Hurtled all around, we sob and rustle

As if we resemble winnowed leaves

Since life path tramples our heart castle.

Wondering the yonder of the shades

“Let bygones be bygones” no longer holds true.

Why autumn evermore betrays lovers

Dispersing men and scattering ladies

The ease of souls someday blossom with peace

No doubt resurrection lays bare

The repose of hearts; fleeting and deceased,

Turning our shadows into reality.

Before they go to holy places people bathe or shower and then dress in their best clothes. In this way, they are showing their Creator how morally and physically clean they are. Physical cleansing also has benefits for health by removing visible or invisible dirt from the body. As mentioned above, all religions give importance to both physical and moral purity. This article will focus on the Islamic perspective of cleanliness and support it with scientific findings.

The Islamic perspective of cleansing and ablution

In the Islamic belief it is stressed that God’s beloved people are those who are pure and clean. The Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, said: “Cleanliness is half of faith.” This means that physical cleanliness is very important for the purification of the soul and for preparing to worship God. The purity and cleanliness of the body consists of avoiding all external filth and adorning it with cleanliness and good manners.

Traditions of the Prophet about cleanliness

Whenever the Prophet took a bath after intercourse, he started by washing his hands and then performed an ablution that is similar to the one for the prayer. After that he would put his fingers in the water and rub the roots of his hair with them, and then pour three handfuls of water over his head and then pour water all over his body.¹

“The taking of a bath on Friday is strongly recommended for every Muslim, and (also) the cleaning of his teeth with miswak, and the using of scents if it is available.”²

Aisha said: “The Prophet passed away in my house and leaning against my chest. One of us would recite a prayer asking God to protect him or her from all evils if he or she became unwell. So I began to ask God to protect him from all evils (by reciting a prayer). . . . Abdur Rahman bin Abu Bakr was passing by with a fresh leaf-stalk of a date-palm and the Prophet looked at it; I thought that the Prophet was in need of it (for cleaning his teeth). So I took it (from Abdur Rahman) and chewed the top of it, shook it and gave it to the Prophet, who cleaned his teeth with it, in the best way he had ever cleaned his teeth, and then he gave it to me. Suddenly his hand dropped down or it fell from his hand (i.e. he passed away). So God allowed my saliva to mix with his saliva on his last day on earth and his first day in the Hereafter.”³

The Prophet said, “Were I not afraid that it would be hard on my followers, I would order them to use the miswak (as obligatory, for cleaning the teeth).”⁴

Aisha reported: “The Messenger of God, may peace be upon him, said: ‘There are ten acts according to fitra (acts required by human nature): clipping the moustache, letting the beard grow, using miswak (for cleaning the teeth), snuffing water in the nose, cutting the nails, washing between the fingers, plucking the hair under the armpits, shaving pubic hairs and cleaning one’s private parts with water.’ The narrator said: I have forgotten the tenth, but it may have been rinsing the mouth.”⁵

Abdullah ibn Abbas reported: “I spent (one night) in the house of the Messenger of God (may peace be upon him). He got up, brushed his teeth and performed ablution and said: ‘In the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the alternation of the night and the day, there are indeed signs for people of understanding’ (Al Imran 3:190), reciting to the end of the chapter. He then stood up and prayed two cycles, standing, bowing, and prostrating himself at length in them. Then he finished, went to sleep. He did that three times, six cycles altogether, each time cleaning his teeth, performing ablution, and reciting these verses. Then he observed three cycles of witr. The call to prayer was then heard and he went out for prayer, saying,:” O God! Place light in my heart, light on my tongue, light in my hearing, light in my eyesight, light behind me, and light in front of me, and light above me, and light below me. O God! Grant me light.”⁶

Ablution and its benefits

There are twenty-six movements to the washing ritual of ablution in Islam, and Muslims perform ablution before they start their daily prayers, going before God with a healthy and clean body. The description of ablution and the importance of physical cleanliness are given in the Qur’an as follows:

O you who believe! When you rise up for the Prayer, wash your faces and your hands up to (and including) the elbows, and lightly rub your heads (with water) and (wash) your feet up to (and including) the ankles. And if you are in the state of major ritual impurity (requiring total ablution), purify yourselves (by taking a bath). But if you are ill, or on a journey, or if any of you has just satisfied a want of nature, or if you have had contact with women, and can find no water, then betake yourselves to pure earth, passing with it lightly over your face and your hands (and forearms up to and including the elbows). God does not will to impose any hardship upon you, but wills to purify you, and to complete His favor upon you, so that you may give thanks. (Maeda 5:6)

According to Prophetic tradition these movements are repeated three times each. Additionally, the inside of the ear, behind the ear and one-third of the head above the forehead are wiped once, according to the traditions of the Prophet. Moreover, the Prophet encouraged making ablution before going bed.

Yoga instructors also teach their students to wash their hands, eyes, legs, mouth, and genitals before going to bed with cold water as well. This act of cleansing prepares the body for a deep sleep [Avadhuta, Vedprajinananda, Yoga Health Secrets].

Ablution stimulates the biological rhythms. In his article entitled “Muslim Rituals and their Effect on the Person’s Health,” Dr. Mogomed Magomedov⁷ mentions how ablution stimulates the biological rhythms of the body by specifically focusing on the Biological Active Spots (BASes), very much like the idea behind Chinese reflex therapy:

As we know human body is a complex system of electromagnetic fields, meridians, biological rhythms and so on. Man’s internal organs, in their turn, present a bio-energetically sophisticated whole; they all have indissoluble multi-channel bilateral connections with the skin, which hosts special spots, whose functions resemble those of buttons on “control” and “ recharge boards” responsible for particular organs. These spots are called biologically active spots (BASes).

Dr. Magomedov also suggests that his studies are inspired by his solemn belief that five daily prayers each day are bound to have not only an “indisputable spiritual effect,” but are also to have a purely healing effect physically.

Ablution prevents potential health problems. The scholar Mukhtar Salem points out the health benefits of the washing movements in ablution in his book Prayers: A Sport for the Body and Soul. He classifies the benefits of ablution as follows:

1. Ablution helps prevent skin cancer. The author claims that the areas washed during ablution are those parts of the body that are most prone to be exposed to pollution, whether it is pollution from the internal secretions of the body onto the skin surface, such as sweat, or whether it is from external pollution. Ablution removes this “pollution” five times a day, and hence maintains a clean outer layer of skin, which in turn helps the cells underneath to function properly. Also, washing with water helps invigorate the blood vessels, as well as the nerves and glands that are near the surface of the skin, and hence helps them perform their functions efficiently. [Salem, Mukhtar, Prayers: A Sport for the Body and Soul, Cairo, The Arab Modern Center (1990), pg. 52.].

2. Washing the mouth removes food particles, which could cause teeth and gum problems in the mouth. This is also one of the reasons why miswak (or brushing one’s teeth) is recommended.

3. When washing one’s nostrils, one is also performing a preventive health measure as the germs trapped in the nostrils are removed and do not pass onto the respiratory system. According to a study conducted by a team of doctors at Alexandria University, the Prophetic tradition that urges an exaggerated washing of the nostrils by introducing water into the nostril and then blowing it out positively affects the inner coating of the nostrils. Those who carried out the washing in the correct manner had clean, shiny nostrils with no dust clinging to the small hairs inside. However, those who did not perform the ablution had slightly darkened, greasy nostrils and their nostril hairs came away easily.

4. Repeated washing of the face invigorates the facial skin cells and helps prevent early wrinkles, as well as having a cleansing effect on the inside of the eyes, which prevents eye infections. (Salem 1990). Washing the ears also helps get rid of wax accumulation, which may cause ear infections or affect the inner ear, which eventually causes a loss of balance.

5. The Prophetic tradition of encouraging one to wash between the toes while washing the feet is also extremely important, Salem (1990), as this prevents the foot, which in our modern times is trapped most of the day inside shoes, from acquiring athlete’s foot.

Salem (1990) concludes that ablution also has an exercising effect on all the muscles involved in the action, as they are thus being stimulated five times a day or even more according to the frequency of repetition.

Ablution is useful for controlling anger as well. In a hadith⁸ the Prophet encouraged making ablution when angry in order to cool down and to benefit from the refreshing effect of the water; he stated that anger is from the devil, that it is made out of fire, and can therefore be put out by water.⁹

Conclusion

Scientific experiments document the relation between physical purity and moral purity. This helps to understand the reasoning behind the encouragement of cleanliness in different belief systems. Ablution is a significant part of the Muslim daily rituals, and it not only has physical benefits but also spiritual benefits, such as stimulating the biological rhythm, preventing health problems, relaxing the body, purifying the soul, and washing away the sins.

References

• Avadhuta, Vedprajinananda, 2005, Yoga Health Secrets, http://www.mega.bz/body_energetics/article.mgi?id=147
• Magomed Magomedov, Muslim Rituals & Their Effect On The Person’s Health, http://www.crescentlife.com/wellness/muslim_rituals_and their_effct_on_the_person’s_health.htm
• Salem, Mukhtar, 1990, Prayers: A sport for the soul and body, CAIRO, The Arab Modern Center, p: 52.
• Zhong, Cen-Bo, and Liljenquist, K, 2006, Washing away Your Sins: Threatened Morality and Physical Cleansing, Science, vol 313, pp: 1451-1452

Notes

1. Sahih Bukhari, Volume 1, Book 5, Number 248

2. Narrated by Abu Said, Sahih Bukhari, Volume 2, Book 13, Number 5

3. Narrated by Aisha, Sahih Bukhari, Volume 5, Book 59, Number 732

4. Narrated by Abu Huray ra, Sahih Bukhari, Volume 9, Book 90, Number 346

5. Sahih Muslim, Book 002, Number 0502

6. Sahih Muslim, Book 004, Number 1682

7. Daghestan State Medical Academy, Assistant to the department of the Man’s General Hygiene and Ecology

8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadith

9 Narrated Atiyyah as-Sa’di.

Human beings are visually-oriented in their daily life; they use the sense of sight more than any of the other senses with which they have been endowed. The modern understanding of human vision and the underlining principles were only discovered in the past couple centuries. The nineteenth and twentieth centuries witnessed the development of photographic and digital imaging camera systems, which partially mimic human visual systems. We will open a small window on the history of human vision and camera systems, and try to compare today’s state-of-the-art cameras with the human visual system, focusing mainly on solid-state image sensors, or camera chips, and the image-sensing element of the human visual system, the eye.

History of human vision

Human vision has been the subject of conflicting interpretations since ancient times. Many ancient physicians and philosophers believed in the theory of extramission, or the active eye. According to this theory, the eye perceives objects by emanating light and seizing objects with its rays. It was in medieval Islamic culture that research on human vision and optics developed into a system similar to the modern theory of vision. Among others, Ibn Al-Haytham (Alhazen) (965-1040 A.D.), a Muslim physicist, astronomer, and mathematician in the tenth century, played a great part in this field by promoting the intromission theory which states that vision only occurs because of light rays entering the eye. Ibn Al-Haytham founded physiological optics, which distinguished the functioning of the eye from the behavior of light. On the other hand, ten centuries after Ibn Al-Haytham, Winer et al. (2002) have found recent evidence that as many as 50% of American college students believe in the extramission theory.1

Although the fundamental features, anatomy, and physiology of the eye were documented by Galen (129–200 A.D.), an ancient Greek physician, in the second century A.D., it was Kepler, a close reader of Ibn Al-Haytham, who offered the first theory of the retinal image and the correct operation of the eye in 1604. He proclaimed, “Therefore vision occurs through a picture of the visible things on the white, concave surface of the retina.” Progress came slowly after Kepler, because little was known about the nervous system until the nineteenth century, and only recently have scientists acquired a more knowledge about how the brain apprehends the retinal image. But many questions still elude us.

History of the camera

In parallel with curiosity about human vision, human beings have also tried to mimic human vision by capturing images of objects with instruments. Around 1000 A.D., Ibn Al-Haytham, also known as the father of modern optics, invented the pinhole camera,2 and explained why the image was upside down. It was Johannes Kepler who further suggested the use of a lens to improve the pinhole camera in the 1600s. Capturing an image on a photographic plate was first achieved in the early 1800s. Consequently, photographic cameras began to be mass-marketed in the twentieth century. The photographic equipment with which we are all familiar today, such as the 35mm camera, flash bulb, Polaroid camera, and the point-and-shoot auto focus camera, all were developed in the twentieth century. The invention of the camera as we know it today paved the way for other technologies, including the moving image capture, and, later, the digital camera, in which electronic image-capture devices were used. In 1972, chemically processing an image onto photographic paper no longer became the sole destination of an image, because the first filmless electronic camera was patented by Texas Instruments Corporation. Filmless electronic cameras were made possible with the invention of solid-state image-capture devices called charge coupled devices (CCD) and metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) image sensors in the late 1960s. Since the invention of solid-state imagers, people have become more visually stimulated and oriented than ever before in history.

A comparison of camera chips and the human eye

The technological advancements of solid-state image-capture camera chip design and manufacturing during the past twenty-five years has made digital imaging more affordable and accessible to the general public. These advancements have become more visible to consumers in mobile products, particularly in cellular phones, in which there are still and video-camera functions. Although digital cameras are easily available today, the state-of-the-art image sensor chips used in these cameras exhibit a performance gap when compared with the capabilities of the human eye. How good these image sensor chips are today when compared to our eyes is a question that will be elaborated on.

It is possible to compare the capabilities of the human eye and state-of-the-art image sensor chips used in cellular phones or in mainstream PC and digital still cameras. It is also possible to compare the capabilities of the human visual system, including the eyes, the optic nerve, the visual cortex, etc. with a digital camera system which includes optics, image-capture and signal-processing chips and other camera apparatuses. The capabilities include ability to see different colors (spectral response), photo-element (pixel) characteristics (size, density, distribution), light sensitivity, light-intensity response range, functionality and operation modes, and signal processing capabilities.

Spectral response

A single light-sensing element in a solid-state image sensor is called a pixel. In the human eye it is called the photoreceptor. Both elements convert impinging light or photons into electrical signals. The human eye sees in the so-called visible spectrum, between 380nm (blue) and 750 nm (red), and utilizes two kinds of photoreceptors on the retina; rods and cones. The cones are used for color and daylight vision. Rods are responsible for night vision. There are three types of cone photoreceptors on the retina that contain different types of photosensitive pigments. The three types of cones are L, M, and S, and they have pigments that respond best to wavelengths of light that are long or red (peak at 564 nm), medium or green (peak at 534 nm), and short or blue (peak at 420 nm), respectively. The rods (R) are most sensitive at a wavelength of approximately 498 nm (green), as seen in Figure 1.3 Image sensor pixels in digital cameras mimic the photoreceptors in the human eye for color vision. They utilize three kinds of color filters (red, green, blue) on top of each pixel to convert light rays into electrical signals in different visible spectrums. Unlike the cones in the human eye, camera pixels and color filters can be designed to cover wide spectrums that are not visible to the human eye, for instance, the x-ray, ultraviolet, and infrared spectrums. In the category of spectral response range, camera pixels exhibit greater flexibility than those of the photoreceptors of the human eye. On the other hand, interestingly enough, the eyesight that humans possess has similar spectral characteristics as the sun. The solar light emission peaks in the visible spectrum as seen in Figure 2.4

Figure 1. Spectral absorption curves of the short (S), medium (M), and long (L) wavelength pigments in human cone and rod cells.3

Figure 2. The daylight solar spectral power distribution on earth.4

Pixel and array size

The size of pixels in today’s modern digital cameras is getting closer to the size of the photoreceptors in human eye. The typical human eye contains an average of 130 million photoreceptors. The diameter of the rods and cones varies between 1.0m and 8.0m, depending on their location on the retina.5 Today’s state-of-the-art image sensor chips contain 10 to 30 million pixels. Each pixel can be as small as 1.4m in diameter. To date there has been no image sensor that is 1.4m pixel in size or more than 8 million pixels. However, the human being has been equipped with photoreceptors that are as small as 1.0m and has more than 100 million photoreceptors; and this is since the beginning of existence. It is also estimated that the resolution of the human eye is equivalent to an imager sensor chip of 576 million pixels with a 120 degree field of view.6 Thus we still have a long way to go in improving the image-sensor pixel and array sizes used in cameras if we are to match the human eye.

Pixel distribution and formation

In the human eye the photoreceptor size and densities change, depending on their location on the retina. For example, no rods exist on the focus center of the eye, which is called the fovea. Color vision photoreceptors, which total only 10% of the eye’s photoreceptors, are located mostly on the fovea. There is an irregular distribution of photoreceptors which is unique for every human being, like a fingerprint. Yet, we all see things the same, such as colors (with the exception of people who are colorblind). In camera chips, however, pixels are arrayed regularly, in two-dimensions. As the image-processing techniques and algorithms used in camera systems are linear and do not closely mimic the signal processing that exists in the human visual system, regularly arrayed pixels are required.

Light sensitivity and response range

Although the pixel sizes in image-sensor chips are approaching the size of the photoreceptors in the human eye, camera systems are not yet close to being able to match performance in terms of light sensitivity and response range. The human visual system and photoreceptors can easily adapt to very dim and bright light, with a light-intensity response range of ten billion to one (1010:1).7 This response range goes from light conditions on a bright sunny day to dim night vision. Typically, a conventional consumer camera pixel has a light intensity response range of one thousand to one (103:1).8 In a camera system, details of a captured scene are either concealed in the dark regions or washed out by the bright light, depending on the exposure settings of the system. Thus, one could say that the human visual system works ten million times (107) more efficiently than that of consumer cameras in terms of transferring scenes into images.

Operation principle

In terms of operation principles, the photoreceptors in the human eye convert light rays into electrical signals with extremely rapid electro-chemical reactions which can detect a single photon. Typically, in the image sensor pixel of a digital camera the photoelectric effect is used to convert impinging photons into electrical charges. Electrical charges are collected and stored in each pixel during the exposure period. Collected electric charges in each pixel are amplified and converted into digital ones (logic-1) and zeros (logic-0) during image readout before the image is sent to higher processing elements, such as a personal computer, digital-still or video camera. It is possible for a single photon-counting camera to be developed. However, very special and larger pixel sizes and extra apparatuses are required to build such a camera system. Thus, we could say that it is almost impossible to build imaging pixels that have the capability and dimensions of the photoreceptors of the human eye with today’s state-of-the-art technology.

Signal processing capabilities

The captured image in the human eye is preprocessed before it is sent to the visual cortex of the brain. This preprocessing consists of a data reduction operation in which nothing is lost, with a compression ratio of 130 to 1, as only 1 million optic nerves leave each eye carrying the information from 130 million photoreceptors. This compression allows the brain to process information at a rate of 25 to 150 scenes or frames per second. Typically, every pixel in an image sensor chip is first transferred to higher processing units. A data compression method is either carried out with some loss of details in the image or the compression is never used. The transfer of frames in camera chips typically takes place sequentially, reducing the speed of the image-capture operation or frame rate. Different techniques are used to maintain a capture rate of, at most, 25 frames-per-second in camera chips. With today’s technology, image sensors that have a capture rate of one million frames per second have been proposed and can be manufactured for scientific applications.

The inherent inefficiencies of image-capture in today’s image-sensor chips are hidden by employing the limitations of the human eye. For example, solid-state image sensors have always been produced with row or column-vice uncanny stripes which are easily picked up by the human eye. However, psycho-visual experiments have shown that the human eye can only detect contrasts between two adjacent gray lines when the difference is greater than 0.5%. Thus, if a camera chip is designed to have a column to column or row to row contrast of less than 0.5%, these odd stripes would not be visible.

Conclusion

Humans are visually oriented and without a doubt, our eyes are considered to be our primary source of information. It is obvious that the human visual system is extremely complex and this complexity has fascinated human beings throughout history. Yet, the underlining principles and basic functions of human vision and the eye have only been discovered during the last two centuries. These discoveries have led research in how to mimic these functions, which has resulted in moving and still-photographic and camera equipment, and the image sensors chips used in digital cameras today. Even though human beings are only taking baby steps in fully mimicking the human eye, curiosity and scientific inquiry allows us to discover functions and features of the eye and the visual pathways that will increase our knowledge and help us to build better pixels and image sensor chips.

References

1. Winer, G. A., Cottrell, J. E., Gregg, V., Fournier, J. S., & Bica, L. A., “Fundamentally misunderstanding visual perception: Adults’ beliefs in visual emissions.” American Psychologist, 57, 417-424, 2002.

2. Ertan Salik, “Pinhole Cameras, Imaging, and The Eye” The Fountain Magazine, Issue 54, pp. 30-33, April – June 2006.

3. URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Cone-response.png

4. URL: http://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/color3.html

5. Stefan Winkler, Digital Video Quality – Vision Models and Metrics, John-Wiley & Sons, Ltd., 2005.

6. URL: http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/eye-resolution.html

7. R.C. Gonzalez and R.E. Woods, Digital Image Processing, Addison-Wesley, 1993.

8. M. Schanz, et al., “A high-dynamic-range CMOS image sensor for automotive applications”, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, vol. 35, no. 7, pp.932-938, July 2000.

The Fountain: There are many types of philosophies as well as many traditions in the history of philosophy. Scholars for instance distinguish “ancient philosophy” from “modern philosophy.” So how do you locate “Islamic Philosophy?”

Oliver Leaman (O. L.): Trying to define Islamic philosophy is very tendentious, but then definitions as a whole are a problematic area in philosophy. In my view, Islamic philosophy is not necessarily done by Muslims, nor does it have to deal with religious issues. It is that style of philosophy that developed in the Islamic world roughly around the time of al-Kindi which persists today in what is now the Islamic world and indeed further afield.

The Fountain: If it is a separate tradition, what are its characteristics?

O. L.: I don’t think it has any characteristics that have remained the same over time. For example, today in the Arab world there is a protracted debate by philosophers on the nature of Arab civilization, its links with Islam, and how it relates to other civilizations. That is not a debate that existed in the early centuries of Islamic philosophy at all, but reflects the relatively recent experience of colonialism, the modern concept of the state, contemporary political events and so on. Philosophy like everything else has its fashions, and Islamic philosophy rolls with the times, which is why it still survives.

The Fountain: How do you view the relationship between Islamic philosophy and Islamic theology?

O. L.: Many of the issues that have been discussed by Islamic philosophers are religious, and also relate to the theology of a particular faith, i.e. Islam. It is not always easy to know how to distinguish between philosophy and theology, since both are abstract and conceptual investigations into complex issues. Some of the early thinkers like al-Farabi and Ibn Rushd drew a sharp distinction between philosophy and theology, arguing that philosophy is demonstrative and starts from principles that are themselves provable as true, while religion merely starts with beliefs that are accepted, but need not be true. Even if they are right, though, they agreed that the argument forms followed by both are the same, so a sharp distinction between Islamic philosophy and theology is not likely to be very helpful.

The Fountain: As compared to systematic philosophers such as Aristotle, Descartes, Kant on the one hand, and non-systematic ones such as Nietzsche and Wittgenstein on the other hand, how do you evaluate al-Ghazzali’s position?

O. L.: Al-Ghazali is just as systematic as any other major thinker, albeit one has to take him in relation to each stage of his life and thought, since he changed radically from one time to another. The same could be said of Kant, of course, who had a critical and a pre-critical period, and indeed some have argued a post-critical period also.

The Fountain: Did he engage in a philosophical activity in the “Inconsistencies of Philosophers?”

O. L.: I would classify the Tahafut al-falasifa as philosophical, like most of his works. It not only deals with philosophical topics but attacks them philosophically. Had he been operating theologically only he might have pointed to the beliefs of the philosophers and classified them variously as kufr and bid`a, and so condemned them on religious grounds, but in fact he does not limit himself to this at all, he mentions the theological objections to the philosophical principles and then seeks to refute the latter using the methods of those with whom he is arguing. If that is not philosophy then I don’t know what is.

N.M.: Did Islamic thought influence the Western thought?

O.L.: There is evidence of Islamic philosophy influencing Western thought in the medieval period. We know that the works of Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd were translated into Latin and played a significant role in France and Italy, for instance, significant enough for Ibn Rushd’s views to be banned in 1270 and 1277 by Bishop Tempier at the University of Paris. Ibn Rushd was interpreted as arguing that philosophy and religion are contrary to each other, but nonetheless are both true, and so we have to accept them both, albeit as valid for different areas of our lives. Philosophy is for us as rational thinkers, and religion for us as social and emotional beings. This hardly presents a very flattering view of the role of religion, and it did not go down well with the Church. The popularity of Ibn Rushd for many centuries gives credence to the idea that he played a significant role in fostering the development of secularism in Europe.

The Fountain: Is the tradition of Islamic thought alive today? Can we mention theologically or philosophically mature works in this area?

O. L.: I started off responding to the question of what is happening in the area today, and then had to stop since the list of books and thinkers was getting so long. In my view, the most fruitful work today takes place in Iran, where ishraqi philosophy is being combined in productive ways with analytical philosophy to produce a highly original form of thought. Persians have always been predominant in Islamic philosophy; when the subject went into a decline in the rest of the Islamic world it continued to be part of the curriculum in Iran, and there is a very long and indeed unbroken tradition in Iran of philosophical work.

The Fountain: How do you evaluate oriental studies so far? Do they represent the Western interest in Islamic thought?

O. L.: I don’t think Western philosophers are interested in Islamic philosophy, with a few exceptions. The kalam cosmological argument is important in analytical philosophy of religion, and as its name suggests, it comes from Islamic philosophy. Some of the major thinkers in the mashsha’i tradition like Averroes (Ibn Rushd) and Avicenna (Ibn Sina) are known by those interested in medieval philosophy, but otherwise not.

It is not clear to me that we should divide up philosophy into different regions of the world, since those regions constantly work on each other and produce a common philosophical climate. For example, the Christian and Jewish world became in the Middle Ages fascinated with Islamic philosophy, but Islamic philosophy itself earlier on enthusiastically studied and incorporated Greek philosophy.

The Fountain: Let’s talk about the interaction between the Western and Islamic thought. Can Islamic thought bring new perspectives to contemporary Western thought and in what sense can Western thought may be useful for people who try to revive Islamic thought?

O. L.: What is western thought? Ibn Rushd, Ibn Bajja, and Ibn Tufayl, some of the major Islamic philosophers, lived in Spain, which seems quite far west to me. St. Augustine lived in North Africa; does that mean he was an African philosopher? What we call Western philosophy has produced interesting work which other philosophers should study, in just the same way that those in the West should know about more than just their tradition of thought, if there is such a thing.

The Fountain: The University of Kentucky is organizing an international graduate student conference in September this year. You are the coordinator of this conference. Is this conference unique in the US? What was your motivation and target in organizing such a rare and original conference?

O. L.: We wanted to organize a graduate conference on Islamic philosophy because there are a lot of people in the world working in this area, but often they do not come into contact with each other. In the United States in particular graduate students might be working in the area in a department where they are the only person with that interest, and it would be good if people could come together, share views and maintain contact with those in the same field afterwards.

The Fountain: What is your current research about?

O. L.: My current work is on the notion of whether there is a Qur’anic logic and if there is, what is it? The Qur’an constantly calls on its hearers and readers to reflect, ponder, consider what the Book says, and the suggestion is that we are supposed to understand rationally the arguments in the text. I am interested in how those arguments are structured and how far they can be regarded as valid arguments at all.

The University of Kentucky is organizing a conference on contemporary issues in Islamic philosophy and theology. All graduate students, and those of equivalent status, are eligible to present papers at the conference. For further inquiries please visit http://www.uky.edu/AS/Philosophy/events.htm

The most precious of values inherited from our ancestors, speech does not consist only of clarity of meaning, the sound of words, or the expression of certain intentions. It also gives voice to our thoughts, expresses the music of our feelings, the excitement of our hearts; it is the translator of an addressee to God and it is the golden winged turtledove released by our hopes to the future.

The Divine Knowledge has designed the scheme of existence, whereas His Speech has drawn its architecture. After emerging as twins in the most intimate sanctuary of the unchanging essence (ayan al-thabitah), creation and Speech have taken on physical forms and come into existence. In creating mankind, the Most Merciful gave us the ability to speak of the human essence, our inner profundities, the entire cosmos, and the truth beyond material existence before sending us to the dimension of external existence. In this respect, one can argue that “speech” was the first drop of ink that flowed from the Divine Power’s pen to give life to nonexistence. The speech revealed and displayed the mysterious relation between the Creator and the created.

Mankind is nothing more than a mixture of dust, mud, and water of this earth; however, thanks to the repository of knowledge and the ability of speech, they have been elevated to the rank of vicegerent on the same earth. In a sense, mankind is in a position to speak not only on his behalf but for the jinn as well. Human beings have become the addressee of God through speech and it is thanks to speech that they can address Him. As humans started to talk, things that seem silent and reticent have also begun to talk, and all beings and events, which are lines and paragraphs coming from the highest rank (mala al-ala) have become the talking tongue, wisdom-laden speech and the eloquent language of the truth that is behind the scenes of everything, like potent orators. During times when, in our belief, speech did not exist, all beings were silent, all events were muted, and everything was stagnant. How does each being talk? How do they express themselves? These issues are not easy to understand. What is known in this respect is that with the capability of speech that has been endowed on human essence, humans have been created with an ability to express and interpret all things and act as they wish. Indeed, speech is our life in this world of relativity. Each of us is a language in its own way, and the raison d’étre of these languages is speech or expression. Speech acknowledges truth as the highest reality and speaks for all beings like a symphony, thereby removing the cloak of objects, enabling them to express themselves. Speech is the key that opens the locks on the doors of the treasury of thought. Speech is the key by which a wide-ranging central move stimulates the periphery. Speech is the throne of humankind that has been elevated to the position of ruling on the earth and improving it as a vicegerent. Speech is the pen and sword of humanity. Speech is the basis of the kingdom of humanity. Wherever the flag of speech waves, the most powerful armies will be defeated and scattered. In the arenas in which speech shouts out, the sounds of cannon balls will become like the buzzing of bees. Behind the battlements on which the banner of speech has been raised, the sound of its drums will be heard. In the precincts where its march reverberates, the kings shake in their boots. Many insurmountable walls, in the face of which Alexander the Great, Napoleon, or many other men were desperate or had to retreat, were smashed to pieces by the words wielded by the Master of Speech, and the pen of Speech which provides training in submission and docility was saluted.

The Qur’an

The Holy Qur’an is a sample of Speech; it is such that it brings down the walls and echoes in even the most obstinate and bigoted of hearts. There is such a dazzling magic in the presentation of its themes that it is impossible not to be impressed upon hearing it.

The expressive style of the Qur’an is like no divine or worldly expression. The Qur’an has such an irresistible power penetrating the hearts that even those who do not speak in its language (i.e., Arabic) will be fascinated by the melody of its words.

While providing various solutions to various problems, the Qur’an presents them in such a manner that everybody, except those who are prejudiced against it, will be fascinated or at least influenced by it, and led into profound meditation, eventually the Qur’an will conquer their hearts.

The sentences, paragraphs and full-stops of this monument of Speech have a vast depth of meaning, an exquisite style, and a lively music and rhythm that penetrates the soul. With their musical grace, with words chosen to appeal to all the senses, the concepts and themes will take whoever listens to them to their magical horizon, surprising them at every turn.

If you attempt to replace the materials the Qur’an uses to discuss a subject, the attempt will be futile, the speech will be obscured, and the vivid style will lose its spirit.

The Qur’an has such a lofty power of speech that it exhibits different events like living images along with their time periods and backgrounds, and all this causes amazement, admiration, and excitement in the audience. By doing this, it makes no concessions; nothing is detracted from its ravishing beauty, its heart-penetrating profundity, or its phrasal harmony. Rather, it presents everything with clarity, leaving no room for obscurity.

The Qur’an does not address solely the minds, hearts, or souls. It treats human beings in the totality of their emotions, be they physical or spiritual. Its message is brief and concise, but addresses both the inner world and the outer world of the human at the same time. The Qur’an generates a unity of feelings, thoughts, and intelligence related to the entire universe, to all things and to all of humanity.

The Qur’an is more influential than the most magical of speeches, more exquisite than the most delicate of styles, and more elevated than the most exceptional of expressions. Up until now, neither those who opposed it with the desire to surpass it nor those kings of utterance who undertook the task with the enthusiasm of imitation have managed to produce anything that is equal to the Qur’an in speech.

Notable Arab poets, for example Farid al-Din Attar, about whom Shams al-Tabrizi said, “I might write poems that are sweeter than candy, but I can only ever be his pupil in terms of producing choice words,” or Rumi, who said, “I am a bonded servant of the Qur’an,” or Jami, whom Said Nursi described as “intoxicated by the cup of love” and their outstanding works, which still strike us as novel today despite many centuries, have never come close to the Qur’an as the Master of Speech.

We will deal with this issue in detail in future; but for now we will content ourselves with small hints at the narrative style of the Qur’an, and turn back to the reflections which have fallen on our limited comprehension of speech inspired from the Qur’an and the verse and prose that develop in the shade of the Qur’an:

We have all had our eyes opened to this world with speech, and have grown up on the lullabies of speech, and we have headed toward where we are with the magic of speech. Henceforth, we will breathe and live again with speech if we are to live, and we will die with a lack of speech and knowledge if we are to die. Speech is the resuscitating breath for living corpses and the water of life for those who want to live forever. Those who are capable of playing it like a flutemaster in the realm of the spiritually dead will promise successive resurrections to those who are living devoid of spirituality for thousands of years, and they will have the effect of Sur1 on those graves that have been inflicted with God’s wrath.

If there is a most beautiful thing which manages to keep its freshness and colors at all times in this guest house of day-dreams, which withers and grows obsolete in all aspects, a place where those that have arrived eventually leave and those who have settled down ultimately migrate, and “whose property, estates, and pleasures are transient,” it is speech. On the slopes on which speech echoes, thousands of doves delve in contemplation, living in the day-dreams of new rose gardens. As the plectrum of speech plucks at the strings of knowledge, objects start to whirl, and events moan with the whirling of a divine dance. Not one, but thousands of Majnuns wander in the deserts filled with echoes of speech. Nightingales fall quiet and retire to their nests in streams where the melody of speech is heard. In the wild forests where the cries of speech can be heard, the foxes take their leave of deception, and lions are terrified, seeking shelter in their dens.

Speech is the spirit, content, color, and pattern of the Book of the Universe and the Laws of Nature; it is the seal, sword, and pen of the truth of Islam as the divine path. In the same way that only goldsmiths can appreciate the true value of gold and only jewelers can appreciate the genuine value of jewels, only wordsmiths can know the actual value of speech. Gold objects or pearls are given relative values by the people of this world, and the relative values they have start and end in this world. On the other hand, speech is a king who issues coins at the different strata of the earth and heavens; he is a commander giving orders and a hero of legends. Up until today, nobody has managed to access the dizzying summits that speech has reached, and no combatant has possessed a weapon mightier than speech. Every prophet is a sultan of words, and every person of letters is a shadow of those sultans that falls on our heads. The former are the original models and the latter are their followers; the former are architects while the latter are laborers. All of them have acted in cooperation and are unified in developing prosperous cities from speech, weaving laces from the silk threads of words, and making exquisite necklaces from the jewels of words.

When the inspiration of those who wield speech is aroused, it pours into hearts and turns them into golden pastures which swell and become effervescent with the falling rains, while arid deserts become meadows with the gentle summer rain. And when speech matures and becomes a river, a waterfall, or an ocean which flows in waves, stretching out to the coasts, it attains such an irresistible power that all unseemly voices will cease in the face of its spiritual melody, and all nonsense that pretends to be real words will fall silent, and all talk without content will seek solitude. A person who is fortunate enough to attain their nourishment from such speech will listen to it; their ego will melt in complete submission to the extent that they open their heart to it, with the intention to intensify it, as if to allow their soul to fall down the waterfall of music.

Good speech influences almost everybody to the extent of their capability and potential. Sometimes, faced with a strong breeze of speech, people find themselves in the atmosphere where kites wander, taken up by balloons, and they will enjoy freedom and the ease of the bird taking wing toward the atmosphere. They will be captivated by the allurement of this attraction and start to revolve continuously around that “centripetal” force. If it were possible for them to turn back and listen to their soul, they would observe what stupendous romantic considerations they have been encased with and what alternative revelations of pleasure they enjoy; they would probably be enraptured. These fortunate people are revived each time they drink from the profuse rivers of such sounds and words, discovering themselves anew. As phrases and sentences echo in their ears and pour down upon their soul, they feel that they are evolving into a separate distinction and perceive the transcendence of the colors of life in the dimensions of speech, and are repeatedly startled.

And speech, inspired by the divine, emitting forth with such feelings and thoughts, captivates the audience with its charm, wafting its impact towards their souls and pouring its mark on their hearts. They find themselves in the warm bosom of speech, completely surrendering to it. Then, in this comforting atmosphere they can perceive the delicacies of their own world and lose themselves in the stunning beauty of their own achievement.

In the gentle murmurs of speech, people sometimes hear the melodies of belief and faith, like the rivers of Paradise, and the melodies of permanence and transience; with full comprehension that all things come from and ultimately return to eternity, they watch with pleasure the ever-changing colors of the horizon of hope and faith.

And sometimes we pass through certain exits and set sail to our past, trying to be aware of it in all its magnificence; and sometimes we listen to it, as if it were music, and then dance to it and take wing to it. Acquiring a state that is beyond time emotionally and spiritually, we find ourselves sitting at the convergence point of past realities and future day-dreams and observing three dimensions of time all at once. In this vision, the entire past, which has grown into a dream destroyed, acquires once again all of its previous magnificence through a magical restoration; the future we feel in our beliefs and hopes comes running to us like a joyful child entering our hearts to remember the good days and become ours once again. Thus, with these inner feelings, we release ourselves to the stream of diverse associations. Inside this waterfall, to which we have given an infinite power and a transcendent flow in our dreams, we pass from one state to another, from one thought to another, and just as in our dreams, we give shape to everything that is based on our intentions and our heart, casting them into whatever molds we wish and manipulating them as we desire; we can move as we want, taking wing, and landing on the ground to walk when we wish; we can watch the sunrise in the evening or the sunset in the morning; we can increase in number, taking a particle and making it everything.

Speech is based on the fundamentals of meaning, it nourishes our day-dreams, sings lullabies to them, takes them to the heavens, and even shows them the doors that open on the infinite, taking us to the upper reaches of the sky, causing our feelings to ascend and preparing thrones in the supraspatial realms. Responding to our desire for eternity, speech will enrich our feelings in an indescribable manner and give our souls a profundity that cannot be encased with dimensions of corporeality and it will open our ears to melodies from musical compositions that have no lyrics.

When refined speech with lofty ideals that comprise all of these goals erupts in its own accent, when it is profound like the skies, vivid like the earth, as smooth as silk, and as cozy as a mother’s embrace, the speech will have a magical impact that depicts the awakening of logic, the rampaging of spirits, the charm of words, and the history of talking that stretches to before time. Thus, speech tells us the beauty of our faith and values.

A good speech that originates directly from and voices what is in our hearts will always remind us of the breath of the spirit, the beating of the heart, and the color and manner of the ability to speak. To the extent of the sacredness of its color, wealth and goals, speech will echo in our hearts like celestial voices, providing us with specimens of its origin.

Notes

1. The Trumpet which the Archangel Israfil will blow to start the Apocalypse.

A group of scientists attempted to do just this; they used focused electron rays as their writing implement, rather than a pencil. Some researchers at Liverpool University developed a power source that can draw a line of light no thicker than the width of two atoms. This line is so narrow that if millions of them were to come together they would still fit inside the line drawn by the thinnest pencil lead. Drawing such lines would certainly not be something one could do by hand. The smallest vibration would cause the lines to converge. The only way to successfully do this is to send the electron rays by computer.

If we think that nearly 4 trillion atoms can fit on the head of a pin, which is accepted as being equal to one millimeter square, then we can understand how small atoms are. If we arrange the atoms as squares consisting of 100 atoms each, with 10 atoms at every edge, this means that we can get 40 billion of these squares on the head of a pin. We then put one letter into every one of those squares, with some squares being used as blank spaces between the words. If we think that on average there are six letters in a word, we can use 4.7 billion words to fill only 28 billion of our squares. There are nearly 50 million words in the Encyclopedia Britannica. Previously, it was thought that it would not be possible to fit the encyclopedia on the head of a pin, but now we can see that only one percent of the pinhead would be used up. Even if every letter were written ten times larger, it would still fit on the head of the pin. What a huge area a pinhead is! To see if their theory would work the researchers at Liverpool University placed one page of the encyclopedia on the pinhead.

One may wonder what use writing an encyclopedia on a pinhead could possibly be. We wouldn’t be able to read it, so is it not just a futile exercise? In the future, this technology may lead to some new developments, but for now, we can give an example about how this technology could be used by looking at the works of art created by the Divine Power. One of the wonderful examples of “books” in which atoms are used as letters is in the cell of a chromosome. God Almighty writes with His Pen of Power the coded programs and characteristics for living beings in the DNA molecules. The Human Genome Project has made it possible for us to read the genes in chromosomes; each of these can be compared to a library or a data bank. This development has shed a great deal of light on the biological secrets and features of the human being, which can be considered to be a “minor universe.”

How can so much knowledge fit into the DNA? DNA molecules are found in the chromosomes, which are packaged in the form of chromatin in the nucleus of a cell. If a DNA molecule was unfolded and each piece was to be laid side by side, it would measure up to 6 meters. In order to understand how many atoms can be found on such a long DNA, the following example may be of some assistance: if we place 75 million hydrogen atoms next to one another we make a hydrogen chain that is 1 cm. long. As each chromosome is 6 meters, and there are 46 chromosomes in a cell, the total length of the chromosomes in just one cell is approximately 300 meters. Now, if we remember the two-atom wide line drawn by the researchers at Liverpool University with the electron rays, (i.e., a million times thinner than the line drawn by a pencil), then we can imagine how small the DNA chain is in its folded state. In fact, this means to compress human being called micro cosmos as chromosome in 1/100.000 or 1/1.000.000 of one cm. Of course, this miraculous task is not the work of lifeless and unconscious beings called atoms or the result of confused coincidences, but must be the work of God, Whose every job is miraculous and Whose knowledge and power is eternal.

The Qur’an on an atom

Now, can the Qur’an be written on an atom? Since atoms are too small to be seen with the naked eye, let’s think of an apple that is the size of the earth; thus we will better be able to see the atoms, and the subject will be more easily understood.Like everything, an apple is also made of atoms. In such a huge apple, an atom is the size of a football. But still we cannot see the nucleus of the atom, including the neutron and proton. The space between the nucleus and the electron is a vast distance in the scale we are using. The radius of this distance is a ratio of 1/100,000 for the electron to the atom. If we imagine this electron to be in the size of a marble with a radius of 1 cm, this means that the nucleus is 1,000 meters away from the marble. When we enlarge the nucleus to the size of a football, the smallest atom (e.g. the hydrogen atom) is a sphere with a 2,000 meter radius. Then, how many Qur’an copies can we write using electrons, which are as big as marbles, or neutrons and protons which are 1,836 times larger than electrons, as letters. The Qur’an can be written 10 times, maybe even a 100 times on such a huge surface. One of the important things to note in these examples is that atom are almost entirely hollow. If we try to fill atom with nuclei, we need as many nuclei as 1015. If we write the Qur’an not only on the surface of the atom, but also on the inside and the cavities of that huge sphere, then thousands of Qur’an copies, each of which has 300,620 letters, can be written using atom nuclei as letters.

Amazing similarity

There are a hundred trillion cells in one person, whereas, the science of the human being can be summarized in just one cell. But from the aspect of what is contained in just one cell, the human being is more profound than the greatest written works. If a cell were conscious, most probably it would be just as amazed that it can be the index of humans as we are amazed at the concept that we are the index for the universe.

A human being is 1028 times larger than an atom. The sun is 1028 times larger than a man. This cannot be coincidence; therefore, must there not be some relation between the human, the atom and the sun?

The world is nothing more than one point in the solar system; a person is also like one point in the world. The Owner of the Book of the Universe, when summarizing this Divine Book known as the universe, encapsulated it in the human being, and when summarizing humans He encapsulated them in the tiny book written with the atoms called the genome. It is an interesting fact that the Exalted Creator created the solar system similar to the system in the atom. This indicates that the Creator of the universe is the same as the Creator of human beings. He created spheres like the sun and all other complicated systems and the atom to make us think about His artistry and to astonish us with their beauty.

The human eye can identify colors within a 360-760 mm distance. The limits of a curved sight cover the yellow-green field. Every leaf and blade of grass reflects light in this field (540-560 mm), and the human eye can detect thus detect green more clearly than any other color. In other words, God, the All-Knowing, made our eyes see the peaceful and lively color green more easily than other colors, and He granted us the ability to distinct over fifty hues of green – more hues than any other color.

In addition to green, the human eye also perceives the color red, the color of of begonia and barberries, which are colored with antocyan. But there is a chlorophyll layer with its distinctive green under the red layer on top of the leaves. Only a human can see a begonia like this – for example, a bee sees it in black.

Biologists found out that greenblue seaweed, which is really spread all over the world, used to provide our planet with oxygen billions of years ago, contains not only “A”- type chlorophyll, but also other pigments. The human eye, however, is “determined” to see only the green seaweed component created in order to saturate the environment with vital oxygen.

Claiming that “mother nature” has executed such a complicated selection, for the sake of Charles Darwin’s principles, is impossible – it would be more realistic to expect a typewriter to write the encyclopedia Britannica by chance.

We must, however, concede a very important detail. Energy absorption of phototrophic organisms, which is dependant the Sun, is adaptively connected with continuously changing levels of solar radiation. As it is known, the latter comes into soil, which then nourishes plants by facilitating the absorption of energy in a selectively narrow diapason (400-900 to 400- 700 nm). It is impossible to modulate an optimal situation for a plant to be nourished through evolution. A blind evolution would not achieve that in a time span much more time than the multibillion age of our Universe. This leads to the conclusion that the Creator made the specific system of energy absorption in plants via rays projected to the Earth by the Sun.

Aside from the fact that green is created and chosen by God, one more detail deserves listing. Objectively a plant’s leaf and its pigment are connected with selective spectral energy absorption. Emanation with different quanta outside of this precise and narrow “adjustment” could have any influence – negative or positive. Pigment of another kind would not function to fulfill its purpose to be vivifying. Is not turning the ruthless solar radiation into a life-giving flow a manifestation of His wisdom and of the love He has for His creations?

In our everyday life, we engage in amateur garden work or we just admire trees and bushes in bloom. This wonderful event, this miracle, appears to us as something routine. Pigments are highly organized; they are “adjusted” to radiation, which means that their spectrums permit them to absorb radiation in the diapasons at their limit intensity. Moreover, a plant’s organism is always able to increase/decrease this intensity.

For sure, there is one more obvious thing – the issue of the maximum solar radiation is relative. The problem is that according to every scale of wave length, maximum radiation is registered at 578 nm., and at 1015 nm. It would be even more, 1804 nm, if read according to the quantum quantity scale.

From the point of view of basic quantum physics, the most prominent authority on understanding of the role of God in the act of creation, the green color of a leaf is understood to be connected with the features of the pigment itself, the most suitable for the function of absorption and transformation of ray energy.

Another issue is also very important – what determines the diapason of a ray’s energy is its FAR and its photosynthesis diapason accordingly. If we do not accept God as Creator, it is hard to imagine how nature, through all its stages of development led the only source of inner energy, the ATF molecule – through anaerobic, then aerobic breathing and ultimately to all the forms of photosynthesis. This molecule with the energy of its chemical compound in the living system of some 10 Kcal/mole remained in the green plant, but it was not only the breath that was the source of its creation.

I would like to share my observations of over fifty years. As the solar ray energy has become the most important source of energy for plants, simplifying a number of arguments, I can say that the plants are granted a mechanism able to form universal inner quanta divisible to ATF in energy as well as to a photosynthetically important compound named NADP.H (50 kcal/mole each). This is based on the features and spectrum of chlorophyll. The quanta are one of the strongest donors of “his majesty the electron!” Please tell me who will speak of blind evolution after considering these “coincidences”…

I would like to share my observations of over fifty years. As the solar ray energy has become the most important source of energy for plants, simplifying a number of arguments, I can say that the plants are granted a mechanism able to form universal inner quanta divisible to ATF in energy as well as to a photosynthetically important compound named NADP.H (50 kcal/mole each). This is based on the features and spectrum of chlorophyll. The quanta are one of the strongest donors of “his majesty the electron!” Please tell me who will speak of blind evolution after considering these “coincidences”…

“Let all the breathing praise the Lord!”

There is a simple conclusion that could be made from all the above. If such “portions,” or quanta, are formed from solar energy absorbed by plants, then means the primary products of the same type can be also formed. “The quality of light” is of no metabolic importance for the process of synthesis in the limits of ray energy. The Word of God, once spoken out, is realized in a determined way, far distant from Darwinian theory.

Long years of experiments, research, and consultations with colleagues from around the world persuaded this author to change his opinion from vulgar materialism to a deeper understanding. Properties in plants are not the result of “calculabilitive” photosynthesis “touched” by science; like all things, these properties are of a manifestation of His, just as are the lives of humans.

This is the irrational choice of my soul. Nonetheless, as it was admitted in the works on the general problems of science and historic knowledge by the Chief of Department of Civilization Problems at the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences by Prof. V.I. Sheremet -the real breakthrough can be reached with faith in God and exploring the undiscovered. So I offer a second conclusion devoid of materialist explanation. The pigment apparatus of a plant is a complicated chlorophyll-protein complex that functions jointly with its intended object. Who determined this program of compatibility? The plant – the main hero of this article – is given the ability to form a physiological quantum of 50 kcal by itself. Moreover, a high intensity green quantum from outside cannot be used by a separate chlorophyll- protein compound.

The conclusion is obvious and simple: a plant’s life cycle is realized only according to His will and in the regime determined by Him. “Monochromatic” sources of ray energy are not suitable, nor welcomed, by God for the full-fledged artificial raising of plants, but it can be of use for the photosynthesis regulation. So, hotbeds are useful and necessary. The generalized summary is as follows. The green color of leaves and, the blue of the cloudless sky, are not random, they are the work of intelligent design.

So let the green color – the color of plants, of nephrite, malachite, and beryl – beloved and honored both in the East and in the West. Let the mysterious “green ray” of a seaside sunset, let the green stripe of the rainbow, the bridge to Heaven for the righteous, remain the symbol of His Will, His Life, His Awakening of spring in the peace of the heart.

May peace be with all of you, dear readers! 

Being one of the liberal arts, rhetoric can be defined in such a way that is freed from its usual literary references. Thus, rhetoric is an inquiry into the core of the problem, resulting in a “change” in the state of the subject matter from its current state to a preferred one.

Change in a rhetorical inquiry happens by discovery and invention. Discovery is about becoming aware of existence, whereas invention is about finding new connections within existence. Rhetoric is discovery and invention in a sequence of events. A rhetorician first finds a topic with a particular problem; the definition of the topic is the discovery. The rhetorician then searches for possibilities, uses his judgment about facts, questions the problem, and reaches new issues that will become subheadings of topics. Issues are at the heart of an argument. The rhetorician finds solutions to the problem by merging two contrasting issues and allowing them to work together, which results in invention. Having reached the invention, the rhetorician then uses arrangement, expression, memory, and delivery to resolve the rhetorical inquiry. So, the meaning most frequently associated with rhetoric is actually this last step that comes after discovery and invention.

To make my argument clear, I would like to give the example of Muhammad Yunus, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2006 “for his efforts to create economic and social development from below” (Nobel Prize Statement). From the perspective of rhetoric, Muhammad Yunus is a perfect example of rhetorical inquiry. He first identifies the problem of poverty in Bangladesh and then defines his topic as economic development. In searching for possibilities, he comes up with the issues of “financial loans” and “poverty.” Normally, financial loans are thought to be designed for people who have financial credibility, while poverty, in general is seen as being removed from economic development.

Muhammad Yunus did not think so. He took these two contrasting issues and merged them, arriving at the micro-credit idea; i.e., that if an institution gives small loans to poor people, this will result in a massive change and economic development, which can help the poor to stand on their feet, helping them to survive and recover from poverty. His idea was realized with the institution of the Grameen Bank, which has provided more than $5.1 billion US dollars to 5.3 million people. To guarantee payment, the bank developed a system called “solidarity groups,” which are small-scale unofficial groups that apply together for loans. The group members act as co-guarantors of repayment, supporting one another’s efforts in economic self-advancement.

To restate, Muhammad Yunus took a rhetorical stance and used it as a way to solve the problem of poverty in his country. His argument was based on two issues, one being poverty, the other financial loans. He merged the two issues and invented the micro-credit concept. The implementation of the idea was dependent on the facts of the situation, whereas judgments of the facts relied on objectivity. The realization of the idea of “loans for the poor” was so successful that it resulted in other activities, such as loans for housing, fisheries, etc.

Another example of a rhetorical invention is that of the Turkish scholar Fethullah Gulen who took the education of individuals as his topic, and inspired people to initiate intercultural dialogue and education institutions in order to eradicate cross-cultural ignorance and misunderstandings in society. The general concept of positivist thinking which drives education is that science and moral values are two separate things that should not be considered together. And when it comes to understanding the other, it is stereotypes that control people’s opinions.

But Fethullah Gulen did not think so. He merged science and moral values, which resulted in educational institutions that teach both of these subjects to the students, while merging different cultures by emphasizing the common moral values in intercultural and interfaith dialogue activities. These educational institutions have been breaking the so-called norms and reaching people from all over the world by providing a highstandard education equal for all. Simultaneously, NGOs that focus on dialogue activities have reached people of different faiths, from Jewish rabbis to Buddhist priests, in order to spread the idea of understanding others.

To restate this example, Fethullah Gulen presents a strong rhetorical stance about the problem of ignorance. He suggests education as the topic, and comes up with sciences, culture, and common values as the issues. To reach possible solutions, he blends these issues, and his teachings provided inspiration for the establishment of the institutions that focus on education and in the NGO’s that focus on dialogue activities. The strength of the educational institutions is their emphasis on equity and brotherhood while keeping a high-level academic approach. An effort that spans the entire world, these schools not only provide modern education to poor and developing countries, but also support the solution to the problem of crosscultural ignorance in the world.

In conclusion, both Muhammed Yunus and Fethullah Gulen have triggered “change” in the world under very different circumstances, one in economics, the other in education, but by using a common tool. This common tool is rhetorical thinking, which is rooted in people’s capability to develop arguments. If we return to the question posed at the beginning it would be easier now to define rhetoric. Rhetoric is an art of invention that has its own methodology and which helps to solve the serious problems of the world over a wide spectrum.

HIV/AIDS is one of the most devastating health issues in modern history. Since the first case was reported in 1981, over 25 million people have died of HIV/AIDSrelated causes. Despite a better understanding of the disease, extensive knowledge about virus-human interaction, improved preventive measures, and medical treatment options, most experts agree that the pandemic is still in its early stages and rapidly spreading. According to the World Health Organization, in 2006 4.3 million people became infected with HIV and a total of 2.9 million people died of HIV/AIDSrelated causes. As of 2007, over 40 million people are living with HIV/ AIDS around the world and nearly half of them are females between the ages of 15 and 24.

With a vaccine still perhaps decades away, the best hope for impeding the spread of this deadly disease lies in effective prevention, early diagnosis, and successful treatment. For more than two decades, thousands of researchers from the most prestigious institutions around the globe have been struggling to discover more effective screening, diagnosis, and treatment options against HIV/AIDS, but a great deal has yet to be accomplished. At the moment, the high cost of the current medical treatment options and limited accessibility to HIV testing worldwide remain as additional obstacles to be overcome. Below is a table showing the spread of HIV/AIDS worldwide, based on the best available information provided by WHO in 2006. Additionally, the map below represents the regional distribution of adult HIV/AIDS cases by region based on UNIAIDS 2006 Report on the global AIDS epidemic.

What is HIV/ AIDS?

Healthy human bodies have a wellprogrammed defense mechanism (the immune system) that fights infections and helps prevent the development of cancer cells. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) primarily targets vital elements of the immune system, such as helper-T cells, macrophages, and dendritic cells. Due to the damage and destruction of these cells, the human body loses its ability to fight against infections and cancerous developments. This makes the body more susceptible to certain types of cancers, such as Kaposi sarcoma, and to opportunistic infections that would normally be easily defeated, such as pneumonia (Pneumocystis carinii) and Cryptococcal Meningitis. These infections might result in severe damage or the death of the patients. Therefore, it is not the Human Immunodeficiency Virus that causes death in HIV(+) individuals, but opportunistic infections or cancerous developments that a weakened immune system cannot repel. Hence, the later stages of HIV infection are called Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

In spite of many obstacles, in industrial countries there has been a remarkable improvement in the medical care of HIV/AIDS individuals as a result of testing for HIV on a regular basis, particularly among high risk groups. This facilitates early diagnosis and therefore an early start in medical treatment, which allows HIV(+) individuals to live for decades after diagnosis. However, worldwide, particularly in developing countries, 90% of those carrying HIV have not been tested or do not have access to adequate treatment for the disease. Furthermore, every year a considerable number of HIV(+) individuals in developing countries die without even knowing what HIV is and leave thousands of orphans behind who do not have any idea what took their parents away. The number of people living at critical poverty levels in some of these hardest-hit regions, such as sub- Saharan Africa, has reached over 43 percent in recent years. Women encompass 80 percent of those who are living on less than a dollar a day. For people who live in such abject poverty, neither treatment for an HIV+ /AIDS individual (which normally costs around $25,000 annually) nor routine HIV screening seems realistic. On the other hand, even though testing and medical treatment options are available in developed countries, the economic burden on the health care system is becoming greater with every passing day.

HIV and children

As of 2007, over 2.3 million children are suffering from HIV/AIDS worldwide. A small percentage of these children were exposed to the HIV in medical settings, due to unscreened blood transfusions or reused or insufficiently sterilized equipment. Pediatric HIV outbreaks in Romania in 1989 and in Libya in 1998 are two devastating examples of the consequences of negligent or insufficient precautions taken by medical personnel in hospitals. Currently, health care professionals are required to take strict precautions when cleaning and sterilizing medical equipment, while blood banks are monitored closely to ensure the careful screening of blood. These precautions seem to have led to a significant reduction in the number of HIV infections which are acquired in hospital settings. However, motherto- child transmission still constitutes 90% of pediatric HIV cases. An HIV (+) mother has about a 35% risk of transmitting the virus to her child during her pregnancy, child birth, or nursing. This risk can be reduced by administering AZT (an antiretroviral drug) to the mother during the last trimester of pregnancy, delivering the child by C-section, giving one dose of prophylactic antiretroviral therapy to the baby after birth, and by avoiding breast-feeding the infant. As a result of widespread screening and the use of prophylaxis for mother-to-child transmission, the rapid spread of HIV among the pediatric population in industrial countries is relatively under control.

Sadly, not all nations have benefited uniformly from the recent advances in our knowledge about the prevention of transmission. Mothers and infants in developing countries face a different scenario than those in the “modern world.” In places like sub-Saharan Africa, where the majority of HIV/AIDS cases are due to mother-to-child transmission, the number of new infections is rapidly increasing; it seems that ensuring the abovementioned precautions are in place is extremely difficult due to several limitations. These limitations should be discussed in another paper, however to give a brief idea to the reader, one of these instances can be examined. It is a fact that if an HIV(+) mother avoids breastfeeding her newborn baby the risk of her infecting the child with HIV is dramatically reduced. Although this sounds like a wonderful way to combat HIV infection in infants, it poses many problems to mothers in sub-Saharan Africa. Every year, more than one million babies die in the first 28 days of their life in Sub- Saharan Africa. Most of these deaths are due to malnutrition and infections. In most situations breast-feeding is the only clean source of nutrition a mother can offer her child. It also provides natural immunization against most of the infectious agents to which a newborn can be exposed in the later days of his/her life. Babies who are not breastfed have almost no other alternative source of clean nutrients and stand little chance against infections. An HIV(+) mother in Sub-Saharan Africa has to face this dilemma every single time her baby cries from hunger: either take the risk of infecting your baby with HIV or let your child die of malnutrition or infections which kill approximately 3,000 African children every day.

Another issue concerning children in the hard-hit HIV regions is the loss of one or both parents or primary care-givers at a very early time of their life. So far in Africa, HIV/AIDS related deaths have left 14 million orphans. The United Nations estimates that the number of orphans will reach 25 million by the year 2010. Only in rare cases do these children have access to clean water, food, shelter, and education. Furthermore, the orphans who have been infected with HIV by their parents do not have access to adequate treatment options. The number of orphans is so high and resources are so limited that unfortunately most of these children fall through the cracks of society, succumbing to poverty, abuse and even death. Some of these orphans are relatively lucky and have healthy grandparents to care for them. It is not uncommon to find 75-80 year old grandparents who are already living under the critical poverty level taking care of three or four AIDS orphans, and wondering who will care for their grandchildren when they pass away.

Education

Success against the HIV/AIDS epidemic cannot be accomplished only with scientific and medical means. Preventive education plays a key role in the battle against HIV/ AIDS. The first step in preventive HIV/AIDS education is to inform individuals about the disease and answer their questions, such as, “What causes AIDS?”, “How is HIV/AIDS spread?”, “What are the preventive measures to be taken?” If one is already infected with HIV then one must ask “What are the treatment options?”

Preventive education for risk groups who are not aware of HIV/ AIDS and the consequences of the infection helps to decrease the overall number of new infections, particularly those in developing countries. However, another issue appears as education level increases: according to current studies, the number of people who continue risk-taking behavior is increasing in spite of the knowledge they have about HIV/ AIDS prevention and the consequences of the disease. This suggests overthat effective HIV/AIDS prevention should include not only education about the facts of the illness, but also education that focuses on teaching people to avoid behavior that puts them at high risk. It is also worth noting that the widespread dissemination of information by governmental organizations may not be effective on its own, and that different types of intervention may be necessary by groups with the potential to motivate people on a personal level. In other words, it is important to individually instill a sense of consequence and personal responsibility within those at risk, rather than broadly reminding them of the dangers that they face. As a result of recent thinking along these lines, various institutions, professional groups, and government organizations have realized the need for strong collaborative efforts and have aligned themselves in order to begin taking the steps necessary to effect this type of change.

Working together

Around the globe, government agencies have been initiating and sponsoring several efforts aimedat HIV-prevention. However, the complexity of the HIV epidemic and the involvement of many sociologic and behavioral factors require a shared commitment among government agencies and civil society organizations. For example, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) is the leading federal agency in HIV prevention in the United States. In their strategic plan for HIV prevention in 2005, the CDC admits that the HIV epidemic is not a matter that can be handled by only one agency, group, or organization. Therefore, for success in HIV prevention the CDC recognizes the need for other domestic partners, such as:

~ Other federal agencies;

~ State and local health and education departments;

~ HIV prevention community planning groups;

~ Community-based organizations;

~ Academic institutions;

~ The private sector;

~ Faith-based groups and

~ Foundations and nonprofit groups

(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention HIV Prevention Strategic Plan Through 2005)

In addition to domestic partnership, worldwide cross-cultural and cross-faith collaborations are establishing a strong global response to eradicate HIV/AIDS. People from all over the world should contribute, in whatever capacity and with whatever resources they can, to the solution; their involvement is critical. The World Health Organization, UNICEF, UNESCO, and similar organizations are doing their parts to bring multinational aid to the hardest hit regions. Additionally, many faith-based national and international organizations around the globe have started working in collaboration towards the eradication of HIV/AIDS. Among these faithbased efforts there are recent examples of interfaith partnerships. The Africa HIV/AIDS Faith Initiative, a successful example of this type of collaboration, has been active since 2001 in five African countries: The Ivory Coast, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. One of their noticeable accomplishments is promoting interfaith dialogue in these countries where ethnic and religious variations often cause serious clashes. A report from The Global Health Council lays the power of Interfaith partnership before our eyes:

“In Kenya, the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims, the Anglican Church of Kenya and the Pentecostal Churches of Eastlands, a low socioeconomic community outside Nairobi, have teamed up to reach bishops, pastors, men, women, youth, children and people infected with HIV/AIDS through education and service initiatives. In Tanzania, the national staffs of the Episcopal, Christian and Muslim HIV/AIDS offices meet monthly to exchange ideas and plan together for the effective development, implementation and coordination of HIV education and service interventions.

But it is in Nigeria, with its welldocumented history of religious conflict and recent violence, where the partnering of Christians and Muslims is most remarkable. Observing the establishment of separate offices in each of the four other countries, Nigeria’s religious leadership said “it won’t work here,” and charged The Balm In Gilead to set up the Interfaith HIV/AIDS Coalition of Nigeria. Christian and Muslim clerics going out on the street together can draw curious crowds, and “people will come into the office just to see us working together,” said one reverend.

Nigerian faith institutions involved in this historical decision included the Episcopal Conference of Nigeria, Christian Association of Nigeria, the Christian Health Association of Nigeria and the Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs. This interfaith approach in Nigeria is being seen as a model that can be replicated by other countries. The Kenyan Muslim leaders have already requested that it be presented as a best practice model and replicated in other parts of the continent.” http:// www.globalhealth.org/reports/ text.php3?id=194

Conclusion

We have witnessed many harsh discussions, questions and speculations about HIV/AIDS such as, “How and where did HIV/AIDS start?”, “Whose fault was that?”, “Why don’t people simply stay away from risky behavior and put a stop to it?”, “What are the roles of faith traditions, family values and public wisdom in terms of preventing and fighting against HIV/AIDS?”, “If I am not involved with certain risky behavioral elements am I safe? Are my children safe from HIV?”, “Is contributing to the solution for HIV the same as trying to legitimize the life-style preferences which are the primary cause of the spread of HIV in the first place?”

As a matter of fact, how this epidemic started, whose fault it was, why precautions were not taken on time does not matter that much anymore. What matters is that hundreds of people are dying, thousands of children have been orphaned, and millions of mothers are crying in desperation everyday. We do not have the luxury to sit back in our comfortable seats and be the judge who decides who is right and who is wrong in this drama. We are all human… we are citizens of the earth… we breath the same air, sleep under the same sky. When we cut ourselves, our blood runs red, our tears are salty. Pain is pain… a cry is a cry… desperation is desperation…No matter where we go, what language we speak, or how we live our lives… We are obliged to put the differences to one side and to become a part of the solution…to think about it… to talk about it… to do something about it… or at least with a sore heart cry and pray for our HUMAN sisters and brothers who are suffering from HIV/AIDS… who might not be able to do much for themselves.

The rational attempt to combine philosophy and wisdom and the refutation of this possibility by human experience must have been matters that preoccupied Nursi’s thought for a long time. This must have prompted him to review his philosophical position and, consequently, reconsider the established view among Islamic philosophers that philosophy and wisdom are connected in an inclusive way, like siblings or in an associative way, like friends.

It is at this point in his life that the “New Said”² appeared. He shed his old philosophical guise and put on a new one, the robe of wisdom. Here we see the demise of Said the philosopher and the birth of the New Said. This radical transformation in the life of Said Nursi has two aspects; one critical and the other constructive. In this article, we will discuss the critical aspect. Said Nursi’s revolution and the criticism of the connection between philosophy and wisdom.

The critical aspect of this transformation can be seen in Nursi’s preoccupation with the criticism of the combination between philosophy and wisdom in its inclusive and associative forms. This was a triple criticism: logical, moral, and figural. This is not to be wondered at, because basically the sage does not stop at the logical criticism of views as does the philosopher. He goes beyond to the moral criticism of views, since he does not regard these views as abstract, but as linked to praxis and would thus re-evaluate them in accordance with their practical effects. He then goes a step further and examines the views from the point of view of their aesthetic value, thus producing a figural criticism.

We can start by showing how Nursi exercised such a triple criticism on the first connection between philosophy and wisdom (i.e., an inclusive connection). In the writings of Nursi, this inclusive connection is built on two basic principles: ¹) The Principle of Founding Tradition on Reason: this stipulates that tradition (i.e., transferred religious knowledge) should be interpreted on the basis of reason when it appears that it (i.e., tradition) contradicts reason. ²) The Principle of Using Reason in Tradition: this stipulates that rational concepts are means to the explanation of the facts of the tradition.

1. The criticism of the inclusive connection between philosophy and wisdom

a) Logical criticism: Said Nursi holds the view that the founding of tradition on reason, on which the inclusive connection is based, is a baseless option because reason is no less in need of foundation than tradition. Such a foundation cannot come by way of reason itself as long as this reason consists one of “that which is circulating among the people”³ and is not a new kind of reason of which philosophy has no knowledge.⁴ Moreover, this principle leads to the interpretation of tradition in a manner that becomes distorted as the reason known among people does not have the scope, objectivity, or freedom that are required for the understanding of tradition.⁵

Nursi also believes that the principle of using the concepts of reason to explain the meanings of tradition, on which the first kind of connection between philosophy and wisdom is based, does not exalt tradition but, rather, denigrates it by creating the impression that the rational bases are deeper and more stable than the bases of tradition. Moreover, reason is useless in defeating opponents, because it remains confined to warding off objections in an abstract rational way acceptable by the opponents. Reason does not, however, rise to presenting the facts of tradition in a manner that combines the heart and the mind and which could characterize these truths.⁶ It may, indeed, lead to the full distortion of these truths.⁷

b) Moral criticism: Nursi stresses that the adoption by the philosopher of the foundation of tradition on reason makes the heart ache with ills that are surmounted by arrogance as the philosopher creates a criterion for measuring the Revelation with his defective and limited mind, that is, speech with boundless perfection.⁸ He also stresses that the use of philosophical concepts in Qur’anic studies-particularly natural and metaphysical ones-leads those who do so to the deification of nature and the abandonment of the deification of the Creator.

c) Figural criticism: For Nursi, the philosopher who advocates an inclusive connection between philosophy and wisdom is like one who is walking through a tunnel or one who is seeking shelter in a cave,⁹ thus becoming a ghost who is invisible though his identity is known and his traces can be seen. He ends by suffocating in this tunnel before completing the journey. The standing of such a person, as defined in the Qur’an – the essence of wisdom – is that of the misguided.¹⁰

Hence, Nursi thinks that the two philosophers whom he frequently mentions, Al Farabi and Ibn Sina, are among those who are misguided,¹¹ because they advocated an inclusive link between philosophy and wisdom; a view similar to the sophistry of the Christians. Ibn Sina went further than Al Farabi¹² in enacting that view. Since Nursi was deceived by their cunning and believed that their view was true, he himself was on the verge of becoming misguided like them, but for the shining of God’s name Al-Hakim (the All-Wise) to guide him and correct his thoughts and deeds.

Acting on the principle of the inclusive connection between philosophy and wisdom leads a person to become weak in faith and argument, to cling to appearances, to become conceited and misguided.

We turn now to the second mode of connection between philosophy and wisdom, the associative one, to see how Nursi exercised his triple criticism. This mode, as we said, is based on three principles: astonishment, questioning, and proof-finding.

The criticism of the associative connection between philosophy and wisdom.

a) Logical criticism: Regarding the principle of philosophical astonishment,¹³ what actually happens is that philosophy does not act upon a sense of the wondrous and miraculous, but rather on that of the strange and anomalous.¹⁴ There is a wide gap between the two feelings. The first stems from the perfection of creation in things, while the second emanates from the imperfection in those things. Most of philosophical knowledge is built on what is familiar and ordinary. However, when it speculates on what is miraculous or supernatural, philosophy still takes the familiar (maruf) as its basis.

As for the principle of philosophical questioning,¹³ it is uncontrolled in its objectives concerning beings, thus falling into confusion and dissipation in every direction. Such an approach does not attain the required answers, leading the questioner to excessive perplexity or even great torment.¹⁵

Concerning the principle of philosophical proof-finding,¹³ the proof is a series of propositions under perpetual threat of invalidation. If we wish to ward off that threat, we have to supply proof for each of these propositions through another series of propositions that are, in turn, open to invalidation and so on. We have barely warded off invalidation from one series of propositions when we have to bring many others to it, and this process continues incessantly.¹⁶

b) Moral criticism: Since philosophical astonishment fundamentally is a sense of the strange and is never a sense of wonder, it leads the philosopher to two pitfalls: One is “blocking off the extrapolation of lessons”; if philosophy does not wonder at the ordinary and familiar, then it does not enable the philosopher to extrapolate lessons and wisdom from what is ordinary and familiar. The other pitfall is “opening the path to the denial of God”; if philosophy throws a veil of familiarity on things, it prevents the realization of divine power and the acceptance of its infinite graces.

Since philosophical questioning is an uncontrolled process, it leads to two things, both of which are fatal deprivations. One is “that it loses the mystery of the oneness of God.” Raising too many questions without guiding objectives or satisfactory answers betrays the fact that the question is deprived from the mystery of the oneness of God. Were the philosopher aware of that mystery, his questions would revolve on set goals and he would attain the answers to them within the framework of those goals that are derived from the oneness of God.¹⁷ The second is “the loss of the feeling of happiness”, because the philosopher, failing to find answers to his various questions or to achieve responses for his various demands, will find himself in great misery.¹⁸

Since philosophical proof-finding is a chain of propositions that is open to invalidation, it leads to two things, both of which are great evils. One is “clinging to the created causes rather than Creator.” Philosophy confines its evidence-seeking to created beings rather than the Almighty Creator or, as Nursi puts it, philosophy examines at these beings as names and not as particles.¹⁹ Inevitably, such an approach leads the philosopher to the worship of natural causes.²⁰ Second, is “clinging to the self alone.” Just as the philosophizing person examines beings in their natural causes, he also looks at himself in the same way; i.e. as an object,²¹ thus falling into self-worship.²²

c) Figural Criticism: For Nursi, the philosopher who advocates an association between philosophy and wisdom is like one who walks in a vast desert, subjected to terrors on every side, such as the fury of the sea, the danger of storms, or the darkness of the sky. These will scatter his dismembered body along the road and his condition will be like that assigned in the Qur’an to those on whom God’s anger descends.²³

If we compare this figural criticism of the associative mode with the previous figural criticism of the inclusive mode, we will find that those who advocate figural criticism are worse off than those who propound the latter. The fact that the former walks on the face of the earth or under the sky – the symbol of Revelation – and the sun – the symbol of light – indicates that his challenge of the divinity of the All- Wise is far greater than the arrogance of the other philosopher who only seeks a path under the ground, where there is no sun and no sky. Also, the fact that the associative advocate”s dismembered body is thrown by the sea onto the side of the road indicates that his deed is like that of a Pharaoh and he, therefore, deserves the same fate in dying and becoming a lesson to others.²⁴ The other philosopher, the advocate of the inclusive mode, is only seen as a ghost. Hence, his body will not be left behind for people as a lesson, but only his traces will serve that function. Consequently, the great peripatetic philosopher, who is only sparingly mentioned by Nursi, Ibn Rushd, is counted by him among those who are an object of God”s wrath,²⁵ because he advocated an associative mode between philosophy and wisdom and acted accordingly. In this, Ibn Rushd became a renegade, like the rebelling Jews.²⁶ Nursi was also deceived by Ibn Rushd’s cunning and held his opinion to be true. Thus, he also was in danger of being exposed to God”s wrath but for the name of God the Merciful (Al Rahim) shining on him to guide him to the Straight Path. Acting on the principle of association between philosophy and wisdom leads to a person”s losing insight and awareness and failing to admit God”s graces. Such a person will neither be happy, nor saved.

* This is an abridged version of Prof Abdel Rahman’s article which was published in Hira (issues 3 and 4, 2006), a quarterly magazine in Arabic (www.hiramagazine.com).

Notes

1. . This study institutes a basic move in terminology: the word ‘philosophy’ is used to designate the knowledge posited by man, thus speaking of ‘human philosophy,’ but not employing the term ‘Qur’anic philosophy.’ On the other hand the term ‘wisdom’ is used here to designate knowledge revealed by God.
2. . Nursi was actively involved in the social and political life before World War I. After the war he perceived that a religious revival was possible only through an intellectual enlightenment using sciences and spiritual illumination through faith, worship, and good morality. He later called this change of perception as the transition from the Old Said to New Said.
3. . We find this description in the following passage: ‘I saw God”s laws as mountains hanging from the sky. Anyone who clings even to a part thereof will ascend and be happy. I say that anyone who goes against those laws, relying on the mind circulating among men in an attempt to reach the paths of heavens through earthly means, is a fool like the Pharaoh who wanted his minister Haman to build him a tower (of clay to reach the sky).’, The Arab Nuri Mathnawi, p. 165.
4. . He says: ‘It is an established principle that if reason and tradition contradict one another, reason would be deemed the basis and the tradition would be interpreted accordingly. But for this to proceed, the reason should be a genuine one.’ The Polishing Stone of Islam, p. 29.
5. . He says: ‘Know you philosophizing person who upholds reason over tradition and who accordingly interprets the tradition that you distort the tradition as your mind, made rotten by vanity and the immersion in philosophical matters, was not capacious enough for the tradition… Your mind is your shackle and by tradition you are transported.’ The Arab Nuri Mathnawi, p. 190.
6. . He says: ‘In this way, they do not manage to give the true image of Islam conforming to that form of action. They graft the tree of Islam with the twigs of wisdom, which they think deep-rooted, as if they are thus strengthening Islam. But triumphing over the enemies through this mode of action is not of much weight. Also this mode implies some denigration of Islam. Therefore, I abandoned this method and actually demonstrated that Islam”s foundations are so profound and well-established that the deepest bases of philosophy cannot reach them, but must always remain superficial in comparison to them.’ Writings, pp. 569-570.
7. . The Polishing Stone of Islam, p. 35-36.
8. . He says: ‘How ignorant is he who grew vain with the philosophical arts rendering them the criterion for the sacred studies of the Qur’an.’ The Arab Nuri Mathnawi, p. 77. Elsewhere, he says: ‘I have witnessed the growth of the philosophical science in the growth of sickness and seen the growth of sickness in the increase of rational science. For the moral illnesses are conducive to rational sciences just as the latter breed illnesses of the heart.’ Ibid., p. 158.
9. . The symbol of the ‘cave’ in Said Nursi The Sage has the converse significance of the ‘cave’ in Plato and the ‘vault’ in Descartes. For Plato, those who descend into the cave are the ignorant who know only the shadow of things, compared to the philosopher who knows the essences of things themselves (The Republic. Book Seven) For Descartes, they are the blind people who live in utter darkness, compared to the philosopher who lives in bright light (An Essay in Method. Part Six). For Nursi, on the other hand, the one who seeks shelter in a cave is the philosopher himself, whom Plato deems as the truly knowledgeable person, and whom Descartes holds to be the truly insightful person.
10. . He says: ‘Thus, the first path is that of the misguided, described in the Qur’an as the ‘stray’. This is the path of those who fell to the idea of Nature and adopted the ideas of naturalists…’ Words, p. 650.
11. . He says: ‘This earth is “nature” and “natural philosophy”. The tunnel is the path taken by the people of philosophy with their ideas in a bid to reach the truth. The footprints I saw were those of famous philosophers like Plato and Aristotle. The voices I heard were those of cunning ones like Ibn Sina and Al Farabi… Yes, I found sayings and tenets by Ibn Sina in several places, but these voices totally ceased; in a sense he could not make progress. He suffocated.’ Words, p. 648.
12. . Signs of Miraculousness, p. 36.
13. . The ground for the view of associative connection between philosophy and wisdom is the belief that philosophy acts on three principles that are not found in wisdom: One, the Principle of Astonishment: the philosophical act has its origin in the feeling of astonishment vis A vis the effects left on the psyche or the things on the horizon. Two, the Principle of Questioning: the philosopher poses one series of questions after another series, looking for answers to them. Three, the Principle of Proof-finding: in proving its tenets, philosophy relies on intellectual evidence that may attain the highest degree of certainty.
14. . He says: ‘The philosophy reached by man veils the miracles of divine might and the marvels of the Almighty”s mercy by the curtain of uniformities, causing a failure to see the signs of (God”s) oneness under these regularities and these great blessings. It does not show them nor indicate them. However, if philosophy perceives some special peculiarities that depart from custom, it directs its attention and concern to them.’ Annexes, p. 358
15. . He says: ‘If that mind becomes confounded in the mire of misguidance and the denial of God, it becomes an instrument of torture and a cause for disturbance in its combination of the sad pains of the past and the terrible fears of the future.’, Illuminations, p. 19.
16. . He says: ‘The difference between my path in the distilling of benefit from the Qur’an and the method of thinkers and philosophers is that I dig wherever I am and water comes out. They, on the other hand, insist on laying pipes and ducts to bring the water from afar. They build long chains and ladders to the Throne above to bring down the water of life. As they rely on these causes, they have to place millions of proof-keepers all along these lengthy roads to preserve them from the destructiveness of the devils of illusions.’ The Arab Nuri Mathnawi, p. 170.
17. . He says: ‘With the secret of the oneness of God, the sealed secret of the perplexing questions is uncovered. From whence comes the flood of existing beings and the train of creatures? Whither is fate? Why did they come and what are they doing…’, Illuminations, p. 14.
18. . He says: ‘But for the oneness of God, man would have been the most wretched of creatures, the lowest of beings, the weakest of animals, and the saddest and most tortured and pained of sentiments. Illuminations, p. 18.
19. . He says: ‘The Qur’anic view of beings makes them like particles; i.e. they express a meaning that resides elsewhere. They express the epiphany of the Best Names and the Supreme Attributes of the Great Creator that are manifested in beings. On the other hand, the dead look of – materialistic – philosophy mostly views the beings as names [whose meaning resides in them] and its foot thereby slips into the slough of nature.’ Annexes, p. 90.
20. . He says: ‘As for philosophy, it looks at existing beings from the point of view of their aspects that regard their entities and their causes.’ The Arab Nuri Mathnawi, p. 77.
21. . Words, p. 646.
22. . He says: ‘The misguided people of this age ride on the “ego” that roams with them in the valleys of loss. The righteous people cannot serve the Truth except by abandoning the ego. Even if they are right and correct in their use of the ego, they have to leave it behind so that they will not look like the others, because then they would be, like them, suspected of self-worship.’ Writings, p. 549.
23. . He says: ‘The second path alluded to – ‘those who are the objects of God”s anger’ – is that of those who worship causes and consider that creation and creating are the acts of intermediaries, which alone, in their view, are effective. They want to reach the Truth of truths and God, the Exalted, through mind and thought alone like the peripatetic sages.’ Words, p. 650.
24. . This an illusion to the Qur’anic verse: ‘Today we save your body alone to make you a sign for those who come after us. Many are heedless of our signs.’ The Sura Yunus, verse 29.
25. . Nursi avoids mentioning Ibn Rushd by name – contrary to what he did with Al Arabi and Ibn Sina – but he refers to him by referring to the quality he was famous for; i.e. as ‘the Cynic’, since he is the greatest exegete of Aristotle. We do not wish to go into the reasons that led him to such circumspection here. It is enough to say that he may have done so in kindness to Ibn Rushd and as a gesture of politeness to his contemporary followers.
26. . The Signs of Miraculousness, p. 36.