AMSR Unit 3 Paper - Deep Ecology and Islam?! (original) (raw)

It always puzzled when it is claimed that science and religion are opposites; that notion that a man of science cannot, possibly, believe in God or in a religion and vice versa. It also puzzled me the notion that “creation” could be the opposite opinion or view of “evolution”. My experience of Islamic teachings encouraged my interest in science as a means of understanding the world around and inside us, and encouraged the exploration of the theory of “creation” in addition to “a” theory of “evolution”. What provoked me even more and led me to write this paper is the claim, I thought I heard during Workshop 3 at Schumacher, that religion and Deep Thinking do not go together and that we need to “free” ourselves from religion in order to be able to think deeply, question deeply and experience deeply. In this paper, I wanted to inquire whether I was misled to understand that Islam actually encourages Deep Thinking and, if I was not misled, then why could that be a “common” claim. I also wanted to inquire whether some Muslims do not get that same picture and, if so, what led them to that.