Search Engine Optimization  

web counter 

A deeply religious non-believer

I will be using Dawkins’ chapter headings to put this discussion into context. Dawkins likes “decent liberal clergymen”. This is the preference of most unbelievers. They want a compliant and democratic religious philosophy, so that the word fundamentalist is seen as unacceptable and threatening to the values. Dawkins was “fond” of his teacher priest.

Dawkins looks to Darwin’s evolutionary theory as the source of Creation. He sees religion as limited, observing that a “religion . . . that stressed the magnificence of the Universe as revealed by modern science might be able to draw forth reserves of reverence and awe hardly tapped by the conventional faiths.” The believes that the Universe of Science is “much bigger than our prophets said, grander, more subtle, more elegant”. Clearly he was ignorant of what Angel Gabriel and other Islamic sources said about the age of Creation and hence the Universe.

So too do Muslims have a comprehension of the vastness of Creation:

• Sahih Muslim, Book 6, Number 2570: Abu Sa'id al Khudri (Allah be pleased with him) reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Every servant of Allah who observes fast for a day in the way of Allah, Allah would remove, because of this day, his face farther from the Fire (of Hell) to the extent of seventy years' distance.‏
• Sahih Muslim, Book 1, Number 0314: O Gabriel! what is this? He replied: It is the Bait-ul-Ma'mur. Seventy thousand angels enter into it daily and, after they come out, they never return again.
• Al Bukhari: 4.53: “if a houri from Paradise appeared to the people of the earth, she would fill the space between Heaven and the Earth with light and pleasant scent,”
• Al Bukhari: 4.48: Narrated Abu Huraira: The Prophet said, "Paradise has one-hundred grades which Allah has reserved for the Mujahidin who fight in His Cause, and the distance between each of two grades is like the distance between the Heaven and the Earth. So, when you ask Allah (for something), ask for Al-firdaus which is the best and highest part of Paradise."
• Sahih Muslim, Book 40, Number 6813: A stone thrown in Hell took seventy years to reach its base.‏
• Hazrat Abu Huraira (Radi ALLAH Anho) narrates "Once Holy Prophet (Peace be Upon Him) asked Jibril (Alaihissalam) about his age, Jibril Replied "I only know that after every 70,000 years a STAR appears and I have seen that STAR 72,000 times, then Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him) replied "I am that STAR". (Ref: Jawahirul Bihar page 886)

This last detail puts the age of the Angel Gabriel at 5.05 billion years old. Muslims have had this knowledge of the depth of time for over 1,400 years. It is not surprise or challenge to a Muslim that the creation is at least 5 billion years old. After all, Allah is Eternal.

Ancient rocks exceeding 3.5 billion years in age are found on all of Earth's continents. Thousands of meteorites, which are fragments of asteroids that fall to Earth, have been recovered. These primitive objects provide the best ages for the time of formation of the Solar System. Scientists have dated over 70 meteorites using radiometric dating techniques. Their results show that the meteorites, and therefore the Solar System, formed between 4.53 and 4.58 billion years ago. The isotopic composition of lead, specifically the ratio of lead-207 to lead-206 changes over time owing to the decay of radioactive uranium-235 and uranium-238, respectively. Scientists have used this approach to determine the time required for the isotopes in the Earth's oldest lead ores to evolve from its primordial composition. These calculations result in an age for the Earth and meteorites, and hence the Solar System, of 4.54 billion years with an uncertainty of less than 1 percent.

Other calculations put the Milky Way Galaxy at 11 to 13 billion years and the age of the Universe at 10 to 15 billion years old (based on the recession of distant galaxies). Note that Gabriel only noted what he remembered.

Therefore, for Islam, instead of the observation that

“The Universe is much bigger than our prophets said”,

we find that science is beginning to confirm what religion established long ago.

A person with a scientific education, will find difficulty with the Christian stance that the earth is a few thousand years old, but on entering Islam, will note that God’s Creation is even more vast than science has thus far proposed.

Disbelief is so vast a domain that it is easy to get lost and forget what you are not believing. “Let us remind ourselves of the terminology,” Dawkins says and tries to define theism. I doubt he knew how much weight there was in this following sentence.

“A theist believes in a supernatural intelligence who, in addition to his main work of creating the universe in the first place, is still around to oversee and influence the subsequent fate of his initial creation. In many theistic belief systems, the deity is intimately involved in human affairs. He answers prayers, forgives or punishes sins; intervenes in the world by performing miracles; frets about good and bad deeds, and knows when we do them (or even think of doing them).”

Correct on most counts, we find in Islam, some of God’s absolute attributes:

A supernatural intelligence:

"For those who believe not in the Hereafter is an evil description and for Allah is the highest description. He is the All-Mighty, All-Wise." (16:60);

"It is He Who is the only God worshipped in the heaven and on the earth. He is the All-Wise, the All-Knowing." (43:84) (Al Hakim, The All-Wise)

Allah (God), the Creator: "He is Allah, the Creator, the Originator, the Bestower of forms. To Him belong the Most Beautiful Names. All that is in the heavens and the earth glorify Him. He is the All-Mighty, the All-Wise." (59:24) (Al Khaaliq, the Creator)

Allah is living and so “still around”:

"Allah! There is no deity worthy of worship but Him, the Living, the Sustaining." (3:1) (Al-Hayy, The Living);

"All faces shall be humbled before (Allah), the Living, the Sustaining. And the one who carried the burden of wrong-doing shall be in complete loss!" (20:111)

Allah watches over (oversee) his Creation. "He is Allah, other than whom none has the right to be worshipped. The King, the Holy, The One free from defects, the Giver of Security, the Ever-Watcher, the All-Mighty, the Compeller, the Supreme. Glory be to Allah! (High is He) Above all that they associate as partners with Him." (59:23) (Al Muhaymin, The Ever Watching)

His influence shapes our existence. The One Who created all that is in existence, Who made everything correct and in its place in accordance to His Wisdom, Who Shaped it in accordance to His praise and Wisdom. He is continuously doing so. (Al Musawwir, the Shaper also in (59:23))

Allah precedes his Creation and so is The First, Al Awwal.

"He is the First, the Last, the Manifest and the Inward. He is the All-Knower of everything." (57:3)

The theism of Islam is a belief system with One Creator God, Al-Waahid (The One )

"'O two companions of the prison! Are many different lords better or Allah, the One, the Irresistible?'" (12:39)

"Say: I am only a warner and there is no god except Allah the One, the Irresistible." (38:65)

As the Al-Wakeel, Allah is The Disposer of Affairs or the One Who is relied upon and so answers our prayers.

"Allah is the Friend of those who believe, He guides them from the darknesses into the light." (2:256)

"Such is Allah your Lord! None has the right to be worshipped but He, the Creator of all things. So worship Him Alone, and He is the Disposer of all affairs." (6:102)

"And put your trust in Allah, and Allah is Sufficient as a Disposer of Affairs." (39:62)

Dawkins notes that,

“The idea of a personal God is quite alien to me and seems even naive.”

The above Attributes of God are just a taste of the complexity of the personal God of Islam. We will see how the personal God of Islam differs to the delusional and perhaps abused perception that Dawkins has of a personal God. Dawkins openly states that he is intellectually superior to the believer in God, calling the comparison of the metaphorical God of science with the God of religion, “intellectual high treason”. However, he failed to look deep enough into his intellect to understand the complexity of God. He does recognise that God has the power as

“the Interventionist, Miracle-wreaking, Thought-reading, Sin-punishing, prayer Answering God”.

However, he scorns all these qualities or attributes. His reductionist, scientific mind reaches for the microscope for observable or detectable proof and claims to be objective.

Islam Theism is a self funded research project. Please help with this progress by donating now. PayPal allows free, easy, secure and safe transactions. They will not charge you any fee.

Donate any amount to keep this site and research progressing.

by Zaid 2006 - 2008