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CHAPTER 3

Can Science be Built on a Religious Paradigm?

(The Conflict of Reason and Revelation in the Muslim World and its Modern Implications)

Science and religion deal with two entirely different levels of reality. The former deals with the physical universe which is perceptible by human senses, while the latter deals with a higher order of reality which is transcendental and beyond the sense experience. Their sources of knowledge also differ. Science relies primarily on human faculties, particularly reason, and seeks to acquire knowledge through observation and experiment; it tries to describe and analyze ‘what is’, to be able to predict what may happen in the future. When science deals with the physical universe, its description and analysis are more exact and its predictive power is greater. However, when it deals with human beings, who do not always behave in a standard manner, its description and analysis are less precise and its predictions are often inaccurate. By contrast, religion depends on Revelation as well as reason for its knowledge. Its ultimate objective is to help transform the human condition from ‘what is’ to the ideal or ‘what ought to be’, by bringing about individual and social change in conformity with its worldview and the values and institutions that it provides.

Even though science and religion deal with two different levels of reality, the ultimate objective of both is common – improvements in human well-being. However, if the material and the spiritual aspects of the well-being that the two address are both important and also interrelated, then science and religion may be able to serve mankind more effectively by greater cooperation and coordination between them. While science can enable human beings to increase their mastery over the physical universe, religion can help foster the kind of human being who may be able to use the knowledge and power provided by science for the well-being, rather than the destruction, of mankind. Religion can help provide a proper perspective to science so that it does not forget its limitations or its ultimate objective. Science can help religion become more effective in realizing ‘what ought to be’ by a better analysis of ‘what is’, facilitating prediction, providing better technology, and enabling a more efficient use of all available resources.

Conflict and confrontation are, thus, not necessarily ingrained in their nature. Science need not be anti-religion and religion need not be anti-science. However, their verdicts even with respect to their own field tend to have an impact on human attitudes towards the other’s field. Conflict may arise if science refuses to acknowledge its limitations, ignores the contribution that the moral and the transcendental can make to human well-being, and rejects outright all knowledge that cannot be attained by its own method, even though its method is not capable of acquiring, verifying, or even falsifying such knowledge. Conflict may also arise if religion makes propositions that are irrational and difficult for science to accept. If conflicts do arise, the best way to resolve them is through rational dialogue. If either of the two is intolerant, tries to curb criticism of its concepts, and uses force to impose its views on the other, then conflict may escalate, attitudes may harden, and the possibilities for cooperation decline.

Even though a conflict is not necessary between science and religion, it has arisen in different societies. A number of factors have led to this conflict but it is not within the scope of this book to examine the reasons for this in all societies. It is commonly agreed that such a conflict did arise in the West. However, instead of resolving this conflict in a way that would help the development of science without weakening religion, the Enlightenment movement of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries adopted a hostile attitude towards religion and created a different epistemology for science, crowning reason as the supreme judge of all truth, rejecting all metaphysical beliefs that could not be ascertained by means of reason and sense perception, and denying any role for faith and intuition in human affairs. Economics was not an exception. It followed the same tangential path and gave birth, as seen earlier, to the concepts of rational economic man, positivism, and laissez faire, which did not fit into the worldview of Christianity.

This raises the question of whether there was such a rationalist movement in the Muslim world and whether or not it led to a similar conflict? If so, what were the reasons for, and the consequences of this conflict? Is it possible that a similar conflict may arise again with the re-emergence of scientific inquiry in the so far dormant Muslim world? If a conflict does arise, will it change the epistemology of knowledge in the Muslim world in the same way as it did in the West, given the dominant influence of the West on the rest of the world? If the scientific worldview adopts the same anti-religious attitude in the Muslim world as it did in the West, then Islamic economics may lose its raison d’être.

THE RATIONALIST MOVEMENT IN THE MUSLIM WORLD

The fact is that the Rationalist or Enlightenment movement arose even in the Muslim world in the second/eighth century, several centuries before it did in the West. There was also a conflict, but its alternative nature led to results which differed from those in the West. The conflict was not between science and Revelation; this was impossible because of Islam’s positive attitude towards science and the scientific method. The conflict was rather between Revelation and philosophical speculation. However, science and philosophy were closely related in the Muslim world in those days, just as they were in Europe until around 1700. The conflict was generated by the effort of the rationalists to use speculative reasoning to discuss subjects which were transcendent and beyond the scope of reason. This may not, however, have by itself vitiated the intellectual climate. What did the damage, as will be seen in greater detail both later on in this Chapter as well as in Chapter 6, was the effort of the rationalists to forcibly impose their views on an unwilling orthodoxy with the help of the coercive power of a political authority which did not enjoy the confidence of the people. The rationalists at that time consisted of two different groups of scholars from different intellectual backgrounds. These were the Muʿtazilites and the falāsifah (philosophers; singular faylasūf).

The Muʿtazilites¹ were basically religious scholars and not philosophers. They were, however, well-versed in philosophy and the physical sciences and wished to provide convincing rational arguments for religious beliefs and practices, in contrast with the extreme conservatives who wanted people to accept these on the basis of blind faith. The rationalist approach had become necessary because of the rapid spread of Islam in territories previously under the influence of the materially more advanced and intellectually more sophisticated Sassanian and Byzantine civilizations. Without the adoption of such a rational approach, it would have been difficult to gain converts or even to save the common man from the adverse influence of heretics or zanādiqah (singular, zindīq). The rationalists also tried to determine the nature and causes of the various phenomena in human life and the universe around them. Here their objective was to show that God does not operate in an arbitrary manner. He is rather systematic and methodical and operates on the basis of certain principles, which it is possible for human beings to discover. They were, thereby, indirectly trying to lay down a solid foundation for science within the religious paradigm.

To help them in this commendable task, they developed a systematic method of logical reasoning called ʿIlm al-Kalām.² Those who employed this method were called mutakallimūn, which literally means ‘reasoners’. This method was original to the Muslims and, as Gardet has put it, was “certainly not an Arab adaptation of Mazdean or Christian theology”.³ In essence there was little difference between the mutakallimūn and the Muʿtazilites and the two terms were sometimes used synonymously. They attracted scholars from all shades of the Muslim spectrum. While some of them like Jaʿfar ibn al-Bishr (d. 226/841) and Abū Mūsā al-Murdār (d. 226/841) were renowned for their piety, others had the reputation of being lax in their religious observances.⁴

The falāsifah, influenced by Greek philosophy, were primarily intellectuals and not religious scholars.⁵ Since philosophy and science were closely related disciplines in those days, most of the philosophers were well-recognized authorities in sciences like mathematics, physics, chemistry, astronomy, and medicine. They also performed experiments to the extent they could, in keeping with the practice of Muslim scholars in those days. They generally received government patronage and made substantial contributions to the development of these sciences. Moreover, since knowledge was not yet compartmentalized in those days, they were also quite well-versed in the religious sciences, and some, like Ibn Rushd (Averroes, d. 595/1198), were even considered authorities in these. While the extremists among them like Ibn al-Rāwandī (d. 250/864) and Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (Rhazes, d. 313/925) held views that conflicted with fundamental Islamic beliefs, most of them, including al-Kindī (d. 252/866), al-Fārābī (d. 339/950), Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna, d. 428/1037), and Ibn Rushd (d. 595/1198), were relatively moderate. They did not find any incompatibility between reason and Revelation. In fact they tried to show the harmony between the two and rationally argued in favour of Revelation and Prophethood, life after death, and other Islamic beliefs and practices. They quoted profusely from the Qur’ān and the Sunnah to support their views.

This free and rational discussion of Islamic beliefs and practices raised a lively and extremely sophisticated intellectual debate on a number of epistemological issues, some of which were:

• What is the nature of God? Does He have a body with eyes, ears, hands and legs? If not, how does He see, hear, hold and move, and is it possible for human beings to see Him? What are His attributes (ṣifāt)? Are these attributes an integral part of His Being or separate from Him? Can reason help human beings know Him and His attributes, or are they totally dependent on Revelation for this purpose? Does He know everything that will happen in the future, even what human beings are going to do?

• If God is Eternal, is His creation also eternal? If not, was there a period when He was not a Creator? Is this conceivable?

• To what extent are human beings free or predestined? If their life is predestined, then would it be just for God to hold them accountable for their deeds and to reward or punish them?

• Is faith alone sufficient to be a believer or is it also necessary to reinforce it by deeds? Is a sinful Muslim a believer (mu’min), an unbeliever (kāfir), or something in between (fāsiq)?

• Will the resurrection of human beings in the Hereafter be only of the soul or also of the body? If there is bodily resurrection, will the body be the same as it is in this world or will it be different?

• If the Qur’ān is a part of God’s speech (kalām), then is it to be considered created and transitory like this world or uncreated and eternal like other Divine attributes?

• To what extent is it possible for human beings to know what is right from what is wrong by means of reason and to what extent is Revelation necessary for this purpose? Is it conceivable that a just God would hold human beings accountable for their deeds without creating in them an innate ability to recognize right from wrong?

It is evident that hardly any of these questions had anything to do with science. The answers were bound to be speculative and could not have been given with precision. It was, therefore, not possible to have a single answer. There were differing opinions and, therefore, neither the rationalists nor the conservatives constituted a homogenous whole.⁶ The real bone of contention was the extent to which reason and logic could effectively help answer the above epistemological questions. It seems, however, that the moderates among both the rationalists and the conservatives, who constituted the majority, appreciated the need for both reason and Revelation in different degrees. However, it was the extremists on both sides who succeeded in getting greater attention and who, therefore, set the tone of the debate.

The moderate rationalists, who stressed a greater reliance on reason, developed a set of five axioms (al-uṣūl al-khamsah) to help them argue their case more effectively. Two of the most important of these axioms were Tawḥīd (Unity) and ʿadl (justice) of God, which are accepted by all Muslims without exception.⁷ There would be no point in relying on axioms that did not command a consensus. Differences, nevertheless, arose in the deduction of their implications.

With respect to Tawḥīd which is the most fundamental of all Islamic beliefs and stands for the absolute Oneness and Uniqueness of God, the general Muslim understanding is that, because of their limited capabilities and perceptions, human beings cannot comprehend Him fully. The Qur’ān, itself, makes this crystal clear by saying that “there is nothing like Him” (al-Qur’ān, 42: 11), and that human “eyes cannot encompass Him” (al-Qur’ān, 6: 103).⁸ Therefore, in keeping with a Qur’ānic injunction (al-Qur’ān, 3: 7), the general Muslim attitude has been to accept on faith those unseen metaphysical realities which are beyond the reach of reason and sense perception and they do not try to probe into them too deeply. This would be a fruitless exercise because, while the existence of God can be established through observation and logical reasoning, His nature cannot be understood fully except through His attributes (ṣifāt) as revealed in the Qur’ān and the Sunnah. Extreme rationalists, however, insisted that reason was by itself capable of enabling human beings to know His nature. Their effort to do so embroiled them in sterile and divisive controversies on a number of metaphysical questions like Divine attributes, Resurrection and Life after Death, angels, Revelation and Prophethood, the eternity of the world, the creation of the Qur’ān, Divine knowledge of particulars, and the ability of human beings to see God in the Hereafter. These extreme rationalists adopted hard line positions which were in clear conflict with the Qur’ān and the Sunnah and even the moderate rationalists had difficulty accepting their views.

With respect to the concept of ʿadl, the debate was more practical and relevant to the human condition even though it also raised a great deal of controversy. Some of the conclusions that the moderate rationalists derived were as follows:

• God subjects Himself to the same moral principles which He applies to human beings. He does only that which is just and morally right. It is inconceivable that He would do something that is unjust or morally wrong.

• Goodness or evil are innate in the nature of things themselves and not necessarily because God arbitrarily declares them to be so. It is, therefore, possible for human beings to recognize what is right or wrong through their own reasoning even though they need the help of Revelation to guide them and to confirm their conclusions.

• Since God is just, there is absolutely no room for the concept of predestination. Human beings are the authors of their own deeds, good or evil, and, therefore, rewarding or punishing them would be a reflection of God’s justice.

To a modern rationalist thinker there may be much appeal in a number of these views. Such appeal existed even in those days, and the initial objective, method and concepts of the moderate rationalists did not generate tension even among those members of the Muslim orthodoxy who did not accept the need for rational explanations for religious beliefs and practices. The differences of opinion that existed could have been resolved to a great extent over time in the light of the Qur’ān and the Sunnah and through rational debate. The question is, why did this not take place?

Reasons for the Downfall of the Rationalists

It was the extremists on both the conservative and rationalist sides who generated a great deal of heat and changed the texture of the whole debate, creating an atmosphere of confrontation. On the conservative side, extremists like the Hashwiyyahs insisted that faith is based entirely on the Qur’ān and the Sunnah and that there is absolutely no room for reason. In sharp contrast with this, extreme rationalists like Ibn al-Rāwandī and Abū Bakr al-Rāzī⁹ insisted that reason and Revelation were incompatible and that all matters, including right and wrong, should be judged by reason alone. They belittled all attempts at reconciling philosophy and religion. They insisted on formulating a theology solely on the basis of reason, independent of Revelation, and approached what became known later on in the West as Natural Theology.¹⁰ They tended to reject, just like the Western Enlightenment movement later on, all those metaphysical truths that could not be established by means of reason and experience. Acceptance of their views would have pushed Revelation into the background and made reason the sole determinant of faith instead of being a tool for its explanation and defence, as was the original aim of the Muʿtazilites.

Does this mean that there is no room for extreme views in human society? Not necessarily. Extreme views have sometimes made substantial contributions to human development. However, social peace may in certain circumstances be served better if extremes are avoided at least in religious and social matters. Nevertheless, if such views do get put forward, then one would expect that people give them a patient and tolerant hearing. If extreme views are unable to establish their worthiness and gain general acceptance, they will die their own natural death. Why then is it that such extreme views created a problem in Muslim society? Was there a lack of tolerance?

There seems to be little evidence of this in the early Muslim society where tolerance generally prevailed and the debate between conservatives and rationalists progressed relatively freely and smoothly. Even a heretic like Ibn al-Rāwandī received a patient hearing and his arguments were logically refuted by several generations of eminent religious scholars.¹¹ Given the spirit of the age, the prevailing intellectual controversies may perhaps have been resolved through free discussion, particularly because the differences of opinion between the moderates among the rationalists and the conservatives, who constituted a preponderant majority of the intellectuals, were not irreconcilable. What then was it that polarized the then Muslim society into two belligerent groups, when in the same society different fiqhī schools were mutually tolerant and generally coexisted peacefully in spite of substantial differences of opinion among them?

The answer may perhaps lie in the use of force by an illegitimate political authority which did not enjoy the trust of the people. The normal tendency in human societies is that if one group uses force to impose its views on another, the reaction of the suppressed group tends to be severe, particularly if the latter group happens to be in the majority. The Muʿtazilites exploited the political patronage and financial backing that they received from the government during a substantial part of the ʿAbbāsid dynasty (132/750–656/1258), and particularly during the reigns of Ma’mūn al-Rashīd (d. 218/833), al-Muʿtaṣim (d. 227/841), and al-Wāthiq (d. 232/846) to impose their radical views forcefully on all. They became aggressive and intolerant in clear violation of Islamic teachings and introduced the miḥnah or testing (inquisition) into the Muslim world. They went around questioning people about their beliefs and threatened to punish those who held different views: “No faqīh, muḥaddith, mu’adhdhin or muʿallim” was left untested.”¹² Freedom of expression, which had been an important characteristic of the Muslim society before this, almost disappeared.¹³ Furthermore, they jailed and tortured their opponents so as to impose their unacceptable views: “The prisons were full of those who had denied the miḥnah.”¹⁴ Some prisoners like Muḥammad ibn Nūḥ (d. 218/833), Naʿīm ibn Ḥammād (d. 228/842), Yūsuf al-Buwayṭī (d. 231/845), and Aḥmad al-Khuzāʿī (d. 231/845) even died in prison as a result of torturing.¹⁵ Aḥmad al-Khuzāʿī’s head was “placed on public view in Baghdad as a grisly warning to potential nonconformists, while his cadaver stayed in Samarra’, also on display.”¹⁶ Even prominent jurists like Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (d. 241/855), who were held in high esteem by the masses for their piety and scholarship, were not spared. He was flogged on the orders of al-Muʿtaṣim until he became unconscious.¹⁷ All this, because he was not willing to accept the Muʿtazilite view that the Qur’ān was created. They even went to the extent of inscribing on the mosques of Fustat that “There is no god but God, the Lord of the created Qur’ān”,¹⁸ thereby making the concept of the ‘created Qur’ān’ an incontestable part of Islamic belief.

The question is why were the ʿulamā’ so aggravated over an issue which would not be of great significance to a number of people now? The use of force and persecution had the effect of creating bitterness and giving a hostile tone to an otherwise intellectual debate. It created suspicion among the ʿulamā’ about the motives of the government, making them feel, rightly or wrongly, that the state was trying to have a say in the definition of Islam.¹⁹ The concept of the ‘created Qur’ān’ made them afraid that its acceptance would imply that the Qur’ān was not eternally true and could be changed or overridden by illegitimate and corrupt rulers. This they could not stand and steadfastly defended their position without being deterred by imprisonment or merciless flogging.

The miḥnah and the resultant bitterness it generated among the ʿulamā’ against the government led to rising unrest and discontent among the population, particularly in Baghdad. This made even the illegitimate political leadership of that time realize, though belatedly and after the damage had been done, that the miḥnah was unpopular and incapable of working. Al-Mutawakkil (d. 247/861), therefore, put an end to it in 234/849. Aḥmad ibn Abī Du’ād, the Chief Qāḍī, who was perhaps the most instrumental in its harsh implementation, was disgraced, became paralyzed, and died unsung in 240/854.

Although the miḥnah was now over it left two indelible marks on Muslim society. One of these healthy and the other unhealthy. That which has been good saw the distancing of the state from any role in the definition of Islam. Islam stands defined by the ijmāʿ of the ummah in conformity with the Qur’ān and the Sunnah. That which has been unhealthy ensured the alienation of a majority of the ʿulamā’ from philosophy and science. This has had the effect of driving them towards greater conservatism, as will become clear with the progress of this discussion both in this Chapter as well as in Chapter 6.

Al-Ghazālī and Ibn Rushd

In spite of the use of force, the progress of rational debate on the subject continued between the rationalists and the conservatives. Consequently, the extreme rationalists gradually started to lose ground on the rational front. Their questionable views could not stand the rational onslaught from a new School, now generally known as the Ashʿarite. It provided a logical and convincing defence of Islamic beliefs and practices. The leaders of this School were Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (d. 332/943) in Iraq and Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 333/945) in Central Asia, followed by a number of other stalwarts like al-Bāqillānī (d. 403/1012), al-Juwaynī (d. 478/1085), and al-Qushayrī (d. 465/ 1072). All were extremely well-versed in religious sciences as well as in ʿIlm al-Kalām and philosophy. However, they were generally conservative, although to different degrees, al-Māturīdī being significantly less conservative than al-Ashʿarī.²⁰