Many of our scholars...

Many of our scholars, especially during the last 100 years have tried to bridge this gulf and to introduce modern science and civilization in a perspective compatible with the broad and progressive outlook of Islam and free from all misconceptions and distortions.

In this respect valuable contributions were made by such distinguished scholars as Sayyid Jamaluddin Asadabadi, Ayatullah Shaykh Balaghi, Ayatullah Mirza Muhammad Husayn Naini, Shaykh Muhammad Riza Najafi, Shaykh Hibatullah Shahristani, Mirza Abbas Ali Wa'iz Charindabi and lately Shaykh Muhammad Riza Muzaffar and Professor Ahmad Amin. Anyhow the value of the work done by them has been limited and temporary.

They could not cure the ailment of the young men who studied Western science, and the gulf between science and civilization on the one hand and religion and moral principles on the other continued as it was. This was the position till Ayatullah Sadr an illustrious scholar and a prominent personality of Shi'ah history appeared in Najaf and with his valuable and world famous works, did full justice to Western science, civilization, economics and psychology, and dispelled all misgivings about them.

Simultaneously with this intellectual movement, we in Iran also had certain scholars, though less known, who were fully conversant with the civilization and culture of the West and the East and who in their research work followed a correct line of thought and critically examined modern science and civilization from Islamic point of view.

Our philosopher and thinker Ayatullah Mutahhari, who laid down his life for the Islamic revolution in Iran, was virtually Ayatullah Sadr's comrade in-arms in his struggle for stopping the misuse of Western science and civilization. The difference between the two was that till his martyrdom Mutahhari was not introduced on a world level. Only Muslim intellectuals took inspiration from him in their revolutionary activities.

We see that the same line has been followed by some other distinguished scholars and philosophers like Allamah Tabataba'i the author of authentic commentary on the Qur'an al-Mizan, the eminent Islamic thinker Muhammad Taqi Ja'fari and others. What distinguishes Ayatullah Sadr is that he had been busy with his intellectual struggle in the field of Our Philosophy, Our Economics and Our Culture on a world level long before others.