Islamic Leaders Seek to Marry Muslim with Modern
published by Science and Spirit Magazine

by Mike Martin

Half a world away -- in a place many Westerners consider dark and foreboding -- a debate is raging between academic scholars and religious fundamentalists about how to reconcile modern science with Muslim doctrine.

Recent editorials in mid-East newspapers shed light on this other side of Islam, where the teachings of Mohammed are considered a mandate to create -- not a call to destroy.

In a recent edition of Iran's Tehran Times, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, told students that by "depending on the country's proud history, rich culture, and special potential," their nation would soon "exceed the current limits of science and progress."

In a bit of erroneous political bluster, Ali Khamenei attributed the first-ever production of stem cells to Iranian scientists, whom he said made the alleged breakthrough by staying true to "Islamic teachings."

The son of renowned 20th century poet and philosopher Mohammed Iqbal has a more collegial take on the issue. Drawing from his father's own storied legacy, Pakistani Supreme Court Justice Javid Iqbal recently opined in the Times of India about a "key contemporary dilemma facing the Muslim community: how to reinterpret Islamic thought in the light of modern experience."

Iqbal says his father believed "the texture of scholastic Islamic theology -- rooted in Greek speculative sciences -- had broken down and required reconstruction."

Rebuilding the scholarly Islam of old, Iqbal writes, requires "the study of theology in the light of modern scientific thought," a practice that would "strengthen the faith of believers" -- an idea that runs counter to the preaching of Muslim fundamentalists, who equate "modern" with "Western" and "evil."

"Javid Iqbal is asking a question as old as the debate itself," says American University Islamic Studies chair Akbar Ahmed, widely regarded as the world's best-known scholar on contemporary Islam. "Can we reconcile our faith with modern science, or is science godless?"

To answer that question, Javid Iqbal "is continuing the vision and mission of his father" says Ahmed, a close friend of Iqbal's and former High Commissioner of Pakistan to Great Britain. "Mohammed Iqbal clearly established the point that Islam is reconcilable with science."

Islam and science share a long partnership and the idea they need reconciliation seems ironic to Ahmed, who refers to the "Islamic zeal for learning" and the "great days of Muslim scholarship."

Long before terror and destruction dominated the image of Islam, creative genius was a long-standing tradition. In fields as diverse as mathematics, astronomy, pathology, medicine, and engineering, Muslim scientists with names such as al-Haythem, al-Birani, Ibn Zuhr, and al-Biruni wrote the volumes that would later be adapted and borrowed by such Western icons as Roger Bacon and Leonardo da Vinci.

"It was the Muslims who kept the lamp of learning burning while the Christian world imploded into the dark ages," says St. Lawrence University physics professor Aileen O'Donoghue. During that time, "we got our numbers, the concept of zero, and many of the rules of Algebra -- 'Al Gebra,' loosely translated as 'The Thing' -- from the Arab world."

But in recent centuries, colonialism and fundamentalism conspired to drive science and Islam apart.

"European military and economic superiority took over, and almost all of the Muslim world was colonized," says California State University Northridge Islamic studies director Amir Hussain.
"Knowledge is highly prized in Islam," adds Ahmed. "But fundamentalist Muslim rulers have hounded Islamic scholars for centuries."

Autocratic regimes "find it useful to espouse the rhetoric of faith, because people respect that language, are reluctant to oppose it," Hussain tells Science and Spirit. "This is how religions shore up dictators -- by encircling them with words of power."

Scholars, the autocrats know, check their facts but "many Muslims are not religiously literate," says Hussain. "They are often told that something is in the Qur'an or the Hadith and they have no way of checking."

Justice Iqbal blames the same conservative religious leaders -- the Mullahs -- his father often criticized for exploiting this theological illiteracy and driving parts of Islam into a dark age.

"My father's advice was unequivocal: Muslims should not let themselves be exploited by the semi-literate Mullah," Iqbal writes in his Times editorial.

"Mohammed Iqbal went out of his way to expose the intellectual bankruptcy of the Mullahs -- the same Mullahs who have once again taken the lead in Islam," Ahmed tells Science and Spirit.
For his troubles -- and a famous poem he wrote entitled Shikwa -- Mohammed Iqbal received a Mullah-inspired "fatwa" condemning him.

"There is a wide-spread perception -- particularly among non-Muslims -- that Islam does not permit dissent, and without dissent, you certainly cannot have science," Ahmed says. "Shikwa -- and its wide popularity among Muslims -- laid that myth to rest."

Based on John Milton's famous poems, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, Shikwa and its sequel -- Jawab-e-Shikwa -- follow a Muslim commoner as he dissents by complaining about his oppressed existence to Allah, the God of Islam.

Allah responds -- with yet another dissenting opinion.

His answer essentially accuses the Mullahs of being among "the most hypocritical of all people in society," Ahmed explains.

Moving away from the Mullahs and back to the "glory years of Islam, when cities like Cordoba or Baghdad were the centers of learning and civilization" is a priority among literate and educated Muslims, says CSU's Hussain.

Indeed, while the Western world still waits to hear from Islamic religious leaders, the loudest condemnations of 9/11 and Osama Bin Laden -- though not widely publicized -- have come from Islamic scholars and academics.

"They look to the past for the glory of Islam," says Hussain. "They ask why the Muslim world cannot again be what it once was."