I read Mr. Avijit Roy’s article "on discrediting the indications of
science in the Qur’an. First of all Qur’an is not a book of science, it is
book of guidance for the humanity. This book has taught the humanity that
every human being is born sinless ( CONTRARY TO THE BELIEF OF ORIGINAL SIN
COMMITTED BY EVE BEING PASSED TO EVERY SOUL BORN HELD BY CHRISTINITY), that by
birth all human being are equal (NOT CONDEMNED TO BE INFERIOR THAN OTHER
BECAUSE THEY BORN TO A CERTAIN GROUP OF HUMANITY), that human being bow their
head in submission only to the One and ONLY Creator. But to help understand
the power of the Almighty and to consolidate the belief in Allah, the one and
the only creator and sustainer of the universe has given some signs of His
creation in His Holy Book.
I understand that Mr. Roy is a research scientist on software engineering
and not a classical linguist to understand and interpret the Qur’anic
Arabic. Most of his scriptural
criticism were on the Muslim Holy Book, yet personally he does not have any
understanding of the ancient Arabic language. He may have knowledge about
"Sanskrit" which he could use to understand and interpret Hindu
Scripture.
To misinterpret Qur’an by reading the English translation and taking
English text out of context is totally unscientific. He should note that of
the non-Arab translator of the Qur’an admit their limitation in translating
Qur’an and make a point to tell the reader that it is only a meaning
according to their understanding of the Arabic language. Most of the
translator of the Qur’an are non Arab and so used the common known
vocabulary of the english language. Moreover many of the modern scientific
vocabulary were logically not known during the time of revealation of the
Qur’an and so the vocabulary pertaining to the natural phenomena were used
according the understanding of the people of that time.
If you would expect that Qur’an would mention about chromosome,
gene, DNA,
zygote, cellulor differentiation, mutation, quark, plasma, supernova
etc.,ctc., Qur’an would have been rejected right at the time of its
revealation as a meaningless book. Many of the recent arabic language scholar
are rephrasing some of meaning of the natural phenomena mentioned in
qur’an in the light of recent vocabulary. When it is mentioned in the
Qur’an about the wide expanse of the earth, it doesnot mean that the earth
is flat. If it was true then in another verse Qur’an would not say that the
earth and sun swim on its own orbit. I would ask Mr. Roy to read an article
appeared in the "Scientific American " sometime during early 80’s
and he would learn about the contribution early Muslim astronomer made to the
science of astronomy.
This was possible because those astronomer got their inspiration from the
Qur’an to explore the heaven to understand the greatness of the creator.
Allah created Human being as the best of the creation and endowed him with
intellect to conquer to a certain extent the nature. In the Qur’an it is
allegorically mentioned when Allah created the Adam, He asked angels to bow
before Adam, all but one refused to submit to Adam. His reason was he is
superior to Adam because Adam is made of Clay and He is made of smokeless
fire. Allah said to this particular angel "Iblis" that Adam is
superior to you because I have endowed him with knowledge. The Iblis was
cursed for his disobedience. The important point is Allah has made human
superior to all forms of life and so naturally they would be creative and
innovative.
Professional expert like Professor Keith Moore, a renowned human embryology
expert and french surgeon Maurice Bucaille just to name a few westerner have
supported the Qur’anic indications of scientific phenomena and who is a soft
ware engineer to refute those findings. Our problem is when we get some
material knowledge and schooling in a particular descipline we pretend to
behave like we are the master of all trade. Human knowledge is very very
limited. Imagine all your life you have studied, earned a Ph.D. in a very
narrow field of knowledge and worked in even in a narrower field and yet you
know very little. People Like Sir Issac Newton once said when he was addressed
as a man of wisdom that he is just playing with a few pebbles in the vast
beach and the mighty ocean of knowledge is still far far away. So, be modest
and accept the fact that we are mortals with lots of limitation and we would
never know all that is to be known.