ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Islamic Environmental Stewardship: Nature and Science in the Light of Islamic Philosophy An Islamic Perspective on the Trouble with Modern Science Science is defined today as “the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.”34 This definition provides a basis for great compatibility between modern science and the Islamic pursuit of knowledge, but with a few caveats.

The physical and natural world to which this definition refers is Islamically known to embody sacred meanings; their studies are therefore welcomed in Islamic circles, but integral as well is the ability to interpret them on higher ground. Modern science’s denial of metaphysics serves as the basis for much disparity between Islam and modern science. This disparity boils down to the great difference between Islam’s recognition of a sacredness in nature and modern science’s denial of it.

The secular approach of modern science to nature has removed virtually all understanding of the sacred qualities behind it. Unlike modern scientists, the traditional scientists of old integrated theological ontology into their holistic approach to studying nature and thus regarded the study of such sacred qualities as the backbone of their work.

Before this desacralization of nature, a “vision of God in nature” seemed the norm of viewing the world.35 The grave ramifications of this change in approach are evident in the world today, and especially so in the environmental crisis. Since the divorce of science and sacred tradition, the need to know God no longer served as the impetus behind scientific studies.

Before this divorce, the philosophy of science was that of oneness (tawḥīd).36 The traditional sciences of all sacred traditions were unified on certain fundamental principles, and one such principle was the recognition of a hierarchy of reality.37 All such levels of hierarchy alluded to the reality of God as the Real, as well as His supreme and ultimate oneness as the One ( al-Wāḥid ).

In the separation of science and sacred tradition, there was a transformation of ideology from the assertion of oneness to the making of many (takthīr)-the very antithesis of tawḥīd.38 Everything that was seen for its reference to the supreme oneness of God became a separate entity and a “god” of its own.