Islamic Sciences explores—​from Islamic perspectives—​religious and philosophical implications of data and theories originating in the natural, biological, and cognitive sciences. The journal is dedicated to fostering a renewed and rigorous relationship with the spiritual and intellectual traditions of Islam. 

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Evolution

Evolution has become a Muslim Issue. This was inevitable: the self-fueling kinetic energy of “Darwin’s dangerous idea” is such that no religious tradition can remain immune to its sound and fury. Muslims were late-comers and ill-prepared for the discourse when it first reached their colonized lands in the nineteenth century. The post-colonial era (after World War II) did not immediately yield any radical change in the intellectual framework of the Muslim world; and much of the second half of the twentieth century was marked by various pseudo-starts—“revolutions”—that produced more heat than light. However, the ground is shifting.

Muslim encounter with Evolution is part of the Muslim encounter with modern Western civilization, which happened at a time when the Islamic enterprise of science—the longest historical tradition of scientific enquiry in recorded history—had already withered. This demise was, in turn, part of the general wearying of the Islamic intellectual tradition which had produced some of the most insightful and profound works on God, life, the cosmos, and the human condition. Muslim institutions of learning had already suffered severe blows prior to their encounter with modernity, but this encounter made them “epistemic” prisoners—much like the prisoners in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, who were forced to remain in an underground cave where all they could see was the prison wall in front of them, where shadows were cast by puppeteers. Since the prisoners could not turn to look at the puppeteers or the fire lit to produce the light used to cast shadows, they took the shadows to be real objects.

When released from the colonial yoke in some aspects of their collective life, Muslims woke up to find that the world had transformed; everything had metamorphosed and the rules of the game had changed. In addition, for various reasons, they were not able to reconnect with their past. Bewildered, they have been trying to make sense of twenty-first century dilemmas with numerous “Islam and xyz” (xyz = science, modernity, women, economy, technology, democracy, human rights, etc.) discourses thrust upon them. These discourses have not only defined much of the late-twentieth-century intellectual landscape, they have also consumed an enormous amount of the intellectual energy of two generations of Muslims. Only now is the hold of this framing loosening, and a more mature discourse emerging.

This section, is called “debunking” in the sense of exposing the falsehood of the idea of evolution; it also locates new Muslim evolutionists in a compelling historical context that almost foresaw their emergence.

Islam, Rationality and Science

Mohammad Hashim Kamali

Examining the Meta-Principles of Modern Economics and their Implications for Islamic Banking and Finance

The foundational principles of modern neoclassical economics, as of other disciplines of the social sciences, have been influenced by the overall trajectory of post-enlightenment, secular, humanistic thought and its epistemological roots such as rationalism, methodological individualism, and the assumed supremacy of the scientific method as a way of evaluating all forms of knowledge. This paper contends that an Islamic economics and finance bereft of analyzing and addressing these principles has inadvertently reinforced the very same problematic structures it originally intended to replace.​

Yusuf Jha

Evolution, Causality, and Transcendental Truths: Wolfgang Smith in conversation with Muzaffar Iqbal​

Wolfgang Smith, one of the leading philosopher and scientist and Muzaffar Iqbal discuss various aspects of evolution in the light of ancient wisdom and transcendental truths. The free-flowing exchange includes discussion on the emergence of new Muslim evolutionists, reflections on Einstein’s theory of relativity, Heisenberg’s insights on the impact of technology on non-Western cultures, Teilhard de Chardin and his views, the difference between vertical and horizontal causality, transcendent truths, Martin Lings’ insights into the nature of our times, Frithjof Schuon and his views on the transcendent unity of religions, Smith’s comparative work on Christianity and the Vedic traditions, al-Ghazali’s arguments from the design of the beehives, and the need and limits of inter-religious discourse.

Challenges to Islam and Muslims: What is to be Done?

Of course this question has been asked before under circumstances no less threatening than those which confront us today and with a similar sense of urgency, if not more. And each time this question has been asked, there was a response which outlined a detailed account of the malaise faced by the community of believers, the Ummah, its reasons, and a course of action that would correct the malady.

Muzaffar Iqbal 

In Remembrance