciences but also social sciences; but by who? Muslims? or other scientists?
The above might have been a one-off miracle by Allah but we also know that this is a ‘cause and effect’ world thus Allah may have left clues about them somewhere if we look close enough to the right places. And also to bear in mind: Surely these questions cannot be answered by a single scientist but by a consortium of scientists from many backgrounds.
It is not all doom and gloom for the Muslim world as there are many distinguished Muslim medical and social scientists out there and I believe we must acknowledge their achievements by rewarding them accordingly, maybe through starting a competition just like the Nobel Prize within the Islamic world (with the winners being decided by scientists from all over the world so that it does not lose it’s credibility). This would surely breathe new life into the scientific world and increase the enthusiasm within Muslims…
Many aspects of the Quran and the Hadith remain undiscovered and it is up to us find these jewels, and we cannot afford to wait for non-Muslims to do it for us. Muslim leaders of the world could fund projects and such consortiums as aforementioned which would once again gain the attraction of the Muslim world, encourage them to learn about Science and inspire future generations to become great scientists. We cannot carry on living in ignorance while science keeps improving. We have to contribute to it like our ancestors have been doing in the past; and more importantly, because The Creator wants us to!
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