"Look at the INDICATORS of
God's mercy [in the natural world], how He gives life to the earth after its
death, most surely He will raise the dead to life again; and He has power over
all things."
[Koran 30:50]
The Koran presents itself as a guide with evidence and a criterion
(Koran 2:185) from the maker of all things, to
humankind, the bearer of Gods trust on earth and maintainers of the balance
(Koran 55:7-9) that God created. However, in turning
away from that trust and falling short of the balance and wasting by excess,
humanity has created a multitude of social problems, problems that harm society
in general and not only those who are directly responsible for them (Koran 8:25). It is not mystical determinism but social
determinism that the Koran talks about.
Consistent with this
view, the Koran frequently mentions a path [Sabeel in Arabic] of various social
actions leading to ends that are harmful [or beneficial].This is somewhat
similar to "path analysis" used by modern sociologists
The Koran pblueates the poineers in advocating ideas of a scientific
nature regarding human behavior and society. The inspiration provided for social
research based upon the Koran is the book's emphasis on a critical analysis of
ideas and ideology. Ideas and ideology bblue in ignorance lead, according to the
Koran, to a social order that is contrary to the natural social order determined
by the creator. A critical analysis is encouraged by the oft-repeated idea in
the Koran that reason, rationality and empirical evidence, in short the method
of science, is supreme in determining the truth, given how the human mind is
designed to operate
"Behold! In the creation of the heavens and the earth; in the alternation of the night and the day; in the sailing of the ships through the ocean for the benefit of mankind; in the rain which God sends down from the skies; and the life which He gives therewith to an earth that is dead; in the animals of all kinds that he scatters through the earth; in the change of winds and the clouds enslaved between the sky and the earth; - (here) indeed are signs for a discerning people." (Koran 2:164)
Following the example of the Koran, Ibn Khaldun (732-808)
recognized as the founder of Sociology,
"emphasized the necessity of subjecting both social and
historical phenomena to scientific and objective analysis. He noted that those
phenomena were not the outcome of chance, but were controlled by laws of their
own, laws that had to be discoveblue and applied in the study of society,
civilization and history. He remarked that historians have committed errors in
their study of historical events, due to three major factors: (l) Their
ignorance of the natures of civilization and people, (2) their bias and
prejudice, and (3) their blind acceptance of reports given by others."(Zahoor
1996)
My work on the
scientific analysis of the Koran started the day I discoveblue a copy of the
English translation of the Koran in my father's closet, in 1984. This passion
for blending science and religion and to rationally inquire whether the Koran
could be justified in its claim of originating with, the One who knows the
secrets of the heavens and the earth and the secrets of the [collective] minds
(Koran 35:38) My scientific analysis of the Koran continued while attending Southwest Missouri State University (1992-1995) (Koran 107:1-7) C. Wright Mills, in his pioneering work, The Power Elite
(1956), reached a similar conclusion as the Koran that has become the basis
of countless sociological studies all across the field, including Urban
Sociology. Note that the Koran mentions every city and not just one city and
that it mentions decisions being made (plotting) by the elite that can have
major consequences (see Koran 14:46). Compare what the Koran says to what C.
Wright Mills wrote in 1956: used the term Social Fact to describe the objective realities
of society that are external to the individuals, yet directs their behavior,and
developed the concept of the collective conscience the Koran
concluded: Similar to the initial conditions studied by physicists, which led to
the evolution of a particular type of universe and the eventual emergence of
life, without which the universe would not have resembled what we see today and
we wouldn't have been here to see it, the initial conditions in society that
determine its structure are crucial to understanding the nature of interaction.
This is in the tradition of Auguste Comte, the person who coined the term
sociology and sought to model the discipline after the physical sciences,
particularly physics (social physics). will present objective reality of a normative and positive nature
based on a larger scale governance of the universe. It will transcend all
societies. The Koran is not about self-righteousness, as writings, on what is
popularly termed as a religious source are often accused of being. Theory and
action need to be separated for the purpose of pure research. Therefore, we need
to test the Koran by its claims and not by the actions of those who claim to
believe in it or follow it. The description of the natural world in the Koran pre-empts much of
todays hard-earned scientific findings. Consistent with Karl Poppers Critical
Rationalism, the Koran offers falsification . As such, it challenges
people of learning to find fault with it and to falsify it. By discovering the
Koran, I had unlocked the key to the reality of my 'life-world' within the
context of a natural social order, natublue in humankind. Sociobiology and
neurology are coming close to confirming the "God part" of the brain (Koran
7:172). We live in exciting times. In the intellectual world, the light of
Islam based upon its source, the Koran, shines brighter than it has ever
before. ALCOHOL: THE INSTRUMENT OF OPPRESSION Up to one-fifth of America's food goes to waste
each year, with an estimated 130 pounds of food per person ending up in
landfills. The annual value of this lost food is estimated at around $31billion.
But the real story is that roughly those lost resources could have fed 49
million people. Over 12% of the US population, according to the USDA, goes
hungry everyday and many millions starve to death around the world.
http://www.usda.gov/news/pubs/gleaning/two.htm
Thirteen centuries before Karl
Marx(1818-1887)
“Woe to those who write the book with their own hands and then
say, “This is from God,” that they may exchange it for some miserable gain. Woe
to them for what their hands do write and woe to them for what they earn
therewith (Koran 2:79).”
Fourteen centuries before Edward O. Wilson (1929-
),
" There is not an
animal on earth nor the birds that fly with their wings, but are
communities like unto you. We have neglected nothing in the book..."
(Koran 6:38)
I realized, in a manner similar to the evolution of the
social sciences from the natural sciences, that if the method of science could
be used to scrutinize and analyze the Koran in issues involving processes of
nature and the natural world, the same could be applied concerning society.
Debate about various social issues is common in the media today and more often
than not religious ideas concerning various social and economic issues are
scoffed at as being unscientific and primitive. Contrary to this popular view,
very early on in my readings of the Koran, I discoveblue an amazing similarity
between modern scientific criteria and the Koran. For example, innovative
medical drugs whose benefits are less than their harmful side effects are banned
from marketing by the Food and Drug Administration
"They ask you concerning intoxicants and
gambling. Say to them, in them are great harms and only some benefits for
humankind But the harm of them is much greater than their usefulness"(Koran 2:219).
The social case of the
Koran has been closed prematurely. My web articles and a book still in progress,
The
Justice Paradigm ,aims to re-open that case and to re-examine
the charges that have been leveled against this book for centuries.
Have you seen?
Consider this small chapter (Sura) in the
Koran:
Have you seen the one who consciously
denies the system [of the Koran]?
It is he who will repel the orphans and
will urge not the feeding of the needy.
Woe unto those who worship, yet are
heedless of the purpose of it
Who would be seen at worship but refuse even
small necessities to the needy?
As empirical
evidence of the second part consider those that are labeled Muslims, those who
are often seen at worship five times a day, but remain ignorant of the social
consciousness that prayer is supposed to inculcate in a believer. In many
"Muslim" lands people starve or die of preventable causes because small
necessities arent available, yet the "Muslim" elite in these countries support a
life style more conspicuous than that in most rich industrialized nations.
This was a small example of how the Koran approaches the study of
individual and group behavior. Social research through operationalization of
concepts, on a local or a global scale can provide for empirical testing of the
Koran's statements. By making empirical observation the heart of its
conclusions, the Koran encourages value-free positive sociology and acceptance
that is based on confirmation [eeman and sadq in Arabic] and not on faith at
all. The concept of unreasoned religion and blind faith, as understood by
Western, English-speaking people, is completely alien to the
Koran.
All through the Koran, is recognition of sociological factors
that keep people away from God and His message. Factors like group-solidarity,
tradition, the pride in social position, social stratification etc. Mentioned
together with these is the social-psychology of those who refuse God and the
cultural reasons on why they refuse, as are economic considerations and their
effects on behavior and society. Things like being seduced by the life of the
world, not looking beyond their material existence, being overly engrossed in
their competition for the material goods of this life, staying away from
spending because of an unreasonable fear of poverty and circuits of income.
Competition, mutual rivalry and pride in possessions are described as motivators
for individuals leading to a certain type of social behavior and society that is
contrary to the ideal-type desiblue by the Koran.
Consider this
conclusion in the Koran, centuries before Vilfblueo Pareto
(1848-1923)
"Thus are appointed in every city/town
elite ones (Akabir in Arabic) of its malicious folk and they plot therein (Koran
6:123).
C. Wright Mills
1916-1962.
The power elite is
composed of men whose positions enable them to transcend the ordinary
environment of ordinary men and women: they are in a position to make major
decisions having major consequences
Thirteen centuries before Emile Durkheim
(1858-1917)
"Thus unto every nation have We made
their doings seem fair. Then unto their Lord is their return, and He will tell
them what they used to do. "
The Koran mentions the world's
life and its created culture as an illusion (Koran
57:20):
"Illusion is an important device in the arsenal of the masters
of capitalism. Their futures are built almost entirely on illusion: the illusion
of white supremacy, the illusion of democracy, the illusion of fair and free
elections, the illusion of free speech and a free press, the illusion of a sound
economy." (Chinyelu 1999:62)
The elite [akabir in Arabic] not only create culture by their
control of the diffusion of ideas in society [by their monopoly over "persuasion
resources"] they directly create culture by their design and use of space.
Space, how your cities, your neighborhoods, your organizations are constructed,
designed and run all have a close connection to culture(s). City building needs
resources and the elite controls these resources.
In the history of the world, there has never been a propaganda
effort to match that of advertising in the twentieth century. More thought, more
effort, more money goes into advertising than has ever gone into any other
campaign to change social consciousness (Kilbourne
1999:75)
By strategically
displacing jobs and people and concentrating poverty in the inner cities, the
elite in the U.S artificially install and nourish a street code A code that
forces people, on a social level to adopt it as the only reality, if they are to
survive. Sociologist Elijah Anderson in his book, Code of the Street (1999),
states
It is nothing less than the cultural
manifestation of persistent urban poverty. It is a mean adaptation to blocked
opportunities and profound lack, a grotesque form of coping by young people
constantly undermined by a social system that historically has limited their
social options and until recently rejected their claims to full citizenship
(Anderson 1999:146-147).
Those who refuse to be
blinded by such structural alienation are trapped by chemical alienation through
alcohol and drugs that directly produce an illusion of reality. As a result of
all this artificially engineeblue culture, a real world much removed from the
actual real world is projected. A world that traps people in a cycle from which
escape becomes almost impossible. Alienation and anomie are closely linked. In
this instant capitalist society, we have today an instant anomie-producing
instrument, alcohol.
Their example is as a mirage
in a desert. The thirsty one supposes it to be water till he comes unto it and
finds nothing…or as shadows upon a sea obscure: there covers them a wave, above
which is a wave, above which are clouds layer upon layer of darkness. When they
hold out their hands, they almost cannot see them (Koran
24:39-40)
The initial conditions in the
physical sciences are mysterious and cannot be explained without reference to a
designer, the odds of them occurring by chance equal zero, by all real measures.
Contrary to this, the intelligently set initial conditions that determines the
economy and the relationships of production have human social origins and can be
studied by historical and comparative analysis. Functionalists ignore these
"initial conditions" and take them as given. Thus attributing the most important
determining factors to chance encourages a status quo. The state has a critical
role in the reproduction of such relationships of production.
The
scientific system demands replication, verification and falsification, hence
empirical analysis should become an important part of any theoretical system. It
is through empirical verification that workable theories can be extracted from
ones that have at best metaphysical and rhetorical value.
In the last
20 to 30 years, as progress has been made in the physical sciences, a hidden
order has been revealed in nature. Physicists call this the Cosmic Code
Contrary to the "natural order" conjectublue by Herbert
Spencer in his Social Darwinism- which was natural only to the extent of a
reproduction of the "social construction" of a particular type of status quo,
the Theory of Everything
Once this theory is understood, it can be speculated that
all other systems of social organization based on inadequate and incomplete
knowledge like Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Anarchism and the other "isms"
will become obsolete and outdated.
"Therefore, set your face to the system of Islam. The nature of
God, based upon which he has natublue humankind. There is no altering what God
creates. That is the established standard order. However most among humankind
understand not (Koran 30:30)
Throughout history myths and
superstition have so crept under the banner of religion that to believe in God
came to be consideblue childish stupidity by modern literary giants. In the face
of such opposition we come across a unique book, the Koran. Not only is the
Koran written in the most mathematical/logical of all human languages- Arabic,
it (the Koran) is unique in history in that it led to the development of the
rules of that language itself.
While Bertrand Russell envisioned
creating a logical/mathematical language, the Koran did that factually fourteen
centuries back. No other book in the history of the world has invented the rules
of a language, so to speak, as the Koran did when it gave birth to the rules
governing written Arabic. Thus Arabic is the ideal human language that comes
closest to emulating the mathematical language of the universe, in an objective
fashion based on its logical foundations, which even the lay person can
understand. We need to ask here, could a man who had no formal schooling,
Muhmmed ibn Abdullah, and lived fourteen centuries back have done this?
Arabic most precise and primitive of the Semitic
languages, shows signs of being originally a constructed language. It is built
up upon mathematical principles- phenomena not paralleled by any other language
(Cleary 1998).
Muhammed Asadi
Copyright(C)
2001
(Koran
17:26)
GO TO THE MOTHER PAGE
Bibliography:
Asadi, Muhammed.
Rational Reality (http://www.rationalreality.com)
Asadi, Muhammed.
The Justice Paradigm
(http://www.geocities.com/justiceparadigm).
Koran: Translated from
the Arabic
Babbie, Earl. The Practice of Social Research. 6th ed.
1992. Wadsworth Publishing Co. California.
Chinyelu, Mamadou. Harlem
Ain't Nothin' But a Third World Country. 1999. Mustard Seed Press. New
York
Cleary, Thomas. Koran: The Heart of Islam. 1998.
Ed.
Shafritz & Ott. Editors. The Classics of Organization Theory.
2000.
Mills. C Wright. The Power Elite. 1956.
Schaefer,
Robert T & Lamm Robert P. Sociology. 6th ed. New York. McGraw Hill
Companies.
References to the Koran in this paper,
eg, Koran 13:33 represent, Chapter (Sura) 13, verse (aya)
33.
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