The Failed Hypothesis? A 'New' Approach in Understanding the Qur'an and Science (2017-09-18) ​

0:00:15 what is this and i'm going to be
0:00:16 delivering to you today
0:00:20 a new approach in understanding the
0:00:22 quran and science now
0:00:26 when i say a new approach
0:00:30 i don't mean it's new
0:00:33 i mean that it's new for some people
0:00:37 but the approach that i want to
0:00:38 articulate today
0:00:40 concerning how to understand the quran
0:00:42 and science
0:00:44 is really based
0:00:46 on our classical tradition
0:00:49 it's based on the richness
0:00:52 of our intellectual tradition
0:00:55 and i think some of the problems i'm
0:00:57 going to be also talking about during
0:00:59 this presentation
0:01:02 are as a result of not having a strong
0:01:04 link
0:01:06 to our classical
0:01:08 and intellectual tradition
0:01:11 and if
0:01:13 we learn any lessons from
0:01:16 what i'm going to be discussing
0:01:18 one of them should be
0:01:20 that we should take a more active role
0:01:24 and be more active
0:01:26 in
0:01:27 linking ourselves back to our
0:01:29 intellectual tradition
0:01:31 because
0:01:33 we are standing on the shoulders of
0:01:35 giants
0:01:37 we are standing
0:01:39 on these mountains
0:01:42 of
0:01:44 intellect
0:01:46 the likes of ala gozali
0:01:48 the likes of razi
0:01:50 the likes of
0:01:52 ibn te mia the likes of
0:01:58 and many many others and they all had
0:02:02 a specific role to play
0:02:04 in our
0:02:05 intellectual tradition
0:02:09 so
0:02:10 the summary of today's presentation is
0:02:13 that i'm going to be basically
0:02:16 going through
0:02:18 some of the problems
0:02:20 with the current scientific
0:02:23 miracles in the quran approach
0:02:25 because as you know
0:02:28 or you may be aware
0:02:29 that a lot of the duats
0:02:31 those who try to convey a compassionate
0:02:34 and intelligent case for islam to the
0:02:36 wider community
0:02:38 they adopt certain arguments
0:02:42 to
0:02:43 justify
0:02:45 the claim that the quran is from the
0:02:47 divine
0:02:48 and one of these arguments is
0:02:50 that there are scientific miracles in
0:02:52 the quran
0:02:54 i want to basically deconstruct this
0:02:56 approach
0:02:58 and show how number one
0:03:00 it's not in line with islamic
0:03:02 epistemology
0:03:04 number two
0:03:06 it's not in line with our
0:03:07 islamic tradition
0:03:09 number three
0:03:11 it has a lot of conceptual historical
0:03:14 and linguistic problems
0:03:18 and not only that number four
0:03:21 the whole approach is very incoherent
0:03:22 and inconsistent
0:03:24 within our tradition
0:03:28 then what i aim to discuss is the
0:03:31 orthodox
0:03:33 multi-layered
0:03:34 and multi-leveled approach to the quran
0:03:37 concerning natural phenomena concerning
0:03:41 the empirical world concerning science
0:03:44 if you like and i do appreciate
0:03:47 this approach the multi-layered and
0:03:50 multi-leveled approach is probably new
0:03:52 for some
0:03:55 and what's very interesting is that this
0:03:57 orthodox approach to the quran
0:03:59 bypasses all of the issues and
0:04:02 contentions and
0:04:04 the negative popularizations
0:04:07 concerning the quran and science
0:04:11 and
0:04:13 insha allah
0:04:14 you'll be able to
0:04:16 see the beauty of the book of allah
0:04:17 subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:04:20 because the multi-layered and
0:04:21 multi-leveled approach is
0:04:24 that the quran has a scope of meaning
0:04:29 when it refers to
0:04:33 scientific phenomena or empirical
0:04:35 phenomena or natural phenomena
0:04:38 and the words that it uses has many
0:04:40 layers of meaning obviously there is a
0:04:42 scope but there are many layers of
0:04:44 meaning
0:04:45 and each layer of meaning
0:04:48 can address a particular understanding
0:04:51 across time
0:04:54 and this understanding not only refers
0:04:56 to
0:04:57 an empirical understanding
0:05:00 but it can also refer to
0:05:02 existential aspects
0:05:05 spiritual aspects metaphysical
0:05:08 aspects so from this point of view the
0:05:11 quran is very four-dimensional
0:05:15 and i'll explain this a little little
0:05:18 bit later towards the end of the
0:05:20 presentation
0:05:23 now
0:05:24 before i get into the
0:05:27 the depths depths of things
0:05:29 i want to basically
0:05:31 highlight to you that the approach that
0:05:32 i'm taking
0:05:35 is not something i'm making up myself
0:05:39 and i've deliberately put a whole list
0:05:41 of people here
0:05:43 rather people is the wrong term to use
0:05:46 mashayek
0:05:47 scholars
0:05:50 and i've deliberately chosen scholars
0:05:52 from the past
0:05:54 and from the present
0:05:56 and scholars from different
0:05:59 positions
0:06:01 in islamic theology
0:06:04 and i've done this deliberately just to
0:06:05 show
0:06:06 that there's like a wide
0:06:09 consensus or quasi consensus
0:06:12 concerning
0:06:14 this issue
0:06:16 so for example we have the famous
0:06:18 abu
0:06:25 you have the contemporary
0:06:29 the contemporary sheikh saleh al-fawzan
0:06:33 the american contemporary sheikh abdul
0:06:35 nassar janga
0:06:38 the
0:06:39 thinker and writer on the quran muzaffar
0:06:42 iqbal
0:06:44 the contemporary american sheikh hamza
0:06:46 yusuf
0:06:48 the academic professor sayed hussain
0:06:51 nasser
0:06:54 uthmani
0:06:58 and there are many many more to mention
0:06:59 but i wanted to mention these in
0:07:01 particular because they represent
0:07:03 the past
0:07:05 and the present and they come from
0:07:07 different
0:07:08 positions on the islamic theological
0:07:12 spectrum
0:07:15 and here are some statements for example
0:07:18 he said
0:07:20 i'm going to forward it to my friends
0:07:22 and students
0:07:24 i will request you to make it available
0:07:25 in other languages like urdu turkish and
0:07:28 persian
0:07:29 the arabic translation is excellent may
0:07:31 allah reward you for writing such an
0:07:32 amazing peace
0:07:34 now this was a piece that
0:07:37 was written
0:07:39 concerning the new approach to the book
0:07:41 of allah subhanahu wa ta'ala well it's
0:07:43 not new but reviving the kind of
0:07:45 classical approach on how to understand
0:07:47 natural phenomena in the quran
0:07:50 and
0:07:52 like the peace he liked the arabic
0:07:53 translation of the peace and he
0:07:55 basically wanted to push that to his
0:07:56 students so from this point of view he
0:08:00 was in line with that understanding of
0:08:03 how you
0:08:05 attempt to see science in the book of
0:08:07 allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:08:10 muzaffar iqbal in the relatively recent
0:08:13 publication the study quran on page
0:08:17 1691
0:08:20 he summarizes
0:08:22 this approach
0:08:23 he says in general it can be said that
0:08:26 attempts at finding modern science in
0:08:28 the quran or proving the veracity of the
0:08:30 quran by way of modern science are
0:08:33 fundamentally flawed
0:08:35 because they suffer from a conceptual
0:08:37 confusion produced by various forms of
0:08:39 scientism
0:08:41 produced by various forms of scientism
0:08:43 they disassociate and decontextualize
0:08:46 the quranic vocabulary and concepts in
0:08:48 order to graft modern scientific
0:08:50 theories onto the book and i don't want
0:08:51 to discuss what he really means by this
0:08:54 but it's just to show that scholarship
0:08:57 academia in our tradition from different
0:09:00 scholars along the theological spectrum
0:09:03 are basically talking about this issue
0:09:08 for instance you have
0:09:11 a shaytabee he said many have
0:09:13 overstepped all bounds and made undue
0:09:16 claims about the quran when they
0:09:18 assigned to it all types of knowledge of
0:09:20 the past and the present such as the
0:09:22 natural sciences mathematics and logic
0:09:25 hamza yusuf said
0:09:28 i would like to say i'm very wary of
0:09:30 connecting anything in the quran with
0:09:32 scientific knowledge
0:09:33 i mean socrates had the last word on
0:09:36 science
0:09:37 he said how can you consider something
0:09:39 knowledge that's always changing
0:09:41 and the nature of science is that it is
0:09:43 always changing and if you don't believe
0:09:45 that you haven't studied the history of
0:09:47 science
0:09:49 so notwithstanding what we discussed so
0:09:51 far
0:09:52 it's interesting to go to
0:09:55 history
0:09:56 to really understand why
0:09:58 this
0:10:00 movement if you like of trying to impose
0:10:03 science into the quran and trying to
0:10:05 warrant and justify
0:10:06 our claim that the book of allah
0:10:08 subhanallah what that is from the divine
0:10:10 in reference to science
0:10:13 now there are three main things i
0:10:16 think that happened in history
0:10:21 that can really
0:10:23 indicate to us why this movement
0:10:28 grew
0:10:30 now before i discuss these three main
0:10:32 things just type in science and the
0:10:34 quran or scientific miracles in google
0:10:36 and you get i think over 50 million
0:10:40 50 million search
0:10:42 items
0:10:44 so coming back to the history
0:10:48 a major milestone in the kind of
0:10:52 proving the quran using science
0:10:54 was in 1976
0:10:57 when dr maurice bukhaio he wrote the
0:11:00 famous book the bible the quran in
0:11:02 science
0:11:04 and this book was translated into so
0:11:06 many different languages
0:11:08 all of the duat were memorizing this
0:11:11 book i mean i would even still argue
0:11:13 today that many
0:11:14 duats
0:11:15 know this book
0:11:17 better than they know the book of allah
0:11:19 subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:11:20 and i'm not saying that rhetorically
0:11:23 and
0:11:25 this book was translated in many
0:11:26 languages and it sparked of this
0:11:29 discussion and this movement and i think
0:11:31 because
0:11:33 the muslim community especially in the
0:11:35 east
0:11:38 is still going through this kind of
0:11:39 post-colonial trauma and with
0:11:42 post-colonial trauma
0:11:44 you have this kind of inferiority
0:11:46 complex
0:11:48 anything that is written by a doctor a
0:11:51 white man
0:11:53 and is
0:11:54 in some way supporting science and islam
0:11:58 then we're going to take it without
0:12:00 thinking without scrutiny without
0:12:03 any kind of
0:12:04 detailed understanding and just run with
0:12:07 it right
0:12:09 so
0:12:11 the book the bible the quran and science
0:12:13 was a major milestone
0:12:18 the second main
0:12:22 the second main thing that happened
0:12:24 that sparked off this movement
0:12:27 was basically
0:12:29 the commission on scientific signs in
0:12:31 the quran and sunnah this was a
0:12:33 saudi-based commission i believe
0:12:36 and what they did they produced a video
0:12:39 entitled this is the truth this was in
0:12:41 around the early 1980s
0:12:44 and the commission on the scientific
0:12:46 signs in the quran sunnah basically
0:12:48 invited
0:12:50 scientific scholars from the west
0:12:53 to
0:12:55 the the arab world
0:12:57 to sit on this commission
0:12:59 and
0:13:01 they were speaking about religion islam
0:13:04 and science
0:13:05 particularly the quran science
0:13:09 and as a result
0:13:11 they produced a video this is the truth
0:13:13 and this video was produced by
0:13:15 abdul madid zindani
0:13:18 and in this video
0:13:20 there are kind of statements from these
0:13:22 western scientific scholars saying that
0:13:25 yes
0:13:26 it is impossible that the prophet
0:13:28 muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam
0:13:30 could have known this how can the quran
0:13:33 have said this it must be from the
0:13:35 divine
0:13:36 and what's interesting
0:13:38 relatively recently
0:13:40 online
0:13:42 atheist popularizers they basically
0:13:44 interviewed these scientists most of
0:13:46 them i believe the majority of them
0:13:50 30 plus years after the commission
0:13:55 and they basically
0:13:57 said you know either they were they were
0:14:00 quote mined or they were misquoted
0:14:02 and from that point of view it's it's
0:14:04 it's a bit of an intellectual
0:14:06 embarrassment especially since many of
0:14:08 these statements are still used
0:14:11 in islamic literature all around the
0:14:12 world and translated into many many
0:14:14 different languages
0:14:17 the third kind of historical milestone
0:14:19 that popularized this
0:14:21 quran and science movement
0:14:23 was basically you have many sincere
0:14:26 duats
0:14:27 like dr zakir naik
0:14:30 yusuf esters and many others
0:14:32 that were pushing this forward
0:14:34 and they were basically
0:14:36 articulating this narrative in written
0:14:39 format in audio format
0:14:42 in visual format
0:14:44 and
0:14:45 they've been doing this for
0:14:47 over
0:14:48 a couple of decades i believe
0:14:51 so from this point of view these three
0:14:53 major historical milestones if you like
0:14:57 are responsible for this movement number
0:15:00 one
0:15:01 the bible and the quran in science
0:15:03 published by dr maurice bukhail number
0:15:06 two the commission the scientific signs
0:15:08 in the quran and sunnah
0:15:09 and
0:15:10 their video called this is the truth
0:15:13 and number three various popularizers in
0:15:16 the west and the east that adopt this
0:15:18 narrative and they push it to everybody
0:15:24 unfortunately there's a
0:15:25 growing counter movement from that point
0:15:27 of view
0:15:29 if you for example type in islam and
0:15:31 science you have so many different
0:15:34 anti-islamic websites
0:15:36 or websites that are criticizing this
0:15:38 approach and
0:15:41 showing that the quran
0:15:42 or trying to show that the quran does
0:15:44 not have any scientific miracles
0:15:49 you even have
0:15:51 forums or fora if you like that
0:15:54 basically talk about various
0:15:56 popularizers
0:15:57 and say you know how can intelligent do
0:16:00 art talk about these issues
0:16:05 you have famous blogs this particular
0:16:07 blog rational islam i believe would get
0:16:09 like 10 000 unique hits a week or a
0:16:12 month
0:16:13 and they'll be scrutinizing
0:16:16 the science and the quran narrative
0:16:19 and this is one of the famous atheist
0:16:21 popularizers
0:16:23 he basically
0:16:25 did a skype interview with alfred croner
0:16:28 who was one of the scientists that
0:16:29 attended
0:16:31 the commission
0:16:33 in saudi arabia or in arabia all those
0:16:36 years ago and he basically says that he
0:16:39 was quote mind
0:16:42 in his own words
0:16:45 even the wall street journal
0:16:48 over a decade ago around 15 years ago
0:16:51 they even spoke about this issue so you
0:16:53 could see how this narrative has become
0:16:56 extremely popular
0:17:00 not only this
0:17:02 you have academic journals for example
0:17:04 in the journal of religion and science
0:17:07 there was a piece called snakes from
0:17:09 staves
0:17:11 science scriptures
0:17:13 and the supernatural in maurice bukio
0:17:16 to the point that in the academic
0:17:18 literature you would find
0:17:20 the term bookailism
0:17:23 they wouldn't even call it quran and
0:17:24 science
0:17:25 narrative they wouldn't call it the
0:17:27 scientific miracles in the quran
0:17:29 they would basically say this is
0:17:31 bocaillism
0:17:32 right the kind of
0:17:36 movement or ism
0:17:38 that claims that there are scientific
0:17:40 miracles in the quran or that the quran
0:17:42 predates
0:17:43 modern science
0:17:46 so now we're ready to
0:17:48 get into the crux of the matter here
0:17:52 so what is the scientific
0:17:55 miracles claim when someone says there
0:17:58 are scientific miracles in the quran
0:17:59 when someone says
0:18:01 that
0:18:02 the quran predates science what are they
0:18:05 really saying
0:18:07 i believe most of the narratives
0:18:10 around this topic
0:18:13 can be summarized in three statements
0:18:18 number one
0:18:20 the prophet muhammad sallallahu alaihi
0:18:22 wasallam did not have access to the
0:18:25 scientific knowledge mentioned in the
0:18:27 quran
0:18:28 therefore it must be from god
0:18:32 number two
0:18:35 no one at the time of revelation the
0:18:37 seventh century had access to the
0:18:39 necessary equipment to understand or
0:18:42 verify the scientific knowledge in the
0:18:43 quran
0:18:44 therefore it must be from god
0:18:48 and number three the quranic verses were
0:18:50 revealed at a time
0:18:52 where science was primitive so no human
0:18:55 could have uttered the truths mentioned
0:18:56 in the quran
0:18:58 therefore it must be from god
0:19:00 i believe that most of
0:19:03 the approaches to
0:19:05 the quran using
0:19:07 the
0:19:08 scientific miracles in the narrative can
0:19:11 be summarized in these three statements
0:19:14 or are based on these three type of
0:19:16 statements
0:19:19 so what we're going to cover is
0:19:21 in order to deconstruct this approach
0:19:24 and then reconstruct the traditional
0:19:26 orthodox approach
0:19:28 is number one talk about what is the
0:19:30 purpose of quranic verses specifically
0:19:33 the quranic verses referring to
0:19:37 phenomena do they have a purpose if they
0:19:40 do
0:19:41 what is the purpose of
0:19:44 these verses
0:19:47 we're going to talk about the logical
0:19:49 fallacy of
0:19:51 this narrative that there are scientific
0:19:53 miracles in the quran and i'm going to
0:19:55 talk about the fallacy of the
0:19:57 undistributed middle it doesn't
0:19:59 logically follow
0:20:01 there is no
0:20:03 logical connection between the
0:20:04 conclusion that is made
0:20:06 and
0:20:07 the
0:20:09 previous premises
0:20:10 of the argument
0:20:13 number three and this is quite damning
0:20:15 actually and this one really
0:20:18 really really got me
0:20:19 frustrated and i i was
0:20:21 i wouldn't say i was angry
0:20:24 it's very hard for me to get angry i
0:20:25 guess
0:20:26 but
0:20:27 i'm not saying that just to show that i
0:20:29 don't get angry but it's i it's
0:20:32 something that my dad taught me really
0:20:34 i think it was um
0:20:36 more frustration
0:20:38 bordering anger
0:20:40 i was like oh my god
0:20:42 we we have either lied to people
0:20:45 or we just have not bothered to
0:20:48 investigate and read
0:20:50 now i'm not i don't wanna i don't wanna
0:20:51 come across as arrogant saying this
0:20:53 because i've done a hell of a lot of
0:20:54 mistakes
0:20:55 especially when it comes to the dour
0:20:58 everyone is on a journey
0:21:00 everyone is learning everyone is moving
0:21:02 forward in sha allah
0:21:04 so i want you to understand it in that
0:21:07 context
0:21:08 that
0:21:10 we're all on a journey here and we're
0:21:12 helping
0:21:13 each and every one of our brothers and
0:21:14 sisters to be able to articulate a more
0:21:16 positive case for themselves and a more
0:21:18 positive case for the book of allah
0:21:20 subhanallah ta'ala
0:21:23 the fourth point is we're going to talk
0:21:25 a little bit about the philosophy of
0:21:26 science i mean we're not going to get
0:21:27 into huge academic detail but if we
0:21:30 understand some of the main issues in
0:21:32 the philosophy of science will
0:21:34 understand why this whole approach is
0:21:36 extremely incoherent especially if we
0:21:38 understand islamic epistemology
0:21:43 the fifth point we're going to talk
0:21:44 about are einstein unscientific verses
0:21:47 now what i mean by this is
0:21:51 in order for
0:21:52 the quran and science narrative to be
0:21:54 consistent
0:21:57 then there shouldn't be any verses that
0:22:00 have some kind of scientific ambiguity
0:22:02 or
0:22:03 that cannot be explained from a
0:22:04 scientific point of view or that can't
0:22:07 really go against
0:22:09 our understanding of science and i'll
0:22:11 discuss that a little bit further
0:22:14 the sixth point i'm going to talk very
0:22:16 briefly on exegesis
0:22:19 the kind of
0:22:22 islamic understanding on how to approach
0:22:24 the quran from a point of view of
0:22:26 interpretation
0:22:29 so this is an issue of tafsir and we're
0:22:31 going to talk about you know what are
0:22:32 the rules here the very basic rules and
0:22:35 have we violated these rules by
0:22:37 basically trying to superimpose science
0:22:40 in the book of allah subhanahu wa
0:22:43 and finally we're going to talk about
0:22:44 the orthodox traditional multi-layered
0:22:47 and multi-leveled approach of the quran
0:22:49 which really is going to
0:22:51 hopefully elevate your understanding of
0:22:53 the book of allah
0:22:55 is going to
0:22:57 make you see the quran in a different
0:22:58 way the quran is very four dimensional
0:23:01 from that point of view
0:23:03 words that refer to natural phenomena
0:23:05 have
0:23:06 many layers of meaning and each layer of
0:23:08 this meaning addresses different
0:23:10 understanding understandings across time
0:23:13 and those understandings are not just
0:23:14 limited to the empirical domain but they
0:23:17 also basically refer to things like
0:23:19 existential matters metaphysical matter
0:23:22 spiritual matters and it's going to
0:23:24 really ensure allah
0:23:26 encourage you to see the quran in a
0:23:27 different light from this point of view
0:23:31 so the first point what's the purpose of
0:23:34 quranic verses
0:23:38 it's very important to understand when
0:23:40 we read the book of allah subhanallah
0:23:41 that we are holistic in our reading
0:23:44 and yes the quran does refer to natural
0:23:46 phenomena in a very general way it
0:23:49 points to these natural phenomena
0:23:52 and these natural phenomena are
0:23:55 indicators they are manifestations
0:23:57 of
0:23:58 allah's creative power
0:24:01 you may have heard this as allah's
0:24:04 lordship or the creator's lordship or in
0:24:06 arabic the tawheed of
0:24:10 the tawheed of the fact that allah is
0:24:12 the sole maintainer sustainer
0:24:16 creator master owner of everything that
0:24:18 exists
0:24:20 so allah subhanahu wa is pointing to his
0:24:22 creative power
0:24:24 his creativity his divine creativity and
0:24:27 his creative power so when allah says
0:24:29 look at the mountains look at the stars
0:24:31 look at the sydney street objects look
0:24:33 at all these things
0:24:35 the purpose of these ayats are not
0:24:39 are not for you to say wow look the
0:24:40 quran is giving us so much detail
0:24:44 concerning these natural phenomena
0:24:46 this is a reductionist understanding of
0:24:48 the book of allah subhana wa ta'ala it's
0:24:51 a flawed and reductionist understanding
0:24:54 because when we study the books of creed
0:24:56 from different interpretations of the
0:24:58 islamic
0:25:00 creedal spectrum
0:25:03 we will see that when allah refers to
0:25:05 natural phenomena they are there
0:25:07 to propel us to understand that allah
0:25:09 deserves worship that allah deserves
0:25:13 praise that allah deserves glorification
0:25:16 but allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:25:18 is the one that we must single out all
0:25:21 of our internal and external acts of
0:25:24 worship to
0:25:26 and you could take
0:25:29 most of the ayats that refer to allah's
0:25:31 creative power
0:25:33 in other words when allah refers to
0:25:36 his creation
0:25:37 and you will find eventually the
0:25:39 conclusion
0:25:41 that allah deserves worship
0:25:44 just pick up the quran do even now
0:25:47 go to the 78th chapter for example see
0:25:50 that allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is
0:25:51 talking about
0:25:52 the
0:25:54 creation he's talking about the
0:25:56 mountains he's talking about the plants
0:25:58 and vegetation and he continues
0:26:00 and at the end
0:26:02 you will find
0:26:04 that allah is referring to the fact that
0:26:06 he deserves worship
0:26:08 so the main purpose of the ayat of the
0:26:11 verses that talk about
0:26:14 allah's creativity allah's divine
0:26:17 creativity and creative power
0:26:19 the main purpose is to propel us
0:26:22 intellectually and spiritually to the
0:26:24 understanding that allah
0:26:27 deserves worship
0:26:30 now i found a really interesting quote
0:26:32 from
0:26:33 the subcontinent thinker
0:26:36 i mean
0:26:38 islahi in his
0:26:41 he summarizes this point quite well he
0:26:43 says
0:26:45 the reference to creation of the heavens
0:26:47 and the earth
0:26:48 indicates and demonstrates the
0:26:50 tremendous power and might of their
0:26:52 creator
0:26:55 the way they are fashioned testifies to
0:26:57 the uniqueness of his in other words
0:27:00 allah's handiwork and astounding wisdom
0:27:03 it also refers to the beneficial nature
0:27:06 of the creation and its harmony with
0:27:08 human life and needs
0:27:10 the benefits and
0:27:11 and advantages we gain and depend upon
0:27:15 all of these are indicative of the grace
0:27:17 and mercy of the creator and his
0:27:19 providential care for his servants
0:27:23 so
0:27:25 what i mean
0:27:26 islam is trying to say here is that
0:27:29 these ayat refer to creation and they
0:27:32 demonstrate the creative power of allah
0:27:34 and therefore they refer to the fact
0:27:37 that there is an astounding wisdom
0:27:39 behind this and then you
0:27:41 conclude that allah is merciful that
0:27:44 allah is wise
0:27:46 and therefore he deserves to be
0:27:47 worshipped
0:27:52 now
0:27:53 interestingly
0:27:55 even in
0:27:56 academic work
0:27:59 they also allude to this and they say
0:28:02 when
0:28:04 the quran refers to natural phenomena
0:28:09 it does so not to refer to scientific
0:28:12 details
0:28:14 or empirical facts per se
0:28:17 but to show that there is an underlying
0:28:19 wisdom behind this there is an
0:28:21 all-powerful all-knowing wise creator
0:28:23 behind this therefore he deserves to be
0:28:26 worshipped
0:28:28 now in the academic reference work
0:28:30 encyclopedia of the quran under the
0:28:32 section science in the quran
0:28:35 ahmed dalal says the marvel of creation
0:28:39 is a recurrent theme of quranic
0:28:42 commentaries
0:28:44 these marvels are viewed as signs of god
0:28:47 and proofs that he exists
0:28:50 is
0:28:52 is all-powerful and all-knowing and is
0:28:54 the willing creative or being
0:28:56 at a basic level such reflection leads
0:28:59 to the conclusion that there is order
0:29:02 and wisdom in creation which in turn
0:29:04 means that a wise maker must have
0:29:06 created it the quran according to these
0:29:09 commentaries directs people to reflect
0:29:12 on the wisdom of the creation of nature
0:29:14 but provides no details on the natural
0:29:18 order or on the ways of deciphering it
0:29:22 now i know you're looking at this slide
0:29:25 now and you're probably thinking
0:29:26 what on earth is donald duck doing on a
0:29:29 slide
0:29:32 now this is where i want to show you
0:29:36 the role of ayats
0:29:39 and how ayat are very different from
0:29:41 scientific details
0:29:43 now listen to this story
0:29:46 it's a made-up story
0:29:48 but it's a good story never nevertheless
0:29:51 to understand the point i want to make
0:29:56 well the true part of the story that one
0:29:58 of my favorite toys was donald duck okay
0:30:01 i had a plastic version of donald duck
0:30:04 and his beak was chewed i think i used
0:30:06 to chew the beak
0:30:08 so when i was young around five years
0:30:10 old i used to love donald duck anyway
0:30:13 so imagine
0:30:15 me now hamza i'm 36 years old i'm gonna
0:30:19 be 37 and
0:30:21 i think a week in sha allah
0:30:25 and
0:30:27 i
0:30:28 go to my mother's
0:30:30 basement she doesn't have a basement but
0:30:32 let's just be hypothetical here
0:30:35 and she tells me to clean up her
0:30:36 basement so i'm cleaning the basement up
0:30:39 i'm moving bags
0:30:41 i'm i'm removing cobwebs i'm
0:30:45 you know cleaning up
0:30:47 after half an hour a little bit tired
0:30:50 i moved the last bag before i want to
0:30:52 sit down and i see in the corner
0:30:56 this
0:30:56 kid's rucksack
0:31:00 it's got dust all over it's a blue
0:31:01 rucksack and it's quite a familiar
0:31:03 rucksack so i i'm a bit intrigued
0:31:07 i go to the corner
0:31:09 i unzip the rucksack it's a bit rusty
0:31:12 the zip because it's obviously quite old
0:31:15 when i open the rucksack what do i find
0:31:18 i find
0:31:19 my old favorite toy donut duck
0:31:23 prior to this i forgot all about my
0:31:25 favorite toy
0:31:28 what happens to me when i open the bag
0:31:30 and find my favorite toy
0:31:32 i say
0:31:34 oh yeah
0:31:36 oh my god
0:31:38 it's donald duck my favorite toy i used
0:31:40 to play with when i was five years old
0:31:43 so what happened to me was this
0:31:46 is i
0:31:48 forgot but that was my favorite toy it
0:31:50 wasn't at the forefront of my mind or in
0:31:52 my consciousness
0:31:55 it was embedded deep within my memory
0:31:57 but it wasn't at the forefront i totally
0:31:59 escaped me
0:32:01 but
0:32:02 observing this toy now as a 36 year old
0:32:06 in my mother's basement helping her
0:32:07 clean up
0:32:10 the very fact that i interacted with
0:32:13 this toy now and i observed it
0:32:17 awakened the truth within myself that
0:32:20 this was my favorite toy it was a oh
0:32:23 yeah moment
0:32:25 now ayat in the quran when they refer to
0:32:29 the creative power of allah
0:32:32 are very similar
0:32:35 they are there for the oh yeah moment
0:32:38 because when you understand islamic
0:32:40 theology you understand that human
0:32:42 beings have been created upon ephitra
0:32:46 now
0:32:47 we get this term from the quran and also
0:32:49 from the sunnah we have a hadith from
0:32:52 sahih muslim
0:32:54 the prophet
0:32:55 alaihi wasallam said
0:32:57 that
0:32:58 every child is born in a state of fitra
0:33:00 the word fitra
0:33:01 comes from the triliteral stem
0:33:05 you have words like
0:33:07 that something has been created within
0:33:09 us to acknowledge the divine
0:33:11 and to want to worship the divine
0:33:14 so these ayats awaken the fitra they
0:33:17 awaken our
0:33:18 previous knowledge and understanding or
0:33:21 proto-knowledge that allah exists and he
0:33:24 deserves to be worshipped so when allah
0:33:26 talks about these ayat in the quran
0:33:28 referring to
0:33:30 referring to his creative power
0:33:32 and his create divine creativity
0:33:35 they are there to awaken within us that
0:33:38 there is a wisdom behind
0:33:40 this creative order there is a
0:33:42 all-powerful
0:33:44 knowledge
0:33:46 behind this creative order
0:33:48 and this
0:33:51 is connected to
0:33:53 allah and therefore he deserves to be
0:33:55 worshipped
0:33:56 so an ayah when it talks about the sun
0:33:58 the celestial objects the moon
0:34:00 the fact that we came from a blood clot
0:34:03 right
0:34:04 all of these things are there to
0:34:07 awaken with within us that behind these
0:34:10 things is a creative wisdom and power
0:34:13 and knowledge
0:34:15 and this wisdom is from
0:34:17 allah this powers from allah subhanahu
0:34:19 wa to allah this knowledge is from allah
0:34:21 subhanahu wa to allah therefore he
0:34:23 deserves to be worshipped
0:34:25 so we move from a known
0:34:27 to a known
0:34:29 we don't start with an unknown and we
0:34:31 conclude unknown
0:34:33 we don't start with skepticism in
0:34:35 islamic tradition
0:34:37 this basic understanding of
0:34:40 the affinity to acknowledge the divine
0:34:42 and to understand that he deserves
0:34:44 worship is embedded within the human
0:34:46 fitrah and these ayat are there to
0:34:49 awaken the truth within
0:34:52 so it's very important for us to
0:34:53 understand this
0:34:57 and let me give an example
0:35:00 i'll give an example
0:35:02 concerning
0:35:03 some of these ayat and by the way
0:35:07 these ayats when they refer to
0:35:10 creativity
0:35:12 divine
0:35:13 creative order
0:35:14 the sun the moon the stars the celestial
0:35:16 objects the human being the animals
0:35:21 they're not there to only
0:35:24 awaken the truth within that there is a
0:35:26 divine power and therefore he deserves
0:35:28 worship
0:35:29 there is a secondary purpose as well
0:35:31 that we always miss
0:35:32 because we become very reductionist very
0:35:35 binary when it comes to the book of
0:35:36 allah subhanallah
0:35:39 this ayat and especially when you look
0:35:40 at the classical the clash
0:35:47 there was germany speaking a conclusion
0:35:49 about our spiritual state and our
0:35:53 metaphysical state
0:35:56 let me give an example allah says in
0:35:57 chapter 22 verse 5
0:36:00 we created you from a sperm drop
0:36:02 and we settled
0:36:04 in the wombs whom we will for a
0:36:06 specified term then we bring it out as a
0:36:09 child
0:36:10 and among you is he who's returned to
0:36:12 the most decrepit old age so that he
0:36:14 knows afterwards having knowledge
0:36:17 nothing so we move from a sperm to a
0:36:20 child to an old person to eventual
0:36:24 death there's nothing miraculous about
0:36:27 this verse from the point of view of
0:36:28 science and natural phenomena we know
0:36:30 this is the case
0:36:32 even with the naked eye even with
0:36:34 primitive understanding
0:36:37 but think about
0:36:39 think about
0:36:40 the
0:36:42 spiritual existential metaphysical
0:36:44 realities behind this verse
0:36:49 if we were a sperm and then a baby then
0:36:51 we become
0:36:52 decrepit and old and we eventually die
0:36:55 then it should number one make us
0:36:58 understand that we are ultimately
0:37:00 dependent
0:37:02 there is no such thing as a purely
0:37:05 self-sufficient human being
0:37:07 your very existence was based on
0:37:09 variables outside of your control
0:37:12 your very existence was based upon
0:37:15 things outside of yourself
0:37:18 in order for you
0:37:22 become a baby an embryo
0:37:25 there's almost an infinite number of
0:37:27 physical variables that were in place
0:37:29 for that to happen
0:37:30 in order for you to be born i mean
0:37:32 consider you being a baby subhanallah
0:37:35 this is an ayah for us to make us
0:37:38 realize that we should be humble and we
0:37:39 are ultimately dependent on
0:37:42 allah
0:37:43 a baby
0:37:45 can't lift his neck up
0:37:47 a baby
0:37:49 cannot even wipe its own posterior it
0:37:52 cannot feed itself take a baby and put
0:37:54 it in a corner of a room for two weeks
0:37:56 and do not touch it forget two weeks two
0:37:58 days it will die
0:38:02 obviously don't do this but i'm just
0:38:04 saying
0:38:05 as an example
0:38:09 and we we must realize that when we
0:38:12 deeply reflect on these ayats so you
0:38:14 could change our understanding of
0:38:16 ourselves and our understanding of
0:38:17 reality and change our spiritual state
0:38:20 when we're reflecting zayat we must
0:38:22 conclude that we're not individuals and
0:38:24 that's why we can't adopt this full
0:38:25 sense of individualism that is
0:38:27 permeating our societies today
0:38:30 this false notion of i am
0:38:33 primary
0:38:35 the primacy is on me as an individual
0:38:38 as the feminist
0:38:40 philosopher
0:38:42 marilyn friedman she says individual
0:38:44 individualism is the view
0:38:46 that the human being
0:38:48 is a
0:38:50 entity divorced from social obligations
0:38:53 and attachments
0:38:56 and this form of activism or
0:38:59 individualism is actually false we're
0:39:01 not individual we are dividual we're
0:39:04 part of so many other
0:39:06 different things and we all connect with
0:39:08 one another in some different way and
0:39:11 we're all dependent on each other and
0:39:12 all of these things are ultimately
0:39:13 dependent on allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:39:15 but subhanallah many of us have this
0:39:17 kind of ego centricity this egoism that
0:39:20 we think we were catapulted from a
0:39:22 mother's womb with a briefcase and a tie
0:39:27 and we'll reflect on our origins from
0:39:29 that point of view
0:39:30 it should humble us and it should make
0:39:32 us realize that we're ultimately
0:39:33 dependent on allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
0:39:36 now there's no point reflecting on the
0:39:37 other aspects of this ayah but i just
0:39:39 wanted to show to you that
0:39:40 yes these ayats when they refer to
0:39:42 natural phenomena they're there to make
0:39:45 us realize an underlying divine wisdom
0:39:47 and power and therefore allah deserves
0:39:48 to be worshipped and they're there to
0:39:50 awaken the truth within that allah
0:39:51 exists and he deserves to be worshipped
0:39:53 however they have a secondary purpose
0:39:56 which is not to give us details about
0:39:57 science but to give us details about our
0:39:59 spiritual state that we are dependent
0:40:02 and we must be humbled before allah
0:40:04 subhanahu wa ta'ala and humble before
0:40:06 others
0:40:08 so the second point
0:40:11 the science and quran narrative adopts a
0:40:14 logical fallacy now what is a logical
0:40:15 fallacy logical fallacies basically
0:40:17 there is a problem in
0:40:19 the flow of your argument
0:40:21 that's what it's basically saying there
0:40:24 is a big problem in the flow of your
0:40:26 argument
0:40:29 there's a cute picture here as you can
0:40:31 see it says penguins are black and white
0:40:33 some old tv shows are black and white
0:40:36 therefore some penguins are old tv shows
0:40:40 this is an example of a fallacy so what
0:40:43 is the fallacy of the undistributed
0:40:46 middle well the fallacy of the
0:40:48 undistributed middle is where two
0:40:50 different things are made the same
0:40:53 two different things are equated due to
0:40:55 a common middle ground that is misused
0:40:58 for example
0:41:01 they claim number one all a's are c's
0:41:05 number two all b's are c's number three
0:41:08 therefore all a's are b's
0:41:10 let me give an example
0:41:13 number one
0:41:14 john needs oxygen to survive
0:41:18 number two
0:41:19 my dog needs oxygen to survive so the
0:41:22 common ground here is oxygen
0:41:24 number three therefore john is my dog as
0:41:27 you can see
0:41:28 this doesn't logically follow
0:41:31 there's a common ground that is misused
0:41:33 which is oxygen here
0:41:36 so let's apply it to
0:41:38 the quran what i mean by applying it to
0:41:39 the quran applying it to the force
0:41:42 narrative of
0:41:44 that the quran has some scientific
0:41:46 miracles or that the quran
0:41:49 is
0:41:51 predate science
0:41:53 so here's a a kind of
0:41:55 generic
0:41:56 summary
0:41:57 of
0:41:58 the
0:41:59 fallacy applied in this context
0:42:02 number one
0:42:03 a description of a scientific fact a
0:42:06 uses c
0:42:09 a dis number two a description in the
0:42:11 quran b uses c
0:42:14 number three therefore the description
0:42:16 in the quran b is the description of a
0:42:19 again this doesn't logically follow so
0:42:22 let me just give you some
0:42:23 further detailed examples okay
0:42:26 let's refer to the embryology example
0:42:31 number one
0:42:32 the scientific fact in embryology is
0:42:35 that the implantation of the blastocyst
0:42:37 in the uterine wall
0:42:40 sorry let me repeat that again number
0:42:42 one the scientific facts in embryology
0:42:44 is the implantation of the blastocyst in
0:42:46 the uterine wall
0:42:47 implantation can be attributed as a safe
0:42:50 place
0:42:51 number two
0:42:52 the quran uses the words paradin mccain
0:42:55 which can mean a safe place number three
0:42:58 therefore the quran is describing the
0:43:00 scientific fact of the implantation the
0:43:02 blastocyst
0:43:03 this doesn't follow
0:43:06 you have to provide
0:43:08 a necessary link between the words
0:43:10 karadine mccain
0:43:12 and
0:43:14 the implantation for example
0:43:17 you can't you can't provide that link
0:43:19 because you have to assume that that's
0:43:21 exactly what the quran is talking about
0:43:23 but
0:43:24 you can't make that claim
0:43:27 you could make a suggestion
0:43:29 but you can't make the claim and
0:43:31 therefore say it's miraculous
0:43:33 because karate mccain according to many
0:43:35 of the ulama didn't mean implantation it
0:43:37 just meant the womb right
0:43:41 so it's very important to understand
0:43:43 that in order to claim miracle
0:43:46 that this is miraculous
0:43:48 you would have to show that the words
0:43:50 karadine mccain actually did mean the
0:43:53 implantation of the blastocyst
0:43:55 but since you can't show that that is
0:43:57 necessary
0:43:59 or that is necessarily true
0:44:01 the only thing you can refer to is that
0:44:03 it might mean this
0:44:05 but the very fact that you say it might
0:44:07 mean this
0:44:09 takes away the fact that there's any
0:44:10 miracles going on
0:44:12 because you can't say that the quran is
0:44:14 a miracle by saying well it might mean
0:44:16 that
0:44:17 the best that you can do in this context
0:44:18 is just do it
0:44:20 it doesn't do a reflection saying well
0:44:22 isn't it interesting that it might mean
0:44:24 this and that's the best that you can do
0:44:26 here
0:44:30 let's give you another example the
0:44:31 earth's atmosphere
0:44:34 number one
0:44:35 there is a scientific fact that the
0:44:37 earth's atmosphere helps destroy
0:44:38 meteorites as they approach earth
0:44:41 filters harmful light rays protects
0:44:42 against the cold temperatures of space
0:44:45 and its van allen belt acts like a
0:44:48 shield against the harmful radiation
0:44:50 the earth's atmosphere can be attributed
0:44:52 as a protective roof
0:44:54 number two
0:44:56 the quran uses the words sakfun
0:44:59 which means a protected roof
0:45:01 number three therefore the quran is
0:45:04 describing the function of the earth's
0:45:06 atmosphere
0:45:07 again this is a logical fallacy
0:45:10 you cannot necessarily prove that the
0:45:12 words such
0:45:15 actually refer to the earth's atmosphere
0:45:20 just because the earth's atmosphere can
0:45:21 be attributed as a protected roof and
0:45:23 just because the word sakfun mahfuden
0:45:26 can be used can be attributed as a
0:45:27 protected roof it doesn't mean it's
0:45:30 actually referring to the earth's
0:45:31 atmosphere that's a logical fallacy
0:45:34 in order for you to claim miracle here
0:45:36 you have to
0:45:37 show necessarily that the words
0:45:43 actually refer to the earth's atmosphere
0:45:45 you can't do that therefore you have to
0:45:48 basically
0:45:50 remove the kind of miraculous language
0:45:52 you know the remove the idea that it's a
0:45:55 miracle and just merely suggest that it
0:45:58 might mean that
0:45:59 now the minute you say it might mean
0:46:01 that then you can't really prove the
0:46:03 quran is a miracle from this point of
0:46:04 view at all it would just be your
0:46:06 tadabar it will just be your reflections
0:46:08 without anything definite
0:46:12 let's now go to the third point
0:46:14 which is a little bit more damning in my
0:46:16 view
0:46:19 the whole
0:46:21 scientific miracles in the quran
0:46:22 exercise is based on
0:46:25 some flawed historical assumptions
0:46:28 and some
0:46:30 maybe one would argue
0:46:32 deliberate misunderstanding of history
0:46:36 now this is what we used to say right
0:46:40 there are two main historical things we
0:46:42 would say in order to try to justify the
0:46:45 scientific miracles in the quran
0:46:46 argument
0:46:48 number one
0:46:49 the knowledge implied by the quranic
0:46:51 verses
0:46:53 was not available or discovered at a
0:46:55 time revelation
0:46:57 so
0:46:59 many of these who believe that there are
0:47:01 some verses that refer to science
0:47:03 and it refers to scientific knowledge
0:47:05 they say that this knowledge was not
0:47:07 available or discovered at the time of
0:47:08 revelation which by the way is
0:47:10 absolutely false
0:47:12 number two
0:47:14 the prophet
0:47:15 muhammad could not have had access to
0:47:18 knowledge implied by the quranic verses
0:47:22 again this is absolutely false and to be
0:47:25 honest it's a
0:47:28 it's a it's ignoring
0:47:31 the sunnah of the prophet salallahu
0:47:35 so let's go to the first point
0:47:36 the knowledge implied by the quranic
0:47:38 verses was not available or discovered
0:47:40 at the time of revelation
0:47:43 this is frankly not true and here's an
0:47:45 example
0:47:48 the sending down of iron you see this in
0:47:50 the so-called dawah literature the
0:47:53 quran's a miracle because it says iron
0:47:55 was sent down as allah says in chapter
0:47:57 57 verse 25 and we sent down iron
0:48:02 and we know this because
0:48:04 if you go and look into the science
0:48:06 literature
0:48:07 that's iron ore
0:48:10 was given to us by meteorites and
0:48:12 meteorites i sent down on earth
0:48:15 now
0:48:17 it's not true
0:48:18 that no one knew it
0:48:21 at the time of revelation or prior to
0:48:22 revelation
0:48:24 because if you study history you see
0:48:26 that the ancient egyptians
0:48:28 fourteen hundred years before the
0:48:30 prophet of muhammad sallallahu alaihi
0:48:32 wasallam
0:48:38 which meant iron from heaven and here's
0:48:39 a reference for you on the slide
0:48:42 to investigate further
0:48:44 but this doesn't mean
0:48:47 the process copied anything it doesn't
0:48:49 mean the quran copied anything of course
0:48:51 not
0:48:52 where men is saying that the quran
0:48:55 refers to no knowledge because the quran
0:48:58 wants to speak to people of all
0:49:00 knowledge meaning of all different types
0:49:02 of understanding to awaken the truth
0:49:05 within
0:49:08 let me give you another example
0:49:10 the moon being a borrowed light
0:49:14 now
0:49:15 the word that is used in the quran is
0:49:18 which means they can mean a borrowed
0:49:21 reflected light
0:49:23 as allah says in the quran in chapter 10
0:49:25 it is he who made the sun a shining
0:49:27 light and a moon a derived or borrowed
0:49:30 light neuron
0:49:33 and people argue you know
0:49:34 no one knew at the time
0:49:36 they thought the moon had its own light
0:49:38 but we know the moon just reflects it
0:49:40 borrows the light of the sun
0:49:44 again it is forced to claim no one knew
0:49:46 this at the time or prior
0:49:49 take for instance sales
0:49:52 1200 years before quranic revelation in
0:49:54 500 bc
0:49:56 he said the moon is lighted from the sun
0:49:59 another greek and aksagoras in around
0:50:02 the same period
0:50:03 he asserted the moon does not have its
0:50:06 own light but the light from the sun
0:50:08 another greek
0:50:10 aristachus of samos
0:50:13 around 300
0:50:15 bc
0:50:17 he also said the moon was lighted by the
0:50:19 sun and there are references here for
0:50:20 you to investigate further
0:50:22 so this historical claim that we make is
0:50:24 absolutely false and plus we need to be
0:50:26 linguistically consistent
0:50:29 how can we say nuran in this context
0:50:31 means a borrowed light
0:50:33 because the same
0:50:35 word is used for the
0:50:38 for allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when allah
0:50:42 says allah is the light of the heavens
0:50:44 and the earth he uses the same word
0:50:47 are you saying that allah's light is a
0:50:49 broad light
0:50:50 that allah is aborted like of course
0:50:52 you're not going to say this so why take
0:50:55 one meaning
0:50:57 in one particular linguistic construct
0:51:00 but take another meaning in another
0:51:02 particular linguistic construct what's
0:51:04 making you shift
0:51:06 what's making you take one meaning of
0:51:07 the over another in these two different
0:51:09 ayats
0:51:10 obviously you're not going to say allah
0:51:12 is a broad light
0:51:14 but why are you saying it for the moon
0:51:15 it's because you have presumed the
0:51:17 science
0:51:18 and that's what's making you taking one
0:51:20 meaning over another
0:51:22 so we need to be a little bit more
0:51:23 concerned more consistent from this
0:51:24 point of view
0:51:27 what about the other so-called miracle
0:51:28 that the mountains have
0:51:30 roots firstly the quran doesn't mention
0:51:32 roots at all but we squeeze
0:51:40 have we not made the earth as a wide
0:51:42 expanse in the mountains as pegs
0:51:45 now
0:51:46 one would argue that in geology today
0:51:48 and it's true you have geology textbooks
0:51:51 and they discuss do mountings have roots
0:51:53 and there is a discussion that mountains
0:51:54 do have roots
0:51:56 i have a book somewhere here
0:51:59 in the office
0:52:00 that
0:52:01 talks about
0:52:03 that topic and it and it
0:52:05 basically concludes mountains do have
0:52:07 roots
0:52:08 but firstly the quran doesn't mention
0:52:10 roots it mentions pegs but you may argue
0:52:14 tomatoes tomatoes potatoes potatoes
0:52:16 potatoes whatever it's neither here or
0:52:18 there
0:52:19 but the point i want to show you here is
0:52:21 that
0:52:22 this type of knowledge was pre-existing
0:52:24 in the biblical literature
0:52:27 in the old testament for example
0:52:28 explicitly mentions the roots of the
0:52:30 mountains
0:52:32 in the bible in jonah 2 6 it says the
0:52:35 roots of the mountains i sank down
0:52:38 the earth beneath barred me in forever
0:52:41 but you brought me you brought my life
0:52:43 up from the pit o lord my god now the
0:52:46 key word the key hebrew word in this
0:52:48 verse
0:52:49 literally means extremity but it's a
0:52:52 poetic description of the bottoms or
0:52:54 roots of the mountains
0:52:57 and there's a reference if you
0:52:58 investigate further so this goes to show
0:53:00 that this this description of mountains
0:53:02 existed prior to the quranic revelation
0:53:07 what about the so-called big bang right
0:53:10 allah says in the quran have not those
0:53:12 who disbelieve known that the heavens
0:53:13 and the earth were of one piece and we
0:53:15 parted them in quran 21 30.
0:53:18 and people say look this is the big bang
0:53:20 bro you know and you know this is a joke
0:53:23 with all due respect right we need to
0:53:26 elevate our understanding revive
0:53:28 our intellectual tradition revive
0:53:30 thinking we need to be thinking beings
0:53:35 firstly
0:53:36 we talk about the big bang like there's
0:53:38 one model and it's conclusive
0:53:41 this is popular science we need to move
0:53:43 away from popularization
0:53:45 this is why we're failing sometimes in
0:53:46 the tower
0:53:48 is because
0:53:49 we've gone straight to the popularized
0:53:51 discussions we don't go to academia and
0:53:52 unfortunately in the west
0:53:54 there is such a big gap between what's
0:53:56 happening in academia and
0:53:58 popularizations
0:54:00 and popularizes
0:54:02 and alhamdulillah allah blessed me to
0:54:04 recently complete two post-graduate
0:54:06 degrees in philosophy
0:54:09 i did the post credit certificate i did
0:54:11 the m.a
0:54:12 and i realized and this gave me a little
0:54:15 bit of a frustration i realized there is
0:54:17 such a gap between what's happening on
0:54:19 youtube and google and facebook and
0:54:21 what's happening in academia even
0:54:23 atheist secular academics that i sit
0:54:25 with i had lunch with we discussed
0:54:28 they agreed with he said yes we're
0:54:29 frustrated about this to the point where
0:54:31 the british government had a project
0:54:33 called the impact project which was to
0:54:35 try and close the gap between
0:54:38 popularizations of academia and academia
0:54:40 itself
0:54:41 now when it comes to the big bang the
0:54:43 big bang is inconclusive we have
0:54:45 empirical data yes i agree
0:54:47 but there are 17 different models that
0:54:50 explain the same data and these 17
0:54:54 different models most of them contradict
0:54:56 each other but they have the same value
0:54:58 same weight same epistemic weight
0:55:01 so we take the big bang we read it in a
0:55:03 magazine or we hear it from one of the
0:55:05 duat we think it's an absolute truth and
0:55:07 we try and squeeze it in the quran
0:55:10 we need to be very careful brothers and
0:55:12 sisters
0:55:14 now
0:55:15 this whole concept of the earth and the
0:55:18 heaven were one piece and then we parted
0:55:20 them exist
0:55:21 existed in sumerian literature thousands
0:55:25 thousands of years before the quranic
0:55:27 revelation
0:55:29 in the epic of gilgamesh it states when
0:55:31 the heavens had been separated from the
0:55:33 earth
0:55:34 when the earth had been delimited from
0:55:36 the heavens when the fame of mankind had
0:55:38 been established
0:55:41 now i'm not saying the quran is
0:55:42 referring to surveying literature of
0:55:43 course not
0:55:45 what i'm saying here is
0:55:47 don't claim that there was there was no
0:55:49 form of pre-existing knowledge and by
0:55:51 the way we're not saying the quran is
0:55:52 wrong here it's not wrong
0:55:55 absolutely not but what we're saying is
0:55:58 don't say that it gave us
0:56:00 kind of
0:56:02 new references
0:56:04 to understand
0:56:06 natural phenomena
0:56:09 and even to make such a claim would be
0:56:10 unjust because the quran came for all
0:56:13 people for all mindsets so it's going to
0:56:15 use a very unique
0:56:17 eloquent language and simple language in
0:56:19 some cases to describe natural phenomena
0:56:22 to refer to a particular understanding
0:56:24 that people have so they could have the
0:56:27 truth within
0:56:29 brought forward so they understand that
0:56:31 yes there is a divine creative power in
0:56:33 the universe and he deserves to be
0:56:34 worshipped
0:56:36 let's go to the second historical point
0:56:38 that we make
0:56:40 you hear this all the time the prophet
0:56:43 alaihi who
0:56:44 could not have had access to knowledge
0:56:46 implied by the quranic verses
0:56:48 with all due respect this is absolutely
0:56:50 false
0:56:52 this is
0:56:53 this is ignoring established sunnah
0:56:57 the prophet sallam would go to other
0:57:00 civilizations from the point of view of
0:57:02 investigate
0:57:04 to form his opinions about some medical
0:57:06 practices
0:57:08 so we can't say that the prophet saws
0:57:10 did not have access to other
0:57:12 civilizations of course he did it's in
0:57:15 our tradition
0:57:16 in sahih muslim for example the prophet
0:57:19 sallallahu alaihi wasallam he said i
0:57:21 intended to prohibit cohabitation with
0:57:24 the suckling women
0:57:26 but i considered the romans and the
0:57:28 persians and saw
0:57:30 that they suckled their children and
0:57:33 this thing cohabitation
0:57:36 does not do any harm to them to the
0:57:38 succulent women and this is in sahih
0:57:39 muslim
0:57:40 this authentic hadith shows that the
0:57:42 prophet saw allah who idea
0:57:44 had access to medical practices
0:57:46 prevailing other civilizations
0:57:49 in actual fact this hadith is beautiful
0:57:50 because it teaches us
0:57:52 there's nothing wrong with sharing
0:57:54 knowledge and acquiring knowledge from a
0:57:57 medical scientific point of view from
0:57:59 other civilizations that's why islamic
0:58:01 medicine grew to the point of view that
0:58:03 it borrowed a lot of medical practices
0:58:05 from the hindus
0:58:08 and other cultures and from the greeks
0:58:10 and that's why we were known to be
0:58:11 number one in medicine
0:58:14 from a historical point of view because
0:58:16 we followed the sunnah we were boring
0:58:18 other human knowledge and making it
0:58:19 better
0:58:23 so it's very important for us to
0:58:24 understand not to make false claims
0:58:26 about our tradition
0:58:28 also
0:58:30 we have to understand
0:58:32 that
0:58:34 since sixth and seventh century arabia
0:58:37 was
0:58:39 basically the center of many trade
0:58:41 routes
0:58:42 and when many of these arabs had to
0:58:45 trade all the way to china and africa
0:58:47 you think they
0:58:49 went in some kind of teleportation
0:58:51 system
0:58:52 in they immediately appeared in africa
0:58:54 and china
0:58:55 took their goods
0:58:57 had a vow silence and then came back to
0:58:59 mecca
0:59:01 and they didn't communicate with any
0:59:02 other civilization that would be so
0:59:04 absurd
0:59:06 it took months or years to travel to
0:59:08 these places
0:59:10 and there's obviously a form of
0:59:12 communication and discussion and
0:59:13 dialogue
0:59:15 and therefore there was a sharing of
0:59:17 prevalent medical and scientific
0:59:19 practices
0:59:24 it's interesting to note that the
0:59:25 historian
0:59:26 era m lapidus in his book a history of
0:59:28 islamic societies he clearly states that
0:59:31 the arabs and mecca west established
0:59:33 traders traveling far and wide he says
0:59:35 in his book on page 14
0:59:37 by the mid 6th century as heir to petra
0:59:40 and palmyra
0:59:42 mecca became one of the most important
0:59:44 caravan cities of the middle east
0:59:47 the makkans carried spices leathers
0:59:50 drugs cloth and slaves which had come
0:59:52 from africa
0:59:53 or the far east to syria and returned
0:59:56 money weapons cereals and wine to arabia
1:00:00 so from this point of view
1:00:03 there was obviously an ability to
1:00:04 communicate with other civilizations and
1:00:06 draw knowledge from them
1:00:09 so we can't make the claim that it was
1:00:10 impossible to have access other
1:00:12 civilizations
1:00:14 that's what i'm trying to say here so
1:00:16 the two historical points that we make
1:00:18 to try and justify the so-called
1:00:19 scientific miraculous narrative are
1:00:22 absolutely false and it's a shame that
1:00:24 we're still peddling these false
1:00:26 incoherent narratives
1:00:30 now you have to know something
1:00:32 i am not saying the quran borrowed
1:00:34 knowledge was inaccurate or is
1:00:36 inaccurate
1:00:37 i believe the quran is a miracle of
1:00:39 allah for many many other reasons that
1:00:42 are far more
1:00:44 far more coherent
1:00:46 however what i'm trying to say is this
1:00:49 that since a plausible naturalistic
1:00:51 explanation is possible
1:00:53 to explain the so-called scientific
1:00:55 quran miracle
1:00:57 then you can't claim it's a miracle
1:00:58 because by definition a miracle is an
1:01:01 event that cannot be explained
1:01:02 naturalistically
1:01:05 so since it was
1:01:07 that since there was there was knowledge
1:01:10 there was some kind of scientific
1:01:11 knowledge in other civilizations prior
1:01:13 to the quran since it was
1:01:15 well known in the sunnah that the
1:01:17 prophet sallam
1:01:19 took medical knowledge from other
1:01:20 civilizations and since we know as in
1:01:22 established history that there were
1:01:24 different trade routes and this
1:01:26 cross-cultural fertilization right that
1:01:29 we could
1:01:30 gain knowledge from other cultures
1:01:32 then that provides a naturalistic
1:01:34 explanation for some of the statements
1:01:35 in the quran
1:01:37 so therefore you can't it doesn't hold
1:01:39 weight to say that it's a scientific
1:01:40 miracle because
1:01:42 it can be explained naturalistically
1:01:44 this is why we need a new robust
1:01:46 approach to overcome these intellectual
1:01:49 hurdles
1:01:52 now just to make the point clear there's
1:01:54 a
1:01:55 there's an accumulative approach to the
1:01:56 quran an array of arguments to show that
1:01:59 the quran is from allah subhanahu
1:02:00 wa'ta'ala
1:02:01 obviously it's not the point of this
1:02:03 workshop but
1:02:05 number one you can refer to the
1:02:06 teachings of oneness of tawheed in the
1:02:08 quran
1:02:09 the
1:02:10 literary coherence in the quran the
1:02:12 literary structure in the quran the
1:02:14 social impact of the quran the
1:02:16 linguistic and literary miracle of the
1:02:18 quran the fact that reveals lost
1:02:20 historical knowledge and much much more
1:02:24 and that's why
1:02:28 i'm not i'm not saying here that the
1:02:30 quran borrowed anything absolutely not
1:02:32 it's actually even forced to it's a
1:02:35 false claim to say that the quran
1:02:37 borrowed knowledge from
1:02:40 other civilizations because if it was
1:02:43 the case that the quran borrowed
1:02:44 knowledge
1:02:45 the quran would just reflect a seventh
1:02:47 century language
1:02:49 and it would convey meanings and it
1:02:51 would point to realities that could only
1:02:53 be appreciated
1:02:55 for the seventh century man
1:02:57 but what we're going to discuss soon is
1:02:58 that the quran's language is not
1:03:00 reflective of the seventh century the
1:03:02 quran's language is timeless and that's
1:03:04 why even from this point of view you
1:03:06 cannot even claim that the quran
1:03:07 borrowed anything
1:03:10 so the fourth point the philosophy of
1:03:12 science
1:03:14 now i focused on
1:03:17 analytical philosophy for my postgrad
1:03:21 i did things like
1:03:22 the idea of freedom i did things like
1:03:24 the philosophy of psychology the
1:03:26 philosophy of mind and the philosophy of
1:03:28 science
1:03:30 and when i specialize in the specialist
1:03:32 model of the philosophy of science i
1:03:34 realized
1:03:37 that
1:03:39 it's based on
1:03:40 shifting sounds
1:03:43 and it's very important for us to
1:03:44 understand
1:03:46 that if we believe the quran to be
1:03:47 absolutely miraculous then how can we
1:03:51 prove the quran using
1:03:53 a method
1:03:54 that
1:03:56 is limited and a method that gives rise
1:04:00 to conclusion results that can change
1:04:03 it doesn't make any sense at all
1:04:06 and that's why
1:04:07 the cardiology fellow at indiana
1:04:09 university school of medicine jalis
1:04:11 rahman he aptly and concisely
1:04:13 articulates this major problem with the
1:04:16 scientific miracles quran narrative
1:04:19 he writes
1:04:21 one danger of such attempts to correlate
1:04:24 modern science with the quran is that it
1:04:26 makes a linkage between the perennial
1:04:28 wisdom meaning the timeless wisdom and
1:04:30 truth of the quran
1:04:31 with the transient meaning the
1:04:33 time-bound ideas of modern science and
1:04:36 mono-science or any science is
1:04:38 time-bound
1:04:41 go to any sincere scientist or
1:04:43 philosopher of science and they would
1:04:44 say it is possible to have another
1:04:46 observation that contradicts previous
1:04:49 generalizations that were based on
1:04:51 limited data because we're never going
1:04:53 to have
1:04:54 all possible observations for for a
1:04:56 particular reality
1:05:00 now you may want to ask me why on earth
1:05:02 is
1:05:04 science not absolute why does not
1:05:07 science claim certainty or 100 truth
1:05:10 well
1:05:11 the reason is because science is dynamic
1:05:13 and it changes over time
1:05:15 and there's always a possibility of new
1:05:17 observations changing or negating
1:05:19 previous conclusions
1:05:21 and this rests on the idea of something
1:05:22 called the problem of induction
1:05:26 now
1:05:27 in the philosophy of science the problem
1:05:29 of induction is unresolved
1:05:31 it's unresolved
1:05:33 and the problem of induction is as
1:05:35 follows
1:05:37 that
1:05:38 we could never have certainty
1:05:40 in scientific conclusions
1:05:42 because scientific conclusions are
1:05:44 ultimately based on limited observations
1:05:47 if they're based on limited observations
1:05:50 then we can't with certainty
1:05:53 we can't with certainty
1:05:55 make
1:05:57 a can make a definite conclusion
1:06:00 let me give an example
1:06:03 a very crude example but i bring the
1:06:04 point home
1:06:06 i've observed 1 000 white sheep
1:06:09 therefore all sheep are white
1:06:13 i have made a conclusion but the
1:06:14 conclusion i've made
1:06:16 is not certain because i have observed
1:06:19 all the sheep
1:06:20 i've only observed a thousand sheep and
1:06:22 they happen to be white
1:06:24 and i'm making the conclusion
1:06:27 that all sheep are white
1:06:29 this is a probabilistic conclusion it's
1:06:31 not certain it can only range from 0 to
1:06:34 99 percent
1:06:36 never 100
1:06:37 because i may i have another observation
1:06:39 that contradicts my previous conclusions
1:06:42 for example i may observe a black sheep
1:06:44 and black sheep do exist and i may have
1:06:46 observed the black sheep
1:06:48 and in observing that black sheep
1:06:52 my conclusion now is force
1:06:55 and this is basically the problem of
1:06:56 induction this is one problem amongst
1:06:59 many problems in the philosophy of
1:07:00 science i'm not even going to deeper
1:07:02 things like epistemic holism
1:07:05 or
1:07:07 theory ladenness
1:07:09 or problems with observations or
1:07:11 problems with theories or
1:07:14 all of these crazy things that we learn
1:07:15 in the philosophy of science right
1:07:18 but just by understanding the problem of
1:07:20 induction we see
1:07:22 that scientific claims
1:07:24 are never going to be 100 certain
1:07:27 they can always change
1:07:30 and even if someone makes the claim oh
1:07:31 but science works therefore it's true
1:07:34 it's absolutely true again that's a
1:07:36 that's that's a logical fallacy because
1:07:38 just because some something works it
1:07:40 doesn't necessarily follow that it's
1:07:41 true
1:07:42 especially in science
1:07:44 yes science is great and we love it we
1:07:46 respect it and we we're encouraged to do
1:07:49 science and we have to
1:07:51 so we're not belittling science here
1:07:53 we're just giving you the
1:07:56 the reality of scientific conclusions
1:07:58 this is not based on certainty
1:08:02 because fundamentally of the problem of
1:08:04 induction
1:08:06 and what's interesting is just because
1:08:08 science works it's not true and we could
1:08:09 see this in the history of science for
1:08:11 example
1:08:12 in the 1700s they had this theory called
1:08:15 the theory of phlogeston now the theory
1:08:17 of flagestone was that when you burnt a
1:08:19 combustible object an object that can
1:08:21 burn
1:08:22 it released
1:08:23 flogisticated air
1:08:26 now dan rutherford in 1772 i believe he
1:08:29 used this theory
1:08:30 to
1:08:31 discover nitrogen
1:08:33 but later on they realized that the
1:08:35 theory of floggistan was force
1:08:38 so what this teaches us is
1:08:40 that you can get a truth like the truth
1:08:42 of nitrogen
1:08:44 from a workable theory like floggistan
1:08:47 even though that workable theory is
1:08:49 based on a falsehood so you can get
1:08:51 truth from a falsehood
1:08:54 and and also it shows to us that just
1:08:56 because the theory is working and it's
1:08:58 true
1:08:58 from a limited point of view it's
1:09:00 working the theory of loggerstone was
1:09:02 working
1:09:03 it doesn't necessarily mean it's true
1:09:07 an easy way to understand all of this is
1:09:09 as follows
1:09:11 you can have another observation
1:09:14 that is odds
1:09:15 with your previous generalizations
1:09:19 that were made as a result of limited
1:09:21 observations
1:09:23 you can always have another observation
1:09:25 that contradicts
1:09:27 your
1:09:28 conclusions
1:09:29 that were based on limited
1:09:31 data
1:09:35 now
1:09:37 what's very interesting is karl popper
1:09:40 he came up with the
1:09:43 v the idea of falsification
1:09:46 and he tried to solve the problem of
1:09:47 induction yeah actual fact he said you
1:09:49 can't solve the problem of induction
1:09:51 so therefore he wanted to basically have
1:09:53 a different approach to science and talk
1:09:55 about falsification
1:09:57 that theories could be falsified
1:09:59 right you can't prove theories to be
1:10:01 true but you could prove them to be
1:10:02 false
1:10:04 but that again is a very primitive
1:10:06 understanding of the philosophy of
1:10:07 science because even when you prove
1:10:09 theories to be false
1:10:11 you could actually revive them again
1:10:14 and bring them back to life by changing
1:10:15 some assumptions
1:10:18 i'm not going to go into this detail
1:10:19 because it's quite complicated but read
1:10:21 around something called epistemic holism
1:10:24 h-o-l-i-s-m
1:10:30 so
1:10:31 how can you now use science to prove the
1:10:33 quran when science doesn't need to
1:10:35 certainty and it's based on the shifting
1:10:37 sounds of science and even by the way
1:10:39 many of the things that we claim are
1:10:40 scientific facts in an absolute way are
1:10:43 not scientific facts at all for example
1:10:45 even the big bang there are 17 different
1:10:47 models that explain the same data
1:10:50 and these 17 different models contradict
1:10:52 each other but yet they have the same
1:10:54 kind of explanatory power in the
1:10:56 philosophy of science is called
1:10:57 underdetermination
1:11:00 so the fifth point
1:11:01 unscientific verses
1:11:04 take darwinism for example now
1:11:07 i'm not saying darwin isn't absolutely
1:11:09 true
1:11:09 of course not
1:11:11 it's probabilistic it has assumptions
1:11:15 and there are
1:11:17 challenges to darwinism even in academia
1:11:21 however
1:11:22 from a scientific point of view
1:11:24 darwinism is on the same level as many
1:11:26 other theories we refer to and we claim
1:11:28 to be a fact
1:11:30 take for example the big bang theory i
1:11:32 would generally say that darwinism is
1:11:35 probably
1:11:36 a little bit more conclusive than the
1:11:38 big bang theory because there are 17
1:11:40 different models right to explain the
1:11:42 big bang the data that the big bang
1:11:44 refers to
1:11:46 so why are we taking the big bang as a
1:11:48 fact and showing it's quranic and
1:11:50 therefore the scientific miracle
1:11:52 but we deny darwinism
1:11:55 right because we can't really fit it in
1:11:57 a orthodox interpretation of the quranic
1:12:00 verses
1:12:02 so i'm not saying one is true and one is
1:12:04 false i'm trying to give you a principle
1:12:06 here
1:12:07 we need to be consistent we are so
1:12:10 inconsistent it's ridiculous right
1:12:13 and it just shows our lack of thinking
1:12:16 why do we say that the big bang miracle
1:12:19 in the quran is a miracle because the
1:12:21 scientists said it's a fact the quran
1:12:23 said it way before science did therefore
1:12:25 the quran is a miracle
1:12:28 but darwinism is as confirmed if you
1:12:31 like from a scientific limited point of
1:12:33 view
1:12:35 as the big bang theory
1:12:38 in actual fact i don't think you have
1:12:40 17 different
1:12:42 models to explain
1:12:44 how
1:12:45 we
1:12:46 to explain biological change
1:12:49 right you have less models left less
1:12:52 less challenges
1:12:53 less
1:12:54 competing models
1:12:56 so from even from that point of view
1:12:58 if you want to be consistent
1:13:00 you have to accept darwinism over the
1:13:02 big bang theory the darwinian mechanism
1:13:04 over the big bang theory
1:13:07 but you can't do that especially if you
1:13:09 take an orthodox interpretation of the
1:13:11 verses
1:13:13 of the quran
1:13:14 so why pick and choose
1:13:16 this exposes a severe inconsistency and
1:13:20 incoherency in the scientific miracles
1:13:22 argument
1:13:27 point number six a note on islamic
1:13:29 exegesis this is roughly based on tafsir
1:13:34 okay
1:13:36 now
1:13:37 it's very important to understand that
1:13:38 when we say that something is miraculous
1:13:40 it means that there is no plausible
1:13:42 naturalistic explanation
1:13:44 but there are plausible naturalistic
1:13:46 explanations right
1:13:48 and and therefore it breaks down the
1:13:50 idea that the quran is a scientific
1:13:52 miracle
1:13:55 however
1:13:58 if you still want to follow the path of
1:13:59 saying that the quran is a scientific
1:14:01 miracle
1:14:02 then you have to show that a word
1:14:04 or verse in the quran
1:14:10 would only have only one meaning
1:14:12 and that meaning could only be the
1:14:15 meaning that's associated with the
1:14:17 scientific fact
1:14:20 however if you study usually
1:14:23 you can't even make that claim
1:14:26 you can't say
1:14:28 that that verse with those words have
1:14:31 only one meaning
1:14:33 and that meaning itself
1:14:35 can
1:14:36 is only
1:14:37 connected to the meaning
1:14:40 of the scientific fact that we're
1:14:41 talking about you can't make such a
1:14:43 claim because the general rule
1:14:45 in
1:14:47 our understanding of the book of allah
1:14:48 subhanallah
1:14:51 when it comes to
1:14:53 ambiguous words that refer to natural
1:14:55 phenomena in the quran the general rule
1:14:58 is
1:15:00 that
1:15:01 no one can claim that there's only one
1:15:02 meaning
1:15:03 and you can't claim there's only one
1:15:05 intended meaning
1:15:06 so someone could not say that allah
1:15:10 intended word x to mean why
1:15:13 rather the only approach that you can
1:15:15 take from us
1:15:16 point of view concerning ambiguous words
1:15:19 referring to natural phenomena
1:15:21 is that
1:15:23 x the word x may mean y so a particular
1:15:26 word
1:15:27 may mean
1:15:30 the meaning y
1:15:32 but it may have also other meanings too
1:15:34 so the indefinite nature of a particular
1:15:37 word especially the words are ambiguous
1:15:39 and the words that
1:15:41 describe natural phenomena
1:15:43 clearly highlight how it's impossible to
1:15:45 claim miracle
1:15:46 because from even from a linguistic
1:15:48 point of view to say it's a miracle you
1:15:50 can only say that this is the only
1:15:52 intended meaning and that meaning itself
1:15:54 is associated with the meaning that we
1:15:56 attribute to the scientific miracle you
1:15:58 can't do this in
1:16:00 in accordance if you understand
1:16:05 so we have deconstructed the old
1:16:07 approach in a very thorough way
1:16:09 now is the time to talk about the new
1:16:11 approach and it's not new as i said it's
1:16:13 based on our classical tradition
1:16:17 so this is the summary of the orthodox
1:16:19 approach of the traditional approach of
1:16:21 the quran
1:16:24 now the quranic verses they aim to make
1:16:26 us reflect on allah's creative power
1:16:29 wisdom and knowledge to conclude that he
1:16:30 exists and deserve to be worshipped
1:16:34 and the quranic verses they aim to evoke
1:16:36 the understanding that allah has the
1:16:38 totality of wisdom and knowledge and we
1:16:41 just have fragmentary knowledge
1:16:44 now the words used to describe natural
1:16:47 phenomena in the quran are multi-layered
1:16:49 which means they have many layers of
1:16:51 meaning they don't have an infinite
1:16:53 number of meanings but it has a scope in
1:16:55 the classical tradition
1:16:57 and
1:16:58 that
1:16:59 these words are multi-leveled
1:17:01 these meanings address different levels
1:17:04 of understanding
1:17:06 and the and and these levels of
1:17:08 understanding do not have to be only
1:17:10 scientific they could be non-scientific
1:17:12 such as spiritual metaphysical and
1:17:14 existential
1:17:16 and some of these words may not have any
1:17:18 scientific backing at all
1:17:21 and it may mean that we it just
1:17:23 encourages us to investigate further
1:17:25 into the natural world
1:17:28 so let me give you some examples
1:17:31 let's use this multi-leveled
1:17:32 multi-layered approach to the quran
1:17:35 and see how amazing and empowering it is
1:17:37 and it shows how amazing the book of
1:17:40 allah is because the book of allah is
1:17:42 not just a 7th century book the book of
1:17:44 allah is a timeless book that aims to
1:17:46 speak to all people and that in my view
1:17:49 is is extremely
1:17:51 phenomenal
1:17:53 this is in essence a miraculous feature
1:17:56 of the quran that it speaks to all
1:17:58 people
1:17:59 with different understandings and
1:18:01 different levels of understanding across
1:18:04 time that's phenomenal
1:18:06 so take the orbits as example the quran
1:18:09 says and it is he who created the night
1:18:11 and day
1:18:12 and the sun and moon all heavenly bodies
1:18:15 in an orbit are swimming yes bahuna
1:18:18 they're swimming now what's interesting
1:18:20 is this
1:18:23 and this where the multi-layered
1:18:24 multi-level aspect of the quran comes
1:18:26 into play
1:18:27 at the time of revelation this in the
1:18:29 seventh century the word yes bahana
1:18:31 which means swimming or floating
1:18:34 was used to describe the motion of the
1:18:36 sun and moon
1:18:37 and this could be confirmed with the
1:18:39 naked eye by desert arab there's nothing
1:18:41 miraculous about this
1:18:43 a desert arab could be looking
1:18:45 into the vastness of space
1:18:47 looking at the sun and moon
1:18:50 and conclude that these celestial
1:18:52 objects are swimming
1:18:56 but what we have to understand brothers
1:18:58 and sisters
1:18:59 and friends
1:19:01 is that yes it may have a primitive
1:19:02 understanding
1:19:04 but that primitive understanding is to
1:19:06 make the seventh century man look at in
1:19:10 into the vastness of space
1:19:12 look at that these these heavenly bodies
1:19:14 are swimming
1:19:15 and say
1:19:16 subhanallah
1:19:17 who put them there
1:19:19 who's doing this
1:19:21 subhanahu wa ta'ala he deserves my
1:19:23 gratitude and praise
1:19:25 you see moving from
1:19:27 ruby
1:19:28 to worship moving from divine creative
1:19:30 power to the fact that allah deserves
1:19:32 worship
1:19:34 but interestingly interestingly the word
1:19:36 can also make sense to us in the 21st
1:19:38 century
1:19:39 because it can relate to today's
1:19:41 scientific findings
1:19:43 on celestial mechanics
1:19:45 that there are orbits
1:19:48 so you see here there are many layers of
1:19:50 meaning
1:19:52 to address different levels of
1:19:53 understanding
1:19:56 and even academics agree with this
1:19:58 approach for example
1:19:59 mustang
1:20:00 is a professor of islamic studies at
1:20:02 youngs youngstown state university
1:20:05 young young young's town state
1:20:07 university he says the word yes bahuna
1:20:10 sumo flo in the verse that we've just
1:20:12 mentioned made good sense to the seventh
1:20:15 century arabs observing natural
1:20:16 phenomena with the naked eye
1:20:18 it is equally meaningful to us in light
1:20:20 of today's scientific findings i.e
1:20:22 celestial mechanics
1:20:25 now interestingly one would argue here
1:20:27 well the sun
1:20:28 the sun is orbiting us all according to
1:20:30 this verse but we know the sun doesn't
1:20:32 obey
1:20:33 the sun doesn't orbit the earth this is
1:20:35 quite primitive
1:20:37 but say the 7th century arab accepted
1:20:40 this interpretation and this linguistic
1:20:41 meaning
1:20:42 they also mean the sun is orbiting the
1:20:44 earth just like the moon does yes we
1:20:46 know it's not scientifically accurate
1:20:48 but say they took this meaning
1:20:51 it still allows them to conclude that
1:20:53 allah deserves worship because they'll
1:20:55 be like wow how does the sun do that
1:20:56 there must be some divine wisdom and
1:20:58 power behind this allah does worship he
1:21:00 deserves our glorification and praise
1:21:02 but interestingly interestingly on
1:21:04 closer inspection
1:21:06 of the language used in the quran we can
1:21:09 also conclude that it addresses the
1:21:11 accurate 21st century view that the sun
1:21:14 has its own orbit because we know the
1:21:17 sun orbits the milky way and according
1:21:19 to scientists it takes 226 million years
1:21:22 to completely orbit around the center of
1:21:25 the milky way
1:21:26 so again you have many layers of meaning
1:21:29 addressing different levels of
1:21:30 understanding over time
1:21:34 what about the expansion of the universe
1:21:35 allah says in the quran and the heaven
1:21:38 we constructed with strength and indeed
1:21:40 we are its expander
1:21:42 now the quran explains that allah
1:21:44 created the universe with the power of
1:21:45 strength and that he is the only one who
1:21:48 expands it
1:21:49 now
1:21:50 this is indicated with the arabic word
1:21:52 used here
1:21:54 and
1:21:55 essentially means
1:21:58 expanding
1:21:59 now
1:22:00 from a 7th century classical perspective
1:22:03 this word didn't mean really expanding
1:22:05 yes it's one of the secondary meanings
1:22:07 but the primary meaning that was adopted
1:22:09 i believe this was the opinion of ibn
1:22:11 abbas
1:22:13 is that
1:22:14 the universe is big it's vast and
1:22:16 there's risk in the universe
1:22:19 so for a seventh century man or woman
1:22:22 looking at the vastness of the cosmos
1:22:23 they're like wow it's massive who did
1:22:25 this allah he deserves worship he
1:22:28 deserves glorification and praise
1:22:31 now interesting the word also can mean
1:22:33 that
1:22:35 it is continuously expanding
1:22:37 or it could mean
1:22:39 that it it's just being expanded
1:22:42 and this is
1:22:44 in line with the modern meaning the
1:22:46 morning discovery that the universe is
1:22:47 expanding
1:22:49 now it may not be true at all that it's
1:22:50 expanding i mean i believe i think a few
1:22:52 years ago some cosmologists actually
1:22:54 were trying to disagree with this idea
1:22:57 so it's neither here or there but what
1:22:58 we're trying to show here isn't it
1:23:00 interesting allah uses words
1:23:02 that have many levels of many layers of
1:23:05 meaning that address different levels of
1:23:06 understanding in order for us to
1:23:08 conclude that there is a divine power
1:23:09 that deserves worship
1:23:12 now let me give you a final case study
1:23:14 okay so we're going to end i know we've
1:23:15 been going for quite a while but let's
1:23:17 last five minutes final case study
1:23:20 let's take the word alaka the word in
1:23:23 the quran is used to describe the kind
1:23:26 of developing human embryo or the
1:23:29 developing human baby if you like
1:23:32 now in a classical sense there are five
1:23:34 major meanings for the word alaka
1:23:36 number one blood in a general sense
1:23:39 number two it means a blood clot
1:23:42 number three clay that sticks to the
1:23:44 hand number four something that clings
1:23:47 number five a leech or a worm
1:23:51 now what's very interesting is that the
1:23:53 word alaka was really appropriate for
1:23:55 the time
1:23:56 because
1:23:58 the arabs obviously adopted a greek
1:24:01 embryology a greek medicine of the time
1:24:04 the second century
1:24:06 physician galen
1:24:08 he wrote in his book desmony which means
1:24:11 on semen and i read this book in the
1:24:14 original greek
1:24:16 the greek uh the ancient greek
1:24:18 galen uses the words the greek words
1:24:21 sarcoides and emma s means a fleshy
1:24:25 thing and emma means bloody thing so
1:24:27 it's a blood-filled thing it's like a
1:24:29 blood clot
1:24:31 and one of the meanings of the word
1:24:33 alaka is blood clot now it's not
1:24:35 miraculous because
1:24:38 anyone who study medicine when there are
1:24:41 natural
1:24:42 natural abortions are miscarriages right
1:24:44 so when you see miscarriages especially
1:24:46 at the early stage it looks like a
1:24:48 fleshy thing full of blood it's a blood
1:24:50 clot there's nothing miraculous about
1:24:52 this
1:24:54 so
1:24:56 the hellenic physicians such as galen pr
1:24:59 predated the quran from this point of
1:25:01 view and described the human embryo as a
1:25:04 blood clot and they also described it as
1:25:06 a clinic clinging substance as well
1:25:09 but the point of view is this remember
1:25:11 what is the what is the primary purpose
1:25:13 of ayat
1:25:14 allah is saying
1:25:16 since you know
1:25:17 that you you came from a blood clot
1:25:19 something that looks like a blood clot
1:25:21 this should evoke a spiritual
1:25:22 intellectual understanding within you
1:25:24 thinking subhanallah look at me now i
1:25:27 came from this blood clot
1:25:30 who created the physical processes in
1:25:31 the universe in order for me to be
1:25:33 formed in this way
1:25:35 there must be a divine power and this
1:25:37 divine power deserves to be glorified
1:25:39 and praised
1:25:40 so it's appropriate for the time
1:25:43 as you can see
1:25:47 but also
1:25:51 it's appropriate for our time as well
1:25:55 now the word alaka as you know also
1:25:58 refers to a worm or a leech
1:26:00 now this can correlate maybe to the
1:26:02 external and internal appearance of the
1:26:04 leech
1:26:05 and this view of the embryo could only
1:26:07 have been discovered after the 15th
1:26:08 century because
1:26:10 as you know
1:26:11 you can't really see the embryo looking
1:26:13 like a rimmer leech
1:26:16 at the early stage you know because it's
1:26:18 the size of a kernel of wheat
1:26:20 and these details can't be perceived
1:26:23 without a microscope and it was only
1:26:26 after the 15th century that
1:26:28 we were starting to use the microscope
1:26:32 so look at some interesting images
1:26:34 now you one would argue that this seems
1:26:36 to look like a leech the external
1:26:38 appearance of the embryo at around day
1:26:41 24 to 30 is that it looks like a bleach
1:26:46 and even the internal structure of elite
1:26:48 so if you cut a leech in half
1:26:50 the internal structure of elite somehow
1:26:52 looks like an embryo around the same
1:26:55 stage
1:26:57 and even the sucker
1:26:58 of a leech close up looks like
1:27:01 the leech the embryo around 22 days
1:27:05 before
1:27:06 when i thought this is what these were
1:27:08 called though i think they're called
1:27:09 neural uh i thought yeah i forgot the
1:27:11 scientific term but
1:27:14 these folds close i believe after a
1:27:17 certain period of time
1:27:21 anyway
1:27:22 i'm obviously not a scientist but
1:27:24 the point i'm trying to say is this
1:27:26 that it may mean
1:27:28 the external internal features of
1:27:32 the embryo because it seems to look like
1:27:34 a worm or a leech and interestingly even
1:27:36 dr dale lehmann in his book anatomy
1:27:38 demystified he describes
1:27:40 the embryo as a worm
1:27:44 now i'm not saying
1:27:45 that's exactly the intention of the
1:27:46 quran
1:27:48 but it can relate remember the many
1:27:50 levels many layers of meaning
1:27:52 addressing different levels of
1:27:53 understanding over time
1:27:55 but i prefer the non-scientific
1:27:57 perspective
1:27:59 which is also in line with islamic
1:28:01 tradition now
1:28:02 when allah mentions that the embryo is
1:28:04 like a worm or a leech maybe allah is
1:28:07 saying that that's
1:28:08 how we behaved we were just like leeches
1:28:11 and leeches they are parasites right it
1:28:14 cleans clings onto its host and it
1:28:15 starts to suck the blood
1:28:17 now interesting the embryo can be also
1:28:19 be likened to a parasite where it drains
1:28:21 the resources of its mother it raids
1:28:23 it raids the
1:28:24 the resources of its mother
1:28:27 so from this point of view maybe allah
1:28:28 is saying you were just like a leech in
1:28:30 your mother's eye in your mother's womb
1:28:32 and she willingly and willfully gave up
1:28:35 her resources for you to survive
1:28:37 therefore you're not an individual
1:28:39 you're individual you're dependent on
1:28:40 other people and all those people and
1:28:43 things that ultimately depend on allah
1:28:45 therefore you're dependent on allah too
1:28:48 so be humble
1:28:50 and also
1:28:51 lower the ring of humility and mercy to
1:28:53 your parents especially your mothers
1:28:54 because she sacrificed willingly for you
1:28:57 so this raises the spiritual perspective
1:28:59 that we're not independent
1:29:01 self-sufficient or absolutely free we
1:29:03 are dependent for example in our
1:29:05 mother's womb
1:29:07 and on our mothers and this should
1:29:08 instill a great sense of humidity and
1:29:11 understanding that in some way we are
1:29:12 all dependent on allah subhanahu wa
1:29:14 ta'ala
1:29:15 this is far more profound
1:29:18 you know what's really interesting
1:29:19 professor of science lord robert winston
1:29:22 he actually makes the same point
1:29:25 he
1:29:26 he was a professor of science and
1:29:27 society
1:29:29 um and an emeritus he is a professor of
1:29:31 science and society and he's the emerald
1:29:33 emiratis professor of fertility studies
1:29:35 at imperial college
1:29:37 he says
1:29:38 the leech takes whatever it needs to
1:29:41 live by sucking the blood of whatever it
1:29:43 cannot latch onto
1:29:45 in this case that's me
1:29:46 so basically he was on a video and the
1:29:48 leech was sucking his hand
1:29:50 as it sucks my blood it takes from it
1:29:52 all that it needs to live
1:29:54 it literally lives off me in the whole
1:29:56 of pregnancy shaped by similar kind of
1:29:58 parasitic relationship
1:30:00 unlike the leech the developing embryo
1:30:02 doesn't suck the maternal blood but it
1:30:04 does raid her blood for the raw
1:30:05 materials it needs to grow from the word
1:30:07 go both leech and embryo are out for
1:30:10 themselves
1:30:11 so you see there's a deeper existential
1:30:13 metaphysical
1:30:15 meaning here but the reason i want to
1:30:17 use alaka as an example because it has a
1:30:19 range of meanings different layers of
1:30:22 meaning and these meanings can relate to
1:30:24 different understandings across time
1:30:26 but even in saying that
1:30:28 some of the words referring to natural
1:30:30 phenomena may not have any scientific
1:30:32 backing at all fair enough who cares
1:30:35 science changes
1:30:40 but what we're supposed to do here is
1:30:41 look at the meaning of the word
1:30:44 and it can therefore
1:30:46 encourage us to do more science and to
1:30:48 encourage us further to find out what is
1:30:51 really going on what is allah saying
1:30:53 here
1:30:56 so in absence of a link between the
1:30:58 meaning of a particular word or verse
1:31:00 and the scientific conclusions the
1:31:02 meaning can be used as a motivation to
1:31:03 find new data and develop innovative
1:31:05 scientific solutions
1:31:07 so in absence of any correlation to
1:31:09 modern science the verse still fulfills
1:31:10 its role of showing us the infinite
1:31:12 wisdom of allah
1:31:17 because even if we can't correlate to
1:31:18 anything that we understand
1:31:20 it could encourage us to do more
1:31:21 investigations and not only that
1:31:24 it could show us the infinite wisdom of
1:31:25 allah and the finite wisdom of human
1:31:28 beings from this point of view brothers
1:31:31 or sis brothers sisters and friends
1:31:33 if there's any contradictions with
1:31:34 science it should never be the source of
1:31:36 doubt because science is dynamic and
1:31:37 subject to change
1:31:39 and there may be a new observation that
1:31:41 negates or changes our current
1:31:42 scientific conclusions
1:31:44 now this doesn't mean we shouldn't take
1:31:46 effort to try and reconcile
1:31:48 but we should do it from the point of
1:31:49 view of
1:31:51 of pondering of possibility and not to
1:31:53 claim any certainty in this regard
1:31:55 because we know the main purpose of this
1:31:57 ayat is to awaken the truth within and
1:31:59 the main purpose of this ayat is to move
1:32:02 from the understanding that there is a
1:32:03 divine power and wisdom behind these
1:32:04 things regardless of our scientific
1:32:06 details behind them
1:32:08 and if there's a divine power and wisdom
1:32:10 therefore allah deserves glorification
1:32:12 and allah
1:32:14 deserves praise and worship so the basic
1:32:17 challenge i have to those people
1:32:19 who like to
1:32:22 still articulate a false
1:32:24 narrative of the quran so-called
1:32:26 scientific miracles
1:32:27 is to get them to answer two questions
1:32:30 is the meaning you have chosen for a
1:32:32 particular word in the quran the
1:32:34 intended meaning
1:32:36 is the science you believe the quran
1:32:38 referred to never going to change
1:32:42 right
1:32:47 so
1:32:48 how can we answer the question is the
1:32:49 meaning you have chosen for a particular
1:32:51 wouldn't that the intended meaning you
1:32:53 can never say yes
1:32:55 also
1:32:56 is the science you believe the quran is
1:32:59 referring to never going to change
1:33:01 you can't say yes either
1:33:04 i know there's a confusion on the slide
1:33:06 he says you can never say no to both of
1:33:08 these questions
1:33:09 i didn't mean that i meant you could
1:33:11 never say yes to both of these questions
1:33:13 so you can't say yes that is the
1:33:14 intended meaning of a particular word in
1:33:16 the quran
1:33:17 and you can't say
1:33:19 yes the science that we're referring to
1:33:21 to relate to the quranic verse or word
1:33:23 is never going to change
1:33:25 and therefore
1:33:29 just just by posing these two questions
1:33:30 the whole narrative
1:33:32 falls on the floor so conclusion
1:33:34 the scientific miracles approach the
1:33:36 quran is based on false assumptions and
1:33:38 misrepresents the book of allah subhana
1:33:39 wa
1:33:40 the quran uses words that point to
1:33:42 natural phenomena these words have many
1:33:44 layers of meaning and address many
1:33:45 levels of understanding they may not
1:33:47 have a scientific meaning that the main
1:33:49 point is this regardless of what we know
1:33:52 about the scientific phenomena
1:33:55 regardless of this
1:33:57 it's to conclude that allah deserves
1:33:58 worship
1:34:00 okay
1:34:01 so
1:34:01 the main point is
1:34:03 the verse when they point to natural
1:34:05 phenomena regardless of our details
1:34:07 about that natural phenomena the main
1:34:09 point is is that it's to conclude that
1:34:11 allah deserves worship because there
1:34:12 must have been a creative power and a
1:34:14 wisdom behind the phenomena in question
1:34:18 so
1:34:19 brothers
1:34:20 and sisters
1:34:21 and friends
1:34:23 i know it's been an hour and a half but
1:34:25 i've thoroughly enjoyed your time i
1:34:27 don't know what we're supposed to be
1:34:28 doing now
1:34:29 if there's questions that's fine we
1:34:31 could have questions if there's no
1:34:33 questions then that's fine also
1:34:35 um i know some of you have been raising
1:34:37 your hands
1:34:40 but
1:34:41 that's the end of the webinar i hope
1:34:42 it's been quite informative
1:34:44 and you know it's very important that
1:34:46 when we go through these things that we
1:34:49 basically um
1:34:52 we basically take this knowledge
1:34:54 internalize it
1:34:55 and
1:34:56 push a better narrative
1:34:58 concerning the book of allah subhanallah
1:35:00 narrative that's in line with our
1:35:01 tradition a narrative that's in line
1:35:03 with us
1:35:04 a narrative that's a mind with a
1:35:06 classical tradition and an and a
1:35:08 narrative that's in line with reason and
1:35:09 that is coherent
1:35:11 because at the moment
1:35:13 you know we still have to basically
1:35:17 undo the mess that i was also
1:35:20 partly responsible for as well
1:35:22 and we live and learn and we progress
1:35:24 insha'allah and let's now popularize
1:35:28 this amazing narrative of the quran
1:35:30 because this new narrative
1:35:33 shows to us
1:35:34 that the quran is
1:35:36 timeless from that point of view it's
1:35:37 timeless
1:35:39 it's four dimensional
1:35:41 it doesn't speak to the seventh century
1:35:42 man it speaks to all people
1:35:44 and fundamentally it's there
1:35:46 to create the realization
1:35:49 that allah deserves worship