A Brand of Islam with a Difference

When the misconceptions stemming from a distorted ideology lead to deleterious policies and actions, it is time to launch a massive programme of re-education which will lead the formulators of these policies and the perpetrators of these actions away from militarism and towards pacifism. What we really need to do is to adopt the ‘old’ original version of Islam, based on peace, mercy and the love of mankind. □ Concept of God I n 1965 in Lucknow I met a university Professor who had done his doctorate in Philosophy. He had turned an atheist. The subject of our conversation was the existence of God. During this conversation he remarked: “What criterion you have to prove the existence of God” I replied that I had a valid criterion and this criterion was exactly the same as is employed in science to prove any natural fact. Bertrand Russell has aptly said there are two kinds of knowledge: knowledge of things, knowledge of truths. So far as the “things” are concerned it is possible to apply direct argument to them. But inferential arguments alone can be applied to prove “truths,” as it is related to the law of nature. The validity of inferential arguments is held valid in science that is to admit the existence of some “reality” on the basis of the existence of things. On the basis of this reality Bertrand Russell has acknowledged that the “argument from design” brought forward, by the Religious people is a valid argument, according to science. The argument from design is to prove the existence of a designer from the existence of design. By the first half of the twentieth century people used to debate over the existence of God. But by the end of the