.
However, the main problem I have with Disaffected Muslim, is that she offers no direction or thrust for the apparent problems in the Muslim world (of which there are many). I do not understand what
is the fundamental point of her arguments. Revival? Reform? Wholesale secularisation? It is one thing to be angry and unhappy and let off a bit of steam (which we all do from time-to-time), but quite another to offer some proactive advice and channel this anger into some useful positive action.
Instead, and this is not meant as an insult rather a criticism of her incessant need to re-hash classical Orientalist polemics, she seems to have become the archetypal 'Muslim Orientalist', so much derided by Fazlur Rahman, Muhammad Iqbal, Shibli Nu'mani and others on the Indian subcontinent. That is to say, she is content with formulating opinions which criticise Muslims, Islam, and Islamic history, (criticism is good, but anyone with the appropriate knowledge can criticise), but that she offers nothing at a
level, apart from allusions to Westernisms (or perhaps her tongue-in-cheek comment regarding the
School of Islamic law - a Freudian slip if ever I saw one!). For it is at the normative level that, in reality, only Muslims, disaffected or otherwise, can offer some real hope to Islamicity in general.
And as a brief history of Islamic revival and reform shows, Westernisms have made things worse, often of not fault of their own, other than that they are intelletcually bankrupt and shallow in their line of thinking (i.e. the whole world is Western Europe and North America).
Then again, perhaps it is not her job to suggest some changes at a normative level, and only with the gathering momentum of frustration by people like her, will our leadership, religious or secular, make any attempt to address these issues. Maybe I am being too hasty?
In addition, perhaps I should remind the unhappy Muslimah, that if we really want to criticise our texts, sources and beliefs in general, we need only walk to our local university libraries and take out a book by, say, Wansborough, Jeffery, Goldizher, Schact, de Boer etc. I can bring up a whole host of names, simply because I was were she is; if not way further out of "the Fold". There is nothing spectacularly new she is offering us when she, for example, talks about the integrity of the Qur'anic text. The "traditional" view has been criticised for sometime now,
Don't get me wrong. There is plenty in which she has my full support. She has exposed the hypocritical nature of Muslims, in general, especially with regards to 'justice' in her
Regardless of my criticisms of her, it is good to see that a Muslim has the verve to even post these kind of words. Especially, given the fact that Muslims are often required to develop a close-minded mentality once inside "the Fold", and fall in line.
:: this was posted by thabet at 23:20
Against Muslim apologetics
It has become common to hear of, and read of, the 'scientific miracle' of the Qur'an. Pamphlets, booklets, conferences, papers, debates and lectures; all have been used to disseminate the idea that the Qur'an contains 'facts' which have been discovered by 'modern science', but were unknown at the time of the Prophet (p), or were unknowable because of the sophistication we required in uncovering these 'facts'. The obvious conclusion the Muslim draws is that, the Qur'an was revealed by an All-Knowing God. For how else could the Prophet have know about embryology, the theory of relativity, quantam physics, red giants and white dwarves, and cures for, among other diseaes and conditions, diabetes, tuberculosis and rheumatism, all of which are claimed to be 'scientific facts' revealed in the Qur'an?
Yet, the question that has never been raised in Muslim circles is, do these claims have any substance? Can they stand up against a stringent scientific, philogical and literary criticism? The simple answer, I am afraid to report, is no.
Unfortunately, in our desire to "prove" the foundation of our faith, Muslims have resorted to these poor polemics and pushed what, in my opinion, is nothing more than second-rate pseudo-scholarship. Not only is the 'science' poor in these works, the methodology employed to prove these 'scientific-facts' is less than scientific, and further, the whole endeavour makes a mockery of the Qur'an and its purpose.
All this has been noted by
Imran Aijaz, a Muslim student of philosophy, based (I believe) in New Zealand. He has set out a critical examination of the 'scientific miracles' apologia, in his ongoing paper,
"Evidentialist Apologetics in Islam" [1]. The
second part of this paper is of importance to us, because this is where the criticism of the scientific miracles is made.
Aijaz's paper is a very good read, which I recommend to all interested in examining an example of an arbitary Qur'anic hermeneutic, which (as far as my understading takes me) has no
real basis in Islamic scholarship, whether traditional or contemporary. Below I have highlighted some of his main points, and I have also added a few comments of my own. The main thrust of his criticism is centred on the flawed methodology employed by Muslim apologists.
To begin with Aijaz outlines the two main sources for the apologetic argument, Maurice Bucaille's popular work,
The Bible, The Qur'an, and Science [2], and Keith Moore's paper to an Islamic journal, "A Scientist's Interpretation of References to Embryology in the Qur'an".
[3] Further, he provides a concise summary of another Muslim critic of the scientific-apologetic argument, Ziauddin Sardar, who is most well-known for his works on postmodernism, scientific and cultural stidues as well issues on Islam.
The question posed by Sardar is an interesting one:
"[The scientific-miracles apologia] opens the Quran to the counter argument of Popper's criteria of refutation: would the Quran be proved false and written off, just as Bucaille writes off the Bible, if a particular scientific fact does not tally with it, or if a particular fact mentioned in the Quran is refuted by modern science?"
Personally, I have never met a person who made the purposeful decsion to "become a Muslim" based on some 'scientific fact' which he or she thought existed in the Qur'an (or the
Ahadeeth literature, for this is also apparently replete with scienctific discoveries). It isn't that superficial, I hope. And speaking from my own experiences, I have not "become a Muslim" because I was so awed at the "fact" that DNA or a cure for some condition or some other miraculous 'scientific fact' was 'found' to be in one or more verses of the Qur'an. No, my 'faith' is something best described as being 'organic', something a lot deeper than the shallowness of this supposed 'mircale'. Why then do we expect a non-Muslim to buy this nonsense?
The main problem which Aijaz highlights is the arbitary nature of this 'scientific hermeneutic'. He asks:
"Why should we think certain verses are really modern, scientific statements any more than we should consider them as allegorical, metaphorical or symbolic verses?"
It is this seemingly
ad hoc methodology, which is the bone of contention, for both Aijaz (and myself). Verses are plucked from the Qur'an, more often than not in their English translation (some of which are not very good I have been advised by people far more qualified than myself) and then given the most random "scientific" exegesis. Why, of all the interpretations of a verse in the Qur'an, must a Muslim take the one which accords to 'modern science'? What happened to the literal, the allegorical and the mystical interpretations? Why are they not considered?
The Muslim argues that this verse is indeed a 'scientific fact' simply because he assumes this must be the right interpretation! It is a tragedy, as Aijaz notes, that even educated Muslims cannot see the flaw of this kind of thinking (that is the circularity of the argument).
What is even more intriguing is that, very often (and this is based solely on my own experiences, so is merely anecdotal) the same people arguing for the 'scientific hermeneutic', that is to say a radically new interpretation of the Qur'an (for no one before has attempted this), are the same people who reject any form of reunderstanding or reworking of the legal (and moral) based on the Qur'an. On the one hand they shall savage any fresh look at our sources (the primary being the Qur'an), warning Muslims who engage in such that they are (quote) "deviating from the true path" of the earlier generations. Yet on the other they promote this 'science' in the Qur'an argument, knowing full-well that no one from the "earlier generations" ever engaged in such polemics! The double standards and circularity are quite apparent and 'science' and 'reasoning' are conspicuous by their absence!
We now move onto, perhaps, the most interesting point, one which Sardar alluded to, and which Aijaz is more upfront about:
"No scientific miracles apologist has thoroughly laid out his rules for scientific exegesis, nor defended the legitimacy of interpreting the Qur'an scientifically."
Would a Muslim be able to provide a stringent methodolody for his scientific hermeneutic? For when we try and interpret the Qur'an we resort to a methodology. We have the overall Classical method
[4]; we have a more contemporary methodology of the Farahi-Islahi school, and we have other modern approaches
[5]. We also have a whole array of the various Shi'a schools. But the single thing which marks all of these techniques of interpretating the Qur'an is the layout of a set of rules of exegesis, which they try and adhere to, and which others can comment and criticise as neccesary. Where is such a hermeneutical model from the scientific apologists (Zakir Naik, El-Fenedy et al.)? It seems non-existent.
In addition all books of commentry and interpretation, would on occassion present several interpretations of a verse, e.g. Scholar A says such and such and this is his proof, Scholar B says so and so and that is his proof. The interpretator then usually provides his opinion based on his sources and sees which of the previous interpretations agrees with his. Has such a recourse been made by Muslims who promote the 'scientific-miracles' argument? Of course not!
Though the Muslim apologist is quick to pick up the works of a non-Muslim like Bucaille and Moore in promoting his 'scientific' argument, criticism of the Qur'an,
based on science, especially by a non-Muslim, is surely so heretical that is must cause alarm among the promoters of this cheap polemic, many of whom are not scientists and so have little understanding of the scientific methdology. For if they had known that by accepting 'modern science' as a criterion by which the contents of the Qur'an are judged, then surely they would have realised that science allows for the method of
falsification. And when we apply 'modern science' to the Qur'an, in order to refute its contents, we find that it
can be
falsified. For what does 'modern science' say about virgin briths, raising of the dead, staffs which turn to serpents and the existnece of
Jinns? Absolutely nothing. This negative evidence 'refutes' the Qur'an, if we follow the apologists line of thinking to its logical conclusion (i.e. making 'science' the criterion of the 'truth' of the Qur'an).
But are Muslim apologists about to open the Qur'an to 'modern science'? The answer is again all too obvious, and I shall let the reader decide. In addition, we are now into the question of who is the arbiter of such interpretations? A classically-trained scholar will have a knowledge of Arabic, its grammer and sources, of other commentaries, of the
Ahadeeth literature which is used to interpret the Qur'an, of the
'Ijma of previous generations and so on. But he has no understanding of 'modern science', let alone a sound knowledge of the philosophy of science to allow him to work out a sound hermeneutic. So who interprets? A 'modern scientist'? Moore did so, but he was no philologist, so paid no attention to principals of exegesis, relying on interpretations. In addition, if we do let 'modern scientists' provide a 'scientific interpretation' of the Qur'an, what is the scope for a non-Muslim scientist to interpret the Qur'an, reject it on the basis of 'modern science', and then have Muslims accept his argument?
None, despite his scientific credentials. We can see, that this sort of endeavour has opened a can of worms, which the Muslim apologist has no wish to answer.
It is this hypocrisy, whereby the Muslim accepts 'scientific' proof to support his holy text, but rejects it when it refutes the Qur'an, and it is this 'unscientific' thinking, which Aijaz finds irritating:
"I find this sort of attitude to be very curious, inconsistent vis-à-vis the coherence of one's religious beliefs, and downright irritating [...] Apologists like Naik want to have their cake and eat it too. On one hand, they argue that their belief is scientifically unfalsifiable, because belief in the Qur'an for them is supra-rational, and it is the ultimate yardstick. On the other hand, they are reasoning with the unbeliever that it would be irrational for him or her to reject the scientific evidence for the Qur'an which has been put on the table, proving once and for all that it is God's Word. And yet, this sort of contingency is precisely which the apologist rejects. For if negative scientific evidence was put on the table, attempting to refute the Qur'an (say, for example, the impossibility of virgin births, non-existence of jinns, etc) he would simply shift the goal-post and argue that it is a category mistake to judge the Qur'an using science. The absurdity and hypocrisy of this position is glaring."
Aijaz proposes that a Muslim, who is in general a fideist (that is one who places 'faith' over 'reason'), remains a fideist and rejects this apologia which makes no sense and is so far from 'science', that I am often in shock that well-educated Muslims even bother to engage in this miracle-mongering.
My argument would be similar, but I shall add the following. As the apologist himself points out, to judge the Qur'an by 'modern science' is a false attempt. That is because it never claims it has provided man with some far-fetching 'scientific' miracle. It may draw mans attention to physical phenomena (insofar as they are 'scientific facts'), but these are something which was already known (the existence of the Sun and the Moon, the day and the night, and so on). The Qur'an calls itself a "book of guidance"
[6]. What kind of guidance? Surely page after page it exhorts man to keep
Taqwa (loosely translated as 'God consciousness' or a 'fear of God'), so it can really only mean
moral guidance. And if this is the entire theme of the Qur'an, then aren't all the verses to be understood in light of the moral precepts in reason and revelation?
Whatever the true nature of the Qur'an, which we shall surely come to another time, I can only agree with Imran Aijaz's closing sentiments:
"I think it would be best for Muslims to refrain from engaging in this mockery of the Qur'an, and send this worn-out apologetic straight into the dustbin, where it belongs.
This entire attempt is surely just miracle-mongering and an attempt to provide the modern Muslim with some substance in order to withstand the onslaught of developments in science (which has,
de jure, beceome the standard of all things 'modern'). Sadly, it is really a reflection of the poverty of our intelligentsia at this present time, whose upper echelons seem permeated by pseudo-scholarship and second-rate scientific thinking.
But, and this ought to go without saying,
Allahu `Alim!
Notes
[1] Imran Aijaz,
"Evidentialist Apologetics in Islam", Part 2:
Scientific Miracles,
In: Critical Discourse, 23 April 2002.
[2] Maurice Bucaille,
The Bible, The Qur'an, and Science, Indianapolis: American Trust Publications, 1979.
[3] Keith L. Moore, "A Scientist's Interpretation of References to Embryology in the Qur'an".
In: The Journal of the Islamic Medical Association, Vol.18, Jan-June 1986, pp.15-16,
available on-line.
[4] For a good layout of the Classical methodology for interpetating the Qur'an, see: Ahmad von Denffer,
Ulum al-Qur'an, The Islamic Foundation, 1994.
[5] I have, very briefly, covered the Classical approach and the Farahi-Islahi approach in "Towards developing a hermeneutical model of the Qur'an", Parts
I,
II,
III. I also looked at the work of Fazlur Rahman and Amina Wadud in Part
IV of that series.
[6] Qur'an
2: 2.
:: this was posted by thabet at 22:33
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
Work, etc.
When I had my interview for this current job (pipeline integrity engineer), I was told that I could expect the workload, at times, to be
extremely heavy.
Subha'Allah! They weren't wrong abuot the weight of the work!
However, with work easing off slightly, I hope to resume blogging very soon,
Insha'Allah.
:: this was posted by thabet at 17:26
Sunday, May 04, 2003
British suicide bombers
Shame. Shame. Shame. I sincerely hope this is not true, but God knows I will not be holding my breath.
Unethical,
immoral,
evil. How else can I describe the deliberate targetting of
non-combatants? Of course, we can abuse causistry, and scour the books of
fiqh till we find an opinion which favours the killing of those not engaged in warfare directly. And indeed, this is what we do. Why do we stoop to such low levels of ethical and moral behaviour, all the while proclaiming ourselves to be the "best of peoples"? We cannot even bare troubles with patience!
SubhanAllah!
And what is our response? Poor, shoddy, apologia. I saw Iqbal Saccrine of the MCB, one of my leaders apparently, on television. Did he condemn the act? Not clearly enough for my liking. He simply had to say that such acts are disgusting and have no place in our ethical code of conduct as humans, let alone resorting to some juristic or moral argument from Islam and that nothing can let an entire
nation or a community resort to such actions or even find some way to condone; especialy not one which professes to be upholders of morality. That we do not, or cannot, only highlights deficiencies in our current moral and ethical paradigm.
I do not usually engage in the (scare quotes included) "Israel/Palestine" issue, because I feel that both sides have reached a point where there is little chance of dialogue. I pray honestly for a solution in which justice is served, rather than "my side" or "their side" "winning". Yes, as a Muslim I feel for my fellow brethren who suffer injustices. But, I am afraid, not to an extent that I am blinded by injustices or immoral acts they may commit. That would be worse than not feeling anything at all.
Our religious leadership must make more concerted efforts at educating our youngsters that though standing for justice is a noble effort, resorting to acts which violate basic humanity cannot be a path to persue. But instead at times they, and us as a community, seek to justify these acts by looking for textual or juristic arguments to "prove" that bombing a woman and her child is an "acceptable" and "Islamic" act, and even one worthy of being "rewarded". Basic moral values and a simple ethical code, I have been told on occasion, are an "innovation" of the "West", and we should seek only the "Islamic" judgment on such acts. As if the two are mutually exclusive! And yet these are the same people who speak for a God who is
Most Just and
Most Merficul!
SubhanAllah!
:: this was posted by thabet at 21:42
