Muzaffar Iqbal | Center for Islamic Sciences, Sherwood Park, AB, Canada (original) (raw)

Papers by Muzaffar Iqbal

Islam & Science, 2010

The year 2009 was declared the “International Darwin Year” by the International Union of Biolog... more The year 2009 was declared the “International Darwin
Year” by the International Union of Biological Sciences.
It generated a lot of intellectual activity in the Western
world through conferences, seminars, websites, and pub
lication of books. There was hardly any enthusiasm in the
Muslim world; no one seemed to be interested in celebrat
ing the bicentennial of Darwin’s birth or the sesquicen
tennial of the publication of On the Origin of Species.
This third installment of the series “Darwin’s Shadow”
explores Darwinian and post-Darwinian evolutionary
theories from an Islamic perspective. Surveying the intel
lectual landscape of the Muslim world, the article situ
ates Darwin’s arrival and post-Darwinian responses in a
broad historical and social context and then suggests why
Muslims should not ignore evolutionary perspectives,
even though these have little to do with their worldview.
The article also indicates areas where evolutionary theo
ries in cosmology and biology overlap with religious be
liefs and how this overlap produces conflict between the
metaphysical structures of religious and evolutionary
worldviews. The only version of evolution which requires
serious examination is the so-called theistic evolution, be
cause all other versions are obviously outside the pale of
the Islamic worldview and therefore need no further at
tention. Fundamentals of theistic evolution are compared
with the Qurʾānic creation narrative and it is shown that
the two are not compatible.

Islam and Science, 2009

This second article in a series of three examines Darwin’s reception in the Muslim world. Begin... more This second article in a series of three examines
Darwin’s reception in the Muslim world. Beginning with
a broad description of the social and political milieu of
the nineteenth century Muslim world, the article goes
on to examine various responses to Darwin’s ideas in
the Muslim world. Part three will examine Darwinism
and neo-Darwinism from an Islamic perspective.

Islam and Science, 2008

Emerging from a particular European context, Darwin’s ideas have influenced all parts of the wo... more Emerging from a particular European context,
Darwin’s ideas have influenced all parts of the world.
Two hundred years after his birth, Darwin contin
ues to cast a long shadow over fundamental beliefs
and concepts of a large number of people. Many re
ligious scholars have devised ways to accommodate
Darwinism into their religious beliefs. These include
religious scholars of all three monotheistic religions,
for whom the notion of God is a central tenet, even
though Darwinism appears to render superfluous the
very notion of a Creator as conceived in this tradition.
Supported by famous scientists, a multi-million dollar
Darwin industry has emerged in the wake of Darwin’s
1859 influential book, On the Origin of Species. Not
only modern biology, founded on Darwinian and
neo-Darwinian theories, but also several other disci
plines—such as anthropology, sociology, anatomy, ge
ology, and history—have been affected by Darwinism.
This is the first of a three-part article on Darwin,
natural selection, neo-Darwinism, and the philo
sophical and religious responses to these ideas.
It focuses on the emergence of Darwinism and
surveys Darwin’s reception in the West. Part II
will deal with Darwin’s reception in the Muslim
world and part III will examine Darwinism and
neo-Darwinism from an Islamic perspective.

Islamic Sciences, 2023

One hundred and seventy years after the sound and fury surrounding “Darwin’s dangerous idea”, one... more One hundred and seventy years after the sound and fury surrounding “Darwin’s dangerous idea”, one would expect everything has been said by all sides and there is no further need to write on the subject. Yet, what Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) once said seems to hold true: “Truth, Sir, is a cow that will yield such people no more milk, and so they are gone to milk the bull.”
“Such people” for Samuel Johnson were the skeptics of his time, but in our protean world, “such people” are people of faith who are keeping the Darwin industry afloat.

This article is Part I of an in-depth study of the intellectual and spiritual makeup of a unique ... more This article is Part I of an in-depth study of the intellectual and spiritual makeup of a unique Muslim within the broader twentieth-century social and political currents that produced a sea-change in the traditional lands of Islam. Muhammad Asad was placed at the heart of this change, first in Arabia and then in the Indian Subcontinent, where he witnessed and participated in the freedom struggle for Pakistan. He was granted Pakistani citizenship, he worked at the Department of Islamic Reconstruction, and later he was in the Pakistan foreign office. His resignation from foreign service in 1952 weakened his ties with Pakistan and he spent the remaining forty years of his life in Morocco and various European countries, before finally settling in an upscale district of Malaga, Spain, till his death.

Zafar Ishaq Ansari (December 27,1932–April 24, 2016) was among the last of that highly-cultured g... more Zafar Ishaq Ansari (December 27,1932–April 24, 2016) was among the last of that highly-cultured generation of scholars from the Indian subcontinent who knew their Qurʾān, Hadith, and fiqh, and who could also recite couplets of Rumi and Iqbal with ease. That generation witnessed and participated in historical events which shook the world. Born in a scholar’s home, Zafar Ishaq Ansari’s personal and intellectual makeup was, in many respects, formed by that of his father, Mawlana Muhammad Zafar Ahmad Ansari (1908-1991), who was a gifted scholar with zeal to apply Islamic solutions to contemporary problems. He had been the author of the Ansari Commission Report (1983) which reestablished the primacy of Islam in Pakistan’s attempt to formulate a new constitution. Born and raised in Allahabad, Mawlana Ahmad left his teaching career at Allahabad University in 1942, when Liaquat Ali Khan (1895-1951, the first Prime Minister of Pakistan from 1947 until his assassination) invited him to join the All-India Muslim League. Zafar Ishaq, then ten years old, saw his father devote his next seven years to the struggle for Pakistan, serving as the Secretary to the Central Parliamentary Board and Assistant Secretary to the All-India Muslim League. This obituary captures glimpses of his life in memoriam.

In retrospect, 1913 seems relatively unremarkable, especially compared to the following year, whi... more In retrospect, 1913 seems relatively unremarkable, especially compared to the
following year, which ushered the world into the first of the two great wars of
the twentieth century. Although not many would consider the publication of a
reference work in a Dutch town by a small publishing house a world-historical
event, Brill’s First Encyclopaedia of Islam, with its revealing subtitle (“A Dictionary
of the Geography, Ethnography and Biography of the Muhammadan
Peoples”),1 became a milestone in Western academia. It marked a turn in the attempt to establish definitive knowledge about the Orient, becoming dated
so quickly that by the time it was completed in 1936 there was already need
for a revised edition.

This article examines making of the Western academic tradition of encyclopdias of Islam, especially in reference to Brill's Encyclopedias of Islam.

According to the majority Muslim opinion, the first revelation of the Qur'ān occurred when the Pr... more According to the majority Muslim opinion, the first revelation of the Qur'ān occurred when the Prophet, upon him blessings and peace, was in retreat at the cave of Hira, some fifteen km. from the Ka`ba, the ancient House of God, built by the Prophets Ibrahim and Isma`il, upon them peace, approximately twenty- five hundred years prior to this event; the last verses of the Qur'ān were revealed in 632, just a few days before the death of the Prophet in Madina, the oasis town to which he had migrated in 622.
During the twenty-three year period of the descent of the Qur'ān and ever since then, it has drawn two fundamental responses from humanity: (i) belief in its Divine authorship, which simultaneously entails belief in the veracity of the Messenger to whom it was revealed, and
(ii) disbelief in its Divine authorship and consequently the denying the prophethood of Muhammad, upon him blessings and peace.
This paper explores, in outline, a variety of responses of those who felt compelled to refute the Qur'ān. Dividing these responses into three broad categories based on their methodological distinctions, it examines certain facets of (i) polemical works on the Qur'ān; (ii) works by the Orientalists; and (iii) the academic discourse on the Qur'ān. It also points out inherent links between these three categories and provides historical background to their emergence.

Can English be an Islamic language?

Visiting the Grave of Imam al-Ghazālī in Tus is a spiritual experience of great significance. The... more Visiting the Grave of Imam al-Ghazālī in Tus is a spiritual experience of great significance. The author recounts one of his visits.