A few years ago, I was invited to present a paper on a panel titled “Teaching for the Post-Anthropocene.” At the time, I was an English teacher, at a high school in England. I was unfamiliar with the word “Anthropocene” and so started an educational journey that took me to the heart of the matter – an understanding of the root causes of environmental decline. My primary sources were Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis, Deep Ecological thought from Arne Naess and Joanna Macy, and the works of Gregory Bateson and Fritjof Capra. These writings, among others, helped me understand that all life on Earth is interconnected and interdependent. Addressing the matter of environmental decline abstractly, in a reductionist way, is thinking about the wicked problem at the same level of consciousness that created it. It is not enough to recycle or change lightbulbs, as Leonardo Di Caprio, the UN Ambassador of Peace for Climate Change, demonstrates in his documentary Before the Flood that what is needed is a shift in perspective – shift in the way we view the world and our place in relation to it.

Fundamentally, the problem of environmental decline is a malady of tension – between the self, society, and nature. Over time, when one begins living in a more connected way, developing intimacy with nature, a deep reverence for life and an awareness of the spirit emerges. The environment’s decline is a sign that modernity is suffering from a crisis of spirituality. Despite the urgency with which humans need to reconnect with nature and the spirit, I believe it is important for a person to discover and find the deep mysteries of life on their own. With guidance, yes – but each of us must relate to, and discover, the world, personally. Becoming connected to and aware of nature highlights the role of the educator in the post-Anthropocene paradigm.

Before diving into the educational offer of this new paradigm, which Thomas Berry calls the Ecozoic era – “the geological era earth is entering when humans live in a mutually enhancing relationship with Earth and the Earth community” – we need to touch briefly on the elements within the present education systems, across the world, that have fed the existence of the Anthropocene.

Through the lens of Paolo Freire, we understand formal, mainstream education is oppressive. It is dehumanizing and moulds people into consumers and workers. Education systems all over the world value academic intelligences (Gardner) over all others. These intelligences are favoured because they serve the economic values the system upholds. These values define what education offers, as well as the way one sees the world and their relationship to it. Education presently preserves patho-adolescence, which few move on from in adult life. This is a term that will be discussed later in this article.

The contemporary education system also perpetuates “The Old Story” – the story of separation. This story divorces humans from nature and the world by “othering” and commodifying it. The world becomes an empty place, devoid of spirit. And the kosmos – a term revived from the Greeks by Von Humboldt to describe the interconnection of all in the universe – becomes a dark, empty void. Because humans are educated and socialized into these values and perspectives, it is understandable that many see the world as a place absent of soul, and they do not recognize or understand the responsibility of guardianship that comes with living life as a human being. Viktor Frankl says, “with great freedom comes great responsibility.” Because many adults are unable to recognise their responsibility to life, is it fair to ask, are we really free? Or are we just poorly educated?

Regenerative education supports the emergence of healthy adults. From the ecozoic perspective, this adult is one “who understands why he is here on Earth, why he was born, and is offering his unique contribution to the more-than-human world” (Plotkin). The soul-centred adult is one who lives with a sense of belonging to the Earth community, and who works with nature and lives with a sense of reverence towards it.

This adult has shifted perception and no longer lives with an Anthropocentric/human-centered worldview. Rather, the adult that emerges lives with an eco/soul-centered sense of belonging. This means one recognises one’s self as being a part of the web of life. One has embodied understanding, that each living being has significance and contributes to the whole in its own unique way. This shift is extremely empowering, because it enables a person to understand and recognize that we are all irreplaceable; that we all carry and hold a gift that no one else can offer to the Earth community. When one begins to live from that gift and shares it with the community of life, the Earth becomes a little more complete.

John Seed, an environmental activist, makes the point clearly. He experienced the shift in his perception while protecting some native rainforest in Australia. He said,

‘I am protecting the rainforest” develops to “I am part of the rain-forest protecting myself. I am that part of the rainforest recently emerged into thinking.’ What a relief then! The thousands of years of imagined separation are over and we begin to recall our true nature. That is, the change is a spiritual one.

When one’s perspective shifts to that of belonging and place, the choices one makes, the values one lives by, and the attitudes one has towards life and one’s self, shift, too. It is this shift that regenerative education serves.

When planning for regenerative education, two points of focus emerge. The first is the support and guidance given to the person as they progress through life, and the second is culture repair – co-creating regenerative culture. If the culture of the place one learns in is not regenerative – that is, connecting the self, society, and nature – and is not conducive to the peace growing from these connections, then growth, flourishing, and individuation are inhibited. The individual needs a healthy, life-enhancing environment to be in, and to thrive, the environment needs a collection of connected people.

The San bushmen, a nomadic hunter/gathering tribe that lives in the Kalahari Desert, offer comprehensive examples of what a connected way of life resembles, and they model how it is lived and shared through their culture. Through his 20+ years of research, Jon Young, an anthropologist and tracker, has come to believe the San people are some of the most connected people in the world. It is with their knowledge, and the knowledge of other wisdom traditions from around the world, that modernity can begin to relearn how to live in a connected way. The challenges come in finding ways to bridge ancient wisdom with modern attitudes and ways of life.

We, in the modern world, have forgotten what it takes to raise and develop healthy, connected human beings.

Jon Young believes there are 64 elements (512project.com) which comprise regenerative culture/culture repair. For these elements to exist, they need a defined social structure. Traditionally, this structure has been called “the village.” In a regenerated system of learning, it is the village that raises and educates the child. The process of education and support for the newborn begins from the moment of birth, if not before. Parents give love and support the independence of the youth to develop into self-reliant adulthood. Aunts and uncles facilitate the emergence of the child’s uniqueness, offering mentoring in ways parents cannot. Grandparents teach children what they need to know, offering healing and support from their wisdom and experience. Such social support is difficult to come by in modern settings and households, because a) the nuclear family rules; b) adults need to work to provide for their families; and c) there has been a breakdown in trust between adults and youth. Within the context of the village, a person has 25-30 people to share stories with. This is far greater than the access any modern human has to intimate and trusting social connection.

The biggest difference that is emerging between The Old Story and The New Story is abstraction/holism. Formal mainstream education judges a human being ready to learn from a curriculum at a set age – usually 4 – and ready to enter the world of work at the age of 18. In these 14 formative years, the person will have learnt enough about the world and acquired the necessary knowledge and competencies to go into the world with qualifications (hopefully) and begin working; or, they will continue learning at a university. The New Story understands education holistically and recognizes it is a shared, collective responsibility to support, mentor, and guide a child and adolescent into true adulthood. Each member of the village can give something unique to the child, enriching the learner’s understanding of their place and journey. The New Story asserts that learning is qualitative and is not time-bound. We all develop and grow in our own ways, at our own paces and rhythms. We each have our own gifts to bring into this world.  

Measuring learning quantitatively overlooks the psycho-social and psycho-spiritual development of a human being. Presently, students may graduate with grades (or not) and be judged ready to go into the world of adulthood, but psycho-spiritually, they may be stuck in patho-adolescence. This refers to a psycho-social stage in life, which many Westerners sleepwalk through. Bill Plotkin, a depth psychologist and the founder of the Animas Valley Institute, defines pathoadolesence as,

an egocentric existence focused upon the attempt to look good to others; to conform and/or to rebel against the ordinary and mainstream; to “get ahead” in the dog-eat-dog competition for material possessions, financial wealth, and social status; and to minimize the experience of challenging realities by way of addictions (whether to substances or to compulsive behaviors such as shopping, impersonal sex, or gambling).

Many remain stuck in the late adolescent psycho-social phase of development due to an absence of the village and an absence of rites of passage, which celebrate or confirm a life transition. Plotkin has refined the four life phases of childhood, adolescence, adulthood and elderhood into eight – that is, two stages per life phase. The model he has defined can be seen below. The life cycle begins and ends in the east and moves clockwise/earthwise around the circle.

This model is revelationary, because it looks at human development soul-centrically. It acknowledges and understands that every human being has a natural rhythm of unfolding and growth, which enables each person to live to the fullness of their potential… if the life-cycle is followed and supported. Each phase is defined by an archetype which speaks to and outlines the qualities, gifts, and tasks that each stage offers a person in their development. One is ready for a rite of passage when one has done the daily work of addressing and meeting the task of that specific developmental stage.

When a person experiences a shift in their center of gravity – observed in regenerative culture by elders and true adults – a rite of passage is orchestrated for the human to navigate and move through. Elders and true adults are able to identify the moments when a person is ready for a rite of passage, because they themselves have walked the path and have gone through the processes themselves. The competencies one needs to have in order to facilitate these learning and initiatory processes are completely different from the skillset of a teacher operating in a system of formal education. Comparing and analyzing the differences between “Mentors of Connection” and “Guides to the Soul” to “Teachers of Subjects” promises to be an insightful exploration of specific roles within regenerative education. However, this will need to be explored at a later time.

A question to ask, at this point is: how can the holistic support of the village be offered to a person living in the industrialized/industrializing worlds, allowing them to live in a healthy, connected way?

Over time, in the most developed parts of the world, I foresee increasing numbers of people moving away from cities, returning to the land and community/village life. This movement and transition of people can be seen as a shift towards neo-egalitarianism. It is not enough to move onto the land with good intentions and high ideals; one needs to understand what regenerative culture is, and, with this understanding, one needs to begin building the village and repairing culture. This is necessary, if one is to begin co-creating the life enhancing reality that is presently emerging across the world.

There are pockets of regenerative culture that exist already, yet we, as an industrialized/industrializing population, are a long way from realizing “local autonomy and decentralisation” (Naess). I believe the early adopters have already begun to make these transitions, yet the shift and tipping point will take longer than our lifetimes to occur. This invites the intergenerational perspective. The first peoples of North America practice the wisdom of thinking seven generations ahead. When we expand our thinking and consciousness to imagine intergenerational transition, it is possible to live with greater faith and hope, knowing that our lives are a part of something far greater than what we are living now. What we create with our lives, whilst we live, can continue to serve and be built upon by the generations who come after us.

Soulcentrism and Nature Connection are needed in today’s world and are central to a regenerative system of education: these methodologies support the emergence of human beings who are capable of leading and shaping the future of life on Earth. The soul-centered and connected adult is capable of being an artisan of cultural change. Such a person lives with the eight attributes of connection: inner happiness; vitality; a commitment to mentoring and paying it forward; empathy and respect for nature; being truly helpful with vision activated; having full awareness, full aliveness, love and forgiveness, and quiet mind; creativity; and presence. These are the qualities of true leadership, and it is these qualities that empower any person to lead and consciously contribute to The Great Turning, which Joanna Macy defines as “the essential adventure of our time. It involves the transition from a doomed economy of industrial growth to a life-sustaining society committed to the recovery of our world.”

Life, illness, and death are basic human conditions. But at the same time, it is a very individual decision which specific meaning you ascribe to these elements. These meanings also affect the behavior patterns of our life and its consequences. Ascriptions of meaning can – considered without any judgment – be of religious, nationalist, pluralist, and atheistic nature, or be supported from the symbiosis of several ways of thinking.

In the training of health care professionals and in public lectures, the author of this article noticed that illness has a very negative image: the color which stands for physical and mental discomfort is a deep black, while shiny white is the color of health. Consequently, modern medicine therapies have been developed that do not necessarily try to diagnose the causes of diseases, but most of all combat the declared enemy. For this purpose, high-dose drugs, radiation and other weapons are out in the field, according to the motto: attack is the best defense.

The doctors make every effort to win the battle, but there is a risk that the emotional state of the ill person falls into despair – because it is taught to him that his new physical condition is an unnatural, undesirable condition. Thus, a melancholy forms, which reduces the quality of life dramatically. The patient regards the illness as invincible.

In the following, I will present some perspectives that renowned scholar Said Nursi (d. 1960) demonstrated decades ago. They are still powerful today. In my opinion, they harbor the potential to raise the quality of life not only of the ill, but also of healthy people.

In his treatise “The Twenty-fifth Gleam: 25 Remedies for the Sick”¹ Said Nursi throws 25 views (Turkish: Deva² ) on the phenomenon of illness. His outlook could assist in transforming the negative picture of illness into a positive one.

What makes a shift in perspective so important?

Anyone who prepares himself while he or she is a healthy person, if they later catch a more serious illness, will benefit from this text. Nursi’s thoughts on the meaning of illness and potential remedies can play an important role in preparation. Those who internalize his message can help prevent the emotional fall into depression and may instead hope for a cure.

Said Nursi’s first view presents its readers with the understanding that illness should not be seen as a problem that brings bitterness into life, but that you can also draw strength out of it. There may, as said before, be different ascriptions of meaning to human life, but ultimately all people agree that life is something precious and offers a variety of opportunities. The direction of our lives depends on which use we make of these opportunities.

Those who consider illness as something negative will experience every illness as a curse. Such an attitude has a negative impact on the patient and their environment and turns them very pessimistic. They might castigate themselves, and ask questions like: “Why is it me of all people who has ​​this disease?” In extreme cases, this can lead the patient to become delusional and withdraw from society. A shift in perspective, however, can release positive energy and let sorrow and pain melt away.

Those who recognize the opportunities offered by life and appreciate the efforts and labors of everyday life as something positive will concede that even diseases have a meaningful function – for themselves and humanity as a whole.

Nursi says that ill people perceive time differently, which enables them to observe their environment from a more passive perspective. This passivity is supposed to tear modern, urbanized people from the hustle and bustle of everyday life and move them to a pause. It decelerates the lives of those affected and leads them to horizons healthy people find difficulty to access.

Nursi’s second view goes to the role of prayer which he defines in two forms: positive and negative prayers. He refers to prayers like ritual worship, fasting, supplication, and other forms of remembrance as “positive” (müspet) prayers. “Negative” (menfi) prayer on the other hand is attaining awareness and knowledge of one’s own vulnerability and mortality – which is more likely to arise in moments of illness rather than any other time – as a result of which one turns to God in praise of His ultimate power and infinity. Nursi signifies these positive and negative prayers as the second remedy.

The insight into our own transience, which is the third remedy, allows the ill person to recall their past mistakes, many of which might have been forgotten, and allows them to reconcile with themselves and their fellow humans. According to Nursi, this allows a person to realize they are not as perfect and as infallible as they thought. Illness makes people honest: honest with themselves and with others. The confession of the own fallibility is tantamount to an admission of human weakness and mortality.

Viewed from this perspective, the question arises as to whether illness itself is a cure for mankind. It conveys us new views and leads us to reconsider our previous positions. The ill person becomes an observer, and he finally has time to start thinking. As said by Nursi, he realizes that mankind may be considered the crown of creation. But man’s frailty, his aging, and also the health problems of other people make him realize that life on earth is not all there is – a realization that opens his eyes and takes him out of the darkness into the light. Becoming aware of one’s mortality takes away any thoughtlessness. It causes a person to shed laziness and reflect on their obligations.

If the patient manages to do so, they will feel gratitude and be patient, not least in dealing with physical ailments. This gratitude and patience is what Nursi refers to as the fourth remedy. For Nursi, the body is not the property of man, but rather a loan, which he may not dispose of freely. Suffering is to be endured, since it can do some good, too. Nursi characterizes it as a kind of bonus, which God the ultimate owner of our body grants to us, and we should not protest against it.

Chronic diseases or disabilities, which are seen very negatively in today’s society, can be reinterpreted positively in this way because, as Nursi asserts, they bring a gain in knowledge compared that we cannot achieve when healthy. As a result of their illness, they understand new things that healthy people cannot, just as blind, deaf, or dumb people perceive their environment differently, and sometimes more sharply, than people without physical limitations.

Each person strives for well-being, mercy, and forgiveness, and every sorrow and misfortune also harbors rays of mercy in it. From behind the veil of the illness many quite pleasant insights can emerge. A new consciousness arises, and thus many people gain the courage to take risks and reposition oneself in life.

This maturity Nursi describes as the fifth remedy and it can be observed especially in young ill people. Because of their illness, and in contrast to their peers, they have to cope with issues that seem to contradict their youth. They do not fall into the typical noise of youth and are relieved of thoughtlessness and of the pressures of everyday life.

From this point of view, health, for some people, can be even a calamity that can make their heads spin and blind, and lets them lose sight of the fact that their life does not last forever.

Conclusion

Even these first 5 of 25 views on the subject of illness show that not everything, which is interpreted as negative, is actually negative. A shift in perspective can often work wonders.

Nevertheless, such a shift in perspective appears quite disconcerting initially in our modern society in which health equals to a gift and illness to a disaster. If we have considered diseases as the enemy for so long, why should we suddenly welcome disease? A notion that a disease may also enrich the patient and their friends and family is a useful approach. Surely, the thought that positive thinking can influence the illness (coping), and even contribute to the healing process, is quite common. However, the angle shift described by Said Nursi goes much further. And in my eyes, there is no doubt that it is able to significantly improve the quality of a patient’s life and environment.

Illness allows ill persons to pull out from everyday life, at least for some time. Thereby, it gives them new insights and opens doors that probably would have remained closed if they had stayed healthy. Illness allows a refocusing of which we can benefit from as individuals and communities.

Erdogan Karakaya is pursuing a master’s degree in history in Heidelberg, Germany.

Footnotes

1. Nursi, Said. 2009. 25 Remedies for the Sick, the Twenty-fifth Gleam, NJ: Tughra Books.
2. Deva in Turkish actually means cure, resort, and solution. In this article it is also understood as view or view angle.

In this work we study a verse from the Qur’an, the 47th verse of the Sura al-Dhariyat (The Winds that Scatter), under the light of new discoveries in the field of astrophysics. We note that recent evidence about the accelerating expansion of the universe is also strongly consistent with this verse, although this has shocked the scientific community. In the last part of the article, we discuss possible relations of “metaphysical dimensions” and the concept of “the seven layers” with the word “sama” (translated in to English as “heaven”) as mentioned in the verse.

The existence of the universe is perhaps one of the greatest mysteries in science and philosophy. No convincing argument has been ever put forward that has enabled us to understand this amazing event, not since the beginning of modern science. Religions like Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, on the other hand, explain that the Creator built our robust universe directly out of physical nothingness, independent of any cause. Therefore, the initial creation of such universe would be impossible to explain physically (M. F. Gulen, from his conference on “Evolution and reality”).

In his translation of the relevant verse, S. Yildirim has noted that God keeps the universe expanding and He will continue to do so. Yildirim attributes two meanings to the word musiun in the verse; the first is the owner of great power, strength and wealth; the second is one who expands. Thus, it should not be a surprise to learn that this verse is indeed describing a continually-expanding universe. This might further lead Muslims to think that the Creator has not left the universe unattended after the Big Bang, but rather it is He who has kept creating and expanding it.

In the 1920’s a discovery was made that completely changed our perception of space. It was discovered that distant stars depart from the solar system and leave us even more and more alone in dark space. Then, Fr. Georges-Henri Lemaître, a Belgian astrophysicist, mathematician, and Catholic priest, proposed the idea of the expanding universe. Despite its finite size, it was believed that the universe was expanding.

We can explain this fact simply by an analogy. Think of a toy balloon with spots on it. Mark one of those spots and inflate the balloon. As we inflate it, we observe that all other spots on the surface of the balloon move away from the marked one. So, if we replace the balloon with our universe, the spots will be the stars and planets. If the universe is expanding indeed, then we expect them to be moving away from each other. In other words, the distances between heavenly bodies must be increasing.

Unfortunately, we don’t have a gigantic ruler to measure such immense distances. However, there are other means, such as measuring wave frequencies. Consider the following analogy: Someone throws one ball every second toward a target. Assume that balls travel with constant velocity. If the thrower is stationary, the target will receive one ball every second. However, if the thrower is moving towards the target, it will receive balls more frequently because the balls will be less spaced out. The converse is true if the thrower is moving away from the target. So it is actually the wavelength which is affected; as a consequence, the perceived frequency is also affected. That is, the distances between the waves emitted by objects moving away from us (wavelength) must be increasing, so the frequency decreasing. Likewise, think of an ambulance siren coming towards you and going away from you. It is a good example showing that while an acoustic source that is approaching us emits a higher frequency, the same source radiates lower frequency when going away from us. In physics this is known as the Doppler effect.

Red shift

This phenomenon does not only occur with sound waves, but also with electromagnetic waves. When we think of the spectrum of light, violet at one end has the shortest wavelength and red at the other end has the longest wavelength of visible light. So, any wave of light shifting toward red means the source is moving away from us. It has been determined that the frequency of light emitted by the elements within distant stars shift to a lower frequency, which is called a red shift.

It is this shift that makes astrophysicists think that the universe is expanding. One mustn’t be confused by red shift. This terminology is just used to explain in what direction the frequency is actually shifting on the spectrum. Those signals captured from distant stars have a much smaller frequency (much higher wavelength) than that of red light and they are indeed in the microwave regime and shifting to even much smaller frequency radio waves.

In 2002, an article presenting new evidence of the accelerating expansion of the universe was published by the Royal Astronomical Society. It was not so long ago, only five years, that general opinion concurred with a decelerating expansion. However, the first evidence found by two astronomers in that year led us into a universe that expands in an accelerating fashion, contrary to previous views. This result was absolutely unexpected, because many scientists believed that expansion would slow down due to gravity. Another interesting fact is that if space were to cease expanding, this would be in contradiction to the above verse. God, however, by never allowing this to happen, shows how futile the actions of those who deny His verses are and how extensive His power is, as well as how purposefully He creates.

Dark energy

The groups who worked in the above study figured out, from the brightness of supernovas in distant galaxies, that the universe must expand more and more in the future due to a peculiar dark energy within it. The concept of dark energy was first postulated by Einstein, who named it the “cosmological constant.” However, since this did not fit in well with his theory of general relativity, he withdrew it and said that it was a scientific blunder. Since then, dark energy has had a rather controversial history.

A team of 27 astronomers, directed by Professor Efstathiou of Cambridge University, proposed strong evidence supporting the existence of dark matter, based on completely novel techniques. Their results, which were consistent with previous supernovas, showed that the universe is indeed full of dark matter. Professor Efstathiou thinks that the explanation of dark energy might include additional dimensions like creation (Big Bang) as well. Fr. Lemaître also proposed the expanding universe theory at an opportune time since Edwin Hubble would soon release his red shift observations that strongly supported an expanding universe and, consequently, the Big Bang theory. Here, the Big Bang is seen as the beginning of a continuous expansion.

The verse seems to tell us miraculously that the expansion of the universe will not cease, despite our limited knowledge of the physical reason for its acceleration.

The Hubble Telescope

Another article, published in Nature, presents us the first and deepest picture of space taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. This caused the astronomers to compete in solving the mysteries of the arts of God. The picture, also known as the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, was broadcasted and published in various programs and journals. It has not only shown us the farthest stars of the universe, but the youngest as well. It was very difficult to detect such weak light with the former technology. This picture reveals the embryonic universe, with an age of only 500 million years old. Estimated age of the universe is 13-14 billion years. Three physicists from American Natural History Museum in New York started a competition to publish an article on the Ultra Deep Field picture after the data was disclosed. They hope to answer many questions about the past and future universe. A group at the Stony Brook University, New York, directed by Kenneth Lanzetta, analysed the embryonic samples in the picture to try to discover when various galaxies had been born and how they had evolved. Two other groups are studying the motions of stars and galaxies, as the picture is a result of data collected over a month.

Having looked at the expansion of universe under the light of recent discoveries, now we turn our attention to two other arguments that could be relevant to expansion. Namely, ether (a substance which it is believed fills up the vast universe and which is the ultimate building block of the space), and the seven-layer-universe.

Despite the Michelson-Morley experiment, which argued against theory of luminiferous ether, the propagation of electric, light, or heat in space shows the existence of a substance through which they flow. The Michelson-Morley experiment is nothing more than just a test of the non-existence of certain qualities of ether. For example, in order to show the existence of photons, of which light is made up, we cannot go beyond showing the features of photons. In other words, depending on how we have defined its qualities, we can observe different aspects in the photon, ether, or anything else. In fact, even today, we don’t really know what a photon really is, although we observe its affects every day. In short, it is not possible to show the non-existence of phenomena that cannot be absolutely defined. Instead, we can only test the existence of the properties that we have defined and attributed to them, and thus we better understand their nature of existence in the context of those pre-defined qualities. Hence, the existence of ether is still controversial and needs more thorough research.

Seven layers

Regarding the seven-layer-universe, on the other hand, how is it possible for ether to manifest itself in seven heavens? It may be that these seven layers are not all posed above our heads, but rather that they may be found one with another. The universe is composed of many systems and networks that are the building blocks of their counterparts on larger scales. Each system is governed by laws, which differ slightly from one another. Inside the atom there exists a proton with its unique organization and in a proton we find quarks. For example, communication between protons and electrons is mediated by the electromagnetic force, while the quarks inside the protons communicate via the strong force. These interleaved circles show us that the universe is indeed composed of numerous layers.

We may use these layers for the metaphysical world as well. The human being is not only composed of matter, but also has a mind, a soul, and intelligence. Although these components are accepted as existing by all, their exact nature has not yet been explained by positive sciences.

It seems that the universe is composed of at least two different worlds: The material world (physical) and the immaterial (metaphysical) world. Are these two worlds completely separate, or do they have some features in common? In fact, the existence of humanity might prove to be this common set. But, it may also be true for the universe itself. Nursi states that the distant galaxies, stars and planets are not empty, but home to many spirits and angels who have their own consciences. Thus, one can say that despite the boundaries which separate these two worlds, such as different numbers of temporal and spatial dimensions, they constitute a whole, the Universe. The interaction between them will never fail as long as the universe exists.

The existence of two separate worlds is not that difficult to believe, but there is more:

It is He Who (prepared the earth for your life before He gave you life, and) created all that is in the world for you (in order to create you – the human species – and make the earth suitable for your life); then He directed (His Knowledge, Will, Power, and Favor) to the heaven, and formed it into seven heavens. He has full knowledge of everything. (Baqara 2:29)

The Qur’an calls the heaven where the sun, moon and stars are the lowest heaven or the heaven of the world (Mulk 67:5). The other six heavens may be the heavens of the worlds of the Hereafter.1 We are not sure whether this seven-layer heavens can only be attributed to the physical universe. It might be able to apply to the universe as a whole, with its all seen and unseen layers as well. Even the worlds of angels and spirits may be expanding in accordance with the laws therein, to show how the power and the wealth of God are comprehended in those worlds as well. Although our Earth is finite, the expansion may not be restricted to our finite world, but it may continue in infinite worlds as well.

It is possible that the space being filled with ether has an important role in paving the orbits of planets or stars, as well as other heavenly bodies. We believe that future studies on dark matter, ether, and string theory will help us to better understand the expansion process of the universe.

Note

1. What the Qur’an means by seven heavens has been interpreted in different ways. For further information see Unal, 2006, p. 19.

References

• Ünal, Ali, The Qur’an with Annotated Interpretation in Modern English, The Light, Inc., New Jersey: 2006.
• Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 330, 21 (2002).
• Nursi, S., The Words, The Light, Inc., Istanbul: 2005.