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We must now ask
ourselves, what was the political, economic and medical situation in
Arabia
, at the time of Mohammed? From the Hajramount in
Yemen
, the caravans of the spice trade past North, through
Mecca
and
Medina
, and then reached into all of
Europe
. In North Arabia, in about 500 A.D., the Gazaneeds took over, and by 528,
they controlled the Cyrian deserts over to the outskirts of
Medina
. ‘Syraic’… a form of Aramaic, related to Arabic, was their
official language. As early as 463, the Jews translated the Torah and Old
Testament from Hebrew, into ‘Syriac’ - The British Museum has a
copy.
This made it
available to the Guscians, who were Christians and to the Jewish tribes in
Arabia
. During this time Syrgius Cyrra Cynie who died in
Constantinople
in 536, one of the earliest and greatest translators from Greek into
Syraic, translated various works on medicine, including 26 works of Galen.
This made them available in the
kingdom
of
Khasrov
I, in
Persia
and to the Ghasan tribe, whose influence extended to the outskirts of
Medina
. Khasrov I, Arabic Khisra, King of Persia, was known as Khasrov the
great. His troops conquered areas as far away as
Yemen, and he also loved learning, and started several - schools. The
school
of
Jundi Shapueer
became during Kasrov first’s long reign of 48 years. The greatest
intellectual center of the time. Within it’s walls Greek, Jewish,
Nostorian, Persian and Hindu thoughts and experience were freely
exchanged. Teaching was done largely in Syriac, from Syraic translations
of Greek texts. This method Aristotle, Hippocrates
and Galen were readily available when the Medical School of Jundi Shapaer
was operating during his reign.
The next step was
that the conquering Arabs compelled the Nostorians to translate their
Cyriac text of Greek medicine, into Arabic. The translation from Syriac to
Arabic was easy, as the two languages had the same grammar.
Considering the
local medical situation during Mohammed’s life, we know there were
physicians living in
Arabia
during this period. Harith bin Caladia was the best educated physician
trained in the healing art. He was born about the middle of the 6th
century at Taif, in the tribe of Bani Sakif. He travelled through Yemen,
and then Persia, where he received his education in the Medical Sciences,
at the great Medical School of Jundi Shapuer and thus was intimately
acquanted with the medical teachings of Aristotle, Hippocrates
and Galen. Having completed his studies, he practiced as a Physician in Persia, and during this time he was called to the court of King Kkosrov, with
whom he had a long conversation. He came back to
Arabia
about the beginning of Islam, and settled down at Taif. While there, Abu
Khair, a King of Yemen came to see him in connection with a certain
disease, and on being cured, rewarded him with much money, and a slave
girl. Though Harith bin Caladia did not write any book on Medicine, his
views on many medical problems are still preserved in his conversation
with Kkasrov. About the eye, he says that it constituted of ‘fat’,
which is the white spot. The second is constituted with ‘water’, which
is the black part. And of ‘wind’ which constitutes the eyesight. All
these things we know to be wrong now - But this was Greek thought. All is
goes to show the acquaintance of Harith with the Greek doctors.
Summarising
the situation in a few words in his book, ‘Eastward delamitry Arabs’,
Dr. Lucaine La’ Clerk writes…Harith bin Caladia studied medicine in
Jundi Shapur, and Mohammed owed to Harith the part of his medical
knowledge. Thus with the one as well as the other, we easily recognize the
traces of Greek medicine. Sometimes Mohammed treated the sick, but in the
difficult cases he would send the patients to Harith.
Another educated
person around Mohammed, was Nadir
bin Harith. Not related to the doctor. He was a Quraishite and cousin
of Mohammed, and had also visited the court of Khosrov. He had learned. Persian and music, which he introduced among the Quraish at
Mecca. However he was not sympathetic to Mohammed, marking some of the stories
in the Qur’an. Mohammed never forgave him for this, and when he
was taken prisoner in the battle of Badr, he caused him to be put to
death.
In summary we see
that…
1) Arabs living in
Mecca
and
Medina
in 600, had political and economical relations with people from
Ethiopia
,
Yemen
,
Persia
and Byzantine.
2) A cousin of Mohammed knew Persian well enough, to do his musical
studies in it. 3) The Ghasine tribe which ruled the Syrian desert over to
the gates of Medina, used Syriac. One of the main languages used to teach medicine
at
Jundishapur is their official language.
4) An ill king of Yemen
came to Taif, to consult the physician Harith Bin Caladia, who had been
trained well at Jundishapur - the best medical school in that world,
and to whom Mohammed sometimes send patients.
5) During Mohammed’s lifetime a new medical school was established in
Alexandria
, using the 16 books of Galen as their text.
This all shows that
there was ample opportunity for Mohammed and the people around him, to
have heard the embryological theories of Aristotle, Heppocrates s and
Galen, when they went to seek treatment from Harith bin Colada and other
local doctors. Thus when the Qur’an says in the late Meccan Surah
of ‘The Believer’, 40: 67…‘He it is who
created you from dust, then from a sperm drop, then from a leach like
clot, that perhaps you may understand’. And then in the Surah of
‘The Pilgrimage’… ‘O! Mankind! If
you have doubt about the resurrection, consider that we have created you
from dust’.
It is correct for us
to ask again, what were they to understand? What were they to
consider? And here are the Qur’anic stages again –
1- Nutfa…
‘sperm’,
2- Alaqa… ‘clot’,
3- Mudga… ‘piece of meat’,
4- Azaam… bones.
And…
5- dressing of bones with muscles.’
The answer is very
clear. They were understanding and considering that which was common
knowledge, the embryological stages as taught by the Greek physicians.
I don’t mean that
Mohammed’s listeners all knew the names of the Greek physicians -
But they knew the embryological stages of the Greek physicians.
1- They believed
that the male sperm mixed with the female menstrual blood to cause it to
clot, and this became the baby.
2- They believed there was a time when the fetus was formed, and unformed.
3- They believed the bones formed first, and then was covered with
muscles.
Allah was using that
common knowledge as a sign, encouraging the listeners and readers to turn
to Him. The trouble is that this common knowledge was, and is not true.
Arab physicians after Mohammed:
We must now look at two well-known Physicians, from the period after
Mohammed. Obviously they had no effect on the Qur’an, but they
demonstrated that faith, and the embryological ideas of Aristotle,
Heppocrates and Galen, continued among the Arabs right up to the sixteen
hundreds. If the correct
translation of Alaqa is ‘leach like substance’, as modern
Muslims like Shabbir Ali claim, there is no place for these post
Qur’anic doctors said so. In fact it is just the opposite. The ideas of
these Greek Physicians were being used to explain the Qur’an, and
the Qur’an was coded to enlighten the meaning of the Greek
Physicians.
The human being
takes its origin from two - This is speaking about Avicenna.
The human being takes its origin from two things – the male sperm which
plays the part of factor – the female sperm… first part of the
menstrual blood, which provides the matter. Thus we see that Ibn Sina gave
the female semen, exactly the same role that Aristotle has assigned to the
menstrual blood. It is difficult to overstate the importance of Ibn Sina,
as a scientific and philosophical authority, for the pre modern Europeans.
Then we are going to
look at Ibn Qaima Jaujia. Ibn
Qaim took full advantage of the agreement between Qur’anic Revelation
and Greek medicine. It is not very clear probably, but the Hippocrates is
in purplish, and the Qur’an is in bold type green, and the Hadith
is in purple, and commentaries are in red, and his own thoughts, in sort
of a blue-green. So it starts out – He is giving - He says Hippocrates
said, in the third Ch. of Kitab al-Ajinna….‘The
semen is contained in a membrane, and it grows because of the blood of its
mother, which descends to the womb. Some membranes are formed at the
beginning, others after the second month and others in the third month’.
And this phrase about the blood descending to the womb, we saw it when we
looked at Hippocrates
slide. That is why God said, here in the Qur’an is
mentioned…‘He creates you in the womb of your
mothers, by one formation after another, in three darkness. That
is Qur’an 39 : 6. Then he gives his own ideas…. ‘Since each
of these membranes has its own darkness when God mentioned the stages of
creation and transformation from one state to another. He also mentioned
the darkness of the membranes’. Most commentators explain, and here are
the words of the commentators…‘It is the darkness of the belly and the
darkness of the womb and the darkness of the placenta.
In a second example,
we read, Hippocrates said…‘The mouth opens up spontaneously and the
nose and ears are formed from the flesh. The ears are opened and the eyes
which are filled with a clear liquid.’ The Prophet used to say… ‘I
worship Him who made my face and formed it, and opened my hearing, and eye
sight and …… and so forth. Here we look at Hippocrates
again, and they are in the second stage. It is the same thing, which I
read. Ibn Qaim is quoting Hippocrates, and speaks about the mother’s
blood descends around the membrane.
He could do this as
we have seen, because the educated people of Mohammed’s time were
familiar with Greek medicine. However what is important for us here today
to realize is, that there is no
place where the Qur’an corrected Greek medicine. There is no
place for Ibn Qaim shouting…“Hey you guys you got it this all wrong -
the correct meaning of ‘Alaga’ is, ‘that which clings’, or
‘leech’ like substance.” On the contrary, even Qaim is demonstrating
the agreement between the Qur’an and the Greek medicine - Their
agreement in error.
A final witness is
the commentary of Badawi in 1200 A.D. Here we have the commentary. We
have the… we have the Qur’an here, we have his commentary, and
here it is being translated. And he says then from ‘Alaqa’…‘a
piece of solid blood’, is his explanation of ‘Alaqa’, ‘Alaqa’
is underlined - that is from the Qur’an. And here is his
explanation… ‘A piece of solid blood.’ Then he goes on… ‘Then
from a piece of meat’ - from the Qur’an. ‘A piece of meat
originally as much as can be chewed, and so forth.’
As I mentioned in
the beginning of the study, it is been said that the idea of the embryo
developing through stages, is a modern one and that the Qur’an is
anticipating modern embryology, by depicting different stages. Yet we have
seen that Aristotle, Hippocrates, the Indians and Galen have all discussed
the stages of embryological development, during the thousand years before
the Qur’an. And after the coming of the Qur’an, the
court of the different stages, as described by the Qur’an and the
Greek doctors, was carried on in the teachings of Avicenna and Ibn Qaim -
and is essentially the same as that taught by Galen, and those preceding
him.
Concerning the bone
stage, it is clear as Dr. Moore demonstrated so capably is his text book
that muscles start forming from the somites, at the same time as the
cartilage models of the bone. There is no bone stage where there is a
skeleton sitting here, and then and then the muscles are plastered around
it.
It is equally clear
that ‘Alaqa’ in the Qur’an, means ‘clot’ and
that the Quraish who heard Mohammed speaking, understood him to be
referring to the menstrual blood, as the female contribution to the
developing baby. Therefore we can conclude that during all these years,
the Qur’anic Verses on embryology, saying that man is created from a
drop of sperm, which becomes the clot, were in perfect record with the
science of the 1st century of the Hijra, of the time of the Qur’an.
But when compared with the modern science of the 20th century,
Hippocrates is in error, Aristotle is in error, Galen is in error, and the
Qur’an is in error - They are all in serious error.
Now we are going to
look a little bit about, ‘moon
light.’ Does the Qur’an state that…‘The moon gives off
reflected light from the sun’, before his was common knowledge? In
the Surah Noor, 71 : 15 - 16, it says… ‘See ye not how Allah has
created the seven heavens, one above another and made the moon a light…‘Nur’
in their midst, and made the sun as a lamp…‘Siraj.’ The moon
is called a ‘light’…Arabic ‘Nur’ - and the sun a lamp -‘Siraj’.
Some Muslims claim that since the Qur’an uses different words,
speaking from about the light of the sun, and the light of the moon, it
reveals that the sun is a source of light, while the moon only reflects
light. This claim is implied very strongly by Shabbir Ali in his
booklet…‘Science in the Qur’an’ - and stated clearly by Dr.
Zakir Naik in his Video - ‘Is the Qur’an God’s Word’ as you
will now see clearly.
(Dr.
Naik
Video Clipping)
“The light that we have… the light that we obtain from the moon -
where does it come from? So he will tell me that previously we thought
that the light of the moon was its own light. But today after science has
advanced, we have come to know that the light of the moon is not its own
light, but a reflected light of the sun. I will asked him a question, that
its is mentioned in this Qur’an, in Surah
Al- Furqaan
,
Ch.
No..25, Verse No.61…‘Blessed is He, who has created the constellation
and placed therein a lamp and a moon which has reflected light. The Arabic
word for moon is ‘Qamar’, and the light described there is ‘Munir’-
which is borrowed light, or ‘Nur’, which is a ‘reflection of
light.’ The Qur’an mentions that the light of the moon is
reflected light. You say you discovered it today? …How come it is
mentioned in the Qur’an 1400 years ago? He will pause for a time
- He won’t reply immediately and then he may say…‘May be, may be it
is a fluke.’ I don’t argue with him for sake…..”
(Dr. Campbell)
Near the end of the video we heard Dr. Naik explain the Arabic word for
‘moon’ is ‘Qamar’, and the light described there is ‘Munir’,
which is ‘borrowed light’ or ‘Nur’, which is a reflection
of light.’ Please do not forget what he said… ‘Munir is
borrowed light, and Nur is reflected light.’ Not only is this
claim to be a statement in keeping with scientific truth, but it also
claimed to be scientifically miraculous, since this was supposedly only
discovered relatively, recently.
It is correct that
the moon does not emit its own light, but only reflects the light of the
sun - But this was known already almost a thousand years before Mohammed. Aristotle
in about 360 BC discussed, knowing that the earth was round, by its
shadow on the moon. He could only speak of the Earth’s shadow crossing
the Moon, if he knew that Moon’s light is reflected light.
If you still insist
that this is a miracle of scientific knowledge, then we must ask
ourselves…‘Do the Qur’anic words themselves support this claim?’
‘Siraj’ - first we shall look at ‘Siraj.’ In
Surah Nur which was read above,
in Surah Al Furqaan, 25 : 61, it is simply ‘lamp’…
referring to the Sun. In Surah Naba, 78:13, ‘Siraj Wahjan’
means ‘a dazling lamp’, again indicating the Sun.
The words ‘Nur’
and ‘Munir’ comes from the same Arabic word.
Root: The word Munir is used 6 times in the Qur’an 4 times
Suratul Imran, 3 : 184, Al Haj 22 : 8, Lukman 31: 20 and Fatir 35 : 35. It
is the phrase ‘Kitabul Munir’, which Yusuf Ali translates as…
‘A book of enlightenment’ and Picktall uses… ‘The Scripture giving
light.’ Clearly this indicates a book which is radiating the light of
knowledge. Nothing about ‘reflection’… ‘Nur’.
It says in Surah Nur,
71:16 and Yunus, 10:5 that… ‘Allah made the light… the Moon a
light.’ Thus we find that the Qur’an says that the Moon is a
light, and it never says that the Moon reflects light.
Moreover in other
Verses, the Qur’an says that… ‘Allah is a Nur… a
light.’ Surah Nur, 24:35, one of the most beautiful passages in
the Qur’an reads… ‘Allah is the light… Nur of the
Heavens and the Earth. The parable of His light, is as if there was a
niche and within it a lamp, the lamp enclosed in glass. The glass as it
was a brilliant star and so forth.’ Thus we see that the word ‘Nur’
is used for both, ‘the moon’ and ‘Allah.’ Are we going to say that
Allah gives off reflected light? I think not. But if you continue to
insist that ‘Nur’ used for the Moon, means ‘borrowed’ or
‘reflected light’, and we saw above, that Allah is ‘the light’… Nur
of the Heavens and the Earth. What is the source of this light? ‘Siraj’,
of which Allah is only a reflection?
Think about it! If
Allah is named ‘Nur’ or a ‘reflected light’… who or what,
is the ‘Siraj’? Well the Qur’an tells us who the ‘Siraj’
is? But the answer will shock you. In Surah Al Ahzab, 33:45, 46 we find…
‘O Prophet! Surely We have send thee as a witness, a bearer of
glad tidings and a warner, and as a lamp spreading light. Here it says
that Mohammed is the lamp spreading light. In Arabic it is ‘Sirajaan
Munira’ Linguistically and spiritually, this is the end of the
discussion. Linguistically ‘Siraj’ and the adjective ‘Moon’
here are used together for the same shining thing - the person Mohammed.
It is clear ‘Munir’
does not mean reflected light in this verse or in any other verse. It
means shining. The people of Mohammed’s time understood that the Moon
was shining, and they were right. Just as the people of Moses’ time
understood that the Sun was the greater light, and the Moon the lesser
light, and they were right. But if you insist, the Arabic words ‘Nur’
and ‘Moon’ here mean reflected light, then based on the use of these
words in the Qur’an, Mohammed is like the ‘Sun’ and
‘Allah’ is like the ‘Moon.’ Does Dr. Naik really want to say that
Mohammed is the source of Light, and Allah is only his reflection? Why are
these so called scientific claims made, which no Muslim can support, if he
make a serious study of his own Qur’an. In a dialogue like
tonight it makes an honest discussion very difficult - almost impossible.
Let us go on and
look at the water cycle. Some
Muslim authors claim that the Qur’an shows pre scientific
knowledge of water cycle. What is the water cycle? Here in this slide, you
see four steps. The first step is evaporation. The water evaporates from
the seas and the earth. Second step it becomes clouds. Third step, it gives rain. And fourth, this rain causes the plants to grow. Seems
all very straight forward, and everybody knows 2, 3 and 4. Even if they
live in a town, they know that clouds come and rain comes, and the flowers
grow. But what about step one – ‘the evaporation.’ We cannot see it. It is difficult. And the Qur’an
does not have step one.
Now we are going to
look at a Prophet from the Bible - Prophet from 700 B.C… Prophet Amos. And he writes: ‘He who made the Pleiades and Orion,
Who turns blackness into dawn, and darkens day into night, and then Who
calls out for the waters, of the sea.’… Stage one. And pours
them out over the face of the land… stage three - The Lord (Yahweh) is
His name.
And one other
Prophet is Job, in 36:26-28, at
least a thousand years before the Hijra. He says… ‘How great is
God! Beyond our understanding! The number of his years is past finding
out. Stage one He draws up the drops of water which distill from the
mist as rain. That is stage three. And then the clouds are mentioned –
Stage two - Which pour down their moisture and abundant showers fall on
mankind. So here in the Bible, this difficult stage one, is there
for more than a thousand years, before the Qur’an.
Now let us go on and
look at Mountains. The Qur’an
has more than a dozen Verses stating that God placed firm and unmovable
mountains on the Earth. And in some of these Verses, the mountains are
listed as either a blessing for believers, or a warning for the
unbelievers. One example of this is found in the Surah Luqman, 31:10,11,
where the mountains are one of five warnings. It says: ‘He has created
the heavens without support, that you can see, and has cast aalqa
onto the earth…‘firm mountain’–‘Rawaasiya’, lest it
should shake with you. In ‘The Prophets’… Al-Ambiya, 21:31, as one
of seven warnings we read… ‘And We have set on the earth, firm
mountains lest it should shake with you….. with them. ’Finally in
‘The Bee’… Nahl, 16:15, says that… ‘He has cast ‘aalga’
onto the earth… ‘firm mountains’ ‘Rawaasiya’, lest
it should shake with you.
We see then that the
believers and the Non-believers are told, that Allah has done this great
thing. He strolled down and placed the mountains, so that the earth will
not shake violently with them. Therefore we must ask ourselves… ‘What
did they understand?’
In the next two
Verses, another picture is given, ‘The News’, Al-Naba 78 : 6-7…
“Have We not made the Earth an expanse, and the mountains as stakes ‘Al
– jebaala awtaad’, as those used to anchor a tent in the ground.
And then ‘The Overwhelming’ Al-Ghashiya, 88:17-19… ‘Do they…the
unbelievers not look at the mountains… ‘Al-jibaal’…
how they have been pitched like a tent?’ Here men are told that the
mountains are placed as tent pegs -Tent pegs keep the tents, stable. So
again the idea is put forward that the pegs… the mountains will keep the
earth from shaking.
A third picture is
presented in the word ‘Rawaasiya’, used for mountains. This
word comes from the Arabic root ‘Arsa.’ And the same root is
used for the Arabic word for ‘anchor.’ To ‘throw out’ or ‘cast
the anchor’ is aalgaa almirsaa. So instead of ‘Cast the anchor
to keep the ship from moving’. ‘We have cast the mountains, to keep
the earth from shaking’. From these pictures, it is clear that
Mohammed’s followers understood that the mountains were thrown down like
tent pegs, to keep a tent in place like an anchor to hold the ship in
place. To stop the earth from moving or limit earthquakes.
But in fact this is
false. The forming of mountains causes earthquake. Therefore these Verses
present a definite problem. Dr.
Maurice Bucaile recognized this, and discussed them in his book…
‘The Bible, the Qur’an and Science.’ After quoting the
above Verses about ‘Mountains’, he says… ‘Modern Geologists
described the faults in the Earth, as giving foundations to the mountains,
and the stability of the Earth’s crust results from this phenomenon of
these faults. When asked about this, Professor of Geology, Dr.
David A. Young says… ‘While it is true that many mountain ranges
are composed of folded rocks and the folds maybe of large scale, it is not
true that the folds render the crust stable. The very existence of the
fold, is evidence of instability in the crust.’ In other words,
mountains don’t keep the earth from shaking - their formation caused and
still causes the surface of the earth to shake.
Geological theories
of the present time propose, that the hardened crust of the earth is made
of sections and plates, which slowly move with relation to each other.
Sometimes the plates separate, like North and South America, separating
from Europe and
South Africa
. And some times they go together and they slide next to each other, and
they bump into each other, and then they cause earthquakes. An example of
this type of mountain formation is found in the Middle East, where the
migration of Arabia towards
Iran
, has resulted in the Zagross range in Iran. In many parts of the world, as one travels along the roads, one sees a
hillside, where the sand storm layers which were horizontal when they were
deposited, are now sticking up at angles. And so here you can see, these
sand storm layers, which were horizontal in the beginning, now they are
striking up at 75 degrees. They were pushed up there by an earthquake, by
the mountains being formed.
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