What made Islamic Science great?

Published in: Science
Date: 03 / 05 / 18

Islamic science is not "islamic" because it was formulated by Muslims only. Infact many non muslims have made great contributions to this immediate and crucial predecessor of Western Science. So what makes Islamic Science Islamic. Conceptually speaking Islamic science organically evolved out of the fundamental concepts of Islam. the most crucial being the concept of Tawhid, on which rests the entirety of the Islamic Tradition. Tawhid being the principle that "there is no god except God or there is no Reality except Divine Reality".

So now after centuries of Orientalist onslaught on the literary accomplishments of the Muslim World, we see a growing acceptance of Muslim Scientists and the public acknowledgement that Western Science owes its origin and methodology to Islamic Science. But still this perspective is inadequate as the credit is afforded to "Muslim" scientists and the foundations on which they stood is absolutely ignored.

So as to say that only these men and women were great and their Scripture was inherently unrelated to their science. This is NeoOrientalism in my opinion which still cannot help but show its deep seated aversion to the Quran.

They say, for science to progress it has to move outside the realm of religion, but that was the opposite of what happened in the Muslim world. The more devout were the more scientific in their thought.

Islamic Science stemmed out of the Quran and that it no longer exists internationally is because Muslims moved away from the Quran. This is in sharp contrast to Western Science which stemmed from Greek Philosophy and rose to prominence as people moved away from the Bible.

Today the biggest challenge for Modern science is the frustrating conflict between general relativity- or the theory of the big and apparent things in the universe and Quantum Mechanics- the theory of the very small and hidden building blocks of the entire universe. The laws that govern the two realms seem to be in violent conflict with each other. This conflict comes to show a serious problem with the methodology of Western Science. On the contrary, Islamic Science has the power and the stable methodology to reconcile between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. Because of its foundational principle of Tawhid, which has a powerful unifying ability. A conflict between what you see and what really is there cannot be solved by a mathematical equation as some physicist woud have us believe. Rather there has to be a total shift of perspective.

Safiyyah Sabreen Syeed

About the author

Safiyyah Sabreen studied Mechanical Engineering and is currently pursuing her Master's in Philosophy. She is the Content Director for KNOW. Being interested in the field of Islam and Science and Islamic Eschatology, she produced a documentary on the Golden Age of Islam and directs the Second Golden Age series.

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