3. MUSLIM CONTRIBUTION TO SCIENCE

~ 144 ~ This sermon was a declaration of human rights: “Hear, O people. All human beings are born of a man and a woman. All the apparent differences are only for the sake of introduction and identification. The most worthy before God is the one who is the most God-fearing. No Arab has any superiority over a non-Arab and vice versa. No black has any superiority over a white and vice versa. Taqwa (piety) is the only thing which will determine one’s superiority over others.” To this the Prophet added, “All things of the period of ignorance before Islam have been trampled down by my steps.” For the first time in ancient history, all sorts of inequality and discrimination were almost entirely eliminated. Only then did a new civilization come into being in which all human beings were equal. Speaking of the successors of the Prophet, Abu Bakr and ‘Umar, Mahatma Gandhi noted, “though they were masters of a vast empire, they lived the life of paupers.” This revolution was so powerful that even at a later period, when the rot had set in in the institutions of governments, and the Caliphs had been replaced by “emperors,” the pressure of Islamic civilization was