ISLAM AND SCIENCE

ISLAM and SCIENCE

Dr Sakir Kocabas

1. Introduction

The contribution of Islamic civilization to scientific development has been a subject of debate both by Muslim and non-Muslim writers since the 19th century. The controversial position of Muslims in such debates is due to the fact that they have lost their effectiveness in science and in other fields of life after a certain stage in history.

When we look at the "Islam and Science" debates in the last two centuries, we see several approaches in general. The first one, which was developed by European historians of philosophy and science in the last century and lasted until World War II, claims that Muslims have not contributed to civilization in the fields of science and philosophy anything significant beyond being the "commentators" of Ancient Greek philosophy. We see such eminent philosophers as Bertrand Russell1 among the proponents of this view.

The second approach is the one developed by some Muslim writers in need of intellectual defense for Islamic civilization against the views of European historians of science and philosophy. According to this approach, science and philosophy are not only not needed for human happiness and well being in any case, but even harmful activities. Consequently, there is nothing to worry about the fact that Muslims are lagging behind in science and technology.

The third approach, which is also developed by some Muslim scholars, claims that Muslims have conducted pioneering studies in science and philosophy in the Classical Era of Islamic civilization, but were held back in scientific activity by devastating external influences such as the Crusades and the Moghul invasions.

The fourth approach, which was adopted by some western historians of science such as Sarton2, and more recently by Huff3, recognizes that Muslims made major contributions to science in the early period of the Islamic civilization, and attempts to explain the decline of scientific activity in terms of social, cultural, economic and legal issues.

The fifth approach which is being advocated by some Muslim writers4, claims that the Muslims' earlier contributions to science have nothing to do with Islam, as these studies were conducted in a non-Islamic, secular spirit, and if at all, Muslims will only be successful in the same way. The proponents of this approach also want to extend the separation of "science” and “religion" which took effect after the Renaissance and Reformation in Europe. They carry the related arguments about Christianity over Islam without a detailed conceptual analysis, and try to establish an "Islam and science" division in the Muslim mind.

Our approach will be a different one bringing a detailed analysis and a new synthesis to the subject, although carrying elements from some of the above stated approaches. We will try to describe our approach in some detail below, but before that, let us take a closer look at the other five approaches.

The first approach has lost its credibility today among people who are acquainted with history of science, but nevertheless is still being argued by some short sighted writers. We will show below with examples why this approach is based on mistaken views. The second approach is being defended by naive Muslims in good will, without being aware of what they advocate seriously contradicts the concept of knowledge (=‘ilm) and a series of other related concepts in the Qur'an. The third approach on the other hand, is in the error of exaggerating the relationships between scientific motivation and social, political and economic conditions. In this study, we will start from the point reached by the fourth approach. We will attempt to unearth the basis of the problem, namely, what have happened after a period of intensive learning, investigation leading to the development of a scientific research tradition in the Classical Era of Islamic civilization, i.e. the 8-11th centuries. But before we do that, let us try to explicate why the fifth approach starts from mistaken premises.

In order to decide about how much of the historical reality is reflected by the claim that Islam had nothing to do with the Muslims' contribution to science during the Classical Era (roughly 8-11th centuries), we have to bear in mind a few historical facs. It is well known that the Europe of the Middle Ages turned to scientific investigation as it turned away from the views of the Church about the world and nature. Whereas, we observe that the Arabic and Turkic populations who did not have any noticeable scientific activity before Islam, began to produce their scientific and philosophical works after they accepted Islam. Therefore, the Muslims in that era conducted their scientific and philosophical studies with the motivation and within the intellectual framework that they acquired largely from Islam.

To see that it was Islam that gave the Muslims of the Classical Era such great motivation in science and philosophy compared to their contemporaries, we have to understand what sort of conceptual transformation that Islam had made in their minds. What were their concepts of the world and reality before their acceptance of Islam? And how did their concepts of kmowledge and reality transformed by their acceptance of Islam? We can ask similar questions for the christian peoples in Europe in the Middle Ages: What sort of conceptual transformation took place in Europe after the 12th century? What sort of conceptual changes lay behind the scientific development that took place after the 16th century?

Some contraversial european historians, before answering such questions kept claiming that scientific thought in Europe was developed from ancient Greeks, in an attempt to blur the effects of Islam on the Renaissance, the Reformation and the subsequent scientific endavour. This opinion has long lost its historical credibility, but there may still be some who would like to defend it. A simple question should be sufficient to bring this claim into perspective: Why had the Europeans not been able to start the Renaissance and develop their scientific thinking much earlier, as they had the works of the ancient Greek philosophy and science in their hands for over a thousand years? Why had Europe waited another 1200 years for the development of scientific thought in Europe? The answers to these questions can be: Either the Europeans were unable to understand the works of the ancient Greeks during that period, and began to understand them only after reading the works of the Muslim thinkers such as Ibn Rushd, or the ancient Greek thought by itself did not provide the concepts and motivation good enough to initiate such a scientific enterprise, or both. (Despite their controversial nature we can say that all these possibilities are worthy of a detailed investigation.)

When we study the history of Islamic thought, we see that the Muslims have been in a large scale and multi-dimensional research activity in science and philosophy until the 12th century, lasting as sporadic and isolated activities until the 15th century. During this period, on the one hand they studied the works of ancient Greek and Indian scholars5, and on the other they developed completely novel approaches and methods of systematic investigation of nature. We will explain this with examples below.

The development of these different approaches and methods require a certain creative intellectual capacity. Scientific creativity and its relation to motivation and conceptual structures is a subject which we have been studying recently6. In order to have an insight to the nature and extent of the conceptual transformation that Islam has brought to the Muslims in the Classical Era let us now take a look at certain concepts and their interrelations in Islam, particularly in the Qur'an.

2. The Concept of Knowledge in The Qur’an

Throughout the history of Islam, a great many things have been said about the concept of knowledge (= ilm) by Muslim and non-Muslim writers7. These will be outside of the scope of our present concern. We have conducted a 6-month study over the concept of knowledge (= ilm) in the Qur'an in 1986. A summary remarks on the grammar of the concept "ilm" in the verses8 of the Qur'an in which the word takes place in its root form and derivatives can be given as follows:

1) First of all, the concept of knowledge (= ilm) in the Qur'an is an indivisible, holistic concept. (In this respect, there is a certain important difference between the concept of "ilm" in the Qur'an and that of today's Muslims. We shall return to this point below.)

2) The Qur'anic concept of knowledge covers all knowledge, without making any distinction between sciences as such.

3) The concept of knowledge in the Qur'an does not allow the qualification of true/false knowledge, because the word is always used in certain relation to reality. On the other hand it can be used in indicating as someone having or not having the knowledge of something, as in "... has the knowledge of" or "... has not the knowledge". (See verses: 006.108, 006.119, 030.029)

4) The Qur'anic concept of knowledge indicates that reality is grasped with knowledge, and the limits of knowledge determines the extent of the awareness of reality and consciousness. (027.084)

5) In the Qur'an, it is stated that Allah has encircled (= wasia) everything with knowledge. This might mean that knowledge extends through space. (006.080)

6) Also, the expression "a knowledge from Allah’s presence" (= min ladunna ‘ilma) takes place in verses as a particularly different kind of knowledge, in contrast to the knowledge that extends through space. (018.065)

7) The fact that Allah has power over everything, can be known by man. (065.012)

8) The verb "to know" (= alima) is applicable to both individual human beings and to a nation (= qawm) as in the expression "a nation that knows". (002.230,006.097, 007.032)

9) "Those who know and those who do not, cannot be the same". (039.009)

The conceptual grammar of "knowledge" which we have summarized here, constitutes a part of a wider conceptual network in the Qur'an. The importance and necessity of knowledge in Islam, emerges as a prerequisite for being human. Only through knowledge man wants to know how far his abilities and responsibilities extend.


3. The Importance and Necessity of Knowledge

What is it that makes man important, while he occupies such a small space-time region on a small planet compared with the astronomical dimensions of the heavens that emcompass hundred billions of galaxies? An answer can be given to this question in Islamic thought is: What makes us important is the fact that Allah has given us some superior qualities among His creation, notably our superior ability of learning and thinking, by which we can increase our contact with reality and consciousness.

For a man believing in Allah, the most important question of science is this: "How does Allah administer or rule the heavens and the earth?" Another question that follows this is: "Can human mind comprehend how Allah rules the heavens and the earth?" This may come as a surprise to some readers, but both questions have answers, and the answer to the second question within the Quranic framework, is a definite "yes". The answers are given in the Qur'an as follows:

"Have they not studied the Administration of the heavens and the earth, and what things that Allah has created? (= awa lam yanzuru fi malakut as samawati wal ardi wa ma khalaqallahu min shay)" (007.185)

"Allah is He, who created the seven heavens and of the earth the like of them. The instruction (= amr) is sent down through them, so that you know that Allah has power over everything, and that Allah has encompassed everything with a knowledge." (065.012)

As can be seen, in the first verse above, man is motivated to a systematic study of the Administration of the heavens and the earth, or in other words, over the “laws” and “principles” of the interactions which take place in them. The word "study" (= yanzuru fi) in this verse indicates reference to both observation and thinking, and the term “nazariya” (= theory) has been derived from this word in the classical era of Islamic thought. Accordingly “nazara fi”, can be understood as “systematic observational and theoretical study”.

In the second verse, we see how the concept of instruction (= amr) that emerges as a key concept in the "Administration of the heavens and the earth" is closely related to the concept of knowledge (= ‘ilm). In this verse, the expression "so that you should know", clearly indicates that man can know how Allah keeps the events happening in the heavens and the earth under His knowledge and His control. The knowledge of this should indeed be the most important gain for mankind.

Notice that the question: "How does Allah direct the heavens and the earth?" is, in a narrower sense, also the fundamental question of physical science: How do various phenomena take place in nature in an ordered way? How did the order that we see in the universe come about? We shall return to this below.

It is with these motivations that the Muslims in the classical era turned towards understanding themselves and the space that they lived in. This was the motivation behind their occupation with such sciences as mathematics, logic, physics, chemistry, botany and astronomy. The prominence given to knowledge, learning and thinking in Islam, is a pointer to the importance that is given to man. The Prophet (s.a.) had taught Muslims through the Qur'an, the importance of knowledge, learning, and thinking. And the Muslims, through their books between 8-12th centuries, taught Christians and Jews in al-Andalus how to correctly reason about nature. Regretfully, due to serious changes in their concept system, which started to take place in the 11th century, Muslims began to loose motivation to science, and as a result, their influence in science gradually dwindled and died out in the subsequent centuries. The present state of the Muslims regarding scientific activity constitutes a complete contrast with that of the Islamic civilization in the classical era. The concept of knowledge has now lost its significance, while some secondary or obscure concepts have acquired prominence in the Muslim's mind today.


4. The Concept of Knowledge and Motivation in Islamic Civilization

The concept of knowledge (= ‘ilm) had such a central role in the Islamic civilization during the Classical Era, that this made the famous orientalist Franz Rosenthal9 to coin his observation that there had been no other civilization in history, in which the concept of knowledge had played such a central role as in the Islamic civilization in the classical era, including the Western civilization.

It can be said that, correct thinking develops over correct premises, a correct concept system, and correct observation and inference methods. Correct thinking affects motivation to research positively, as it leads to a better understanding of the world, and to useful discoveries and inventions. Systematic knowledge rests on a correct concept system. For this reason, in the process of the improvement and increase of systematic knowledge, the concept system on which it stands, plays an important role. In our own study on scientific creativity, we are convinced that the concept system has a critical role over scientific motivation and scientific creativity.

With the birth of Islam, the development of tendencies towards learning, quickly turned into a campaign, and within a short span in historical terms, it caused the formation of scientific motivation among Muslims. The campaign for learning had already started in the Medina period, when the Prophet (s.a.) introduced a policy of releasing the prisoners of war (who were then treated as slaves) on the condition of teaching Muslim children reading and writing.10 In the same years, it is also known that Muslims opened a school in Medina. Such an educational policy could not even be dreamt of in those ages. In this era, Muslims considered learning and acquisition of knowledge as a paramount duty of being human.

The conceptual change, and the learning campaign that developed in parallel, started giving its results in scientific development within less than a century, during the time of the Umayyads. This was followed on in an even stronger form during the Abbasids (750-1254), particularly by the establishment of Bayt al Hikma (= the House of Wisdom) by the Abbasid ruler Harun al Rashid. This royal institute, being unique in its kind in the history of science, had started as a center for translation for all the works of ancient cultures, from poetry to medicine, astronomy and philosophy, but soon turned into a center for original scientific work.

With their pioneering work in chemistry, the Umayyad prince Khalid bin Yazid (665-704), Ja’far al Sadiq (700-765), Jabir bin Hayyan (approx. 721-805), Zunnun al-Misri (d. 860), Al Razi (= Alrhazes, 860-925), Ibni Sina (= Avicenna, 980-1037) and Al Matruji (? - 1007) laid the foundations of modern chemistry as an experimental science. In physics, we see Al Kindi (= Alkindus, a 796-872) and again in physics with his research in optics Ibn Haytham (a. 965-1051); in mathematics Al Khawarizmi (a. 780-850) and Thabit bin Qurra (a. 834-901); in zoology Jahiz (a. 776-869); in astronomy Bayruni (a. 973-1051), al Zarqali (1029-1087), and Ibn Shatir (d. 1375); in medicine Al Razi (= Alrhazes a 864-925) and Ibn Sina (= Avicenna, y 980-1037), and in medicine, physics and philosophy Ibn Rushd (=Averroes, 1126-1198) among the prominent Muslim pioneers of science and philosophy.11 We can now take a brief look at the important contributions of Muslims to chemistry, physics and mathematics in this period.

The Muslims' contribution to the development of chemistry as an experimental science has been crucial in several respects. First, as can be seen in Jabir bin Hayyan's collection, contrary to the ancient Greek tradition, Muslims thought that chemical substances are composed of a set of basic properties combined in certain proportions, and that these properties could be separated and recombined to yield new substances12. Notice that this idea introduces the concepts of analysis and synthesis and an accompanying methodology for research into chemistry for the first time in its history. Secondly, their claim that these basic properties are held together in balance (= mizan) in chemical substances, introduces the notions of stability and equillibrium13. Third, but not the least important, they have described their chemical experiments in such a way that it is possible to see all the parameters of a modern chemical experiment. For example, we see everything in the description of an oxidation experiment of mercury conducted and described by Al Matruji14, that the description of a modern chemical experiment should include: a) reaction materials, b) their quantities, c) reaction equipment used, d) reaction conditions, e) reaction products, and f) their quantities. The same approach can be seen in the experiments of other early Muslim alchemists. It can hardly be denied that these are very important contributions to the development of chemistry as an experimental and theoretical science. Using this methodology, Muslim scientists had isolated inorganic substances such as alkalis and hydrochloric, nitric, and sulphuric acids and ammonia. They conducted distillation experiments on organic substances and separated several basic organic substances.

In the field of physics, Ibn Haytham's work on parabolic and spherical mirrors, and glass magnifiers, and his work on the refraction of light in general formed the basis of optics. Ibn Haytham studied the behavior of light when passing from a less dense medium to a denser medium, and led the way for the discovery of the famous sinusoidal law of refraction of light15. This was the second law discovered in physics after Archimedes' well-known discovery.

Perhaps the most important contribution of Muslims to the development of classical physics has been an indirect one; by the invention of algebra. Al Khawarizmi's (780-850) introduction of the concept of equation and the use of variables in place of numbers in mathematical problem solving, is regarded as one of the most important abstractions in the history of mathematics. The first abstraction in mathematics was the invention of decimal numbers and the introduction of zero. The second important abstraction was transforming geometry into an axiom system by Thales (640-546 B.C.) and Euclid (4th century B.C.) After Khawarizmi’s invention of algebra, the next important abstraction in mathematics took place nine centuries later, with the introduction of the concept of function by Newton and Leibniz in the 17th century. With their invention of algebra, the Muslims had shown how complex arithmetical problems could be easily solved by symbolic equations. This was a serious departure from the geometrical techniques used by ancient Greeks. The development of algebra, coupled with geometry, has led to the development of analytical geometry and trigonometry, whose foundations were also laid by Muslim mathematicians. Without algebra, there could be no analytic geometry, calculus and classical physics, and consequently no industrial revolution. In astronomy, we know that the Muslims had not only discovered that the earth was spherical, but also measured the distance between the longitudes during the Abbasids. They had also considered the heliocentric system of planets several centuries before Galileo and Copernicus. In fact, Copernicus’ book contains astronomical drawings identical to those drawn by Tusi several centuries earlier. 16

When we compare the studies that the Muslims conducted in science between 8-11th centuries to the scientific developments in Europe since the 16th century, of course they might look minimal. However, for a correct evaluation, the Muslims' success in several fields of science in these centuries, must be viewed in comparison and contrast with the happenings in the other parts of the world during the same centuries. Then the Muslims would stand out as unrivalled in scientific activity and motivation among their contemporaries. The methodological error that is frequently fallen into in the so called "Islam and Science" debates is the result of an illicit evaluation.

The important point that must be noted is: The Muslims' studies in this period had led to the development of a "research tradition" based on experimentation and observation for the first time in the world history as we know it today.17 Right here we are faced with the central questions of our analysis: Why did the Muslims not continue their activities in science after such a successful start. Why did not they develop a systematic and multi-dimensional research that formed the basis of sciences such as physics, chemistry and astronomy? What had happened in the history of Islam that scientific and philosophical studies gradually slipped out of the field of interest of Muslim scholars? What kinds of psychological, social, economic and political factors caused Muslims to leave research in the fields of science? These are the questions that must be asked in the "Islam and Science" debates until the correct answers and explanations are found.

The decline of Muslim scientific activity after a brilliant and successful start has attracted the attention of a number of Muslim writers and historians since the 17th. century with the Ottoman scholar Katip Chelebi, down today. Katip Chelebi's insightful observations had related the decline to a conceptual problem, but his warnings did not start a serious movement in the Ottoman administration. Until recently most of the proposed explanations, were directed to explain the decline with political causes such as the Crusades in the 12th. Century and the destruction (especially of libraries and men of knowledge) by the Moghul invasions in the 13th. Century; and to economic causes such as the decline of the importance of the Silk Road, and the accompanying shift of economic power from Islamic countries towards Europe as a result of the geographic discoveries that took place in the 15th and 16th Centuries. All these explanations may have some truth in it, but they do not explain the loss of motivation in science in Muslim societies as a whole.

Huff,18 a leading figure in the field of comparative historical study of science, states that Muslims had made a brilliant start in the middle age, and quickly gained and established a clear superiority over China, India and Europe in almost all the fields of scientific activity, but that their activity started to decline after the 12th century. He examines the causes of decline through several interrelated issues which can be summarized in three categories: 1) the role of the scientist in the society, 2) the basic beliefs of the scientist about nature, and 3) the existence of the social and legal institutions that support the development of science.

When he examines the role of the scientist, Huff classifies the intellectuals in the Islamic society of the Middle Age into three classes: fuqaha (= jurists), mutakallimun (= theologians), and philosphers. He recounts al-Kindi, al-Farabi, al-Razi (Alrazes), Ibn Sina (Avicenna), al-Biruni, and Ibn Rushd among the Muslim philosophers who have contributed the development of early modern science. He states that the philosophers could not maintain influence on their societies after some their ideas became the target of the theologians, causing the former to lose support for their activities from the Muslim population. In this period, the theologians used the opinions of al Ghazali and Ibn Taymiya to attack philosophers. Huff also states that the fuqaha (=jurists) from time to time severely criticized the theologians themselves. According to Huff, the Muslim philosophers did not have clearly defined and valid social roles in their society. Those who studied philosophy and science mostly had an additional duty accepted by their societies. For example, Ibn Rushd was also a jurist, and Ibn Shatir was a muwaqqit preparing prayer timetables for the daily prayers of Muslims.

From the viewpoint of the basic beliefs of the scientist about the nature, Huff relates several principles for scientific inquiry, some of which can be listed as: 1) a rational and objective investigation of nature in order to understand it operations is possible and desirable, 2) such an investigation makes use of empirical methods, 3) might make use of mathematics and deductive reasoning, 4) the scientist should eschew all voices of authority, tradition and popular opinion in question of how nature functions, except to the extent that the information is rationally verifiable, and 5) the scientist must practice systematic doubt, and sometimes endure a prolonged uncertainty in his disciplined search for an understanding of natural phenomena. Most of these principles were practiced by the Muslim scientists, as they had developed and applied empirical and methods, particularly in chemistry and optics, and they were the first to use mathematics in a field of science, namely in astronomy.

Huff also notes the negative role of the doctrines developed by the theologians, which rendered systematic studies of nature a meaningless activity. Lastly, he states that in the Medieval Muslim world, the legal and social institutions were not developed to support the activities of Muslim scientists. The colleges (= madrasa) that were developed by Muslim foundations focused on teaching classical Arabic, Qur’anic interpretation (= tafsir), prophetic tradition (= hadith), logic (= mantiq) and theology (= kalam), and limited teaching of mathematics and medicine. Later, college education became confined to “religious sciences”. Study of astronomy and mathematics were the subjects of observatories, while medical studies were carried out in hospitals. The educational system of the Madrasa were based on mastering the subject of individual teachers, rather than being organized in faculties. The curricula of these colleges were determined by the foundation (= waqf) who provided its finances, and as they did not give much respect for sciences other than the “religious sciences”, studies in experimental sciences and philosophy were left to individual efforts. In contrast, the European universities founded several centuries after their Muslim counterparts obtained their legal and educational independence soon after.

In summary, Huff tries to explain the decline of science in Islamic civilization primarily by the failure of Muslims in developing the necessary institutions and in providing legal autonomy to scientific activities. These are important insights into the nature of this historical phenomenon, and we agree with Huff on these accounts to a certain extent, but we have to go deeper below the social and legal causes. Social and legal order in a society is continuously shaped and reshaped by the beliefs and motivations and the order of concepts of the society. For this reason we claim that the deeper causes of the decline has to be searched for in the conceptual changes that began to take place in the language and minds of the Muslims around 11th century.

For a historical change in such proportions, we never found satisfactory the explanations that rested only on political and economic causes. We were considering since the early 1970s that there had to be more convincing explanations for such a grand scale decline, but were not able to figure out the real causes. Years later, after a debate when doing a PhD in London in 1986, a question began to emerge as to whether the Muslims used certain Qur'anic concepts such as "aql" (= using intellect) and "ilm" (= knowledge) correctly, i.e. in the same grammar as in the Book. Then, following a three-month study on the concept of "aql", we had realized that this word was used quite differently from its native grammar in the Qur'an.

Our later studies on several concepts which we called "The AMR Constellation of Words", revealed an important conceptual network which was directly related to the cosmic order. These concepts were completely ignored by today's Muslims, while they had at least partially constituted the basis of the ideas of many Muslim scholars about reality in one form or another, between 8-12th centuries, from Al Kindi to Ibn Rushd.
This study was indicating that there had been a serious conceptual break in the history of Islamic thought. It began to look clear that this conceptual break gradually diminished the motivation for scientific research among Muslims, and as a result of this had they failed to develop the necessary social institutions and legal support, but not the other way round. In the next section we discuss this conceptual degeneration in some detail.

5. The Conceptual Disintegration in the 11th Century: The Division of the Concept of Knowledge

We can say that the most important conceptual change in the history of Islamic thought had taken place on the concept of "ilm" (= knowledge). This concept is used by today's Muslims as divided into two broad and disjunctive categories as "ilm ad-din" (= religious knowledge) and "ilm ad-dunya" (= worldly knowledge). In a study conducted on this concept both in the Qur'an and the six hadith books which compile the sayings and actions of the Prophet (s.a.), we noticed that there was no trace of such a division in these sources. On the contrary, the concept appears in these sources as an indivisible whole. This indicated that such a conceptual division on knowledge as "religious knowledge - worldly knowledge" had been introduced in the latter half of the 10th century, about a century later from when the hadith were compiled. We can now say that the conceptual division of "knowledge" began to take serious effect in the Muslim thought in the 11th century, and before the end of the 12th century with the exile of Ibn Rushd, it became an accepted norm in the Muslim world from Cordova to Baghdad. In this way, the integral concept of knowledge (= ‘ilm) with its close relation to the concept of reality (= haqq), left its place to a divided concept of knowledge and reality.

At this point some might argue that the qualification of knowledge as "religious knowledge - worldly knowledge" had resulted from a necessity due to the increase in the amount and variety of knowledge. We maintain that this conceptual division was introduced by the 10th century Muslim theologians (particularly by the Ash’arites) for certain other purposes. These purposes primarily included the "protection of Muslims from certain heretical beliefs and ideas". Whatever their aims were, the conceptual changes introduced by the theologians can hardly be taken as a mere manifestation of goodwill, considering the drastic results that they entailed. They introduced both a simplistic and a contradictory set of concepts in place of a rich and complex, but a consistent conceptual structure in the Qur'an. Simplistic, because it overlooked the fact that the Qur’anic concept of knowledge includes all expressions which reflect reality; and contradictory because it ended up denying reality itself.

The division of knowledge as "religious knowledge - worldly knowledge" in the 11th century resulted in questioning the status of physics, chemistry, astronomy, mathematics and logic, which were now regarded as "worldly knowledge". In the beginning it had been stated that these sciences "had, positively or negatively, nothing to do with the religion"19, then the idea that knowledge of these sciences are superfluous, began to creep in the minds of Muslims. Quite often, these sciences were considered as "useless knowledge" as opposed to the "religious knowledge" which was regarded as "useful" by definition. Muslims who were engaged in such sciences, while previously being supported by the public and rulers alike, began to lose support, or even became isolated from society.

As an example, we can cite the case of Ibn Rushd (= Averroes) who was the chief justice in Cordova and the doctor of the Caliph during the Andalusian Umayyads in the 12th century. Ibn Rushd was persecuted by the theologians for his ideas about science and philosophy, when the latter had established their political power in the Umayyid administration. The theologians publicly burned Ibn Rushd's books and wanted to him to be sentenced to death, but he was narrowly saved by the Caliph owing to his earlier services to the state, and was exiled to North Africa instead. Reactions to men of science to the extent of the Inquisition, are in general not observed in the history of Islam. But, as we can now see more clearly, the dismissal of philosophy as heresy, and science as a useless enterprise, has deeply influenced the motivation of the Muslims away from such activities conceptually, psychologically and politically.

On the other hand, many early Muslim philosophers also had based some of their ideas about reality on several concepts adopted from ancient philosophers like Plato and Aristotle. Such controversial concepts as existence (= wujud), infinite past (= qidam), and intellect (= ‘aql), and the logical concepts such as universal (= kulli) and particular (= juz’i) were being used in philosophical and theological discussions instead of the rich network of Qur’anic concepts about the whole reality. Unending debates were taking place between the philosophers and the theologians where the latter were also using the same concepts as their opponents, in addition to the evasive dialectic methods. This led to the gradual isolation of the philosophers from their society, as they could not defend their position effectively in a concept system detached from the Qur’an. It is no surprise that the most original contribution of Muslims have been in the fields of chemistry and algebra, where they relied on the Qur’anic concepts of “balance” (= mizan), and “shay”.

The most interesting outcome of this conceptual break was yet to come. The division of the concept of knowledge, which appears as a unified concept in the Qur'an, as "religious knowledge - worldly knowledge", and the almost unanimous acceptance of this division by the Muslims after the 11-12th century meant the acceptance of secularism by the Muslims in thought as a doctrine. In other words, by accepting such a conceptual division, Muslims would have effectively accepted the separation of their "religion" from their "world". Despite this, when they were faced with the situation of forcefully accepting secularism as a legal principle after nine centuries, they reacted strongly. The rationality of this reaction needs to be evaluated in the same framework with the quiet acceptance of the division of the concept of knowledge in the 11th century.

The conceptual change that took place during the 11th century did not confine to the concept of knowledge, but also spilled over a series of other concepts related with "creation". Abandoning the understanding of a cosmic order based on the concepts of “haqq” (= reality) and "amr" (= instruction) and a set of related concepts in the Qur'an, the theologians adopted a view of physical space based on the hypothesis of continuous creation-annihilation. This hypothesis was developed from a simplistic concept of "creation" which resulted from the reduction of a dozen concepts in the Qur'an related with "creation". In this process, the theologians reduced such concepts in the Qur'an as khalaqa, jaala, baththa, nabata, fatara, banaa, sawwara, sawwa, etc., that mean designing, making, evolving, giving form, bringing into existence, constructing, growing, etc., into a single concept "creating" (= khalaqa) and in this way, turned a rich, complex and consistent concept system into a single concept which swallowed all the details of the original set of tightly related concepts.

As a result of this conceptual reductionism, many Muslims soon found themselves in a position to deny that substances had any essential properties, and by denying the principle of causality in any form, they had locked their minds in a concept system that made scientific explanations quite impossible. (Imagine the development of empirical sciences such as physics, chemistry and astronomy, without accepting the principle of causality or that the substances have characteristic properties.) Yet it is clear from the verses related with the word "amr" (= instruction) and a set of other related concepts in the Qur'an, that the properties of substances are manifestations of a set of instructions that make the substances themselves.

There are about 250 verses (= ayah) in the Qur'an in which the word "amr" (= instruction) and its derivatives take place. Some of these verses state that Allah rules the heavens and the earth with His "amr" (= instructions). Indeed, it is clearly stated in the verses that mention the movements of celestial objects, that they move in accordance with the instructions that had been revealed to (or loaded in) the heavens during their formation:

"... Then He decreed it (the heaven) as the seven heavens, and revealed in (or loaded in) each heaven its instruction." (041.012)

"The sun, the moon and the stars are subjected [to remain in their courses] (= musakharat) by His instruction." (007.054, 014.033, 016.012, 022.065)

From the grammar of the word "amr" that occurs in these verses, a conceptual framework emerges, which indicates that a set of instructions that are distributed in space, where they can be joined or dispersed. In this framework, it is understood that physical events take place in an order determined by the complex interactions, unifications and distributions of the instructions in the physical space. However, the cosmic order is not totally unchangeable and free from divine intervention. As can be seen from the verses related with the word "izn", Allah may intervene to any space-time regions with new instructions and can alter its physical properties according to His will. In this way He can bring about changes that would otherwise be impossible with the existing instructions in that space-time region. Similarly, He can also prevent the happenings that would have resulted from the existing instructions otherwise. Indeed, from the verses related with "amr" and "izn", it is clear that Allah intervenes with some events by means of new instructions which He "sends down" periodically. What we call "miracles" are also partly explainable in this framework. We say "partly", because we do not exactly know what can and cannot be materialized within the interactions of the existing instructions in a space-time region.

On the other hand, in verses related to the word "sakhara" (= make subject to / give under use or control) in the Qur'an, Allah states that He has "made subject to mankind whatever is in the heavens and the earth":

"Do you not see that Allah has made subject to you whatever in the heavens and the earth (= sakhara la kum)?" (031.020)

“He has made subject to you whatever is in the heavens and the earth, all from Him (= wa sakhara la kum ma fi-s samawati wa-l ‘ardi jami’an minhu); in this there are indeed signs for a nation who reflect (= qawmin yatafakkarun).” (045.013)

The words "amr", "izn", "sakhara", "sultan", "qadr" and "qada" constitute an extremely remarkable conceptual network in the Qur’an. We have made a detailed study on this subject, and we intend to publish this work soon in a book titled "Foundations of Scientific Thought in Islam".

The denial of the essential properties of substances and causal relationships between physical events by the theologians and Al Ghazali (1058-1111) in the 11th century, was criticized in detail by Ibn Rushd (1126-1198) in the 12th century 20. Ibn Rushd also took seriously the erroneous division of the concept of knowledge by the theologians, and wrote a book titled Fasl al Maqal. 21 In this book he tried to demonstrate the indivisibility of science and religion, both in logico-philosophical and legal terms (as he was both a philosopher and the chief justice of Cordova.) Despite his serious warnings on this matter in both of his books Fasl al Maqal and Tahafut al Tahafut, his work did not receive sufficient attention and understanding by Muslims of his times and of later centuries.

The continuation of conceptual disintegration in subsequent centuries resulted in the abandonment of the research tradition developed until the 12th century. (It would be impossible to do research in experimental sciences such as physics and chemistry, in an intellectual framework where causality and the essential properties of substances were denied.) The philosophical disagreement between Al Ghazali and Ibn Rushd was debated until the 15th century when the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II decided to resolve it by an academic debate. The sultan asked a committee to be set up from scholars to discuss the issue in a free spirit. This is related by Osman Turan, a 20th century Turkish historian as:

"Sultan Mehmed had gathered the scholars of the age around him. He wanted to resolve the disagreement between Al Ghazali and Ibn Rushd. For this reason, he formed a commission under the chair of Hodja-Zadeh who had publications in philosophy. However, because of the complexity of the matter for the scholars of that age, the problem remained unresolved, and the controversy between philosophy and religion continued." 22

However, after Sultan Selim I (1512-1520), the official educational policy in the Ottoman Madrasas gradually shifted towards the Ash’arites’ views from that of the Ma’turidi theologians who give more prominence to reason and rationality. As a result, interest in experimental sciences further declined in the Ottoman institutions.

The reasons for the failure of the Ottoman universities (= the Madrasa) in competing with the European universities in the field of mathematical and physical sciences, can be found in its mistaken views about philosophy and science. But at the root of this failure was the gradual abandonment of the research tradition developed by the early Muslim scientists. However, in contrast to their failure in physical sciences, sporadic technological achievements by the Ottomans continued until the 17th century, particularly in the military technology. The real Ottoman success was in political science and administration which can partly be explained by the effect of the Enderun (= the Royal College) which was independent of the Madrasa system. Additionally, the Ottomans followed the original political concepts of Islam to a certain extent, rather than that of the 14th century theologian Ibn Taymiyyah. This is another topic that needs a careful and detailed study in itself.

Despite their earlier technological successes, the poor performance of the Ottomans in science and philosophy in comparison to the developments in Europe, was noticed early enough by some Ottoman scholars. For example, Katip Celebi (1609-1657) in his Mizan ul-Hak, had alerted the Ottoman administration about the complete failure of the Madrasa in the study of physical sciences and mathematics by its dismissal of such sciences as "of philosophy", despite the clear advancements made in European universities in these sciences. But such warnings were bound to fail to produce real concern within the distorted concept system that had started to settle in the Muslims' minds a few centuries earlier.

6. Ottoman Initiatives for Renewal and Muslims in the 20th Century

By the turn of the century, the Ottomans started to feel deeply the decline in the structure of the state from economy to defence as a result of their failure in the fields of philosophy and science, and consequently in technology. However, the Ottoman administrators and intellectuals (with a few exceptions like Katip Celebi, Koci Bey and Ahmed Cevdet Pasha) tried to reverse the decline only by a series of social and political measures such as in the reforms of Islahat (= recovery), Tanzimat (= reorganisation) and Meshrutiyet (= constitutional reform). They could not see that their problems would not be resolved by mere political and social measures, as they were rooted much deeper in the conceptual plane, and were affecting the Muslims' motivation to science in an extremely negative way. The failure in science in turn, was deeply affecting, in an indirect way, the social and political structure and its institutions.

Finally, the educational campaign started by Sultan Abdulhamid II towards the end of the 19th century, which at times met serious opposition from Muslims themselves, proved to be insufficient. In the end, the Ottoman state left the stage of history following a decisive defeat by European states who commanded scientific and technological superiority in World War I.

The attempts to solve conceptual problems by political and social measures continued in the Turkish Republican Era. The political measures such as the cultural reforms like changing the alphabet and enforcing new outfits; the social reforms like the adoption of constitution and legal codes from the French, Swiss and Italian laws in the early period of the Republic (1923-1933); the industrialization campaign in the second stage (1950-1960); the heavy-industrialization phase in the third stage (1970-1975); and finally, the policies of liberalization and market economy (1980-1990), can be regarded as the continuation of the efforts in the same direction as started in the last century.

As the conceptual structure that was inherited from the Ottomans could not be changed by forceful social, legal and pseudo-cultural measures, the Republican policies of development, which themselves were infected with the same conceptual diseases albeit in the opposite end, have failed to yield real success. The positivist policies that were introduced in the Republican era, were aimed at suppressing Muslims in effect, if not in form, extinguishing the social motivation still further by straining the illicit "religion - science" division even further, instead of trying to resolve it.

The Republican governments failed to develop an effective "science policy" despite the illustrious slogans they produced about science. Until recent years, there was even no academy of sciences in Turkey, and the one that exists now looks at cultural affiliations rather than academic achievements as criteria for nominations. The reasons why there is still no proper academy of sciences, no ministry of science and technology, and no policy of science and technology in this country must be seriously investigated by the thinking people in this country.

7. Other Recent Attempts

About two decades ago some Muslim writers in the UK and Pakistan had initiated a programme which they called “Islamization of Knowledge”. These writers had proposed that the scientific theories developed by "Western" scientists be examined carefully and modified in accordance with the “Islamic viewpoint” (inevitably this will be their own viewpoint based on a concept system adopted from some relativist "Western" philosophers), and thus be "Islamized". Whatever underlying goodwill their proponents may have had in mind, we considered such attempts as spurious as they did not reflect any serious consideration of the conceptual problems involved. As could be expected, this project had ended in failure within a few years from its inceptions.

Another attempt came from the distinguished Muslim historian of science Nasr, who proposed mystical foundations for motivation in scientific research for the Muslim scientists of the future 23. Nasr claimed that the early Muslim scientists, particularly the alchemists were motivated by the prospect of gaining the knowledge of the hidden.

Both programs were bound to fail because of the errors they precluded. The proponents did not see that the decline of the Islamic civilization in the field of science, and consequently in many other fields of life, was the result of the Muslims' abandonment of their own research tradition, and deeper below, their loss of motivation for learning and research. No program can succeed before Muslims regain their motivation to science, which in turn, can happen only when the Muslims abandon the disintegrated concept system and reclaim the rich and consistent concept system in the Qur'an. Then only, will they begin to see reality as it is, and free themselves from the need of any slogans and the evasiveness of the shallow policies of change.

As to Pervez Hoodbhoy's24 comments: We have to take seriously his criticisms on the ill-formed notion of science of today's Muslims. However, we have also to consider the serious errors in his analyses, and will show how his analyses are based on a series of mistaken premises.

One of the serious errors of Hoodbhoy is his claim that science is a secular activity25. His claim is based on his mistaken views about the scientific motivation of Muslims during the 8-11th centuries. He seems to forget that the Muslims in that era conducted their studies and research within a certain concept system and the related understanding of "being human" that they learned from Islam. Early Muslims had great respect for truth (= haqq) and knowledge (= ‘ilm), and would stand all kinds of hardships for truth and knowledge.

If Hoodboy were correct in his claims that the Muslims scientists and philosophers in that era owed their success to a secular view of the world, why had other more secular societies not been able to demonstrate such a remarkable scientific activity around the same centuries? The fact is that Muslims in those centuries had an unrivalled position in terms of scientific activity, despite that they had never obstructed the activities of other cultures that lived with them.

Hoodbhoy correctly identifies that the "Islamic" countries are in a "crisis of science" down from popular to the administrative levels, and that this crisis has been causing them a complete destruction in many fields of life. However, he continues to state that, when examined carefully, it would be seen that this crisis is of political nature in its essence26.

We have only to remember that this diagnosis had already been given by the Ottoman and the Turkish Republican intellectuals and administrators much earlier, and that the political measures taken to that effect had until today, produced nothing but failure. We can see that deep in the heart of this crisis, there lies problems of conceptual nature, rather than political or economic problems.

Finally, after having described the tragic situation of today's Muslims as regards to science, Hoodbhoy finds the only solution for Muslims to initiate a scientific revival in a secular approach, with the acceptance of "science - religion" duality. We have just described how a similar approach fails in Turkey since the early days of the Republic. The reasons for the failure was first of all, that this approach was obstructing the Muslims' motivation to learning and to research in general, let alone their scientific motivation. Secondly and more importantly, the conceptual division entailed by such a secular approach, contradicts the unifying concept of knowledge and a host of related concepts in the Qur'an.

It would be naive to expect Muslims to have any sustainable motivation for scientific activity within such a contradictory and secular conceptual framework. Besides, any other motivation would be indistinguishable from anything within the existing framework of modern scientific culture which itself cannot offer any new solutions to the existing problems of modern science. Fame or the feeling of superiority, are the main motivations for science in the contemporary secular culture, but not any love for truth and reality. More scientists with the same motivations would not earn mankind any better world than this unjust world that we live in.

It should be noted that the conditions of contemporary world do not support isolated scientific activities, except in some extreme cases. This means that scientists are in much closer contact with each other than they were in the earlier centuries. Therefore Muslim scientists would do better if they focused on more basic problems of modern science, rather than on the particular problems of modern science, but only through a concept system which has perfect contacts with reality. This is because, at the roots of the illnesses of the contemporary culture, there lies a complex conceptual network inherited from the distant past, which has already begun to hinder further progress in science.

8. Back to the Future

We insist that, the Muslims' scientific revival in the future can be realized neither by Hoodbhoy's programme, nor with that of the other Muslim writers that he criticizes. Because none of them seem to be aware of the conceptual disintegration behind the problems, and how it obstructs the scientific motivation of the Muslims of today. These writers find the solution only in the changes of external factors with new additions to a disintegrated concept system. What drives men/women to learning is their motivation, which can only develop in a concept system that feeds it. We have seen a live historical example that it is possible to extinguish cognitive motivation in a concept system and the related cultural environment by introducing changes to that concept system, as that has happened to the Islamic civilization. The question now lingers is: How can we revive a disintegrated concept system which was in perfect order when it started? Is there any easy way of reconstructing a degenerated concept system?

We are not going to answer these questions in this study. This subject will be dealt with in detail in a book that we intend to publish soon. What we can say here is that, before Muslims realize the necessity for such a conceptual restructuring, they cannot give much hope for the future of Islamic civilization. Unless and until they regain the rich concept structure that they abandoned around the 11th century, the Muslims will not possess the cognitive motivation by which they can make real progress in science and other fields of civilization. Finally, we can also say that, if Muslims, in an effort which we can call going "back to the future", succeed in regaining the concept system that they began to abandon around the 11th. Century, then the history of mankind shall once again witness surprising scientific developments from the hands of Muslims, surprising even in the standards of the fast changing scientific and technological conditions of our time.


References

1. Russell, B. (1969). History of Western Philosophy. George Allen & Unwin, London, p. 420.

2. Sarton, G. (1927-48). Introduction to History of Science. Williams & Wilkins, Baltimore, Vol. 3, Chapter 5.

3. Huff, T.E. (1993). The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West. Cambridge U.P.

4. Hoodbhoy, P. (1992). Islam ve Bilim. (Turkish Tr.), Cep Kitaplari, Istanbul.

5. Scientific activity was institutionalized in the famous Bayt al-Hikma (= House of Wisdom) established by Abbasid caliphs in Baghdad in the 9th century, from where it quickly spread throughout the then Islamic world from Spain to Central Asia.

6. Kocabas, S. (1993). Elements of Scientific Creativity. Working Notes: AAAI Spring Symposium Series, 23-25 March 1993, Stanford, USA, pp. 39-46.

7) See: Rosenthal, F. (1970). Knowledge Triumphant. E.J. Brill, Leiden.

8) The figures in the parantheses indicate the numbers of the chapters and verses of the Qur'an. E.g. (006.108) means the 6th chapter, 108th verse.

9) Rosenthal, F. (1970). Knowledge Triumphant. E.J. Brill, Leiden.

10) See, Hamidullah, M. (1966). The Prophet of Islam. Tr. into Turkish by M.Said Mutlu. Irfan Yayinevi, Istanbul, p. 14. (The author relates this information from classical Islamic sources, Ibn Sa’d, Suhaili, and Ibn Hanbal.)

11. The reader is referred to the following sources for the Muslim contribution to early modern science:
- Sarton, G. (1927-48). Introduction to History of Science. Williams and Wilkins, Baltimore.
- Nasr, S.H. (1989). Islamic Science. Insan Yayinlari, Istanbul.
- Huff, T.E. (1993). The Rise of Early Modern Science. Cambridge U.P., Cambridge.
- Demirci, M. (1996). Beyt-ul Hikme. (In Turkish). Insan Yayinlari, Istanbul.
- Akin, O. and Desay, M. (1993). Five Great Scholars of Algebra. (In Turkish). MEB Yayinlari, Ankara.
- Leicester, H.M. (1971). The Historical Background of Chemistry. Dover, N.Y.

12. See: Leicester, H.M. (1971). The Historical Background of Chemistry. Dover, New York. p. 66.

13. Ibid, p. 66.

14. Ibid, p. 71.

15. Topdemir, H.G. (1991). Ibnul Heysem'in Optik Arastirmalari (= The Optical Studies of Ibn Haytham). Bilim, Felsefe, Tarih. No. 1, pp 187-190.

16. See, Huff, T.E. (1993). The Rise of Early Modern Science. Cambridge U.P, Cambridge. p. 56 and 58.

17. This view is also supported by Huff (1993).

18. See, Huff, T.E. (1993).

19. Al Ghazali in his book Al Munkiz min ad-Dalal states that logic and mathematics which are counted as philosophical sciences, have nothing to do, positively or negatively, with the religion. We do not argue about his intentions about this qualification, but observe that it is quite open to misunderstandings.

20) See, Averroes (1978, pp. 316-321). Tahafut al-Tahafut. Tr. by Simon van Den Bergh. Luzac, London.

21) Averroes (1976). Kitab Fasl al-Maqal (On the Harmony Between Religion and Philosophy). Tr. by G. F. Hourani. Luzac, London.

22) Turan, O. Turk Cihan Hakimiyeti Mefkuresi Tarihi. Vol I-II, p. 542.

23) Nasr, S.H. (1991). Islamic Science. Insan Yayinlari, Istanbul.

24) Hoodbhoy, P. (1992). Islam ve Bilim. (Turkish Tr.) Cep Kitaplari, Istanbul.

25) Ibid, p. 17.

26) Ibid, p. 21.

How Allah Directs Natural Phenomena

HOW ALLAH DIRECTS NATURAL PHENOMENA

Sakir Kocabas

Summary


In this work we look into how Allah directs what we call “natural phenomena”. Let us remind from the outset that our study is based on the ayahs (= verses) of the Qur’an. For a more detailed study, the sayings of Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w.) on the subject need also be taken into account. Yet, relying on the general principle that there can be no contradiction between the ayahs of the Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet, we believe that the conclusions that can be derived from the Qur’an about this subject will be sufficient to draw a correct frame to start with.

Before we go on to explore the main subject of this study, we need to recall some of the ayahs in the Qur’an about how Allah, the Creator of the heavens and the earth, has established the order in the heavens and the earth and how He maintains it. For this reason we will first see the ayahs of the Qur’an, which state that Allah is the Real Ruler (= Malik al-Haqq). Secondly, we examine in some detail, the ayahs that express how Allah has established the order in the heavens and how He maintains it. Next, we attempt to bring clarity to the concepts of “physical phenomenon” and “natural phenomenon”. After these definitions we attempt to explore our main subject: How Allah controls and directs physical phenomena and natural phenomena. Finally, we end our survey with a summary of the conclusions.

1. Allah is the Real Ruler (= Malik al-Haqq)

In the Qur’an, there are more than 30 ayahs (= Qur’anic verses) that state that Allah is the Creator of the heavens and the earth.1 Some other ayahs state that Allah’s is the dominion of the heavens and the earth (= lahu mulk as-samawati wa-l ard). Moreover, Allah also states in the Qur’an that He is the Real Ruler (= Malik al-Haqq):

“Exalted is Allah, the Real Ruler; be not in haste with the Qur’an before its revelation to you is completed, but say: My Sustainer, increase me in knowledge.” (Ta-Ha 20/114)

We learn from this ayah an important name of Allah: Malik al-Hakk (= the Real Ruler). We need to dwell on the meaning of this name. Briefly, the above ayah expresses in a clear and succint way that whatever happens in the heavens and the earth happens under the direction and control of Allah. The following ayah on the other hand, states clearly that there is nothing in the heavens and the earth that escapes His knowledge:

“Allah is He who created the seven heavens, and of the earth the like of them [in number]; the instruction (= amr) descends through the midst of them [all]; that you may know that Allah has power over all things and that Allah has encircled all things with knowledge (= wa annallaha qad ahata bi kulli shay’in ‘ilma).” (Talaq 65/12)

“But the god of you all is Allah; there is no god but He; He surrounds all things with knowledge (= wasia kulli shay’in ‘ilma).” (Ta-Ha 20/98)

These ayahs state that Allah has encircled and surrounded everything with knowledge. Moreover, as stated in many other ayahs in the Qur’an, “He is well informed of the actions of His servants (= wallahu khabeerun bi ma ya’malun); “He sees their actions” (= wallahu baseerun bi ma ya’malun); “He hears and sees” (= innahu huwas sami’ul baseer); and as stated in Mulk/67, “He sees everything” (= innahu bi kulli shay’in baseer); in Fatir/38 “Allah knows the secrets of the heavens and the earth (= innallaha ‘alimul ghaybis samawati wal ard); and in the same ayah “indeed He knows the secrets of the hearts (= innahu ‘aleemun bi zatissudur); and in Yunus/10 “… nothing in the heavens and the earth that weighs as an atom (= misqala zarratin), or [anything] smaller or greater than that escapes from His attention (= wa ma ya’zubu ‘an rabbika), all [of this] are in an open book.” It is clearly understood from these ayahs that, all that happens in the heavens and the earth is like an open book to Him, and that nothing happens in the heavens and the earth outside His knowledge.

2. Allah’s is the Administration of the Heavens and the Earth

In the previous section we saw the ayahs which state that Allah is the Real Ruler, and that there is nothing that escapes His knowledge. Yet, His power is not limited to this, for Allah holds in His hand, the Administration (= malakut) of all things:

“Exalted is He in whose hand the is administration of all things (= fa subhan allazi bi yadihi malakutu kulli shay’); you will return to Him.” (Ya-Sin 38/83)

From these verses it is clear that Allah holds the Administration of the heavens and the earth, and He is the Real Ruler. The limited power that He gives to some people in this world for a determined period, is only by His will, and He takes it back when He will.

After we saw the ayahs that state that Allah is the Real Ruler of the heavens and the earth, we are faced with two questions: How does Allah rule the heavens and the earth? Can the human mind comprehend how He rules the heavens and the earth? At first sight these questions may seem to be impossible to answer, yet the answers to both questions can be derived easily from the Qur’an. The next ayah invites mankind to conduct observational and theoretical study on the Administration of the heavens and the earth:

“Have they not studied the administration of the heavens and the earth and what things that Allah has created? (= awa lam yanzuru fi malakut as-samawati wal ardi wa ma khalaqallahu min shay)” (A’raf 7/185)

Another ayah below expresses how Allah actually realizes the Administration, and that this is to be known by mankind:

“Allah is He who has created the seven heavens, and of the earth the like of them; the amr (= instruction) descends through the midst of them so that you may know (= li ya’lamu) that Allah has power over all things and that Allah has encircled everything with knowledge (= wa annallaha qad ahata bi kulli shay’in ‘ilma).” (Talaq 65/12)

In this ayah the word “amr” (= instruction/command) is a particularly important keyword for understanding the administration of the heavens and the earth. As can be understood from the ayah, Allah rules the heavens and the earth by His amr. But what is amr and what is its function in the administration? In order to understand this, we have to look into the ayahs in the Qur’an that this word and its derivatives occur. We attempt to explain briefly what this word refers to in the ayahs next.3

3. The Word Amr in the Qur’an and the Order in the Heavens

In the Qur’an, in relation to the creation and the administration of the heavens, the word amr appears in the ayahs in three principal frames:4

1) The amr that has been revealed into the heavens during their creation, by which the primary order has been established . (We call this the “primary amr”.)

2) The amr that is sent by Allah to influence and control the events in the world. (We call this the “secondary amr”.) With this amr, which He sends down by His angels and which is directly subject to His permission (= izn), Allah can change the current order in any region of space, and can create new and unseen events by it.5

3) The amr that will terminate the current order in the heavens and the earth, which in the Qur’an is called the amr of the Hour (= amr as-Saah).

We can now take a closer look at how the word amr takes place in these three contexts.

The order in the Heavens: The primary amr

The use of the word “amr” together with the words “sakhara” (= make dependent) and “qadr” (= measure) in the ayahs in the first sense above, is closely related with how the order has been established and maintained in the heavens. This is made clear by the ayahs which state that the seven heavens have been revealed in (or loaded with) their instructions with their creation, and that the states of the heavens and of the objects in them are maintained by this amr:

“And in two days He decreed (= qada) them [the heaven and the earth] as the seven heavens, and revealed in each heaven its instruction (= wa awha fi kulli samain amraha) ...” (Fussilat 41/12)

“The sun, the moon and the stars are all subjected [to remain in their courses] by His instruction (= musakharatun bi amrihi).” (A’raf 7/54, Ibrahim 14/33)

“And one of His signs is that the heaven and the earth stands with His amr (= an taqum as-samau wal ardu bi amrihi) ...” (Rum 30/25)

“Did you not see that Allah has made subject to you whatever is on the earth? Ships flow by His amr; He holds the heaven from falling on earth so that it would not fall, except by His permission (= izn); Allah is Most Kind and Most Merciful to mankind.” (Haj 22/65)

As can be seen, the order in the heavens is established and maintained by the (primary) amr that has been revealed in them by Allah. In this case, whatever happens in the heavens must happen in accordance with this amr, so long as there is no other intervention by Allah.6

This understanding leads us to an interesting concept of science, such that in this conceptual framework the aim of scientific investigation becomes understanding and explicating the structure and distribution of the instruction that has been revealed in the heavens by the Creator. An understanding of science as such, would not only explain many things about the order and harmony in the known space, but also would bring clarity to the issue of the creation and formation of the objects in the space. No cosmology developed to date has the basic concepts by which the extremely complicated, and yet excellent order that we observe from the micro-world to the macro-world, can be explained in a consistent way. How did, from a small number of basic physical forces, evolve the wonderously rich physical, chemical, biological and psychological interactions in the world? Is there a cosmic plan behind all this? These are the questions which occupy the minds of many scientists working in the fields of physics and cosmology.7

From the ayahs related with the primary amr in the Qur’an, we can infer that the order in the heavens emerge as a result of the interactions of the instructions (= amr) dispersed in all regions of space (= makan). In this case, the word “amr” (= instruction) emerges as a fundamental concept directly related with “being”. In information physics, the concept of information is used as a basic concept in explaining the degree of order (or the negative entropy) of physical systems.8 But there are categorical differences between the concepts of amr and information: It seems that the primary amr is a set of instructions which not only determines the order in a region of space, but also brings about what we call “matter” itself. From this, we can say that the concept of amr, unlike the concept of information, is a concept related with “being”, or in philosophical terms, is an ontological concept. (Indeed, in a number of ayahs the word amr occurs in close relation with the word kun (= be); see e.g. ayahs in Baqarah 2/117, Al-i Imran 3/47, Maryam 19/35, Mu’min 40/68, Ya-Sin 36/82).

At this point, we are faced with the question whether the primary amr is sufficient in itself or not, in maintaining the order in the heavens as an important question. Before we make a judgement on this issue, we need to consider the ayah:

“It is Allah who holds the heavens and the earth from collapse (= yumsiku-s samawati wal arda an tazula); if they should collapse, there is none, not one can hold them therafter; verily He is most Forbearing, oft Forgiving.” (Fatir 35/4)

This ayah brings several possibilities in mind. The first one is that the verb “holds” (= yumsiku) can be understood as “holds with His amr”, so that when the effects of the primary amr is obliterated by Allah, there would be no one other than Him to bring back the order. The ayah in Rum 30/25 that we saw earlier strengthens this possibility. The second one is that the heavens are protected from reduction or collapse, such that the word “tazula” which is a derivative of “zawal” (= reduction, collapse) may be pointing to such possibility.9

Another possibility is that, the cosmic order which has been established by the primary amr cannot go on indefinitely by itself, and that Allah maintains the order by His secondary amr. It is also imaginable that both possibilities can be the case. Other possibilities than what we said here in a theoretical and speculative framework need also be considered and investigated.

Allah’s intervention to the events in this world: The secondary amr

Let us continue with the relationships between the word amr and the order in the heavens. Since the order in the heavens has been established by the primary amr that has been revealed in them, one might think: If we have a complete understanding of the primary amr which have been revealed in the heavens, and consequently to all systems in them, we can understand all that happens in them. In this way we can possess complete knowledge about these happenings, and see the future. (This could be the final vision of the contemporary understanding of science.) Yet, as explained in some detail below, the problem is not as simple as this. The main reason is that the amr is not something that cannot be changed, and that its effects cannot be overridden once it has been revealed in these systems. An ayah which we saw earlier, explicitly states that other instructions are being (continuously or periodically) sent down by Allah:

“Allah is He who created the seven heavens, and of the earth the like of them [in number]; the instruction (= amr) descends through the midst of them [all]; that you may know that Allah has power over all things and that Allah has encircled all things with knowledge.” (Talaq 65/12)

Indeed, as will be seen when the conceptual frames of the words amr and all other related words (haqq, qadr, qada, izn, sakhara, sultan, ‘aql, and ruh), the amr is not something that consists of the primary amr. We understand from the ayahs in which the words amr, haqq, izn, qadr, and qada occurs, that the effects of the primary amr can be cancelled, overridden, or entirely new conditions can be created by new amr (the secondary amr) sent down by Allah.

The secondary amr sent by the Real Ruler is what is (in terms of the verbs used in the Qur’an in association with it) determined (mubrim), decided on (mustaqir), measured to a measure (qadaran maqdura), differentiated (yufraqu), directed or administered (yudabbir), sent (mursil), sent down (munzil), distributed (muqassimat), decreed (qada), and infused in (yulqi). The angels are sent down with this amr, and they descend through the heavens with it, and after the amr is obeyed (ata), applied/done (maf’ul) and completed (balagha), the amr ascends (ya’ruj) to Allah, and returns (yurji) to Him. The effects of this amr are sometimes made visible (zahara) to mankind. These verses indicate that the completion of the cycle of amr can be regarded both as periodical and continuous.

Some of the other ayahs directly related with the secondary amr are:

“… an amr from Allah’s presence …” (Maida 5/52, Duhan 44/5)

“Or do they determine the amr? We indeed are the determiner (= mubrimun).” (Zukhruf 43/79)

“…all amr have been decided on (= wa kulli amrin mustaqir).” (Qamar 54/3)

“[Allah] directs the amr from the heaven to the earth (= yudabbir al-amri min as-samai ilal ard); then it ascends (= ya’ruj) to Him in [part of ] a day the measure of which is thousand years in your count.” (Sajda 32/5)

“[Allah] sends / sends down the amr (= mursil/munzil).” (Duhan 44/5, Talaq 65/5)

“Allah’s amr is a measure measured (= qadaran maqdura).” (Ahzab 33/38)

“[A nigt] in which all wise [or mighty] amr are differentiated (= fiha yufraqu kulli amrin hakeem).” (Duhan 44/4)

“The angels and the Spirit (= Ruh) descend in that [night] by the leave (= izn) of their Sustainer from [or with] all amr.” (Qadr 97/4)

“When He decrees an amr, He says: ‘Be!’, and it is (= iza qada amran yaqulu lahu kun fa yakun).” (Baqara 2/117, Al-i Imran 3/47, Maryam 19/35, Mu’min 40/68, Ya-Sin 36/82)

“The amr of Allah has come (= ata amrullah) …” (Nahl 16/1)

“… the amr of Allah is done [or applied] (= wa kana amrullahi maf’ula).” (Nisa 4/47)

“… the amr of Allah has become visible (= zahara amrullah) …” (Tawba 9/48)

“Our amr is but a single [act] like the twinkling of an eye.” (Qamar 54/50)

“… Allah has power over His amr (= wallahu ghalibun ‘ala amrihi), but most among mankind know it not.” (Yusuf 12/21)

There are ayahs in the Qur’an indicating that the angels are given the task of applying the secondary amr. Some of these are,

“We [angels] descend only by the leave of your Sustainer (= wa ma natanazzalu illa bi amri rabbika)…” (Maryam 19/64)

“And to Allah bow all that is in the heavens and in the earth whether moving [living] creatures or the angels; for none are arrogant [before their Sustainer].” (Nahl 16/49-50)

“And they [the angels] speak not before He [speaks], and they act by His amr.” (Anbiya 21/27)

Another two ayahs related with the secondary amr, which particularly attract our attention are,

“Nor can a soul die except by Allah’s leave (= izn), the term being fixed as by wiriting…” (Al-i Imran 3/145)

“For each [person] there are [angels] before and behind him; they protect him from the amr of Allah (= yahfazuna min amrillah). Verily, never will Allah change the condition of a nation until they change what is in their soul; but when Allah wishes the punishment of a nation, there can be no turning it back, nor will they find beside Him any to protect.” (Ra’d 13/11)

As can be seen, the first ayah states no person/soul (= nafs) dies except by Allah’s leave (=bi iznillah) which is associated with an amr. This ayah also shows that all the physical conditions determined by the primary amr would not be sufficient to cause the death of a person, however the seem to be deadly. This issue is made clear by the statement in the last ayah, “they protect him form the amr of Allah” so that these protectors [angels], protect that person from the unbearable and deadly effects of the primary amr.10

All these ayahs clearly indicate that the primary amr that has been revealed in the heavens, may not explain every event that happens in the heavens and the earth, despite that the order in the heavens has primarily been established and is maintained by it. Still, we must not overlook the fact that the primary amr has a basic function in maintaining the cosmic order.

We also see from these ayahs that the decree and its application of the amr that overtakes or overcomes the primary amr in a region of space is totally dependent on Allah’s leave (= izn). This is very important, because without Allah’s leave, the primary emr continues its function, and all makan (= spaces) and all the objects in them continue to carry the properties determined by it. The following ayahs clearly state this,

“Did you not see that Allah has made subject to you whatever is on the earth? Ships flow(= tajree) by His amr; He holds the heaven from falling on the earth so that it would not fall, except by His permission (= izn); Allah is Most Kind and Most Merciful to mankind.” (Haj 22/65)

“… the sun, the moon and the stars are in subjection by His amr; verily in this are signs for a nation who use intellect.” (Nahl 16/12)

As can be seen from these ayahs, the properties and motions of the objects in the heavens are formed by the primary amr, and as long as Allah does not send another amr on them by His izn, their properties and motions will continue. The effective use of objects in the heavens and the forces in them by mankind requires studying these properties and the physical forces that determine these properties. We can say that the basic physical forces emerge as the result of the order (= mizan) that has been placed in the heavens.

We can acquire, by all the activity that we call “scientific research”, only the knowledge of the effects of the primary amr and the established order (= mizan). In the future, even if we should have an excellent knowledge of physics and computation, we can only have the knowledge of predicting the effects of the primary amr in a certain region of space.11 As we will explain shortly, when Allah interferes with His amr in any “natural penomenon” it would be impossible to make any reliable prediction about the processes of that phenomenon by physical methods, because it is impossible to know by any scientific method, when and where the secondary amr will take effect.

The ayahs related with this issue clearly shows that, even if we have a complete knowledge of the primary amr that has been revealed in the heavens, we would still not have a complete and absolute knowledge about the world. Even if we used all our scientific research methods, we cannot obtain even the trace of knowledge of the secondary amr that Allah may send by His leave (= izn), to cancel out or partially or completely change the effects of the primary amr in a region of space. This tells us that even when we possess an excellent science and technology, we should put our reliance and trust only in Allah.

***

We see in some of the ayahs of the Qur’an that a close relationship is made between using intellect and understanding cosmological events. Since the order in the heavens and the earth is the work of Allah, the study and research for understanding this great work should be a paramount duty for mankind, because in this way, the true might of Allah can be better understood and better appreciated.

Besides, these ayahs clearly motivate mankind to reason about the creation of the heavens and to understand the amr which lay beneath the cosmological events, and their effective use for the benefit of mankind. These ayahs also ask mankind to take lessons from such events, and guide them to realize that the life of the Hereafter which Allah promises is far superior to the life of this world. Some of the related ayahs are,

“Indeed, in the creation of the heavens and the earth; in the alternation of the day and night; in the ships which flow (= tajree) in the ocean; in the rain which Allah sends down from the sky and revives the earth with it after its death; in the beasts of all kinds that He scatters throughout the earth; in the redirection (= tasreef) of the winds, and the clouds which they trail like their slaves between the earth and the sky, are signs for a nation who use intellect.” (Baqara 2/164)

“In the alternation of the day and night; in the sustenance which Allah sends down from the sky and revives the earth with it after its death; and in the redirection (= tasreef) of the winds, are signs for a nation who use intellect.” (Jasiya 45/5)

“And such are the parables We set for mankind, but none use intellect on them except those who have knowledge (= wa ma ya’qiluha illal ‘alimun).” (Ankabut 29/43)

In the first two verses above, the word “ya’qilun” (= those who use intellect) refers to those who can see the connection between these ayahs and reality. The same term appears in the following verses which state that the life of the Hereafter is superior to the life of this world:

“… But the home [or life] of the Hereafter (= dar al akhira) is better for the righteous; will you not use intellect?” (A’raf 7/169)

“The things you have been given are but the provision and the glitter of the life of this world; better is Allah’s reward and more lasting. Will you not use intellect?” (Qasas 28/60)

On the other hand, the following ayah states that those who do not use intellect are like cattle, or even lower in guidence:

“Do you think that most of them listen or use intellect? They are like cattle, and even more misguided (= bal hum adall).” (Furqan 25/44)

In the ayah below, a surprising stetement appears: “Whatever is in the heavens” have been given to the use and benefit of mankind:

“[Allah] has subjected (= sakhara) to you whatever is in the heavens and the earth, all from Him; verily in this there are signs (= ayat) for a nation who reflect (=qawmin yatafakkarun).”

In this ayah the expression “all from Him” indicates that the use of all the objects and events, or all the physical forces that form and determine their properties and motions are given, without exception, potentially to all men who strive to understand them. In this ayah we also see that the word “sakhara” (= subjected to) is linked with the phrase “a nation who reflect”. This means that the effective use of the objects and the physical forces in the heavens and the earth will be accomplished by collaborative study and the use of intellect by people as nations, rather than as isolated individuals. This would require of course, a public orientation and participation.

The end of the order in the heavens: The amr of the Hour

The amr which is termed in the Qur’an as the amr of the Hour (= amr-us saah), is the instruction which will terminate the order established with the primary amr. As understood from the ayahs related with the Day of Standing (= yawm al qiyama) in the Qur’an, this amr will take effect in a day which will encompass Resurrection and the Day of Reckoning (= yawm al hisab). This subject is dealt with in detail in another study titled “The Day of Standing in the Qur’an and Traditions”, which we hope to have translated into English soon. After these explanations, we can now go on to the definitions of the terms “physical event” and “natural phenomenon” within this conceptual framework.

4. The Definition of “Physical Event”

After this brief inquiry into the ayahs related with the word amr, we can now attempt to provide a definition of “physical event” within this framework: A physical event or physical phenomenon, is an event which happens only within the context of the primary amr which has been revealed in the heavens with their creation. The characteristic feature of such events is that they are repeatable (or repeatedly observable) by humans in the laboratory and observation conditions. We can say that causality in physical events arises as a result of the order or symmetry (= mizan) laid with the primary amr. Causality can be said to be relevant only in the space of large (or macro) scale interactions. Symmetry is also in effect in most interactions in micro space, but here causality leaves its place to uncertainty due to some fundamental properties of light (= photons?) invariably used in the measurements.

The uncertainty in physical events arises in two categorically different forms: uncertainty in the microworld, and uncertainty in the macroworld. We stated that the first arises from the basic properties of light used in observations and measurements. The second type of uncertainty arises from the difficulties of determining the initial conditions of certain complex physical events. This can be called the statistical uncertainty. The physicists believe that many physical phenomena can be modeled by differential equations. In such models, the main problem is to determine the initial conditions, so that starting with these conditions at a time to, the equations would give the status of the event at time t1. In many physical events, the initial conditions are too complicated to know, but in many others, these are known within statistical limits.

5. The Definiton of “Natural Phenomenon”

The term “natural phenomenon” is mostly used for macro scale events observed in the world and in space. Solar and lunar eclipses, various meteorological events, and earthquakes are regarded as phenomena in this framework. In today’s understanding of science all natural phenomena are believed to be a composition of mere physical events. However, unlike accurately predictable events such as the solar and lunar eclipses, the unpredictibility of meteorological events and earthquakes have led the scientists to consider them in a separate class as “chaotic events”.

Based on this classification, causality in natural phenomena needs to be considered in two different frames. Space events such as the solar and lunar eclipses can be explained by the effects of the physical forces, such as gravity, which determine the orbits of the objects in space. But as the explanations of meteorological and tectonic events require taking into account of a number of different effects at the same time, a complete explanation of such an event becomes impossible. The term “butterfly effect” for meteorological phenomena has been coined by some scientists for this purpose. In meteorological and geological phenomena, many effects such as the particular spatial configuration of the planets in their orbits according to the earth and the sun, solar explosions (or “solar spots”), the impact of large meteors on the earth, and other space events can be at work together. All these effects contribute to the uncertainties in the predictions and explanations of such events.

6. Allah’s Intervention in Physical Events

Earlier, we saw from the ayahs in the Qur’an that Allah intervenes in physical events in any region of space and time by His secondary amr as He wishes (= yuridu/arada) to do so. When Allah’s amr comes to a space-time region, it may result in three different effects: 1) The obstruction or cancellation of the effects of the primary amr in the same region, 2) The strengthening the effects of the primary amr, 3) The emergence of an entirely new set of effects in the same region.

In the first case, Allah’s new amr (the secondary amr) interacts with the primary amr that occupies the same place so as to cancel or weaken its effects.

In the second case, Allah’s amr interacts with the primary amr so as to increase its effects, and in this way, it strengthens and/or focuses the current effects.

In the third case, Allah’s new amr brings about entirely new and previously unseen effects either by opening new space for itself, or by interacting with the primary amr in the same space.

7. Allah’s Intervention to Natural Phenomena

A number of ayahs in the Qur’an clearly describes examples of how Allah intervenes in and directs what we call meteorological and geological events. We shall see some of these ayas shortly. But first, let us consider what may happen when Allah intervenes in natural phenomena. In such cases we can think of four different effects: 1) Delaying or initiating the occurrence of the natural event in order to disperse its distructive effects which would otherwise be caused under the effects of the primary amr, 2) Focusing and directing the effects of the natural event, 3) Increasing the strength of the effects of the event, 4) Bringing about natural events with perceived effects of such kind as previously unseen. Let us now see some of the ayahs which exemplify these four different effects:

“Did you not see that Allah makes the clouds move gently, then joins them together and then makes them into a heap? Then you see the rain emerge from their midst; and He sends down from the sky mountain masses (of clouds) in which is hail; He strikes with it whom He will, and He turns it away from whom He will. The vivid flash of His lightning almost blinds the eyes.” (Nur 24/43)

In this ayah the expression “He strikes with it whom He will, and He turns it away from whom He will” exemplifies the effects of the first and the second type that we listed above. Some ayahs which could be taken as examples for the other two cases are,

“[The nation of] Aad, behaved arrogantly in the land with no just reason, and they said: ‘Who is mightier than us?’ Could they not see that Allah, who created them, was mightier than they? Yet they denied Our signs.” (Fussilat 41/15)

“So We sent against them a furious wind through the days of disaster that We might give them a taste of punishment of humiliation in this life; but more humiliating still, will be the punishment of the life to come. And they will not be helped.” (Fussilat 41/16)

“And the [nation of] Aad; they were destroyed by a furious wind, exceedingly violent.” (Haaqqa 69/6)

“[The nation of Samood] rebelled against the amr of their Sustainer; so the stunning noise [of a thunderbolt] seized them even while they were looking on.” (Zariyat 51/44)

The expression “stunning noise” can be regarded as an example of a previously unseen “phenomenon”. (How “natural” could it be regarded is another matter.) In another unusual “phenomenon”, the nation of Lot were destroyed by the collapse of the land swallowing the whole city with all its population, together with a hail of baked stones [lava stones or meteorites?] from above:

“[The angels] said: O, Lot!, we are messengers from your Sustainer; they [your nation] shall not touch you; depart with your kinfolk with the dead of the night, and none of you look back; as for your wife, she shall suffer the fate of the others. In the morning their hour will come. Is not the morning near?” (Houd 11/81)

“And when our amr came, we turned it [the city] upside down, and let loose upon it a shower of baked-stones spread layer on layer.” (Houd 11/82)

These ayahs describe, clearly with no need for more comments, how these nations were destroyed by what we may still call “natural events”.

At this point, regarding our current subject, we are faced with two extremely important questions: If Allah severely punishes sometimes entire nations, what could be the reasons for such punishments? Could it be known or predicted how such punishments will happen? The answers to these questions can be found in the Qur’an in ayahs where the word “sunnatullah” occur. In the Qur’an, the word “sunnatullah” occurs in reference to certain forms of conduct for people and nations. These laws are not changeable, not for even the Messengers of Allah:

“… no change will you find in the laws of Allah (= fa lan tajida li sunnatillahi tabdeela); and no turning off will you find in the laws of Allah.” (Faatir 35/43)

In the Qur’an these laws of conduct are also referred as “the law of the ancients [past nations]” (= sunnatul awwaleen) in some ayahs. The codes of these laws, or in other words the conditions for them to take effect can be found in the ayahs where the words “haqq” and “sunna” take place. We can summarize some of the conditions of these laws as follows:

- To behave arrogantly in the land with no just reason.

- To secretly devise evil plots.

- To kill the messengers of Allah, and those who instruct with equity.

- To make friends with the subjects of Satan (= shayateen) against Allah.

Let us now see the related ayahs. The first is related with the arrogants:

“[The nation of] Aad, behaved arrogantly in the land with no just reason (=fastakbaru fil ardi bi ghayri-l haqq), and they said: ‘Who is mightier than us?’ Could they not see that Allah, who created them, was mightier than they? Yet they denied Our signs.” (Fussilat 41/15)

The Aad paid in this world the due of their evil conduct by being destroyed by a furious storm:

“So We sent against them a furious storm through the days of disaster that We might give them a taste of punishment of humiliation in this life; but more humiliating still, will be the punishment of the life to come. And they will not be helped.” (Fussilat 41/16)

Another great sin which deserves punishment in this world is to secretly devise evil plots (= makr-us sayyia) against people:

“[Their] arrogance in the land and [their] plotting evil (= istakbaran fil ardi wa makr-us sayyia); evil plots will harm only their authors. Are they looking for other than the law of the ancients? “… no change will you find in the laws of Allah (= fa lan tajida li sunnatillahi tabdeela); and no turning off will you find in the laws of Allah.” (Faatir 35/43)

Related with those who devise evil plots, the following ayahs need also be considered:

“Do those who secretly devise evil plots (= allazina makaru-s sayyiat) feel secure that Allah will not cause the earth to swallow them up, or that the wrath will not seize them from directions they little percieve.” (Nahl 16/45)

“Or that He may not seize them in the midst of their going to and fro, when they cannot escape?” (Nahl 16/46)

“Or that He will not give them over to slow destruction? Yet your Sustainer is Compasionate and Merciful.” (Nahl 16/47)

The expression “your Sustainer is Compassionate and Merciful” can be uderstood as that Allah will save those who were wronged by the hands of the plotters of evil. It can also mean that Allah gives long respite to those who devise evil plots, beside openly warning them off by His words about the due results of their deeds, so that they may take heed and give up their evil deeds.

From these ayahs we understand that such plotters of evil are to be sternly punished in this world in four different ways:

1) Allah will bury them in the ground by a terrible disaster.

2) They will be seized by the wrath from a direction they hardly percieve.

3) They will be seized when they go about doing their business.

4) They will be subjected to a slow destruction.

The past nations which murdered Allah’s messengers, or forcefully drove them away from their homes have been destroyed according to these laws (see, e.g. Isra 17/76-77). Those people who unjustly murdered the individuals who instructed equity among them, have also been destroyed in accordance with these laws:

“As to those who deny Allah’s revelations, and slay the Prophets and slay with no just reason those who instruct with equity among mankind; announce them a grevious penalty.” (Al-i Imran 3/21)

“And We have destined for them intimate companions [shayateen]; who make past and future seem fair to them; well was the word justified against them [or: they deserved the fate] which overtook the parties (= umam) of the jinn and men who have gone before them. They shall assuredly be lost.” (Fussilat 41/25)

The expression “well was the word justified against them” (= haqqat ‘alayhim-ul qawl) in the last ayah can be taken to refer to the laws that have been applied to the ancients.

What we have discussed to this point are the laws by which mankind are punished in this world when they exceed the limits. We can now return to our second question above: Could it be known beforehand how the punishment will come into effect?

It is not possible to predict by which “natural event”, and in fact how sunnatullah will take effect. But since the limits of the conditions of these laws are given in the Qur’an, the pending disaster can be estimated by closely observing the behavior of the society, particularly the behavior of those who command and exercise power in it (e.g., its leaders, elites and the wealthy), as to whether the conditions are fulfilled or not.

There are many ayahs in the Qur’an about how Allah has punished the wrongdoing nations in the past some of which seem to be relevant to the conditions of our time:

“Many a cities have insolently opposed the command of their Sustainer and His Messengers, and we called them to a severe account (= hasabnaha hisaban shadeeda); We punished them with exemplary punishment.” (Talaq 65/8)

“When we decide to destroy a settlement, we first send our command to those of them who live in comfort; if they trangress, so that the word is proved true against them; then We destroy them utterly.” (Isra 17/16)

“We did not wrong them, but they wronged their own souls; when the amr of your Systainer comes (= lamma ja’a amru rabbuka), the deities they invoked other than Allah availed them nothing; they only hastened their ruin.” (Houd 11/101)

Lastly, apart from these ayahs, the following ayah is of great interest regarding what may be expected to happen in the future in this world:

“There is no city (= qarya) but shall be destroyed or sternly punished before the Last Day; that is decreed in the Book (= kana zalika fi-l kitabi mastura).” (Isra 17/58)

It would be the duty of all men and women who think, keep contact with reality and take heed, to be prepared as needs to be prepared before the truth of these ayahs become visible.

Conclusion

Many ayahs in the Qur’an declare that Allah is the Creator of the heavens and the earth, and their Real Ruler. He has encompassed and encircled all things with knowledge. Nothing in the heavens and the earth can ever escape His knowledge. Allah intervenses and directs with His secondary amras He wishes, what we call “natural phenomena” which normally happen within the framework of the primary order which He has established in the heavens by His primary amr. He punishes with them whom He decides among mankind, and turns the destruction away from whom He wishes. Allah has made clear by His laws termed as “sunnatullah” in the Qur’an, under what conditions He sends His punishment on people and nations. These laws are also somewhat related with the order (= mizan) which has been established by their creation. If the limits of these laws are well known, it can be sensed when they will take effect, but except as Allah will, it cannot be known exactly when and how they will take effect. We must strive to understand, by using all the means available to us, the happenings in the heavens and the earth and try to understand reality as a whole. When we do this study in a perfect manner and keep equity about ourselves and our position in this world at the same time, we would better appreciate the true might of Allah (= haqqa qadrihi). We will also realize, as has been written in the Qur’an, that the life of the Hereafter is much superior to the life of this world and will give direction to our lives accordingly. Allah knows the best of all things. Was-salaam.


Notes

1 We call what is termed in the Qur’an “the heavens and the earth” as “the universe”. The validity of the term “universe” is being questioned by some physicists such as David Deutsch, who would prefer the term “multiverse” instead. The repeated use of the expression “the heavens and the earth” in the Qur’an can be viewed as to stress the particular importance of the earth in the heavens, with its being the home of millions of different living species including the humans, and its surprisingly suitable conditions for the sustenance of life. This particular place of the planet earth in the universe has been of great interest to many physicists and cosmologists in recent decades. (See, Ref. 7-b)

2 The expression “yanzuru fi” in this verse refers to both observation and systmatic (theoretical) thinking, and muslim scientists in the Classical Era have derived the term “nazariya” (= theory) from the root of this verb “nazara fi”.

3 For more detailed explanations please see,

- Kocabas, S. “Islam’da Bilginin Temelleri”. Iz Yayincilik, Istanbul, 1997.

(An extended English version of this book is being prepared, and we hope to publish it in the future.)

4 The word “amr” occurs in the Qur’an in other frames than the two we have given here. See, Ref. 3 for details.

5 We must emphasize that the word “amr” is not classified in the Qur’an as “primary amr” and “secondary amr”. We have introduced this distinction from the differences of frames of the use of this word. But the appropriateness of this classification can even be seen from the personal pronouns that are used with the word “amr” in the Qur’an. What we call “the primary amr” corresponds to the uses in the ayahs where the word appears almost exclusively in the form “His amr” with the third person singular pronoun, and our term “the secondary amr” corresponds to the uses of the word as “the amr of Allah”, “Our amr”, and simply “the amr”.

6 Whether this amr can be understood as the “operating system” of the heavens, or as a kind of “software” loaded in the heavens, is a subject that deserves to be seriously considered.

7 See;

a - Davies, P. (1992). “The Mind of God”. Touchstone Books. New York.

b - Barrow, J.D. & Tipler, F. (1996). “The Anthropic Cosmological Principle.” Oxford: Oxford University Press.


8 For information physics, see: Stonier, T. (1990). “Information an the Internal Structure of the Universe”. London: Springer-Verlag.

9 The current theoretical framework about elementary particles involves the protection of the basic building blocks of material existence (e.g. protons and electrons) from decay. As an example, consider protons which are accepted to be one of the basic constituents of hydrogen atoms: Unlike free neutrons; protons can stay for a long period (at least 1030 s.) without decaying into lighter particles (mesons and leptons). Had there not been in effect a particular form of baryonic symmetry between elementary particles, there would be no atoms, and no living and inanimate objects as we know them in the world. The word “tazula” may be taken to refer to preventing such kind of collapse.

10 For detailed information on this subject, see Ref. 3.

11 Despite this, we believe that all scientific research in this direction need to be continued by all means, because only those who have knowledge can see the limits of current scientific knowledge, and can better appreciate the true might of Allah. Also, we need to remember the ayah: “... and say: Could those who know be like those who know not? ...” (Zumar 39/9)