[Hassan Ilyas] Ghamidi Sahab, I am sure you're aware, that at this time,
a telescope by the name 'James Webb Telescope' has informed us of
all those hidden realities of the universe,
an experience of which makes us completely awestruck.
Our reason, our consciousness, and our imagination is enlivened,
and our eyes are struck with wonder at the fact
that this universe is so vast, so expansive, the galaxies stretch so far and wide,
and there are such innumerable planets and stars,
and there is so much that exists outside our solar system.
I wish to ask you - because not only are you a student of the deen,
but you are also familiar with the world and its various sciences,
all of this information that the sciences are conveying to us,
after having unveiled the veils of the universe,
as Muslims, the religious teachings that we have with us,
are these related to them,
and what is their relevance to them?
And the entire premise of the religion,
the modern scientific discoveries that are there,
how to they incline the individual towards God and towards God's scheme?
[Javed Ahmed Ghamidi] Alhumdulillah,
All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the Worlds,
and May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon Muhammad,
the trustworthy Messenger,
I seek refuge with Allah from Satan, the accursed,
In the name of Allah, most beneficent, most merciful
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am thankful to you all, that once again you all have
undergone this inconvenience to have come to listen to this student of religion.
It is a different thing that the stage of life that I have reached,
I have to get used to listening to what doctors have to say.
The question that has been asked of me,
it has two aspects,
one of them is that of expressing thankfulness and feeling happiness on the basis
that Allah Almighty has made us such a creation that
apart from whatever was given to it, it was given the ability to achieve and acquire
much more than it.
And it is this very capability which has in the present era, or rather in the last few centuries
become manifest in an extraordinary way.
It is another thing that since the Muslim nations had completed their golden era,
and whatever contributions to the fields of various sciences that Muslims were to make,
that time has gone past long ago,
therefore most of the researches occurred in the western world,
but still, all of this is the inheritance of all mankind.
Knowledge cannot be divided into eastern and western sciences.
It is a journey of the whole of mankind,
In it, in the distant past, ancient Greece played its role,
And thereafter those nations played their role who we now call Muslim nations,
and now, just like I said, in the last 3 or 400 years,
since the time that the Reformation took place in the West world,
a great revolution took place, the Renaissance took place,
the revival of the sciences occurred, and one by one,
those truths have come to light, which have in fact created that situation,
that "mehve hairat hun, ki duniya kya se kya hojayegi"
So, this was one aspect of it.
Human beings should always thank God for every achievement of mankind.
And every success should be seen as a milestone for the next struggle.
The instincts of curiosity and discovery that God has given mankind,
they are very extraordinary, and in the last few hundred years,
mankind has achieved many great successes in all the great sciences.
If one looks at this universe,
then from that perspective
it is only a beginning,
It can't be said what all secrets will come to the fore in the coming years.
And what all truths will open before us.
So, from a human perspective, this is a very ceremonious event.
And just like I said, such kinds of things should be considered
the pride of all humankind, and as a Muslim,
one must give thanks to the Almighty.
Because there is no point in approaching knowledge with prejudice as being
divided into essentialist categories of eastern and Western.
The other aspect is that as we are Muslims,
we are in possession of God's book.
Al these things which are discovered by man,
those things upon which he does research,
these are not taken as themes by God's book,
The Quran is neither a book of history.
Nor a book of science.
It is a book of guidance from Allah.
Its basic subject is that this world to which we have been sent
it will end one day.
And when it will end, we will be called to account based on our record of deeds,
And after that, our real life shall begin.
That real life is the subject of the Quran.
All prophets have come to alert human beings about that real life.
This is the reason why the Prophets (peace be upon them) have been called
'warner' and 'bringer of glad tidings'.
The place where the Quran states why the Prophets were sent,
there the mission of the Prophets has been stated as
they were "mubashireen wa munzireen".
They warn about the life to come,
and they give glad tidings about the success to be received there.
So, the real subject, just like I said, is the coming world,
and its preparation, and how one would achieve success therein,
and what is its criterion,
but, with it, when Allah Almighty discourses about a topic,
and is engaged in reasoning about it,
i.e. He is giving reasons for it,
then on some occasions, regarding this universe's beginnings,
and about its ends and limits as well,
Allah informs us of some extraordinary things.
Even though they are stated in this style such that it doesn't become a puzzle for people,
so that the people who were present during the revelation of the Quran also are able to
understand to some degree,
and as mankind's knowledge increases by degrees over time,
then those aspects of it also become manifest,
which Allah Almighty had kept latent in them.
So from this perspective, when I turn to the Quran,
then this becomes very apparent that
we have been given more knowledge than what has been recently achieved.
For example, the ancient knowledge tradition used to insist that
the Universe is eternal.
It has always been in existence.
Our ancient Greek philosophy would express it like this -
That the Universe is "Qadeem" (eternal),
i.e. it has no beginning.
It has always been in existence.
The Quran has refuted this.
And it has told that such was not the case,
the Universe has gone through many phases.
And these are not merely a couple of phases only,
but they go up to six in number.
And it is possible that in these six phases,
many thousands and millions of years may have been spent,
it was created 'fii sittati ayyaam".
So the Quran dispelled this misconception.
And then it explained that one mustn't think that these are just 24 hour days.
These are God's days.
So, regarding this ancient conception,
the Quran negated it quite strongly,
And in this way, it told that it has had a beginning.
And the beginning too wasn't such that
it was created in one go, one fine day,
but it has been made to go through many stages,
and those stages are so extraordinary that
in them, one after the other, various phenomena have come into being.
Then its details were given as well.
Therefore, in Surah Sajdah, this detail was inscribed that
that four stages passes, or four days went by (by which we mean God's days)
so these are stages established by God Himself,
in which this universe became capable of creating a planet like earth,
which could nurture life.
And then it was told, that in those six days,
there were those two final days, in which the earth became ready
for the inception of life.
In the same way, this was told that what is its expanse (like).
i.e. how vast is this universe?
We were offered a conception of it.
And this was made clear to us, that
this world that you are able to see with your eyes,
the limits till your eyesight can reach,
... obviously, this was before the time of telescopes,
and people back then also used to stare into the far wildernesses,
so this world's expanse would have been visible to men then as well.
This conception wasn't available then, that distances over light years exist,
and billions of galaxies exist,
and how many nebulas there are,
and what all worlds they contain.
However, still, the world and its expanse was visible.
So it was told that, whatever you can see,
which you can call your own universe,
it is (just) one.
This universe of yours is as-samaa ud duniya.
It is a proximal universe.
Beyond this, there are six more.
And further it was told,
just like in your universe, we chose one planet,
in which we have given birth to life.
In the same way, in the other six, we have chosen a planet each
to give birth to life.
So all these things have been described in the Quran.
And it is not subject to interpretation, it is stated in quite plain words.
After this, when the Prophet (pbuh) heard this statement of the Quran,
that the Paradise which is to be created later,
how big would it be?
The Quran had said about it
"Arzuha ka arzis samawaati wal arz".
That all these seven universes, in totality,
the dimensions that they contain between them,
those are the dimensions of that Paradise.
This universe in which we live, or the one we are trying to discover,
and beyond this, the other six as well,
so the Quran said that, all these combined ...
And it said that when We will end this Universe in its current form,
it won't be that it will be annihilated,
only its current organization will be destroyed, and
yauma tubaddilul arzu ghairal arzi was samawaat.
All this matter it contains, the substance that is scattered,
we shall gather it and give it a new form,
and that Universe will be the one where you will flourish.
So when the Prophet of Allah (pbuh) was asked,
that when a believer would go to paradise,
how big a place would he be given,
so, just like we can't conceive of the universe's limits through our units of time,
so we have come up with light years based on the distance light travels in a year,
so of course there was no such concept in the Prophet's time,
so the Prophet said, just think of it like this,
that if you just keep on walking for a thousand years,
even then, the Paradise which would be given to one human being,
wouldn't be completely traversed.
So in this way, the picture of paradise that was sketched,
the information that was given about the Universe,
and the stuff about life in the other world that was conveyed,
this transmission of information was the primary intent,
because this is not the subject of the Holy Quran,
but when the Quran offers arguments, or engages in reasoning,
when Allah Almighty has described the nature of his powers,
so incidentally this information has also been given.
Therefore, the information that we have been given in God's book,
science has to travel much to discover it by itself.