Translated by Ahmet Fahrettin Uçar
Bismillahir-rahman-ir-rahim
In the name of God, the merciful, and the beneficient.
He is in a different reality every day
(id est, he is a Sustainer who creates the universe anew in each moment)
Qur’an
“Know well what your eyes behold; what you do not see will be revealed to you.” said Jesus. What do we see when we behold the world around us? How should we interpret the world that we see and live in? In short, what happened to the humans? In appearance, modern life resembles a nightmare, a bad dream in many ways. Why do we feel alien to the society we live in and feel in our hearts a persistent ache of being homesick? Why did the position of human kind on earth turned into such a panorama of terror and frenzy? Each time we turn the T.V on, scenes of anguish and screams which are broadcasted from all over the world are rushing to our minds. We see people fighting in blood and sweat to earn their bread. In Bernard Shaw’s words: “Dirty money is acquired by lease, interest, and profit, and every shilling of it merges with crime, drunkenness, prostitution and all the bad fruits of poverty.” Chaos and terror dominated our world; nightmarish is our life. I saw while skimming over Spengler’s Decline of the West recently that he says: the tradition of interpreting history by dividing it to eras is an ancient tradition left from the prophecy of Daniel as mentioned in the Holy Book. It appears to me that, as if, the pre-apocalyptic dark age mentioned in the holy books is this era. The Golden Age, the Silver Age, the Bronze age have come to pass and here we are at last in the iron age. The relentless iron weapons of modern technology is pounding humanity, dividing it to pieces. We have to interpret the modern dream of history which has now turned to a nightmare. In similitude to Daniel’s interpretation of Babel’s King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream with his classification of four eras, we too need an interpretation of history; a new philosophy of history.
As narrated in the Holy Bible’s section of Daniel, Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babel, having been depressed by the dreams he saw and thus being awaken, orders all the soothsayers and fortunetellers to be gathered in order to interpret his dream. No problem lest his dreams are interpreted. The interpreters will be rewarded, but in the case of not being able to come up with an adequate interpretation, all the fortunetellers will be killed. When fortunetellers ask their king: “May our King tell us his dream that we may interpret his dreams?”, the King of Babel replies: “The dream I have seen has gone out of my mind, I have forgotten it.” and adds; “You shall tell me my dream so that I understand you can interpret it.” Right as it is; if they cannot see what the King has dreamt, how could it be evident that they may trust the truthfulness of their interpretations? As I contemplate what we live in the modern world, and see it in television, I agree with Nebuchadnezzar. What could be the meaning of this nightmare? How to interpret the reality we live in, the dream of history, the humankind have seen up to our day? First of all, are the events that took place a bad dream, or is it the reality; is this the reality of the world and the humankind? How are we to interpret history and reality?
After the expulsion of Babel the Jewish race who lived dispersed on earth for thousands of years had the holiest of lands: their homeland was the Holy Bible. They didn’t have a land on earth; but they lived by making the Holy Bible their homeland. After living for centuries with the dream of the “promised land”; finally in our age possessed an earthly land, Israel. However, there land is no more a holy land and is but a piece of soil which they have desecrated by displaying the most tragic oppressions of history. Still, in Israel today, there are Jews who hate politics and are against the message of the holy book to be defiled by becoming a means for Zionist politics; but it is no longer the same mentality which made the Holy Bible their holy land which is dominant in Israel, but rationalist and Machiavellian politicians… It is not just the Jews who have lost their divinities, but the whole of humanity is today alien. Humans no longer live in the peaceful world of holy books. The modern civilization today is irreligious. More precisely; since irreligiousity is contrary to the human nature, it has found idols for itself.
Just like the Paris commune which dethroned Christianity and built a statue of human mind, or rather an ugly idol of it in Paris; our contemporaries who no longer believe in the idols of mind and progress have in its stead, to put it in the language of the Holy Bible, started to worshiping the old idol of Moloch which stands for the ambition of power. Although it is said that “Justice is the basis of possession (Moloch)”, the actual basis of Moloch (possession) had only been the ambition of power. Maybe we cannot oppose Anarchy as an alternative to the state, but struggle for prevalence, tyranny, and oppression shouldn’t be the form of political sovereignty still practiced in our age. The three persistent diseases of humanity as Plato quoted are: State (power), wealth, and lust… The new trinity of the modern world are but “power, money, and sex” -they are worshiping these. The evil character of the drive for power mingled with dirty money, and by addressing the base animal characters of humans rather than the noble human side, has created the modern idol of trinity. This is the trick that history played on modern humanity. The dream that reality has created, a bad dream, a horrible nightmare…
We need to understand well and to interpret why this has happened to be so; why when humans dreamt of progress and achieving good things every step towards realizing their passions and goals, every action turned the world into their disadvantage which wasn’t their intention; the meaning of this bad joke and harsh ridicule that history has bestowed upon us, this bad dream… This brings us to the question of what is history?
The author of these lines thinks that the classical descriptions of history are misleading and he thinks that a perspective that we have chosen with good intentions, that is, to see history -naively- as a knowledge of past times has deceived us tremendously. Benedetto Croce said “The real history is modern history.” What he meant by this is that since the time frame of the historian is the modern age, he has to evaluate the historical events with a modern perspective and he has to study the history along the inspiring problems of his day. As a result, to look for similar events in history to our times, is same as looking for modern events in hundreds of years of old magazines.
We may say that essentially all that we know and all the concepts are like the forgotten dreams of Nebuchadnezzar (if we look at it from an epistemological perspective). Hence, we have to discuss at least two ontological theory. Every expression always has a real and a symbolic meaning. As we have pointed out in the section Meaning and its Significance: “The medieval mentality was unable to discern between symbol and reality -allegorical meaning and real meaning. In the medieval times Allegory and reality were conjoined.” If we are to properly understand the dream that the humanity has seen so far until the 20thcentury, first we will have to learn to separate the real meaning and the symbolic meaning.
WHAT IS REALITY? (Not the reality that is visible our eyes, but the complete reality with all its visible or invisible aspects.) What is dream (the dream that we see when our senses are closed to the external world.)? Still yet, what is interpretation? Which means that we have to discuss the “meaning” of meaning.
In order to do this, we first need to grasp the history and the existence; for it is impossible to give a meaning to what we see unless we comprehend it. According to the Holy book, Nebuchadnezzar hadn’t seen just an ordinary dream, and his soul wasn’t depressed for naught. The dream in the book of Daniel is so narrated and interpreted that beneath the symbolic meaning it signifies a view of segmenting history into periods. We have to discuss this `dream of history`, because our adventure took place in the history and we know all what we know through reference to history. But to understand this dream of history we have to understand meaning and its significance, and we have to discuss the meaning of meaning through semantics too. This means an interpretation of epistemology, ontology, and our dream of history (all the thoughts and actions of humanity that emerged in the history). That is the meaning of the profound saying of Prophet Jesus: “Know what is in front of thine eyes, and the rest shall be revealed.”
The animals too see and feel the external world of the five senses, but to comprehend it through thoughts derived from inspiration, and to form them anew is a human capability. Is our understanding of the invisible world just an inspiration? May be so! But the exaltation of humanity, his thought and his whole historical adventures begin with this inspiration. First comes the word, then the world of symbolic meaning generated by that word; and when this world of symbols are not adequate, the world of ‘mazmun’ (hidden meaning) which are expressed by the supra language of symbols.
When we carefully observe the historical dreams of Nebuchadnezzar and the interpretations of these forgotten dreams, we understand that if we are to make a satisfactory and qualified interpretation, we have to discuss matters of history, physics, metaphysics, and epistemology altogether. We cannot stay in the boundaries of scientific specialization (here); because of the intricate in intertwined nature of these matters. We have to re-evaluate and interpret primarily the concept of history as well as many other concepts. When we attribute meanings to such words as nature (Physics), and history, we express our interpretations and choices in relation with our orientation towards semantics, epistemology, metaphysics, cosmogony, cosmology and theologically even though we may not consciously be aware of it. Therefore if these matters be considered as different categories, some inevitable mistakes would occur. To be able to clarify the necessary causes this assertion, we will need to begin with inspecting on the meaning and significance of the word ‘history’, or the `dream of history`. To do this we should begin with linguistics, and semantics, from the etymology of the word history.
What is History? As master Ibn-i Haldun said: “on understanding history philosophers and ignorant are equal” For, the simple and external meaning of history is but the story of past events. There is no difference whether our knowledge about such unique, unparalleled, individual, mass of events that are the products of a specific time and place to be small or vast. Since such a profusion of events don’t have any order or a principal, it doesn’t have a meaning. As to its surface meaning, as Ibn-i Haldun says: “History is an inquiry about the causes of things in occurrence (the universe), and the causes of these matters are quite fathomless. Things in occurrence, he might have meant the historical events but when we talk about history by holding on to the original Arabic word, I intend to show my inclination to use the word not only for the history of humanity, but for the whole history of all events, including the history of nature.
As evident, and as master Ibn-i Haldun points out, the surface meaning of the word history is but about the story of past events. But we prefer the etymological meaning of the word in the dictionary. The word history, which in Hebrew, comes from the word “verrehe” which means to observe the crescent means the designation and recording of events according to the moon calendar, which is to say the designation and recording of events chronologically. The word `history` which is derived from the Greek word `istoria` has also the same meaning. Toynbee says that the word `istoria` in Ionian Greek means investigation, and analysis of the truth. In antique Greece `istoria` was understood as “information about events”. It is said that insisting on words is impertinence, but the etymological meaning of history was a matter of dispute throughout the history of philosophy. For the superficial meaning of history which is understood as knowledge about individual and specific situations and events, was evaluated as to be an inadequate subject matter for the act of theoria; that is, theoretical explanations. Beginning with Aristotle, philosophers undervalued history due to this meaning, and as Ibn-i Haldun points out they considered it to be an incomprehensible mass of information. A perfect documentation of these discussions are present in Doğan Özlem`s book “Philosophy of History” For this reason we do not intend to repeat the discussions emerging from the etymological meaning of the word `history`(not that it is trivial but it would prolong the matter unnecessarily). For now we find it enough to refer the book of Doğan Özlem for the contrast of theoria-istoria.
But if history means the recoding of events, and if we take into consideration that there is not only a history of humanity but also a natural history, according to me history is what took place in the past and all events that were recorded. Doubtless it is that when defined this way, everything known, that is all human knowledge, is included in the field of history. Of course such a limitlessness is not appropriate for a discipline. Yet, although historians usually believe that they are writing and studying the events about the history of humanity, reality is not as simple as historians presume it to be. For even though a historian may not mention his world view, cosmogony, his understanding of metaphysics and his orientation which is derived from theological matters; in short, everything that makes him human: all of these influence every sentence of the history he is writing and narrating, and shape his dream of history. This is an issue no historian can avoid. There are also utterly objective historical records that are written just as reports of the events, and actually this is the ideal form of writing unless the historian consciously deals with the philosophy of history. For instance, Tâberi in his historical writing is content merely by reporting the historical rumors. The Timetables of History with is written with the same chronological style is another example of this. But even if we set aside the question of whether such annuals are to be accepted as histories in the modern sense, it could only superficially be possible for even works as such to document history objectively as mere reports. Even when narrating past events we do not constrain to past alone without interpreting it, and we cannot. For we do not tell everything that was known in the past and we practically cannot. Among what we know, we tell the events that we believe are historically important to be told, and what we consider to be important according to our historical perspective. The historian percolates history from a sieve and writes only what is seeped. However this is not a standard sieve that we may accept to have an extensional existence, and is only present in the mind of the historian who is using it. Therefore the holes of this sieve varies from historian to historian.
Actually whatever is in the past is history (and that is the meaning of history); but which events in the history are to be regarded as historically important and which events should be selected and recorded is an issue that each historian has to decide individually. History is the story of past events: fine, what then should the historian write? All the events? This is impossible. First of all it is practically impossible, for the historian is writing about a particular event, and of course he wouldn’t write about what he sees to be irrelevant. Still what he narrates about the topic he is writing is not about everything that he knows about it, but what he considers to be important. What is the historian writing about if not the whole history? The answer is a simple one: His own preferences, and what he considers necessary to be told that according to his world view, and understanding of history. Historical events are in fact, events of “preference”. Now we ask: why should history be restricted to the preferences of any historian; is there a logical explanation to this?
Since there is no logical explanation to vindicate this, history is the whole of events that occurred in the past; and the historian decides which event is more important. For some, the political decision mechanisms, for others the history of thoughts, yet for others the history of institutions etc. The history is not what we tell according to our preferences, but –theoretically- all the events that took place in the past. It is doubtless that both Newton’s law of gravitation and Plato’s theory of ideas are history. Albeit, these examples examples are considered to belong to the fields of physics and philosophy, these have directed the path of history by influencing the events on a much more persistent way. So far these two examples are two great historical events and only the fool may reject it. If we summarize, history includes all the events in the past and in this sense, it is the accumulation; the total of all human knowledge and wisdom. Essentially we all owe our knowledge and wisdom to history, and we learn it through historical sources. Ghazali in his book El-Munkiz declares that “if someone doesn’t possess knowledge of a science to its highest degree; one cannot realize the faults of that science”. Now, our attribution to historical knowledge of being and including all human knowledge and wisdom makes it a holistic science. However, what is told of history above also points out to its biggest weaknesses. Of course not every historian can, as Ibn-i Haldun does, evaluate and criticize all the human knowledge and build a whole philosophy of history. Furthermore, modern historians bestow the role of philosophy of history to sociology and even dislike philosophy of history. This is a long and multi-faceted matter. In short, according to historians “historical events occur in a certain place and time” that is, they are unique events. This is already dictates itself by the practice of giving time and place, or in other words: the method (we have already mentioned that the word history is about chronologically arranging and cataloging of events). A unique situation is a unique situation; it cannot be generalized: its comparison and classification is impossible. In conclusion, no theory or idea can be procured from the information of unique events. However, all historians are human beings; they have opinions and beliefs that they share or do not share with their associates and his way of thinking influences every line of the events of history he depicts. That is, they certainly have a world view and a philosophy of history. They might consider these opinions the universal practice of history, known by all and exempt from elucidation, that everyone endorses. Id est, most of the time historians are philosophers of history who deny that they are engaging in philosophy of history; for the contrary is impossible in practice. This be said that they might be unaware of it.
An English poet said that “Modern people began to find in forty feet electric dynamo, the spiritual power that the ancient Christians found in the cross.” History is not a past that is left in the past; its influence continues in present time and it shapes our time. It can be said that “in effect the dead govern the living”. For instance, the orientation of the world of Islam was ordained by prophet Muhammad, and for instance, modern Turkey’s orientation; -although it is changing nowadays- our state policy today is still directed by Ataturk. We address the living: of course our audience is not the dead, but we always have to discuss the thoughts of the dead. For the dead which lie in their graves still govern our world. Those who established the status quo, those who shaped our world are of course the people who lived in the past. The path to understand today passes through history.
We are interested in history only to understand today in order to determine an orientation accordingly. Why should we be interested in the past merely out of curiosity as if collecting events like stamp-collectors. Actually this is the real meaning of history: to catalog events chronologically, to define their occurrence date, to date them, but I couldn’t be satisfied merely with history and I was in the pursuit of building a philosophy of history of my own since I have been first engaged in the philosophy of history long time ago. To be interested in the past merely as history doesn’t satisfy me, and I say that, the priority for us is a style of scientism as ‘science for science’; to put it in a better way, not a science in pursuit of gaining power and dominance as of the western sort; but a scientific action we define by our own free volition in order to know how we are supposed to live; in order to live as possessors of wisdom.
If we were content with the world we are living in, we could be satisfied in living the present like the primitives or like the children, -or if it is right to say so, like animals. Perhaps it is not very good for us, but we have a history and a memory. Orteg`y Gasset once said: “Humans have no nature, they have a history”. There is no doubt that if we had an animal nature, and lived solely in the present like the children do, we would have been happier. Mevlana Celaleddin Rumi said: “Sufi ibn-ul vakt ul based ey refik” (The mystic has to be the son of time; he shouldn’t carry anxiety over the past and the future.), but unfortunately in today’s world this is not very likely to be possible. Id est, we don’t even need to be interested in the present if we don’t have any thoughts of planning and shaping the future: if we don’t have an ideal, a vision of future a utopia, a world view which could be summed up vaguely as: if we don’t have a belief, what is the use of knowing and understanding the status quo of today? Of course we could say `la yus`el emma yef`al! (No question of Allah’s doing, it does what it does); or this small mind needs not know the meaning (of God’s deeds) and suffice to care for our lives. But if we have thoughts of planning our future: controlling and creating policies; just right then, it means that we need to know well and understand the world that we are living in. Thus to understand the status quo today we need to comprehend history well. However, if the meaning of history is understood as a source of inspiration to shape our world; being interested in the events of history that are relevant to the status quo will entail.
There is a huge history in the past; many things have happened and actually to know everything that happened is a condition that God alone can have. The historian, even if he really wished to, cannot know the whole history; nor does he need to know. What he needs to know is the historical events that are necessary for him when thinking about the status quo, or the present. Thus described, history is about the present and the future rather than the past. In this state history inevitably morphs into philosophy of history, and I should add right away that essentially it is impossible for any historian to refrain from engaging in philosophy of history: conscious or unconscious; adequately or inadequately. Humanity has seen a dream of history, however it has forgotten what it has seen like the king of Babel, Nebuchadnezzar. Essentially it is interested in the interpretation of the dream rather than the dream itself. Of course it is more vital to be interested in how this dream of history will effect the present and the future for the living men of action.
Now, with your permission I want to use this dream simile one more time to inquire upon the nature of existence. Really, what is the true nature of existence? What is truth? Including history, what difference does the whole world of being and material world have from the dream of Nebuchadnezzar? Descartes too considered this issue and said that the reality couldn’t be more than a dream. Descartes who is essentially from the skeptic tradition says in his book “Thoughts on Method” that he was capable of thinking even in his dreams, and furthermore that he could solve math problems and believed his dream to be the reality; and although he said `cogito ergo sum/I think therefore I am`, proposed this as an evidence for the former argument. Hence “we suppose we think but our thought might also be a dream. Long before him Ghazali pointed out to this and said “Just as the person who only perceives with his five senses is a stranger to those things which are perceived by the mind, in the same way, when the eye of the heart opens (and according to him heart is the organ of judgment), it is possible to see that the perception when one is awake could also be a dream” and in actuality this is the case. This opinion is also present for instance in the eyes of the scholars of Eşari in their atomist theories which are consistent with their world view.
As to my knowledge, similar conclusions were drawn out from quantum mechanics to those of Eşari
In his book `The Birth of Scientific Philosophy` Hans Reichenbach asks a question anew which is found in the old Eşari scientists with pretty much the same expressions in seriousness, after expounding on physics and atomist theories: “how much do objects show traits of continuity? For instance do objects stand where they are when I don`t look at them, or could it be that they disappear?” Our common sense is (adequate) enough to decide on worldly matters (is it really enough?), but there is a vision behind the issue of existence and a worldview; and beyond that in the background lies a metaphysical understanding of religion and God. No doubt that it is even possible to identify with a vision without religion: such as in modern `scientism`, but I want to say that here we are in front of a diverging path, and we have to choose.
We are living in a faithless age; very well, are we going to have a faith or not? Are we going to choose faith of scientism? More bluntly, are we going to believe in God or not? This choice is very important in order to understand events and to have a vision; for it influences the tiniest of detail in our worldview and the way we understand events. It is perfectly possible, of course, to create thoughts and to say something about history and the world as long as it is on the level of small talk. Therefore, seriously, do we really want to comprehend the truth and are we going to give the time and effort to accomplish this? This is the issue at hand and we are facing a problem from which we cannot run away.
I want to express the problem once more in this way: although all cultures from long had a spirituality, or had been religious; even atheists were present in the metropolises of civilization and they too had their arguments and evidences. However, be it Christian or Muslim, theologians have used some misleading statements on this most basic theologic issue. Three groups of main objects made by atheists reasoning by themselves on the impossibility of the existence of God (that the matter existed forever and not created; if God really existed why he didn`t show himself, and the evils and imperfections in the universe) are only partially valid for Judaic, Christian and Islamic conceptions of God. That is, they might be right in criticizing an antropomorphic conception of God; however there are also pantheist, panentheist, immanent and deist conceptions of God. Let us not mix the anthropomorphic conceptions that the atheists are reacting with Islamic conceptions. This much of Western imitation is indeed too much. On the other hand, there is a huge difference of understanding between scholastic theologians and mystic theologians in terms of their conceptions of God, and I am in the opinion that atheist arguments are totally invalid for mystic conceptions of God.
I do not want to enter this dangerous and perplexing issue. In the state of obligation I have to say as much as it can be said. First of all, we have to ask the question “Do we comprehend existence as an unchanging and fixed continuity; id est, does existing objects exist forever in space and time; is their existence contiguous?”. For me, as Heraclitus expressed “existence is `being` in time”; it is historical with all the meaning of the word; it is a process of being in time; a sequence of events and is variable; that is, it has no contiguity in space. Newton’s ideas of absolute time and space are no longer accepted in modern physics. Einstein doesn’t accept the idea of absolute time and space. The particular Latin term ‘continuum’ is an issue that Al-Farabi pointed out in his article “On the Instance”. He exemplifies this issue of ‘continuum’ by the analogy of a cup which is filled with water. This issue, that is “does emptiness exist in nature” is still on the headlines of modern physics (nature, existence) theories even today, and it has to remain there too. To express my opinion in the most concise manner; to sum it briefly in once sentence: “For me, contrary to the inclination of Einstein’s theories, time should be taken as a frame of reference as in the Copenhagen interpretations of quantum mechanics, and it should be acknowledged that material beings as a process in time, constitute space and dimension. Modern physics has been accurate in rejecting absolute space, but this should be done by melting absolute space in the continuum of absolute time.
As Yalçın Koç elucidates in his book `Determinism and Space`, determinism and other such materialist and scientific views are natural consequences of taking space as the actual frame of existence. I am in the opinion that some aspects of the quantum mechanics could better be understood if the continuum of time is taken as the reference frame, and if it is accepted that objects resemble only the being in process. Hence, I present this opinion to the attention of people in our country who are dealing with the theory of this subject/issue. Yalçin Koç(*){Ahmed Yüksel Özemre, the first atom physicist have passed away and since the book is now translated into English these opinions are now present/available to the theoreticians and practitioners of this science.}
Another important point is that- Samuel Alexander in his ‘Space Time and Deity’ made a similar interpretation of quantum mechanics with his idea of ‘point instances’. This is essentially in their field of specialization and I can only approach the field as with a sort of cosmological argument on the postulate of God, or as a basic axiom for building a new metaphysics since this is a vision which forces the acceptance of a mystical divine power; or in short the existence of a God that constantly creates so for the matter to be contiguous in time. Even if understood as point instances, it is the act of constant creation that even enables the continuation of time itself; and it is guaranteed by the constant creation of the Ever-Creator. For the continuum of time cannot be imagined albeit it is our dream that we see everyday; our ever perpetual human experience.
I don’t think that there is any atheist argument against such a conception of nature and God, and I don’t think that there could be. Let me conclude this issue by adding this in order not to be misunderstood: in my opinion the theological and philosophical arguments on the nature of the divine is an impudence of the over-courageous human mind: a foolish attempt to fill the Atlantic Ocean in a cup. Mankind cannot even comprehend the truth and creation or the universe in it’s material aspects. The whole universe professes with its courses to the existence of God; but philosophical and theological discussions on God’s nature should be considered as going beyond the limits of logical reasoning. However this is the most fundamental issue of metaphysics: If you don’t think about God you cannot think about anything. As a beautiful sayings of Jesus which is one of my most beloved quotations say: “Thou shall know the truth and it shall set you free”. Our age has physics, but it doesn’t have a metaphysics to complement it and to give it meaning. A world without a metaphysics lacks a foundation like a pyramid built upside down; therefore its ontology is devoid of meaning and absurd. A world that has lost its ontological basis can have no epistemology, no logic, neither a hierarchy nor a system. Modern civilization which has started its journey by idolizing the mind after the French revolution continues its way, after idolizing “mind, nature, and progress” finally adding to it an idol of scienticism which is but a tool of the ambition of power, and has come to a vision-less and faithless technology of horror and frenzy. This situation has brought us, in spite of all the pains that were taken; to the edge of the precipice that we will eventually have to fall from. The whole world today is craving for a faith and some groundless faiths such as astrology and similar fortunetelling are now as widespread as it was in the time of Nebuchadnezzar. Just because of this, I was obliged to point out my perspective which considers the existence to be a process in time. But, actually this is both a creator and a sustainer that provides the continuity of matter in time (by ever giving the quantum waves a particle character) as in an verse in Qur’an “Kulle yevmin huve fi shen”. In short a belief of God, both immanent and transcendental is made a topic of discussion against atheist arguments. This explanation against the idea that the matter was not created but that it was ever existing is enough for now. (I should also notify that I am trying to write a book that deals with these issues in more detail, as a prologue to metaphysics). As to the argument of the imperfections and evils that are present in the universe is so simple that it doesn’t worth an explication. As to the issue that God doesn’t reveal itself explicitly, the Mystics say that “God is invisible due to the dread of its appearance.” As is proclaimed in the holy Quran Allah is the light of heavenn and land… Eyes see through God and everything exists with him. Allah is the creator of the creation and it is through his constant creation that everything exists. Allah is the Ever-Creator and everything that is in the continuity of time exists through Allah.
Id est, the modern disbelief which has eventually destroyed the vision and understanding of humanity, the disbelief of civilization, is humankind’s most prior problem. As a result, the inclination to idolize possession, state, and society, which in its ultimate analysis serves the ambition of power, is the fruit of this disbelief. Western science as established by Newton, Descartes, Hobbes and the like in the form that has carried on to our age is irreligious. To be more accurate, it worships power, and it is a vehicle to gain power; a vehicle to govern nature, environment, and humans. Even law, in spite of the uproars of natural law in the age of enlightenment, has become an over-formalist, a soulless protectorate of Moloch (possession), status quo and a basis for political sovereignty, without a philosophy to it. The modern trinity, the three idols of the scienticism is all but “ambition for power, money and sex”. The collaboration of the ambition of power and dirty money brought forth states and politicians that are mediating servants for the international corporations to rob the people, and are subservient to the profits of these international corporations which cannot even be identified as to whom they are. An alienation that has never been witnessed in any age of history before is occuring. Henceforth the alienation of the labor is nations-wide and some countries are the slaves of others; furthermore it can be said that the whole humankind is becoming slaves. A race of spectators have emerged that are drugged, brain-washed, made dumb, and robotized by the ostensibly comfortable technologies, communication capabilities, and dexterous multi-purpose techs. What noble inclination, what mighty progress is this that it thus transforms human beings to the level of inanimate robots? Like the diaspora of the Jews that once scattered around the world, the pious people of the world are bound to live in small groups among the disbelieving masses by taking refuge in their holy book and creating a land out of it. People with faith and vision can keep existing by taking refuge in their holy land like the Jews did once, by taking refuge in their holy book and making a homeland out of it. In fact many faithful people today are doing so and living as a diaspora. But if we have a consolation it is that if there will be such a promised homeland it will be the holiest of all homes: the holy books (which for the Muslims is the old Qur’an). Jesus have proclaimed that “Humans don’t live just by money or bread but by every word of the God”. Of course the answer that Tolstoy gives in his story ‘What Men Live By’ is in line with this: “It is God who makes men live and die”. We are living in a world where religion, morality, law, social justice, and peace do not exist. We can bear it only through faith.
We said that this age has a physic, but no metaphysics whereas its most important need is a metaphysic. But this is not intended as an invitation for the scholastic mentality of course. We should get rid of the disease of trying to prove faith and trying to fabricate everything, even the sects, from the holy books. We need to acquire and attain to a belief that has its principal source in staying loyal to the truth, and believing in the unseen; namely a ‘fide-ist’ belief: loyalty to the original covenant with the God[1]. First we need belief, then we have to build a morality starting from this belief, then a law built upon this foundation of morality and at last we have to build a new orientation which has a consideration for the prospect of humanity. If we accomplish this, the curtains in front of our eyes will be removed and our sight will be cleared and when we will be able to know that which is in front of our eyes, we will see that God’s grace will reveal what are invisible to us. As a Sufi says: “When you pass the sands and enter the sea, no foot tracks will remain”.
[1] According to Islam, when God created the spirits it made a covenant with them and asked them am I not your lord Lord, and the spirits replied ‘yes’ and we accept you as our Lord.