FROM MAULANA’S DESK

Modern atheistic thinkers dismiss religion as being unfounded in fact. They maintain that it springs from man’s desire to find meaning in the universe. While the urge to find an explanation is not in itself wrong, they hold that the inadequacy of our predecessors’ knowledge led them to wrong conclusions, namely, the existence of a God, the notions that creation and destruction were a function of the godhead, that man’s fate was of concern to God, that there was a life after death in Heaven or Hell, as warranted by the morality of man’s life on Earth, and that all thinking on these matters must necessarily be regulated by religion. They feel that, in the light of advanced learning, man is now in a position to make a reappraisal of traditional ways of thinking and to rectify errors of interpretation, just as in secular matters he has already exploded myths and overturned false hypotheses whenever facts and experience have forced the truth upon him. According to Auguste Comte, a well-known French philosopher of the first half of the nineteenth century, the history of man’s intellectual development can be divided into three stages–the theological stage, when events of the universe are explained in terms of divine powers; the metaphysical stage, in which we find no mention of specific gods (although external factors are still referred to in order to explain events); and the stage of positivism, where events are explained in terms of common laws deduced from observation and calculation without having recourse of spirit, God or absolute power. We are now passing through the third intellectual stage which, in philosophical terms, is known as Logical Positivism. Through the articles of this issue, we attempt not only to address the third intellectual stage of Logical Positivism but also to chronicle the revolution brought about by the emergence of Islamic ideology. Science, which once, was expected to bring religion to an ignominious end, has now guided humankind to a momentous intellectual revolution. This was the direct result of the revolution brought about by the Prophet of Islam. Instead of negating God, science has fortified faith in God. Latest scientific developments have razed the walls of atheism and science stands ready to bear testimony to the word of God. o Maulana Wahiduddin Khan editor@thespiritofislam.org Follow Maulana at http://www.speakingtree.in (The Times of India)