It is estimated that 80 to 90 percent of all cancer cases are related to environmental and lifestyle influences (1). Many cancer research centers estimate that 80 to 90 percent of human cancers are preventable. Beside chemicals and infections (viral and parasitic), extrinsic factors include diet among a variety of other factors wholly or partly determined by personal behaviour. Though genetic factors and age affect cancer onset rates, the conclusion holds that many human cancers are avoidable (2). A great number of these are related to tobacco smoking and chewing, alcohol consumption, homosexuality, promiscuity and excessive exposure to solar radiation as in sunbathing, all practices disapproved in traditionally religious societies.

Dr John Hill, a London physician, reported an increase of lip cancer in pipe smokers as long ago as 1761. Sir Percival Pott reported cancer of the scrotum in chimney sweeps in 1777, which he attributed correctly to lodgement of soot in the rugose scrotal skin. This type of cancer was virtually eliminated by simple personal hygiene (3). Later, many chemicals were proved to be carcinogenic and hence many cancers became avoidable by taking more care when dealing with them. Ionizing radiation is still an important hazard, preventable by taking better care.

Tobacco and Cancers

In many countries cancer is the second most important cause of death. In the USA and many developed countries, it accounts for 20 percent of all deaths (1,2). An estimated 6 million new cases of cancer occur annually worldwide, of which about a million are caused by tobacco smoking and chewing (4). The death toll due to malignant disease in the USA amounts to 400-450,000 annually of which 100,000 are due to lung cancer, 85 to 90 percent of those due to cigarette smoking (1,2). Indeed, tobacco (smoked, chewed or sniffed) is the most important single factor in cancer causation generally, responsible for 30- 40 percent of all cancers (5). No other single agent has been examined in more detail, nor more firmly established as a causal agent, than cigarette smoking (6). Let us look at some of the facts.

The risk of cigarette smokers developing lung cancer increases with the number of cigarettes smoked the duration of smoking, the time of onset and the type of smoking. Approximately one-sixth of those who smoke two packs of cigarettes per day will eventually develop lung cancer. The risk to hose who smoke 40 cigarettes per day are 25 times more that to non-smokers (6-8). Cigarette smoking causes all ol the major types of lung cancer including squamous cell carcinoma, adeno carcinoma, oat cell and large cell carcinoma (6). Cancer of the lung was a rare form of cancer at the beginning of this century, even in developed countries. As smoking increased dramatically after World War I among men, and among women after World War II, the incidence of cancer of the lung showed incessant increase until the seventies, after which it began to decline among men and a decade later among women. Nevertheless, cancer of the lung is still the first killing cancer among men and women in many developed and developing countries (7,9,13). In Hong Kong, the rates for women are now the highest in the world (13). Lung cancer rates in Chinese men (e.g. 50.2 per 100.000 in Shanghai) are higher than in many North American and European populations (13). It is the leading cause of cancer mortality among males in Bulgaria. Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Egypt, Greece, Hong Kong. Hungary, Israel, the Philippines, Poland, Romania, Singapore, Thailand, Uruguay and Zimbabwe. The risk is particularly high among cigarette smokers, and a clear cut dose-response relationship has been confirmed. The risk is greater among those who started smoking at a young age and those who smoke high tar cigarettes (2,14-16).

Laryngeal cancer is the second cancer caused by cigarette smoking, but the total number of cases is smaller than lung cancer and the survival is much better (6). Cigarette smokers are five times more likely to develop cancer of the oral cavity and the oesophagus than non-smokers (&-8). There is synergism between alcohol and cigarette smoking in causing cancer of the larynx oesophagus and oral cavity(6-8.14-16,22).

Cigarette smoking is also an important contributing factor in cancers of the bladder, kidney and pancreas. Association between gastric cancer and smoking has also been noted (23-26). Cigarette smoking has even been implicated in cancers affecting the breasts, kidneys, liver, cervix, uteri and many other organs (27-29). It has also been implicated in childhood cancer as a result of prenatal exposure to parental smoking (30). Passive smoking was implicated in causing many cases of cancer (31-33).

Non-smoked Tobacco

Long term use of chewing tobacco or snuff has been linked to cancer of the oral cavity, cheek, gums and oropharynx (6). Oral cancer is one of the ten most common cancers in the world. In Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, it is the most common malignant disease and accounts for a third of all cancers. More than 100,000 new cases occur annually in South and South East Asia (13). The commonest cause for oral cancer is tobacco chewing, usually in the form of betel quid which consists of betel vine leaf (piper betel), areca nut, lime and tobacco (13,34). Tobacco chewing is also widespread in parts of Yemen, Sudan and Southern Province of Saudi Arabia: the so called ‘shamma’ is a tobacco plus lime and ash mix, implicated in many cases of oral cancer in these areas (35,36).

Tobacco was propagated in developed countries by tobacco companies after the decline of cigarette smoking there. The 39th World Health Assembly in 1986 adopted Resolution WHA39 which declared that ‘the use of tobacco in all its forms is incompatible with the attainment of health for alt by the year 2000’ (37). The study group concluded that the use of smokeless tobacco caused cancers in humans, the evidence of causality being strongest for cancers of the oral cavity. It also increased the risk of cancers of the nasal cavity, pharynx, larynx, oesophagus, pancreas and urinary tract. Laboratory studies clearly supported the observations that smokeless tobacco caused a number of precancerous oral lesions (37).

Carcinogens in Tobacco Smoke

Tobacco smoke is an aerosol consisting of about 2000 different substances, 50 of which are already proven to be human carcinogens e.g. Benza pyrines, Benza anthracene, Benzo floaranthene, Benzene and other Benzyl derivatives, cadmium, chrysene, methylchryscne, methyl fiouranthene and nitroso compounds (38,39).

Cigarette smoke also contains significant amounts of radioactive substances e.g. thorium Th228, polonium-210 and radium-Rd226. These compounds lodge in the lungs where they constantly irradiate the nearby cells and hence facilitate malignant change (38). Even the urine of cigarette smokers contains mutagenic substances for bacteria, and substances that cause changes in the chromosomes of human cells in tissue culture.

Sidestream smoke which is inhaled by non-smokers contains fifty fold greater concentration of nitrosamines than mainstream smoke. In one hour of breathing in a smoke filled room, a non-smoker may inhale an amount of nitrosamines equivalent to the amount inhaled after having smoked 15 filter cigarettes (38).

Cessation of Smoking

The risk after cessation of smoking decreases dramatically. Light smokers approximate the risk of nonsmokers after 10 to 15 years of cessation of smoking, while heavy smokers have a residual two to three fold increase after cessation (2,6). The mechanism of lung carcinogenesis and smoking cessation has been extensively studied (40).

Women and Smoking

As women started smoking long after men, there is a time lag in the incidence of lung cancer. The incidence of lung cancer has already fallen for men in most developed countries while it was still increasing for women early in the eighties. In 1984, 32 percent of the women smoked in Britain compared with 36 percent of men. In 1961, the figures had been 60 percent of men, and 40 percent of women. Whereas in 1950 the average woman smoker smoked half as many cigarettes as the average male smoker, in the eighties the corresponding figures were 14 and 16 cigarettes (41).

During the second decade of the anti-smoking campaign in Britain, smoking started to fall among women too, slowly at first, but with accelerating momentum (42). Similar trends are found in all developed countries, In some countries e.g. Australia, smoking among young and middle aged women was rising in the early eighties (5,43A4). The proportion of male smokers was falling in 19 out of 22 developed countries, and for women rising or stable in II countries (42-44). In Austria, Germany, Italy, Japan, U.S.S.R., smoking among women was still rising in the early eighties(42).

We may note that lung cancer has already surpassed breast cancer in the number of fatalities it causes. Non-smoking wives of smoking husbands (passive smokers) and non-smoking women working in smoking environments are also afflicted with lung cancer(6,31-33.37).

Trends in Developed and Developing Countries

Anti-smoking campaigns have been launched in the developed countries in the last three decades with tremendous achievements. In Britain, 60 percent of men were smokers in 1961 (the year before the first report of the Royal College of Physicians about smoking was published). By 1971 this figure had dropped to 47 percent, by 1984 to 36 percent, and by 1992 less than 25 percent of the adult males are smoking. As already noted, a similar trend among women smokers was apparent with a ten-year lag (42-45). The decline in cigarette consumption in other European countries and the USA has been comparable. By the mid-eighties sales had plummeted by an impressive 2$ percent with a 5-10 percent annual decline (42-44).

How have the tobacco companies been selling the 10 billion cigarettes they produce daily? By promoting sales in the poor Third World, already suffering from serious health hazards. Consumption of tobacco in Third World has seen a horrendous increase. The World Health Organization (WHO) has reported that tobacco related diseases are on the rise in developing countries.

During the last three decades: in Senegal the percentage of men who smoke in urban areas has reached an unprecedented 80 percent in Bangladesh 70 percent; in Lagos 72 percent of the Faculty of Medicine male students were smoking (46). Statistics from the Chamber of Commerce of Saudi Arabia show an unbelievable increase in tobacco imports: over 4,5 million kgs in 1972: over 27 million kgs in 1977; nearly 36 million kgs in 1981; 42 million kgs in 1984 – an increase of 900 percent (47-48). It is no surprise to find that lung cancer in Saudi Arabia has increased dramatically – from the twelfth most common cancer in a 1950-61 study (49) to the third most common cancer in a 1979-84 study (50). It is expected to be the leading cancer in the nineties us the effects of smoking are unfolding.

The tobacco companies’ methods are unscrupulous as well as aggressive, with bribery of government officials to permit promotion not unusual. In 1982, the head of the Malaysian parliament retired and went to work as a chairman of Rothman’s, Malaysia’s largest cigarette manufacturer (48-51). Ethiopia imported 200 million expensive British cigarettes in 1984 when a large portion of its population were starving to death (52). In Bangladesh, smoking of five cigarettes daily robs the family of a quarter of its food supply, which results in an estimated 18.000 deaths among children annually (53). Unfortunately, the World Bank and Western Governments are co-operating with the seven giant tobacco companies (three American, three British and one French). The World Bank has given Pakistan 60 million dollars in loans to raise tobacco and the US Food for Peace Programs have spent 2 billion dollars in loans to developing countries for the purchase of U.S. tobacco and to establish joint-venture tobacco projects and factories (48-51). Tobacco needs to be cured with heat, obtained by burning wood. This results in deforesting 7 million acres annually with the obvious detrimental impacts on the local ecology, Heavy use (without protective measures) of carcinogenic pesticides on tobacco plantations has also resulted in many fatalities.

Neither tobacco promotion nor high tar content are restricted in many third world countries. Cigarettes smoked in China. India. Pakistan. Sri Lanka the Philippines etc. contain 21-33mg tar and 2-3mg nicotine: while in tile developed countries of U.S.A., Canada, Western Europe, the maximum legally permitted levels are 15 mg tar and 1 mg nicotine (13,46,48).

China consumes one third of the world’s production of cigarettes, while the other developing countries consume another third (48,54). The Eastern and Western block combined consume the remaining third.

The WHO emphasizes the need for a ban on tobacco promotion which should be comprehensive, fully implemented, well publicized, given major priority by governments and health authorities, and sustained on a long term basis (13).

Islamic Law and Tobacco

Muslim muftis and grand ‘ulama’ proscribed smoking tobacco soon after it was introduced to Turkey around 1000H (1573). Sultan Murad of the Ottoman Caliphate made it a capital offence in 1663. The former Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Mohammed bin Ibrahim (55) included in his fatwa the names (If many grand ‘ulama’ and muftis who had proscribed tobacco use since its first appearance in Turkey, Morocco, Egypt, Syria, and Yemen (56). All the religious authorities in Saudi Arabia, including of course the present Grand Mufti, Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Baz, prohibited tobacco use, its promotion, sale, cultivation or dealing with it in any way other than destroying it.

Recently the 1st International Islamic Conference of ulama’ (On Drugs, Narcotics and Liquors held in Madina, March 22-25, 1982, under the auspices of Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz passed a resolution prohibiting the use of tobacco in any of its forms, its cultivation, manufacture, trading in. selling or promoting it in any way (57). The WHO Eastern Mediterranean office published a book in 1988 under the title Al-Hukm al-Shar’i fi at-Tadkhin (Islamic legal ruling on smoking) which involved the decision of the ten leading ‘ulama’ of Egypt, including Sheikh Al-Azhar, who explicitly considered tobacco use as haram (58).

The grounds for these judgments were:

1. Smoking is detrimental to health. The Qur’an states clearly Don’t kill yourselves (4.29) and Make not your own hands contribute to your destruction (2.195). Islamic teachings generally, as well as hundreds of sayings of the Prophet, upon him be peace, encourage Muslims to preserve good health and abstain from things injurious to health.
2. Tobacco use wastes huge sums of money. Saudi Arabia spends annually more than one billion riyals on tobacco imports (59). Some poor Muslim countries spend more money on smoking and other tobacco use than on health promotion or education. The Qur’an deplores such waste: Squander not your wealth senselessly. Squanderers are indeed the like of Satans (17.26, 27).
3. Smoking is had and impure, khabath. The Qur’an declares that the Prophet, upon him be peace, forbids all that is bad and impure and allows all that is good and clean (7.157). Smoking is bad and impure, as it Causes environmental pollution and is unpleasant, even seriously harmful, to those who do not smoke, injuring others is completely prohibited in Islam and considered one of the worst sins a believer can commit.

There is a great need to inform Muslim communities about the legal opinions on tobacco use and the rationale for them. The Muslim governments should stand firmly against the pressures exerted upon them by the tobacco companies and their powerful Western backers. If Muslim countries and peoples adhere to the traditional religious lifestyles. They will succeed in avoiding the perils and tragic losses of life and wealth caused by tobacco consumption.

Hypertension is one of the most widespread dangerous diseases of this century affecting the young as well as the elderly. It can lead to other, more dangerous conditions, coronary and brain diseases among them.

The two main causes of hypertension are stress and being overweight conditions associated with the life-style of the materially wealthy, industrialized nations. (We may note in passing that Islam forbids excessive consumption whether in or in goods, and it requires the believers to halt their daily routines at least five times a day for prayer – and prayer, standing or sitting in the presence of the All-Mighty, gives due proportion to all human affairs, enabling the worshipper to obtain or recover calm of body and mind.) .

Doctors nowadays recommend patients with hypertension to eat less salty foods, to avoid becoming overweight and to keep fit by doing light but regular, frequent exercise. But; before that, doctors ask them to give up drinking and smoking if they indulge in these habits. (Again, we note in passing that the life-style being recommended makes up a prescription as familiar to Muslims as the Qur’an and Sunna.)

Hypertension adversely affects blood pressure; to keep the pressure at normal level, the blood vessels constrict. That constriction may, in turn, cause damage when it passes beyond certain limits. It can overload the heart, soon leading to coronary vascu1ai diseases. On the other hand, excessive blood pressure not reduced by constriction of the blood vessels may damage the vessels and, subsequently, lead on to brain and liver diseases.

The first measurement of human blood pressure was taken in 1834. An apparatus like the type most commonly used today was introduced in 1896, with some operative improvements in 1906 (Weinstein, 1976). We meet the first accurate descriptions of what we now know as ‘essential hypertension’ in a series of clinical papers by F. A. Mohammed between 1874 and 1881 (Page, 1988).

It comes as a surprise to learn that hypertension was first recognized as a serious health problem only in the late 1930s. During the 1920s, the textbooks used in leading medical schools throughout the world made no mention of hypertension as a problem, let alone as a disease. The association of hypertension with stroke, heart failure and renal failure was still nebulous (Page, 1988).

A research group under Irvine Page were trying to demonstrate the connection between hypertension and coronary heart diseases and to convince the authorities of the time about the importance of treatment for hypertension. When this group announced, with another group of researchers, that they had found a hormone which is very important in the regulation of blood pressure, there was little or no interest. Page’s group had named the hormone ‘angiotonin’, while the others had named it ‘hypertension’. The two groups got together and agreed on the name ‘angiotensin’ for the hormone. Page suggested that angiotensin was one of the important factors in blood pressure regulation. The active form of this hormone, Axigiotensin-2, caused the blood vessels to constrict so that the blood pressure could be kept at a certain level. Therefore, hypertension could be relieved by preventing the synthesis of this hormone.

As the years passed, the number of researchers and organizations working in the field (as well as funding) increased dramatically. Drugs like ‘captopril’ and ‘enalapril’ were developed, which would block the production of angiotensin and hence give some temporary relief to sufferers of hypertension. Today, hypertension is a major medical research area usually carried on under the broad category of brain and cardiovascular research.

When Dr Ibrahim Benter, A Muslim chemist and doctor, came to the Cleveland Clinic to work as a research scientist. Dr Ferrario was the head of the brain and cardiovascular research department. Having worked with Irvine Page at the Cleveland Clinic earlier, Dr Ferrario had been interested in angiotensin for several years.

He had previously shown that Angiotensin 1-7 a trimmed version of the hormone Angiotensin-2, was synthesized in various sites in the human body. However, he was somehow unable to show its effects via live-animal experiments. Despite his reputation, his articles on this particular subject were rejected everywhere. One reason for this was the consensus of the research community that submolecules of Angiotensin-2 were ineffective. After several years of fruitless research, Dr Ferrario had begun to lose hope.

The story of Angiotensin 1-7 attracted Dr Benter’s interest. He had a simple and sound principle: ‘The All-Mighty would never create something that is useless.’ Since angiotensin was synthesized in various places in the body, it should have a definite function. He decided to do some experiments in his own lime during his stay in the Cleveland Clinic. When he mentioned his idea to colleagues some of them smiled and told him not to waste his time. Briefly, they were saying ‘We spent several years and got nothing out of this research; you should not make the same mistake.’ Everybody seemed to have convinced themselves that Angiotensin 1-7 was useless.

However, Dr Benter was determined. He began his experiments using his own set-up and techniques in the expectation of turning up something missed or neglected in previously used methods. Dr Ferrario, having noticed Dr Benter’s efforts, visited him from time to time to see if anything new had turned up. When several trials yielded no positive findings, Dr Ferrario gave up all hope. Not so Dr Benter. I us determination was grounded on his belief that all scientific research is like a prayer to the All-Mighty, and that discoveries are part of the results of the acceptance of these prayers. Since God is the One who makes all progress possible our duty is to work with faith in a systematic way.

Shortly afterwards, he received the reward for his patience, faith and determination. Angiotensin 1-7 was not useless at all. It was a hormone with a function of profound importance – it was just that certain mechanisms in the body hid its effects from being easily observed. When he determined those mechanisms and disabled them, he clearly observed the effects of Angiotensin 1-7. The results were very significant. When acting alone, Angiotensin 1-7 lowered the blood pressure considerably; it could therefore be used as the basis For a new medicine against hypertension, one with fewer side- effects (sec Renter. 1992).

On learning about Ibrahim Benter’s findings, Dr Ferrario gathered all the researchers in the department in Ibrahim’s lab: he wanted them all to see the results. As his colleagues watched the gauges with awe and surprise. Ibrahim was silently thanking his Lord for the success He had bestowed.

They quickly prepared an article, sent grant proposals to relevant institutions and requested support for further research. The response was positive. They were given a research fund of approximately 1.5 million dollars to continue their study. When the official from the funding institution visited them, he said privately to Ibrahim Benter ‘without your findings, this grant would not be possible’.

Dr Ibrahim Benter is probably even now continuing his research on Angiotensin 1-7. When interviewed on the subject, he explicitly asked the following comment to be made public:

This achievement, for which many other more experienced and skilled researchers worked fruitlessly was made possible only by God’s help.’

The story we have just told, is perhaps one example among countless others which demonstrate the role of faith and determination in achievement. If it was successful in bringing an important fact to our attention, or refreshing our confidence in it, then our telling the story has served its purpose. 

REFERENCES

• BENTER IBRAHIM (I 993) ‘Cardiovascular Actions of Angiotensin 1-7’, Peptides, Vol.14. pp.679-89
• PAGE, Revise n. (1988) Hypertension Research: a memoir. Pergamon Press. NewYork.
• WEINSTEIN, MILTON C. (1976) Hypertension: A Policy Perspective. Harvard University Press. Cambridge MA.

The Qur’anic descriptions and those in the Hadith are remarkable for their accuracy in relation to what is known about the subject now. But, what was known then? Until 1688, among Muslim as well as European scientists, the Aristotelian account dominated, no one daring to question it. The two theories in Aristotle’s time were: (a) the embryo is preformed as a miniature in either the male semen or the female secretion and then grows in the womb; and (b) the embryo is actually formed and created out of the menstrual blood. Aristotle favoured the second view, adding that male semen caused the menstrual blood to coagulate, like milk curdling into cheese. The Qur’anic description tells us, by contrast, that (a) the embryo is not pre-formed but grows in successive stages (71.13-14, 23.12-14,22.5); and (b) is formed equally of male and female fluids (76.2). The relevant ahadith re-state what is in the Qur’an. Interestingly, while exegetes of Qur’an and Hadith did not fall into error in their account, many Muslim scientists and doctors, under the spell of Aristotle, repeated Aristotle’s (incorrect) view. Thus, about 700 years after the Revelation, Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani commented: ‘Many of the anatomists claim that the semen of the male has no role in creation of the baby. Its role, they claim, is limited to curdling the menstrual blood… The saying of the Prophet denies what they say. The semen of the male actually participates equally to that of the female in formation of the embryo.’

The pre-formation theory lasted in Europe into the 18th century when it was believed that a full miniature existed either in the female ovum or in the male sperm, then simply got bigger in the womb. This theory was destroyed gradually and was no longer held in any form after 1900. Von Baer (1829-37), called the ‘father of embryology’, identified the human ovum. Subdivision of the egg, i.e. growth of the embryo in successive stages, was properly demonstrated and understood in 1839 by Schwann and Schleiden. And in 1875, Hertwig described the fertilization of an egg by a sperm. Then in 1883, Von Benden showed that male and female cells contribute the same number of chromosomes to the embryo.

However, not until this century, have a number of discoveries established how and when the sex of the embryo is determined; how and when the hones and musculature, the organs of sight and hearing, the nervous system, and so on, develop. It is rather more than remarkable, therefore, that in Qur’an and Hadith we should find unmistakably accurate and detailed references to these matters.

The earliest of the successive stages of embryo development is the nutfah, in turn distinguished as male and female nutfah (in modern terminology, gamete), the two being commingled to form the nutfat amshaj (zygote). The Qur’an clearly and explicitly states (75.3(t), 53.45-6, 59. 58-9) that the sex of the embryo is carried in the fluid ejaculated by the male (X or Y chromosome in the fertilizing sperm). Also, in the Qur’an s emphasis that growth is from a lucre drop of fluid, we find a clear pointer to the fact that the spermatozoa make up a mere 0.5% of the ejaculated fluid, in which tiny quantity are carried an average 2 to 300 million individual sperms.

The nutfat amshaj (zygote) develops into ‘alaqah (that which clings) which attaches itself to the uterine wall. The stunning precision of the term ‘alaqah for the detail of how the zygote attaches, implants and is nourished in the womb, is striking in Dr Albar’s account. (For even more on the detail, see Sikander Hussain ‘Al’Alaq: the mystery explored’, Ark Journal, London, 1986, pp. 31-6.) The ‘alaqah is transformed into mudghah (chewed lump), the somite(s) from which hones and muscles are subsequently differentiated. The mudghah stage includes also the pharyngeal arches (out of which face, ear and neck are formed) – the marked indentations give the embryo the look of a ‘chewed lump’. The Qur`an’s allusion (22.5) to mukhlaqa and ghairu mukhlaqa, formed and non- formed development of the mudghah, is now readily understood as the critical period of organogenesis, when the embryo is most susceptible to factors which can cause congenital malformations. The Qur’an says (2.259): kayfa nanshuzu-ha thumma naksu-ha tahma, ‘how We erect them (the bones) then enclothe them in flesh’. Nanshuzu-ha, here inadequately rendered ‘We erect them’ is as informative as any modern textbook description, for example ‘With time a number of needle-like spicules are formed which progressively radiate from the primary ossification centres towards the periphery.’

The pre-formational aspects of embryo development are now understood as hereditary characteristics contributed by parental genes. In the Qur’an (81). 17-19), the nutfah (male and female gametes) is said to carry these predetermined characteristics. There are several ahadith confirming this reading. One, in the Sahih of Muslim, explicitly mentions 4O -42 days after fertilization as the moment when the angel enters the womb and ‘gives the nutfah its shape and form, creates its hearing and visual apparatus, builds up the hones, the muscles and forms the skin. He then asks, 0 God, is it a boy or a girl, what is its livelihood and what will be its lifespan? God gives His answer and the angel writes all that will come. ‘The textbooks tell us that ‘In the sixth week of development the Primordial germ cells invade the genital ridges; if they fail to reach the ridges, the gonads do not develop..’ The site of formation of the gonads is indicated in Qur’an 86.5-9 as ‘between the backbone and the ribs’. This is exactly right. Once formed the gonads differentiate into either male and female and make their progress in the body accordingly. Blood and nerve supply and lymph drainage remain connected, even in the adult, to the area ‘between the backbone and the ribs’.

In this review only a few of the great many correspondences between the Quranic text or ahadith and current knowledge about human embryo development have been mentioned. What is the point of noting these? Almost all of these Qur’anic verses have as their general context a reminder of the resurrection. The re-creation of individual human life after death. We are confronted with the fact of life as a stunning miracle of the Mercy and Omnipotence of the Creator. Knowledge of the successive stages of growth from the near-nothing of a spot of bodily fluid cannot but create a sense of awe at the responsibility one carries for the miracle of one’s life. And one carries it hack to Him whose care initiated, ordained, proportioned and sustained our life – the contrasted human contribution being that drop of ‘lowly fluid’. Then, what – except perversity – could allow us to doubt that the Creator has concern for how we use our lives, or doubt that He can and will bring us again to life so that we may ourselves understand fully the worth of our intentions and actions? Also, these verses, urging a meditation upon the fact of life rather than upon the fact of death, educate a positive temperament, a positive attitude. Religious responsibility can be awakened by reflecting upon the wonder of birth, as much as by reflecting upon the mystery of death.

No textbook about human embryo development can inspire reflections of this kind. Of course, it is also of the utmost importance to know that the information in the Qur’an, given in words which are extraordinarily precise and yet remain generally intelligible, is accurate. Most non-Muslims do not believe that the Qur’an is the Book of God verbatim, as Muslims believe. In trying to make sense of the phenomenon – so copiously illustrated by Dr Albar from the field of human embryology – of how so much accurate knowledge is there in the Book, they may be led to question the assurance with which they hold to their non-belief.

‘My Lord!’ he said, ‘Do not leave me solitary in this strange place. Comfort my people, and relieve them. Give us perseverance and strong resolve, and preserve our young ones in faith.’

But the scene outside would not imitate his mood. Feather-soft clouds and sunlight dazzled his eyes like gold and silver lace-work, urging him to an altogether different mood, as if to draw him to somewhere full of lively hope. The barred window of his prison allowed him only a narrow prospect. He scanned through the bars, this way and that, all that he could see. Beyond blocks of houses and shops, a school wall cast a broad shadow across the school yard, leaving only a corner in the light. He watched that bright corner and saw the shadows of little children traversing it, in and out of the light, as if they were playing in a ring, skipping and dancing. Yet, however he tried, he could not see the children themselves. He imagined he heard their voices, the sound of their feet. The words of childhood jingles rushed into his head. How many times children played such games as these, how often chanted the same words, over and over! Rehearsing. But for what celebration were these children practising so diligently? What great festival were they preparing?

Again the mood of the prison came over him. His mind’s eye pictured the children he imagined in the yard. And he watched them age before him, as though on a film screen, frame by frame, through adolescence and youth, through maturity and old age. Some disappeared from the frame before they attained old age. But the greater number remained. He scrutinized the wrinkled faces, the darkened eyes, exhausted flesh sagging upon weak bones, bodies buckled and bent. Here were, how many disappointed hopes? And dreams not realized? How few are capable of the trial of their old age! Some were sunk in pitiful nostalgia, some wretched with remorse for what they had done or not done. Some still trying, in vain, not to know the truth about themselves.

Their death brought to life, in the bitter torments of the grave, memories of the sins and errors they might have avoided in their younger days. Their corpses became skeletons, frame by frame, and their skeletons little heaps of grey dust amid which they lay, helpless, desolated, ashamed.

The old man’s heart brimmed over with the sorrow and suffering his mind pictured to him. Tears flowed as if from fountain deep within him, inwards to his heart, and out through his eyes and down his cheeks. He wept for the anguish of his people, for the wretchedness that they had stored up for themselves.

‘We must of necessity become old. Snow will-.fall on drip heads. Wrinkles will be stamped on our faces and dark rings etched under our eyes. This is so, so that we may recognize that we are old. So that we may be impressed, as our bodies are impressed, with the understanding that our time is limited. Our coming to the grave is a certainty.

Again, the old man looked out of his cell window. His thoughts turned again to ‘his homeland far away, to his people and, most tenderly of all, to the young. (‘O Lord, let their belief be preserved!’ Still the spring-green poplar leaves applauded the bright day and the birds sang and rejoiced. The clouds, likewise, moved briskly on with the winds, unresisting, graceful, content. He thought:

‘Man too is a traveller. His journey’s end is not the grave, but through resurrection, an eternal life. How unresistingly, how lightly the clouds travel, how sweetly the leaves and birds move through their allotted days! Man, only man, carries the burden of his freedom and so may be caught en route, unprepared, malcontent, fretful, offering vain excuses for his delays and deviations.’

He looked out to the school yard. He stood on tiptoe, but as before he could not quite catch sight of the children, only of their shadows playing. Still playing. Still preparing for some great celebration ahead. ‘Rehearse well, little ones! May He who created you, keep you upon His path. May you grow to a youth that is cheerful but never undisciplined. May you mature with a taste for virtue and for the service of others. Thereby you will be prepared for standing the journey you can by no means avoid. You will then travel the roads ahead of you – as, in the old days of the silk trade, the caravans used to go, if wisely stocked with goods acceptable at their journey’s end at a graceful pace and in modest hope of profitable trade..

And when he had prayed this prayer, the old man’s heart was lightened, and he could look out at the spring light on the other side of his window, without fear of ambush by homesickness or by a desire to complain of his imprisonment.

In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
Whoever has been given the Wisdom, certainly he has been given much good

The following consists of a brief comparison between the sacred wisdom of the Wise Qur’an and human philosophy, and a concise summary of the instruction and training which the Qur’anic wisdom gives to man’s personal and social life, and also an indication to the superiority of the Qur’an to the other Divine Words, and to all speech.

This Word comprises Four Fundamentals.

FIRST FUNDAMENTAL

Look at the differences between the Qur’anic wisdom and human philosophy through the lens of the following parable:

Once, a religious and skillful, renowned ruler wanted to write the Qur’an as beautifully as required by the sacredness of its meanings and the miraculousness of its wording. He wanted to do this so that he might adorn its wonderful words in a worthy array. So, the artist-ruler wrote out the Qur’an in a truly wonderful fashion. In writing it out, he used all kinds of precious jewels. In order to point out the variety of its truths, he wrote some of its letters in diamonds and emeralds, and some in pearls and agate, and others in brilliants and coral, while others he wrote in gold and silver. Also, he adorned and decorated it in such a way that everyone, those who knew how to read and those who did not, were full of admiration and astonishment when they saw it. Especially in the judgement of the people of truth, since the outer beauty was an indication to the brilliant beauty and striking adornment within, that Qur’an became a most precious artwork.

The ruler showed the artistically wrought and bejewelled Qur’an to a foreign philosopher and a Muslim scholar In order to test them and for reward, he commanded them: ‘Each of you write a work about the wisdom of this!’ First the philosopher then the scholar, composed a book about it.

However, the philosopher’s book discussed only the shapes and decorations of the letters and the relationships between them, and the properties of the jewels and the way they were used. He did not make any observations at all about the meaning, for that foreigner had no knowledge of the Arabic script. He did not even know that the embellished Qur’an was a book having a meaning. He rather looked on it as an ornamented art-object. He did not know any Arabic, but he was well-informed about engineering and chemistry. He also had a great ability to describe things and much knowledge about jewellery. So he composed his book according to these skills.

As for the Muslim scholar, on seeing the book, he understood that it was the Clear Book the Wise Qur’an. So, he – this truth loving person – neither paid any attention to its outward ornamentation nor busied himself with the decorations of the letters. He was rather engaged in something else which was millions of times more exalted, more valuable more worthy of respect, more useful and more comprehensive than the issues with which the other man was occupied. Therefore he composed an interpretation in which he described the sacred truths and secret lights behind the veil of decorations.

Both men – the foreign philosopher and Muslim scholar – presented their works to the renowned ruler. The ruler first took the book of the philosopher, and saw that conceited man had worked very hard but not written anything about the true wisdom of his work. He had not understood its meaning at all, and holding that work, which is a source of truths, to consist in meaningless decorations, showed disrespect for it. Therefore, the wise ruler refused his book and expelled the man from his presence.

Then, the ruler looked through the book of the truth-loving, meticulous scholar, and seeing that it was a very beautiful and useful interpretation, a wise and illuminating composition, congratulated him. It was pure wisdom and the one who wrote it was a real scholar, a genuine sage. The other man was an impertinent artificer not knowing his place. Then, he willed that, as reward, for each letter of his work should be given ten pieces of gold out of his inexhaustible treasury.

Now; if you have understood the meaning of the parable, reflect upon its real meaning:

The embellished Qur’an is this artistically fashioned universe. The ruler is the Eternal Sovereign. As for the two men, one represents the line of philosophy and philosophers, the other, the way of the Qur’an and its students. Indeed, the Wise Qur’an is the most exalted expander, a most eloquent translator of this macro-Qur’an of the universe. It is the Criterion, which instructs the jinn and men in the signs of creation Divine laws of the creation and operation of the universe, inscribed by the Pen of Power on the sheets of the universe and pages of time. It looks upon creatures, each of which is a meaningful letter, as bearing the meaning of another, that is, on account of their Maker, and remarks, ‘How beautifully they have been made, and how meaningfully they point to the beauty and grace of the Maker.’ Thus, it shows the real beauty of the universe. As for philosophy, it is absorbed in the design and decorations of the ‘letters’ of creation and, in bewilderment; it has lost the way to truth. While it ought to look upon the letters of this macro-book as bearing the meaning of another, that is, on account of their relation to God, it does the reverse. It looks upon them as signifying themselves, and remaks, ‘How beautiful they are’, not ‘How beautifully they have been made! By doing so, it insults the creation and causes it to complain about itself. Truly, materialistic philosophy is a falsehood bearing no truths, and an insult to the creation.

SECOND FUNDAMENTAL

This is a comparison between the moral training which the Wise Qur’an’s wisdom affords to man’s personal life and that afforded by philosophy:

A sincere student of philosophy is a Pharaoh-like tyrant, but one who abases himself so far as to bow in worship before the meanest thing to serve his interest: That materialist student is also a stubborn, misleading one: unyielding, but so wretched as to accept endless degradation for the sake of a single pleasure; unbending, but so mean as to kiss the feet of devilish people for the sake of some base advantage. That student is conceited and domineering, but since he can find no point of support in his heart, he is an utterly impotent vainglorious tyrant. That student is also self-centred egoist, who strives to gratis’ his material, carnal desires and pursues his personal interests after certain national interests.

As for the sincere student of the Wisdom of the Qur’an, he is a worshipping servant of God, but one who does not degrade himself to bow in a worship even before the greatest of the created. He is a dignified servant who does not regard as the goal of worship a thing of even the greatest benefit like Paradise. Also, he is a modest student, one mild and gentle, but he does not lower himself voluntarily before anybody other than his Creator beyond what He has permitted. He is also weak and in want, and aware of his weakness and neediness.’ Yet he is independent of others, owing to the wealth and munificence the Infinite Power, of his Master. He acts and strives purely for God’s sake, for-God’s pleasure4 and to be equipped with virtues.

The training the Qur’an and philosophy give may be understood through this comparison of the two students.

THIRD FUNDAMENTAL

The training philosophy and the Qur’anic wisdom give to human social life is this:

According to philosophy, the point of support in social life is ‘force’. The aim is the realization of self- interests. Conflict is the principle of life; Philosophy holds that the bond that unifies communities is racism and negative nationalism. The fruits it gives are the gratification of carnal desires and increase of human needs. Whereas force calls for aggression; seeking self-interests causes fighting for material resources. Conflict brings strife. Racism feeds by swallowing others and therefore paves the way for aggression. Thus, it is for these reasons that mankind have been deprived of happiness.

As for the wisdom of the Qur’an, it accepts ‘right’, not ‘force’, as the point of support in social life. It holds, in place of the realization of self-interests, virtues and God’s approval as the aim. The principle of mutual assistance is the principle of life it holds to, instead of conflict. It accepts, not racism and negative nationalism, but the ties of religion, profession and country as the bonds between communities. Its aim is to put a barrier against the attacks of lusts and, by urging the soul to sublime matters and satisfying man’s exalted feelings, to encourage him towards human perfections and make him a true human being. Right calls for unity. Virtues bring solidarity. The principle of mutual assistance means coming to the aid of one another. Religion secures brotherhood and attraction. Restraining the corporeal self and urging the soul towards perfections, it brings happiness in this world and the next.

FOURTH FUNDAMENTAL

If you want to understand why the Qur’an is superior to all the other Divine Scriptures and why it is supreme over all speech and writings, then consider the following two parables:

The first: A king has two forms of speech, two forms of address. One is that he speaks on his private telephone to a common subject regarding some minor matter, some private need. The other is that he speaks, on account of being the supreme sovereign, supreme head of the religious office and the supreme ruler of people, to an envoy or high official of his with the aim of promulgating his commands; he speaks through an exalted decree manifesting his majesty.

The second: A man holds a mirror towards the sun. He receives, according to the capacity of the mirror, light containing the seven colours by which he establishes a connection with the sun. When he directs the light-filled mirror towards his dark house and his roof-covered garden, he will benefit from the sun, not in accordance with the quality of the sun’s light, but according to the capacity of the mirror to reflect it

Another man, however, opens up broad windows out of his house or out of the roof of his garden, thus securing the way for a direct benefit from the sun. He gets the light of the sun directly and continuously and speaks to it in gratitude as if to say: ‘0 fine sun, beauty of the world and beauty of the skies who gild the earth with your light and make the flowers smile! You have furnished my little house and garden with your heat and light the same as you have done for the flowers.’ Whereas the man with the mirror cannot speak to the sun like that. He has to be content with the light and heat of the sun reflected by his mirror.

So, look at the Qur’an through the lens of these two parables and see its miraculousness and understand its holiness. The Qur’an declares: ‘If all the trees on the earth were to become pens and all the seas ink, and if they were to write the words of Almighty God, they would never finish them.’ The reason why the Qur’an has been given the greatest rank among the infinite words of God is this:

The Qur’an has originated in the Greatest Name of God and in the greatest level of every Name. [That is, each Name of God has infinitely different levels of manifestation. For example, the manifestations of the All-Colouring and the All-Decorating in springtime are not the same level as in wintertime.] It is the Word of God on account of His being the Lord of the Worlds. It is God’s decree on account of His being the Deity of all creatures. It is a Divine address on account of God’s being the Creator of the heavens and the earth. It is a speech of God in regard to His absolute Lordship. It is an eternal address in regard to I-us universal Divine Sovereignty. It is book of the favours of the All-Merciful One from the point of His all-embracing comprehensive Mercy. It is a collection of communications at the beginnings of which are sometimes ciphers in respect of the sublime majesty of His Divinity. It is a wisdom-infusing Holy Scripture which, having originated from the all-comprehensive ‘field’ of the Greatest Divine Name, looks to and examines the all-embracing domain of the Supreme Throne of God. It is for these reasons that the title of Word of God has been given to the Qur’an as it deserves it perfectly.

As for the other Divine Words, some of them are of the kind of Divine Speech which is manifested for a particular regard under a minor title and through the particular manifestation of a particular Name; it results from a particular manifestation of Divine Lordship, or of Divine Sovereignty, or of Divine Mercy The Divine Words vary in degrees with respect to particularity and universality. Most inspiration is of this kind, but it varies greatly in degrees. For example, the most particular and simple is the inspiration God sends to animals. Then comes the inspiration occurring to ordinary people. Then the inspirations coming to ordinary angels, to saints and to greater angels, respectively. It is for this reason that a saint who offers supplications without mediation directly through the telephone of the heart ‘connected to God’, says: ‘My heart reports to me from my Lord’. He does not say, ‘It reports me from the Lord of the Worlds’. Also, he can say, ‘My heart is the mirror, the throne, of my Lord’. Never does he say, ‘My heart is the throne of the Lord of the Worlds’. This is because a saint can receive of the Divine address according to his capacity and to the degree of how many of the seventy thousand veils between a man and God he has been able to remove.

Thus, just as the decree of a king which he issues on account of his being the supreme sovereign is higher and more exalted than his insignificant conversation with a common man; and just as directly benefiting from the sun in the sky is very much greater than benefiting from its reflection in a mirror; so in the same degree is the Glorious Qur’an superior to all speech and all books. After the Qur’an, at the second level, other Divine Scriptures- Divine Books and Pages – are superior to all other speech and hooks, each according to its own degree. They have their share from the same point of superiority as the Qur’an has. If all the fine words – epigrams, wise sayings – of all men and jinn which do not issue from the Qur’an were to be collected, they still could not attain to the sacred rank of the Qur’an.

If you want to have some understanding of how the Qur’an has originated in the Greatest Name of God and in the greatest level of every Name, consider the universal, sublime statements of Ayat al-Kursi and the following verses:

With Him are the keys of the Unseen… (6.59); O God, Master of the All Kingdom… (3.26);

He covers the day with the right, each pursuing the other urgently… (7.54);

Earth, swallow your water; and heaven abated!.. (11.44);

The seven heavens and the earth, and all within them extol I-Jim… (17.44);

Your creation and your upraising are as but as a single soul.. (31,28);

We offered the Trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains… (33.72);

On the day when We shall roll up heaven as a scroll is rolled for books… (21.104);

They measure not God as is due to Him. The earth altogether shall be His handful on the Day of Resurrection… (39.67);

If We had sent down this Qur’an upon a mountain, you would indeed have seen it humbled, split asunder out of the fear of God… (59.21).

Also, meditate upon the initials of the Surahs beginning with al-hamdu li-llah (All praise be to God), or yusabbihu (glorifies Him), and obtain some grasp of this significant fact. Further, look at the openings of the Surahs beginning with Alif Lam Mim, Alif Lam Ra and Ha Mim, and understand the Qur’an’s importance in the sight of God Almighty

If you have understood the significant kernel of this Fourth Fundamental, you can understand that revelation mostly came to the prophets by mediation of an angel, and inspiration is mostly without mediation. You will also be able to understand why even the greatest of saints cannot attain to the level of any prophet. You can also understand the Qur’an’s grandeur and its sacred glory and honour and the source of its sublime miraculousness. So also you will be able to understand why Prophet Muhammad, upon him be peace and blessings, was honoured with Ascension, why he ascended to the heavens, to the furthest lote-tree, to the distance of only two bow- lengths, offered supplications to the All-Majestic One, Who is closer to man than his jugular vein, and in the twinkling of an eye returned whence he came. Indeed, just as the splitting of the moon was a miracle of Messengership whereby he demonstrated his Prophethood to the jinn and mankind, so too, the Ascension was a miracle of his worship and servitude to God whereby he demonstrated to the spirits and angels that he is the Beloved of God.

O God, bestow blessings and peace upon him and his family as befits Your Mercy and his deserving.

Another approach to mannerliness is dealing with it under the categories of ‘mannerliness in Sharia’, ‘mannerliness in tariqa (the spiritual order), ‘mannerliness in knowledge of God’, and ‘mannerliness in attainment of truth’. The first means practising the Sunna (the way) of God’s Messenger upon him be peace and blessings, in all his acts saying and all that he approved, whether general or particular. The second means, together with utter submission to and perfect love of, the guide serving him, attending his discourses and refraining from objection to him. The third consists in preserving the balance between nearness to God and self-possession, between fear and hope, and awareness of self-poverty and impotence in the face of the Divine favours coming directly from God. As far the fourth, it is perfect attachment to God in complete detachment from everything other than Him, without any material or spiritual expectation and anxieties worldly or other-worldly.

In fact, Sufism means ‘mannerliness’; it consists in expressing the good manners proper to each occasion, each spiritual state, and each rank or station. However, only if a believer has been able to realize all of these good manners in his own self will he really he well-mannered in his attitudes and ways of behaviour. Apparent and superficial manners, such as have not been ingrained in his self and become an essential part of his nature, will mean no more than an outward show become permanent as habits. Nor is it worth anything in the sight of God, who judges a man by his inner world. With his expressive style, Mawlana Jalal al-Din describes mannerliness with its true and artificial aspects as follows:

For the people of the heart, mannerliness originates in a man’s inner world, for they are aware of secrets. As for the people of the flesh, they see mannerliness in the apparent behaviour of man, for God has hidden the secrets from them. We always ask God to enable us to be mannerly, because one who is unmannerly is deprived of Divine favours.

According to Abu Nasr al-Tusi, mannerliness could be summarized in the following three paragraphs.

1. The mannerliness of literary men who seek beauty and virtue in writing and speech, which is regarded as ‘gossip’ by the Sufis for it does not originate in the heart.

2. The mannerliness of those who represent the religion of Islam at the level of a pure spiritual life, which is regarded as consisting in refining the selfhood through disciplines, and the feelings through love and fear of God, and in meticulously following the religious commandments.

3. The mannerliness of those who through continuous self-control and introspection maintain purity at the level of neither imagining or conceiving of anything contrary to the awareness of always being in the presence of God and overseen by Him.

Those who have been able to attain to the truth have attached much importance to all kinds of mannerliness and tried their hardest to make it as an essential, ingrained part of their human nature. They have many wise sayings uttered in this respect, of which they have themselves striven to be the embodiments ill utmost sincerity. To cite a few examples:

Everything has an aspect of beauty and ornament, The beauty of man lies in mannerliness. There are men who, albeit of ignoble descent, are most noble due to their mannerliness.

The following is a jewel-like saying quoted from Imam ‘Ali, the cousin of the Prophet, upon him be peace and blessings:

Nowadays misfortunes are common, which is not to be wondered at. What is to he wondered at is how one could remain upright and maintain one’s integrity among so many misfortunes. Beauty is not that which the garment one wears add to him. Rather, it is the beauty of knowledge and mannerliness.

The following is from Awarif al-Ma’arif by Shihab al-Din al-Suhrawardi:

Belief requires absolute affirmation of Divine Unity, without which a man is not regarded as having a sound belief. This affirmation requires mannerliness without which one cannot be pious.

Truly, one without good manners cannot be pious, for the Prophets travelled their ways through mannerliness, and became each an elect in the Court of God.

In addition to what we have already said concerning the practical aspect of mannerliness or being well-mannered in behaviour, the following reflections are worth recalling:

It is mannerliness which a man should always wear: without good manners, one is as if naked.

Mannerliness is to be found in people through mannerliness. A student without good manners cannot be a learned one.

The order of the world is through mannerliness; again, through mannerliness is human perfection.

Expressive of purity in thought, uprightness in the heart, and a deep relationship with God, mannerliness in speech has been stressed for centuries in all schools which concern themselves with moral and religious education or with spiritual training.

Wahbi says:

Don’t open your mouth for idle talk, be well-mannered in your speech. Take care of what you may say so that afterwards you do not become uneasy.

Another voices his thought about mannerliness as follows:

Mannerliness is a crown from the light of God: wear that crown and he safe from every misfortune.

The words of Mawlana Jalal al-Din in praise of mannerliness are beyond compare:

Know that the soul in man’s body is mannerliness; the light of man’s heart and eyes is mannerliness. Man is from an elevated world, not from a loose one. This dome [meaning the world rotates on the axis of mannerliness, which is also its beauty and adornment. If you prepare your food on the head of Satan, know that it is mannerliness which will kill Satan. One who is deprived of good manners is not truly human, for the difference between men and animals lies in mannerliness. Open your eyes and see that the Qur’an, the Word of God, consists in mannerliness. I asked the intellect what belief was. It whispered to the ear of the heart that it was mannerliness.

Mannerliness with respect to good morals described as words and behaviour approved by Islam, and as expressed in the words, actions, and acts of approval of the Holy Prophet, upon him be peace and blessings, is beyond the scope of the present answer.

O God! Lead us to what You like and approve.

May God’s blessings he on our master Muhammad and all of his family and his Companions.

There are two ways to explain how a seed germinates under earth, then grows into an elaborate tree, or how an embryo grows into a human being: either each of the innumerable particles operative in the process of growth individually knows its place, functions and environment, and its relations with all the other particles, cells and larger wholes within the organism, or one who has that vast knowledge employs them in the growth process, as indeed in the formation of all living or non-living entities.

The following simple scientific experiment, reported in Discover, 20 August 1993, will help in understanding this significant argument:

Overbeck and his co-workers at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston were trying to practise some gene therapy techniques by seeing if they could convert albino mice into coloured ones. The researcher injected a gene essential to the production of the pigment melanin into the single-cell embryo of an albino mouse. Later they bred that mouse’s offspring, half of which carried the gene on one chromosome of a chromosome pair. Classic Mendelian genetics told them that roughly a quarter of the grandchildren should carry the gene on both chromosomes – should be ‘homozygous’, in the language of genetics – and should therefore be coloured.

But the mice never got a chance to acquire colour. ‘The first thing we noticed,’ says Overbeck, ‘was that we were losing about 25% of the grandchildren within a week after they were born.’ The explanation:

The melanin-related gene that his group injected into the albino mouse embryo had inserted itself into a completely unrelated gene. An unfamiliar stretched of DNA in the middle of a gene wrecks that gene’s ability to get its message read. So in the mice, it seems whatever protein the gene coded for went unproduced, whatever function the protein had went undone, and the stomach, heart, liver, and spleen all wound up in the wrong place. Somehow, too, the kidneys and pancreas were damaged, and that damage is apparently what killed the mice.

Overbeck and his colleagues have already located the gene on a particular mouse chromosome and are now trying to pin down its structure. That will tell them something about the structure of the protein the gene encodes, how the protein works, and when and where it is produced as the gene gets ‘expressed’, or turned on, its the gene expressed everywhere. or just on the left side of the embryo or just on the right side?’ Overbeck wonders, ‘And when does it get expressed?’

These questions will take Overbeck far from the gene-transfer experiment. ‘We think there are at (east 100,000 genes,’ he points out, ‘so the chances of this happening were literally one in 100,000.’

It will take many thousands of tests therefore, and cost the lives of many thousands of mice, for this type of experiment to be carried out with success. However, there is no trial and error in nature, and any seed tinder earth, unless some impediment like lack of enough moisture intervenes, germinates and ultimately becomes a tree. Likewise, an embryo in the mothers womb grows into a living, conscious being equipped with intellectual and spiritual faculties.

The human body is a miracle of symmetry, as well as of asymmetry. Scientists know how an embryo develops in the womb to form this symmetry and asymmetry. but they are completely ignorant of how the particles – the particles that reach the embryo through the mother and function as building blocks in the formation of the body – can distinguish between right and left, how they are able to determine the place of each organ, how each goes and inserts itself in the exact place of a certain organ, and how they understand the extremely complicated relations among cells and organs, and their requirements. This is so complicated a process that if a single particle which should be placed in, for example, the pupil of the right eye, were to go to the ear, it could lead to malfunction or even death. Another point concerning this is that all animate beings are made from the same elements coming from earth, air and water, and similar to one another with respect to the members and organs of their bodies, yet they are almost completely different from one another with respect to bodily features, visage, character, desires and ambitions, This uniqueness of the individual is so reliable that one can be identified absolutely by one’s finger prints.

How do we explain this? There are the two alternatives we mentioned at the beginning: either each particle possesses almost infinite knowledge, will and power or One who has such knowledge, power and will creates and administers each particle. However far back we go in an attempt to ascribe this to cause and effect and heredity, these two alternatives remain valid.

This argument, frequently emphasized in the writings of Said Nursi lost its appeal when I objected: ‘Everything takes place according to a certain program and the principle of cause and effect. Why, then, need a particle possess the knowledge of its place and functions, its relations with all other particles with which it must combine and co-operate?’ However, it soon dawned upon me that I was trying to find an explanation for existence from within existence seeking the Creator in that which was created.

Materialistic science, whether biology or physics reflects upon existence from within it and is dazzled, tangled by the apparent self-organization in the universe. It is true that everything appears to happen according to certain principles and the law of cause and effect. Empirically based and having adopted the method of doing tests in laboratories, modern science attempts to discover the Creator in laboratories. This means regarding the Creator as of the same kind as the created – finite and material – which implies for the scientist a rank over the Creator, If the scientist is not seeking to deify himself over creation, what is the rationale, the sense, of looking for the Creator among the created?

As everybody knows, science advances on the feet of theories. That being so, would it not be legitimate to approach, at least for once, existence and the act of coming into existence from the perspective of the existence of God?

In the past, Muslim theologians argued the necessity of God from the unacceptability of an unending chain of causes. Everything in the universe is finite, transient, it begins and ends. Also, anything that begins and ends needs a cause or originator to bring it into existence since nothing can originate itself. (Even man, despite being the most conscious and powerful of creatures, has no part in his coming into existence, in the time and place of his birth, in determining his family, his race, his bodily features, nor has he much control over the workings of his body.) In short, as every existent needs an originator and the chain of originators cannot regress for ever, there must be an absolute originator, self-originating, self-existent, self-subsistent. This is God, without beginning and end, eternal.

Even if the existence of the universe is attributed to some entity other than God – to evolution or causality or nature or matter or coincidences and necessity – no one can deny that everything displays, through its coming into existence, its subsistence and death, an all-comprehensive knowledge, and an absolute power and determination. As we saw in the experiment referred to above, a single misplaced or misdirected gene, may suffice to ruin or prevent life. The interconnectedness of everything, from galaxies to atoms, is a reality into which every new entity enters and wherein it must know its unique place and function. And is there not a further demonstration of the existence and free operation of an all-comprehensive knowledge, an absolute power and will, that particles made up of the same bio-chemical constituents should be able to produce through the subtlest adjustments in their pattern of mutual relationships, entities and organisms which are unique? Is it satisfactory to explain this as heredity or coincidence seeing that all such explanations again rest upon the same all-encompassing knowledge, absolute power and will? 

We must not be misled by the apparent fact that everything happens according to a certain program or plan or process of causes. This process of causes is a veil spread over the flux of the universe, the ever-moving stream of events. The ‘laws of nature’ which may be inferred from this process of causes have a nominal, not a real and concrete, existence. Unless we attribute to nature the attributes we would normally attribute to the Creator of nature, we must accept that it is, in essence and reality, a printing mechanism, not a printer, a design, not a designer, a passive recipient, not an agent, an order, not an orderer, a collection of nominal laws, not a power. The same argument holds if, in place of ‘nature’, we choose the terms ‘matter’ or (the preference of French biologist Jacques Manod) ‘coincidence and necessity’.

One of the points which entangles, and brings down, materialist scientific explanations is ‘eternity’. In order to perceive eternity, science must first acknowledge the inevitable limitations of its being a product of human reason. Man is a part of existence or creation, and therefore a finite being, and it is impossible for a finite being to comprehend the Infinite:

Firstly, the Infinite cannot be of the same kind as the finite. Secondly, man is enveloped by time and space which are two of the dimensions of existence, that is, they are not there before, but there together with creation. So, unless one goes beyond the limits of time and space, it is impossible for one to comprehend eternity. This can be attained, not by, in the terminology of Kant, the theoretical reason, but by the practical reason, by spiritual experience or enlightenment, or by one’s inner conscience.

Thirdly, God is not dependent on time. Possessing absolute Will, He is not compelled to do or not do anything. He created the universe.

The universe is like a book each sentence, each word and each letter of which is interrelated with every other. By manifesting His Names, God gets this book to ‘speak’, to be listened to or read by man. The original or essential meaning of this book originates in the Knowledge of God. In other words, before coming into material existence, the universe existed in the Knowledge of God. Through manifestation of Will and Power in the sphere of Knowledge, the meanings in the Knowledge appeared as the letters, words and sentences of the book of the universe. The universe which God fastened to the’ string’ of time is the result of Divine manifestation of Will and Power in the sphere of His knowledge. For an existent being, coming into existence means transference from the sphere of Knowledge to the sphere of Power.By dying, it is transferred to the sphere of Knowledge again, but after it has acquired a new state proper for a new, eternal life in the other, eternal world. This can be made more understandable through the following analogy:

The meaning of a book exists in the mind of its author before he writes it. Even though he does not write it, the article or the hook has an ‘essential’ existence in the form of meaning. In order to make this meaning visible in the material world, the author should ‘mould’ it into letters. Readers can know the author through the book. The book’s being there to be read indicates its having an author with the ability to write it. Likewise, the universe points to all the Names of God, including the All-Powerful, the All-Knowing and the Possessor of Will. These Names are indicative of the Attributes of Knowledge. Power and Will, which, in turn, demonstrate the One Who has them.

God has many other Names or attributes and therefore many kinds of manifestations. As the manifestations of primarily. His Will and Power in Knowledge brought the universe into existence and still originate new lives incessantly, so His manifestation of Speech in the same Knowledge gave visible existence to the Qur’an, the last and the most perfect form of the Divine Scriptures. The present revealed form of the Qur’an is in one way, a counterpart of the universe in letters. In the same way as a magnificent building and the booklet describing it indicate the architect who produced them, the Qur’an and the universe, being two different forms or kinds of Divine manifestation are signs of the Creator. The Qur’an came from the Divine attribute of Speech, while the universe originated from the Divine attributes of Will and Power. Both have their sources in the same Knowledge, the Knowledge of God. For this reason, any science – whether biology or physics or chemistry or astronomy or psychology – which studies the universe or man can never be contradictory with the religion of Islam. If there is a contradiction, it is either in the mind or intention or quality of the scientist or in a mispresentation of Islam.

The first revelation to the Prophet, upon him be peace and blessings was:

Read: In and with the Name of your Lord who created, created man of an embryo suspended. Read: And your Lord is the most Munificent, who taught by the Pen, taught man that he knew not. (at- ‘Alaq. 96.1-3)

It is quite significant that the first command and of God to His Messenger, the unlettered Prophet, was ‘read’, when there was not yet the Book to read. This means that there is another book or rather, there are two books, counterparts to the Book which was to be revealed. ‘These two books are the universe and man, A believer should approach the study of universe and man without prejudice. It is also significant that the verses of the Qur’an and the phenomena in the universe and in man – material and psychological – are both called signs’. The imperative ‘read!’ is followed, not by a direct object or an adverbial, but by ‘in and with the Name of your Lord who created.

This signifies:

1. Reading’ the universe – studying it – has principles of its own, like, for example, observation and experiment.

2. The word translated as Lord is Rabb, among whose meanings is educator, upbringer, giver of a certain nature’, God created the universe and man on a certain pattern, and gave each entity a particular nature. Man’s nature includes free will, every other entity acts according to the primordial nature assigned to it. This is what modern science refers to in the words ‘nature’ and the ‘laws of nature’. What man is commanded to do is to discover these ‘laws’.

3. Every act of man including his scientific studies, should be performed in the name of God, and therefore be an act of worship. That is the only limit which the Qur’an or Islam has put on science. Any act so performed cannot be against God’s Commandments. For example, in the pursuit of scientific knowledge as worship, no one could harm mankind, nor put that knowledge in the form of a deadly weapon in the hands of an irresponsible minority. If done only in the name of God, by people conscious of always being supervised by God and who will be called to account before a Supreme Tribunal for all their actions in the world science could change the world into a garden of Eden.

In sum: The meaning of existence is from the Existence of God. That is what gives their true meaning to all things, all events, all efforts to live and acquire knowledge. Consider that the smallest thing like an apple costs the whole universe, seeing that for its formation the sun, earth and water must co-operate, something that the whole world population working together could not provide. Whether for the universe as a whole or a simple life within it, a great expenditure has been made in creation. In spite of this, many living things die at birth, and many others after a few moments of life. The average life span of man, who is the ‘cream’ of creation, to whom much of the existence has been subjugated, is about 60 years. You may, therefore, ask why such a vast expenditure is made for so short a life-span. If there is not an eternal life in an eternal world, will life and every existent thing have been pointless, in vain? However, God has not created anything for vanity. Every existent is infinitely meaningful, displaying an infinite knowledge, will and power. Each is directed to a particular aim. Each, whether its term is short or long, is a ‘sign’ pointing to God and is directly related to Him.

Without that relation of itself to God, every entity would mean nothing – zero; and the universe would be a huge zero. If God is not recognized, if the meaning His Existence and creativity provide for existence is not understood, the zeros would be, each one, a sort of ‘black hole’ absorbing all the Divine manifestations and beauties. It is belief which removes the dark veil from creation and manifests the meaning it carries. Through belief, each of the ‘black holes’ changes – according to the degree of its refinement – into a shining sun, moon or star which manifests the meaning, aim and beauty it has been given by its Creator.

The field of medicine, as one of the oldest fields of scientific inquiry, has been particularly rich in examples of changing theories. Aristotle (384-322 BC) thought that the brain was a device used for cooling the blood. By contrast his teacher Plato (427-347 BC) had thought that it was the ‘originating power of the perceptions…’ Yet today scientists accept Plato’s older theory. In the 1800s the state of the art brain science was phrenology, attributing certain aspects of human character to bumps and ridges on the skull. This is frowned upon today as mumbo-jumbo. However, it must be remembered that at the time it was considered as a hard and fast observational science. It was not until 1861 that Paul Broca refuted this ‘science’ by attributing language to a certain region of the brain, since referred to as Broca’s area. Even so, phrenology continued to have its adherents and practitioners until the early 20th century. Many of the current theories of thought, emotion, psychology and psychiatry are based on observations only slightly more reliable than those made by the phrenologists. The tools used are more expensive (e.g. CT, M RI and PET scanners) but the basic approach is comparable to that of the phrenologists.

Currently a revolution is taking place in biomedical science. ‘This revolution centres upon (aptly named) free radicals’. The most famous of these is nitric oxide (NO).

Nitric oxide is a noxious chemical spewed out by car exhausts and power stations. For years it was considered to be one of the most poisonous gases known to man. However, in the 1980s scientists discovered that many cells of the body also produce nitric oxide. Hundreds of research papers have been produced in recent years investigating this short-lived compound. It is currently a more popular research topic than AIDS, Alzheimer’s and arthritis. NO has revolutionised scientists understanding of blood pressure and the whole manner by which cells communicate.

It is thought that when released by the body in minute amounts it is capable of carrying biochemical signals from cell to cell resulting in a whole array of bodily events. In circulation NO helps to control the bore of the blood vessels and hence blood pressure. In the nervous system it is thought to be implicated in memory. In the immune system it purges both foreign bodies and tumour cells. The medical profession have realized NO’s importance in many conditions not just high blood pressure but also stroke, septic shock, clotting disorders and even impotence.

The mode of action of NO is its most controversial aspect in terms of traditional understanding of cell biology. To start with NO is what chemists call a free radical. This means that it carries an unpaired electron and is therefore highly reactive, unlike any other molecules in the body’s well- documented and well-balanced signaling system. NO liberated from cells is converted within a split second to nitrogen dioxide NO2 by combining with oxygen. Most of the both’s other communication molecules are complex by comparison, molecules such as amino acids, catachol amines and small peptides. These conventional message transducers deliver signals by latching on to specific receptor molecules. A classic example is the catachol amine adrenaline latching onto beta receptors. This is usually described by a lock and key analogy. The mechanism of NO goes against this completely by penetrating cells directly. Once inside cells it stimulates the production of a small nucleotide called cyclic guanosine monophosphate or cGMP. This cGMP induces a host of functions ranging from muscle relaxation to slowing down blood clotting.

The importance of NO was first discovered in the regulation of blood pressure. NO was found to cause blood vessels to dilate by relaxing the muscles in the vessel walls. Blood vessels are made up of layers of muscular, elastic and fibrous tissue, and have a lining called the endothelium. The endothelium releases NO which drifts into the surrounding layer of muscle. There it triggers the events that make the muscle relax at the diameter of the vessel then widens. This process is controlled by the mechanical effect of the blood flow. When blood rushes over the cells of the endothelium it causes them to distort slightly. This distortion results in the release of NO. From this it can be seen which in turn sends messages to the vessel walls via a whole arm of receptors and transmitter muscles. The balance between the central nervous control and local control is not well understood. For years doctors have used drugs that affect the nervous control to lower blood pressure with apparent success, for example beta receptor blockers. However the result of the various NO experiments indicate that the nervous system is comparatively insignificant in the regulation of blood pressure. The mysteries of beta-receptors and there complexities are far from solved, yet these are supposed to provide the scientific bases of high blood pressure tablets, such as beta blockers. ‘There must be a continued balance between these two powerful forces. – the local vasoconstrictor control and the central vasoconstrictor control.’ says Sir John Vane, of the William Harvey Institute, London.

The theories of circulatory control have been revolutionized by one man. Salvador Moncado, who first documented the role of NO in blood pressure and clotting: ‘We worked for hundreds of years thinking that the arterial system is a system of resistance vessels, when conductance is probably the better concept to use – which is the inverse of resistance. ‘This has resulted in a conceptual reversal of all research in the field of high blood pressure. The novel theory has cast doubt on the mechanisms of all the blood pressure lowering drugs that have been used, and yet these drugs do appear to work. This has parallels with the use of the drug aspirin, which has been used for decades for various ailments, but theories of its mode of action were only documented in the late 1970s. What came first – human theories or the practical results? A current controversy is whether we should consider high blood pressure to be the result of too much adrenaline or too little NO.

Doctors have unknowingly utilized the NO system for years. Since 1867 amyl nitrite and nitro-glycerine have been used to relieve the horrendous heart pains experienced by sufferers of angina pectoris. Doctors knew that these nitrogen containing drugs dilated blood vessels and reduced blood pressure. But the exact biochemical Involvement in scientific research should always convince us that humankind has a very limited understanding of the universe and that most of the work done by us only involves giving names to existing phenomena.

Examples of this are not only confined to biology. A recent discovery has rocked the world of cosmology, with much more importance to Muslims. The data that have come back to earth from the Bubble telescope suggest that the universe is only 8 billion years old. Scientists consider these to be the most reliable data involving the most elaborate experiments performed by humans on this subject. Yet Big Bang theory calculations tell us that the universe is no younger that 16 billion years. The best real data tell us 8 billion years: the calculations from theory tell us 16 billion. The inadequacy of theories could not be more dramatically demonstrated.

NEWTON was born prematurely on 25th December 1645 in Woolsthorpe, a hamlet near Grantham in Lincolnshire, a few months after the death of his father. At three years old, he was separated from his mother when she remarried: his stepfather (a well- to-do man and a minister of the church) sent him to be looked after by his grandmother. Nine years later, his mother was widowed for the second time. Newton was reunited with her, a half brother and two half-sisters and went to Grantham grammar school. During this period he acquired the indispensable habits of concentration and teaching himself from books, and was locally famous for his artisanal skills. After finishing school, he respected his mother’s wish that he learn to run the family farm, but could not keep his mind on the tasks assigned to him. A sympathetic uncle managed to get him prepared for admission into Trinity College, Cambridge: he was admitted in 1661 as a ‘sizar’, that is, a class of student required to do copying out and perhaps other menial tasks for college seniors. Teaching at Cambridge was quite haphazard and disorganized at this time. Newton, like every other student, was taught Aristotle, but the ‘new philosophy’, science and mathematics (Kepler, Galileo, Descartes), he had to master by himself, and he did. The University was shut down for two years because of the Great Plague of 1665. Newton, now a graduate, returned to the family home in Woolsthorpe. It is clear from his notebooks that, by the end of this period, he had worked out his ‘fluxions’ (calculus), and carried out much of the thinking and the experiments which were to form the basis of the Principia Mathematica and the Opticks, books which, first published about twenty years later, have informed scientific inquiry ever since. The tiny baby expected to die after a few days lived to be 82 and earn undying fame as the greatest of Western scientists.

The man, his bad temper, his religious calling

Newton did not marry. He did not, with a single brief exception, form any warm friendships. Though generous enough with his time and money when he had both to spare, he did not give with tenderness – either to relatives or acquaintances. He lived the extraordinarily narrow life of a dedicated auto-didact, hardly ever travelling outside London, Cambridge, Woolsthorpe, He was not given to lightness of manner, nor did he show any capacity for sell-irony. When angered, he became unbalanced and, it must be said, vindictive and petty.

He quarrelled with fellow-scientist Hooke for rejecting his theory of colours. Later, when Hooke (now a very old man) claimed that Newton had plagiarized the law of universal gravitation from passages from his (Hooke’s) letters. Newton was cruel and scathing. Hooke’s help was indeed small, but enough to have merited, from a generous soul, some gracious acknowledgement. Newton remained angry even after Hooke’s death, and cut every reference to Hooke from later editions of the Opticks.

To enlarge the proofs of his calculations for celestial phenomena discussed in Principia, Newton needed the latest, accurate data, He applied to Flamsteed at the Greenwich Observatory who had been collecting just such data for a lifetime. Perhaps Flamsteed coveted ambitions of producing a theory of his own; for whatever reason, he was not minded to supply the data Newton needed. Newton, as President of the Royal Society, felt he could demand the records on behalf of the Society and took them; the court ease that followed decided for Flamsteed, who had his records returned to him. However, the process look so long that Flamsteed died before seeing his lifetime’s work in print. Again, Newton was unforgiving, and removed all acknowledgments to Flamsteed from the later Principia.

The most bitter, most public, and most protracted of Newton’s quarrels was with the German philosopher, Leibniz, about which of them had priority in discovering the calculus. It is a fact that Newton wrote his paper first; it is also a fact that Leibniz published first and arrived at the calculus by a quite independent route. That Leibniz had seen Newton’s paper in some summarized form is only a possibility. Disciples of the great men joined in this argument about nothing which grew into polemics against each other’s general philosophy of nature. The Newtonian camp kept up the debate even after Leibniz’s death.

How is Newton’s conduct to be explained?

The explanation usually offered is a psychological one:

Newton had never known his father and then been separated from his mother in early infancy: this had so traumatized him that he suffered from an excessive need for approval and excessive fear of rejection. Therefore, it is argued, he was slow to publish his work, then uncontrollably angry at any suggestion that he had not merited the applause it received, and absurdly reluctant to acknowledge the share of others in it. The same explanation could be advanced for his self-teaching: he would prefer to copy out long passages of books he was studying, go through proofs and calculations over and over until he had mastered them entirely on his own, rather than save effort by applying to someone who had already understood the material.

There must be some truth in this explanation but it is not commensurate with the greatness of what was at stake for Newton. He believed intensely in God as the Divine Architect who had both created the universe and directly inspired the Bible.The metaphor of the book of God’s works (nature) and the book of God’s words (Scripture) was an intellectual commonplace in 16th and 17th century Europe. The most famous statement of it is Francis Bacon’s:

Let [no one suppose that] a man can search too far, or be too well studied in, the book of God’s word, or in the book of God’s works, divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress or proficienc[y] in both; only let men beware that they apply both to charity and not to swelling; to us[efulness] and not to ostentation; and again, that they do not unwisely mingle or confound these two learnings together.

To judge by the volume of manuscripts he left behind, Newton devoted rather more of his time and energy to the ‘words’ than to the ‘works’ of God. He trusted in Divine guidance to unfold to him, personally, both the secrets of nature and the secrets of Scripture. The burden of, first, being quite sure of what he had understood, then, of conveying it to others, must have been heavy indeed. That would explain his extraordinary aptitude for solitary concentration, his reluctance to publish results of whose meaning, coherence and completeness he was not wholly certain, and his desire to hold on to his work as his own – insight into the mind of God, as revealed in His words or His works, was not lobe obtained, as it were, by committee, collaboratively with others. What was manifested in the outside world as a petty possessiveness was, in Newton’s inner world, a perseverance in carrying by himself responsibilities which he believed to be uniquely his own.

The glory of Principia lay in the comprehensiveness and elegant simplicity of the laws of motion. Newton had written:

Truth is ever to be found in simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things… It is the perfection of God’s works that they are all done with the greatest simplicity. He is the God of order and not of confusion [Newton MS, quoted in Manuel, 1974]

At this point, he may have felt his strictly scientific work was complete in its essentials. In the emptiness after having, in some sense, explained everything’ in Principia, Newton suffered a nervous breakdown, He wrote paranoid, accusing letters to Locke and the diarist, Samuel Pepys. Neither man was angry in return:on the contrary, both expressed compassionate concern for Newton’s health. It is to Newton’s credit that he apologised, explaining that his outbursts were due to insomnia. He had been worrying about taking a government post which, on the surface, had nothing to do with his calling to understand and expound the secrets of the two books’. In the event, he proved to be an exemplary public servant, and, alongside revisions and enlargements of Opticks and Principia, dedicated many hours to his theological works.

His science and religion

The separation of scientific reflection on nature and study of religion – a cardinal principle of the scientific revolution in Europe – was, for Newton, a strictly procedural separation, not a philosophical one. Church authorities in England were quite broad-minded at the time and many of the scientists contemporary with Newton were ministers of the Church. Differences on the accidentals’ of faith, discreetly believed and practised, were tolerated – and this tolerance (for most Protestant opinions) was legally established by Parliament towards the end of the 17th century. Newton enjoyed and admired this tolerance and would not abuse it: he saw no merit in religious disputes. The Church to which he belonged all his life required its members to accept the doctrine of the Trinity. Newton did not make public his own firmly held anti-Trinitarian convictions. To do so would have ruined the peace of his fellow-countrymen and, most certainly, jeopardized acceptance of his scientific work. He was faithful to his convictions to the extent that he refused to take holy orders: by this refusal he denied himself the post of Warden (head) of Trinity College. Indeed, his election as professor of mathematics was only possible because a special Crown Patent (1675) exempted him uniquely from the requirements of the College statutes. (Newton’s disciple and successor to that professorship, William Whiston, lost his post when he published his antiTrinitarianism.)

Newton believed in One Omnipotent and Omnipresent God who designed the universe to intelligible laws and governed its operations, moment by moment, according to His Will. Newton detested the metaphysics taught by Descartes and refined by Leibniz., both of whom believed in God as a once-for-all Creator, a First Cause, who had no further engagement in the operation of the universe. Leibniz ridiculed Newton’s view as implying that God was an incompetent Creator who needed to, as it were, continually tinker with His creation. Newton believed that the creation was too subtly interconnected to be sustainable without the ever-watchful dominion of Divine Will:

Each time a planet revolves it traces a fresh orbit, as happens also with the Moon, and each orbit is dependent upon the combined motions of all the planets, not to mention their actions upon each other. Unless I am much mistaken, it would exceed the force of human wit to consider so many causes of motion at the same time and to define the motions by exact laws which would allow of an easy calculation. [Unpublished Scientific Papers, Hall & Hall, 1962. p.281]

In his Chronology of the world, Newton argued that good science and good religion occurred together. Any lapse from monotheism into idolatry (he invariably referred to Roman Catholicism as idolatry) entailed a lapse from clear understanding of the creation. Thus macrocosmic and microcosmic science (astronomy and alchemy) had thrived in Pre-Socratic Greece and again in Egypt before both societies degenerated into the worship of false gods; similarly, it revived after the Reformation rid Christianity of its idolatry.

Newton subscribed to a form of natural theology. God was revealed to every individual human Conscience, the Divine Message to mankind being always consistent, albeit refined down the ages. Therefore, an understanding of virtue and morality was common to all men:

The other part of the true religion is our duty to man… This was the Ethics, or good manners, taught the first ages by Noah and his sons the heathens by Socrates, Confucius and other philosophers, and the Christians more fully by Christ and his Apostles. This is the law which the Apostle [Paul] tells you was written in the hearts of the Gentiles, and by which they will be judged in the last day. Romans 2.12, 14, 15. … Thus you see there is but one law for all nations . . . dictated to the Christians by Christ, to the Jews by Moses, and to all mankind by the light of reason … [Therefore] we ought to love those who profess and practise it, even though they do not yet believe in Christ, for it is the true religion of Christians as well as heathens., though not all the true Christian religion. [Mc Lachlan (ed) 1950. pp.52-3 ]

This is, for a committed Christian, an unusually forthright expression of the essential community and equality in worth of all human beings, even heathens. It is certainly attributable to Newton’s passionate faith in the Oneness of God and his rejection of those doctrines (incarnation, atonement) which inevitably lead to the exclusion of the great majority of human beings from the dignity of virtue.

Newton was a student of nature and of the Scripture for the same reason – to express and improve in knowledge, love and worship of God. Right relationship with God (‘godliness) was, in Newton’s mind, directly linked to tight relationship with others (‘humanity’):

Godliness consists in the knowledge, love and worship of God; Humanity in the love, righteousness and good offices towards men Opposite to the first [godliness] is Atheism in profession and idolatry in practice. Atheism is so senseless and odious to mankind that it never had many professors [adherents]. [Here Newton lists many symmetries in the forms of living creatures. Whence arises this uniformity in all their outward shapes but from the counsel and contrivance of an Author? Whence is it that all the eyes of all sorts of living creatures are … so truly shaped and fitted for vision that no Artist can mend them? Did blind chance know that there was light and what was its refraction, and fit the eyes of alt creatures after the most curious manner to make use of it?

These and such like considerations, always have, and ever will prevail with mankind, to believe that there is a Being who made all things, and has all things in His power … [ibid., pp.48-9]

Plainly, Newton was rather optimistic. At least in Europe (which, culturally, now includes many peoples not racially European) atheism prevails and, even among those who profess belief in God, the concept of a Creator-God is rejected as a nuisance or irrelevance from any rational (scientific) account of nature. What then did Newton achieve?

Influence and reputation

Acclaim for Newton’s scientific achievement, when it came, was on a grand scale, nationally and internationally. He was knighted in 1705 – an honour previously accorded, among scientists, only to royal physicians. Following the peace of Utrecht in 1714 which (for a time) contained French military ambitions in Europe. Newton’s works, well-known among savants, were widely translated and circulated- there was even an Italian Newtonianism for the Ladies. More than the victory over France, Newton’s fame signalled the growing primacy of England. He was national hero and buried with great public ceremony in Westminster Abbey. The poet, Alexander Pope, wrote this tribute which, at the time, was not felt to bean exaggeration: Nature and Nature’s laws lay hid in night.! God said, ‘Let Newton be’ and all was light. Perhaps out of religious sensitivity, these words were not, as first intended, inscribed on Newton’s tomb.

Within seventy years of the great man’s death, the Enlightenment and the American and French Revolutions had happened, with Napoleon about to come on stage. Religious sensitivity was of less account. In 1796 a French aristocrat published a manifesto in which the proposed that a temple be built in Newton’s honour and the calendar re-dated from the day of his birth. How deeply this would have offended Newton who wrote:

Idolatry is a more dangerous crime [than Atheism], because it is apt … to insinuate itself into mankind .,. it seeming very plausible to honour the souls of Heroes and Saints, and to believe that they reside and act principally in the statues dedicated to their honour and memory. … [This] is in Scripture condemned and detested above all other crimes. [ibid., p.49]

However irreverently excessive the Frenchman’s compliment, it nevertheless recognized that, for Europe, a new age had dawned. It was an age that, for all practical purposes, idolized human reason as a means to master nature through knowledge of its mechanisms. Knowledge was divorced from wisdom and married, instead, to economic and military power. Galileo’s struggle against academic philosophy (Aristotelian or Neo-Platonist) which had been manoeuvred by his enemies into a struggle against the authority of Scripture was over: the Principia marked an apparently irreversible victory. Thereafter, in European thought, every branch of knowledge, including the study of human nature and human society, vaunted its independence from traditional authority.

Voltaire, the Enlightenment’s wittiest and most active publicist had failed to meet Newton, but did attend and was deeply impressed by Newton’s funeral. The Enlightenment defined the intellectual temperament of modern Europe: it owed a great deal of its self-confidence to Newton’s success which was generally received as the victory of European reason over nature.

There was a shift away from the Newtonian belief that God was ever-watchful over His creation towards the (Deist) position that God merely set the initial conditions of the universe and then retired. Far from liberating man, such belief chains him to the cycles of nature. God is made remote in the manner of the most vicious paganism for which human life is an incomprehensible (often cruel) entrapment in nature by an inaccessible supreme deity who can be placated only through human sacrifice. The liberation experienced in Enlightened Europe was only a liberation from Church authority and the authority of those who exercised it by wealth. There was no improvement in the morality with which power was used, only an improvement in rationalization and efficiency. The true measure of Equality and Liberty is the degree of Fraternity realized in human relations: we are only now beginning to understand that the rationalist structures of law and government, instituted during and after the Enlightenment, and managed ever since by unelected professionals, exist not to serve representative government but to create the political environment that lets the financially powerful operate without interference.

In the first quarter of the 18th century, the printing of false promissory notes to finance short-lived economic miracles, became institutionalized: In 1715 in France, John Law (1671- 1729) founded, with royal support, the fraudulent Banque Generale (later the state bank), which collapsed after five years impoverishing millions; in England, the South Sea Company (launched 1711) took over the national war debt in exchange for the right to exploit the mirage of wealth in South America – the scandal which followed exposure of the fraud touched both the royal family and government officials. The spinning-jenny was invented in 1764: the industrial revolution (the adaptation of human labour to the demands and routines of capital intensive machinery) had begun. Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into … the Wealth of Nations appeared in 1776- the first philosophical work to ‘secularize’ economics, i.e. separate it from ethics, political science and jurisprudence: the theory was catching up with the spirit and practice of the age. Two years later, the posthumous publication of David Home’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion destroyed for most thinking Europeans, what little dignity was still attached to the ‘argument from design’: the argument (so dear to 17th century scientists) that the evidence of design in nature indicated the existence of a Designer.

As for Newton’s belief in the equality in worth of all human beings: within a century of his death, the slave trade had depopulated Africa of between 40 and 100 million human beings – abolition of the trade being soon followed by colonization. Over the same period, the extermination of 10 million native Americans was going on steadily – just as that most reasonable of Enlightened men, George Washington, had projected: Indians own nothing human about them except the shape… extension of our settlements will as certainly cause the savage, as the wolf, to retire; both being beasts of prey, tho’ they differ in shape’. No one has bothered to compute the numbers of native people killed in Australia. Any way of life not based upon the rationalism which distinguished Europeans in their own eyes as the model of what human nature and society ought to be, was treated with contempt or indolent sentimentality. In a reversal of Newton’s Chronology, they believed their present to be the desirable, inevitable future of all peoples. Thus were born the categories of ‘primitive’ and ‘medieval’, and the myth of social progress. They felt they had nothing to learn from other societies, including those of their own past: to be medieval was to be irrational. The ‘others’ had no place except in museums or histories constructed by their conquerors: most of the major European universities had set up ‘Oriental Institutes’ before 1750.

European Christianity, if it spoke out at all, was a voice of irrelevant, ironic protest, while European civilization marched into and destroyed the traditional patterns of life of every people on every continent. Perhaps some attachment to Christianity helped the Europeans to believe, even while acknowledging the unprecedented scale of their barbarity that they nevertheless remained the models for others to aspire to. This moral amnesia was irresistibly sustained, as it is to this day, by superior military power derived from superior rationality and organization.

For the great majority of the world’s human beings the period of European domination has been the darkest in history, a long tunnel whose end is still not in sight. However, Newton’s science belongs to the 17th century, not the 18th or 19th, and was its climax. Newton represented, for the last time in Europe, an attempt to hold, in one and the same mind, accurate knowledge and religious truth. Therefore we describe his religious-scientific worldview as the light at the beginning of the tunnel, a light, as it were, already pointing and moving into its own shadow.

Neither the argument from design’, nor the analogy of the two Books, are now heard in professional scientific debate. Newton’s laws of motion are invalid for velocities approaching the speed of light. The weight of evidence seems to be favoring the wave theory of light over Newton’s preferred corpuscular (particle) theory. But the reputation of Newton’s method remains undimmed: the ideal marriage of mathematics and physics, and of brilliant, imaginative theory with meticulous, accurate experimentation. No words better express the sense of sheer wonder in 17th century science or Newton’s humility before God than his own famous observation: ‘I do not know what I may appear to the world: but to myself I seem to have been only like a little boy playing on the sea shore, and diverting myself now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me,’

We are now two and a half centuries further along into the idolatry of human reason: the image of the curious boy at the sea’s edge brings to mind sinister present realities – the ocean polluted, the boy a disoriented urban child holding the pebble with intent of some mischief.

SCIENTIFIC WORKS

Newton was elected to a fellowship at Trinity College in 1667. His senior colleague, Isaac Barrow, realizing the younger man’s genius, resigned his chair in mathematics in favour of Newton in 1660. Newton’s early work on the infinitesimal calculus and the binomial theorem was forwarded by Barrow to the Royal Society. Characteristically, Newton was reluctant to publish it. His first lectures in Cambridge (1670-72) were developments of work on the phenomena of colour. On the basis of experimental demonstration, Newton rejected the classical theory of light as a homogeneous entity ‘modified’ into colour. He showed, instead, that light was heterogeneous and colours were produced by refractive analysis. He showed also that the separated rays had different refractive indices and that, therefore, chromatic aberration could never be eliminated from lenses, no matter how well crafted. To get round this difficulty be himself constructed a reflecting telescope. In 1671, the Royal Society (founded 1660) welcomed this invention and honoured its inventor with membership. Newton then submitted a paper on colour to the Society. Criticism of it by Robert Hooke, a senior member, so upset Newton that he hid himself in solitary work, preferring angry letters to reasoned discussion. He could have grasped that the heterogeneity of light was a revolutionary concept which, despite the evident experimental proofs, was not easy to accept. Only when Hooke signalled some approval of the earlier paper did Newton venture (in 1675) a second essay on the analysis of light by reflection as well as refraction and a demonstration of the periodicity of optical phenomena. These lectures and papers were later published (1704) as Books I and II of the Opticks. Following further strained correspondence with Hooke and others, Newton withdrew once more into solitary work in Woolsthorpe and Cambridge.

He applied himself relentlessly through the latter years of the 1 670s at (al)chemical books and experiments, encouraged by another Society member, Robert Boyle. A massive quantity of papers and notebooks relating to this work remain unpublished. Newton, it seems, accepted the allegorical terminology of the alchemical tradition and was convinced of the existence of a single, invisible ‘catholick matter’ from which, by various processes of association and dissociation, all the different forms of visible matter were derived. However, he explicitly rejected the possibility of achieving by chemical process either ‘multiplication’ (increase in the mass of a substance) or transmutation (changing one substance into other). He tried to describe the structure of particles in precise quantitative terms: he believed each particle to consist of geometrically shaped units of void and matter in ratios whose variation explained the different properties of visible matter. A number of these speculations found their way into later editions of the Opticks as Queries. With hindsight, the worth of this ‘chemical dynamics’ lay in Newton’s reflections on inherent attractive and repulsive properties which could act at a distance, that is, without an intervening medium. The effort to express mathematically the action of (invisible) force acting over distance may have helped dispose Newton’s mind to the concept of gravity

Newton applied the idea of attraction and repulsion, in terms of centripetal and centrifugal force, to orbital dynamics. Renewed correspondence with Hooke on this subject (1679) inspired him to calculate accurately the elliptical orbit of an object pulled away from a rectilinear path by a central attractive force. The astronomer Halley applied to Newton for these calculations and was answered with the short tract On Motion (1684). Further reflections on and revisions of this tract led Newton to the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation. In 1686, he submitted to the Royal Society the manuscript of Book I of Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy. All three books of Newton’s masterpiece were published the following year, with revised and enlarged editions in 1713 and 1726.

Newton’s laws described, with the greatest precision and predictive accuracy, the motions of all bodies of ‘sensible magnitude’, that is, all visible bodies. It must have seemed to its first readers that everything was now explicable and calculable – the movement of Jupiter’s satellites, the trajectory of comets, the relationship between the moon and the tides, the difference in the earth’s polar and equatorial diameters, as much as a humble wheel for raising water from a well. The Principia combined observation and experiment with geometry and exact calculation in a decisive proof that the structure of nature is mathematical – not as a literary or mystical metaphor for coherency or harmoniousness, but as a positive fact, demonstrable by any number of easily repeated experiments.

PUBLIC OFFICE AND LAST YEARS

The Principia brought instant glory. Newton was elected to represent his University in a dispute with the Crown, and was for a time its Member of Parliament. Renown brought him a wider circle of acquaintances, most notably the philosopher, John Locke. With the help of a rising politician and admirer, the future Lord Halifax, Newton obtained the post of Warden of the Royal Mint (1696). He resigned his duties in Cambridge in 1701 and settled in the capital, An exemplary civil servant, he was incorruptible, authoritative, innovative, and industrious: he helped in the design and manufacture of the new coinage commanded by Parliament, improved book-keeping and accountancy techniques, reduced waste in the minting process, devised ways to defeat and catch counterfeiters, and urged adjustment of the rate of silver against gold so that the coinage would hold its value.

Newton was elected President of the Royal Society in 1703 and re-elected annually until his death. He changed its character from a ‘gentleman’s dub’ to a professional body of practising scientists required to do and discuss real experiments and attend anatomical demonstrations. He also managed, mainly through his personal prestige, to secure a right for the Society to supervise the work of the Greenwich Observatory. It is impossible to record here the government committees and learned societies for which his fame required him to act as unpaid consultant, or the technical queries scholars and scientists put to him directly or through correspondence, or the support he gave to many young scientists, glad to call themselves Newtonians.

We must record, however, that in the last years of his life, Newton revised and enlarged theological notes he had worked on intermittently since his undergraduate years. He wanted to publish his religious views in relation to his science; his techniques for reading Scriptural allegories; his chronology of the world; and his textual proof that the New Testament verses on which the doctrine of the Trinity is based were corrupt. In fact, he did not quite have the courage (or was not satisfied enough with his work) to publish any of this. A modified account of his general philosophy of nature appeared in the scholia and addenda of the revised Principia. The book on Scriptural allegory, The Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St John, and his Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended were published soon after his death (1 733), Through the agency of Locke, a manuscript of A Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture, was prepared for publication in Holland. But, even when it was agreed that the work be published anonymously and in translation, Newton backed away. It was not published until 1785 when, presumably, it was ‘safe’ to do so.

The Conference was held in the Wembley Grand Hall on Saturday, 29th April, 1995, from 9 in the morning to 7 in the evening. The occasion was formally opened by Dr A. F. Yusuf, who expressed the hope that the Conference would be a means (notably for the media) to see and hear about Islam in another context than that of violent struggle for political and cultural identity; and that it would demonstrate the possibility and scope that exist for mutual respect and tolerance between people of different intellectual and cultural traditions.

Throughout the day the Hall was more or less full. In all, some 3000 people, excluding speakers, organizers and press, attended. Among the audience were non-Muslims as well as Muslims, and many women as well as many men, both young and old. All the different colours of the human race were there, African, Asian and European. Several people remarked that the scene reminded them, agreeably, of the hajj which, among much else, celebrates the world-wide diversity and community that is Islam.

The aim of the Report is to inform those who could not be present.

It is not a transcript of the proceedings. An edited video recording of the Conference is being made available.

A number of points emerged from the papers read at the Conference and the discussion about them:

1. The pervasiveness of Western norms and values in the modern world has meant that it is very difficult to imagine a constructive engagement between science and religion.

2. The old physics led to a deterministic and reductive worldview. The new physics embraces uncertainty, even unknowability as a structural feature of reality, bat it too has metaphysical pretensions and claims, that there is no reality outside human constructions/observations of it.

3. The effort to establish the terms of such an engagement can succeed in a broadly Islamic context because the Qur’an (a) presents the universe to man as the intelligible, harmonious creation of One Merciful, Omnipotent and Transcendent God: (b) encourages observation and study and the use of reason as a mode of worship: and (c) contains many true and accurate statements about natural phenomena and their operative relationships, and no untrue statements.

4. The concept of knowledge in Islam links it to the concept of wisdom. The aim of science is understanding and explaining the attributes of God insofar as these are reflected in nature. Its aim is not to obtain power or leverage over the operative mechanisms in nature. The Muslim scientist therefore aims to be a worshipper, as well as an expert.

5. The achievements of Muslims in laying the foundations of many modern scientific disciplines, most particularly in their use of observation and experimental method, should encourage the conviction that being a good Muslim is compatible with being a good scientist.

6. The failure to acknowledge, in the past, the contributions of Muslims to modern science is probably owed to the European scientists’ belief that the hostility they faced from the Church would have been even worse if their work were associated with Islam. Despite recent specialist studies which correct this neglect, ignorance about the achievements of Islamic science is general. This general ignorance effectively blocks discussion of a possible pattern of relationship between scientific inquiry and religious commitment on the Islamic model.

7. For the immediate future, scientific research will no doubt continue with its present assumption of the irrelevance of religion. This is inevitable given that the physical instruments as well as the intellectual concepts applied in the pursuit of scientific knowledge are Western. The structures of education and training, and subsequent career opportunities, are modelled on the Western pattern of very narrowly specialized expertise, with little opportunity for inter-specialist work even among researchers within the same discipline, let alone inter-disciplinary co-operation or cooperation between scientists and religious scholars. The mutual incomprehensibility of specialist dialects used by experts makes the situation even less susceptible of change.

8. The hurdles in the way of change are forbidding but not impossible. The old Islamic idea of a university as the gathering-place of different branches of knowledge will remain, for a while yet, just a cherished hope. But if it is sincerely cherished, specialists trained in the Western disciplines will work harder in their spare hours at qualifying themselves as Islamic scholars. Gradually, the definition of procedures and purposes in their field will evolve, through their own character as informed, practising Muslims, to give an Islamic shape to their specialist work. To begin with, only minor additions and modifications of existing curricula (both in schools and universities) will be possible.

9. To establish a truly Islamic curriculum in the sciences, but one that is practical from the point of view of training Muslims to be effective in the real world in which they find themselves, can only be a long- term goal. The first step towards that goal must be to provide Muslims with the relevant information and the means to exchange thoughts about it. Therefore:

a. We need case studies of past Islamic achievements which focus on the methods used, not the results. This will involve analyzing particular projects and comparing them with similar projects outside the Islamic tradition. Such studies need not be limited to comparing individual physics and chemistry experiments. They should also include skills and techniques applied in many areas, from town-planning and water management to lexicography and textual analysis. Any publisher(s) willing to undertake the task would need to plan a consistent series format aimed at the general reader.

b. We need an accessible account of how Muslim scholars and scientists maintained contact with each other, and how their work was funded and supported.

c. We need The Fountain or a magazine like it, preferably one that publishes monthly, to reserve a few pages for practising scientists to try and discuss the work they are currently doing from a Muslim perspective.

d. We need more focused (not necessarily smaller) conferences to discuss in detail particular issues that are debated widely but without much input from Muslims.

e. Beside the many essays we already have which associate modern scientific ideas and discoveries with the words of the Qur’an, we need studies that demonstrate a movement in the other direction, namely from the Qur’an to scientific knowledge. (The link between Qur’anic principles and injunctions and specific Muslim achievements in science and technology has been made in many books, but it has not been the central theme of any widely accessible study.)