Muslim Contribution to Science
An atmosphere of free investigation is essential to the progress of science. In former times, however, such an atmosphere was extremely rare, thanks to various kinds of man-made beliefs. There were many cases in those days of an intelligent, scholarly person discovering a certain truth while pondering over his subject, only to find people turning against him and his discovery because they found it clashing with their superstitious beliefs. That was why new, innovative thinking could not make any progress.
One of the most notorious examples of the suppression of new ideas in antiquity was the condemnation of the renowned Greek philosopher, Socrates, to death, by drinking hemlock in 399 B.C. He was accused of ignoring the gods worshipped by the Athenians, of making new inventions in religion and of corrupting the youth of Athens.
Another such example-as late as the seventeenth century—was that of Galileo (1564-1642), the Italian astronomer who offended the Church simply by endorsing the Copernican view of the planets moving round the sun. He was sentenced by a religious court and thrown into prison. When he saw that death awaited him, he was forced to recant before the Inquisition. Kneeling, with both his hands on the Bible, he solemnly withdrew his ‘far-fetched’ theory of the movement of the planets around the sun. He not only rejected this theory but said that he considered it ‘abominable.’
This was not just an isolated incident, but rather a symptom of the intellectual malaise created by the Christian scholars of those times. The search for new truths and the discovery of nature’s secrets remained forbidden pastures to them for centuries. Such activities were reviled as black magic and a part of satanic teachings. In such circumstances, it was impossible for the processes of research and investigation to be carried on with any success. In the Middle Ages, it was solely due to the Muslims that such work could be given any impetus, thanks to the Quran having removed the kind of mental blocks that had stood in the way of people of other faiths, such as Galileo.
An appropriate attitude to scientific matters began to be encouraged for the first time after the Islamic revolution. This process then went on unhampered, ultimately leading to the age of modern discoveries.
