To prove this we shall have to bring examples of the Qur'anic ayahs.

To prove this we shall have to bring examples of the Qur'anic ayahs. The Materialistic Causation Among the many causes mentioned in the Qur'an is that which is known in the philosophic terms as the materialistic causation, which, in this term, means that each of this world's phenomena usually appears from the changing of another phenomenon. i.e. every being in this world which may occur to your mind was formerly something else, which had undergone certain changes and transformed into a new thing.

For example, the soil was before a mountain, but because of erosion, rain and sun, the mountain erodes and gradually turns into dust, the soil turns into plant, which transforms into animal, which is eaten by man and turns into human beings. This body of ours was formerly other beings, some of it was the flesh of former animals, some of it was of eatable plants, some was of mineral materials. Whatever phenomenon of the nature you lay your hand on was formerly something else.

This "something else" is called "the materialistic cause" in the philosophic term, and this is because there is a kind of union between the former thing and the latter one, to which we say: this is what was formerly a plant. There is a sort of sameness and unity between the present phenomena and the former one. So, the former phenomena, on which the latter ones depend, arc, thus, causes. The Qur'an and the Materialistic Causation Is this causation acceptable to the Qur'an?

Yes, it frequently says that Allah has changed these phenomena into other ones, or He created a given thing from a certain thing, which means that the first was the cause of the appearance of the second. Many examples can be sited. This sky which we see nowadays in different shapes, from the Qur'anic standpoint, formerly was a phenomenon called "smoke, which we today scientifically know as gases. That is, this world was one day in the form of a gas.

The noble ayah in this respect says: Then He turned to the heaven when it was smoke.[^112] Regarding the living beings the Qur'an says: "...We made every living thing of water".[^113] So water is a materialistic cause of living things, i.e. water is a necessary part of every living being. This is a proof of the accepted principle of materialistic causation in our world. As for men, the Qur'an repeatedly says that Allah had created him of clay.