THE WORLDVIEW OF ISLAM/

ISLAMIC WORLDVIEW

Part One

WEEK 1
WORLDVIEWS: MEANING,
CHARACTERISTICS AND
KINDS
- meaning and characteristics of the
Islamic and other worldviews

REFERENCES
1.

2.

3.

Mohammed, Riza and Dilwar

Hussain,(ed.).(2003) Islam The Way of
vival. Leicester:Revival Publications.
SMN al-Attas, The Worldview of Islam: An
Outline.pp 25-71, in Islam and the
Challenge of Modernity, (ed. Sharifah Shifa
al-Attas) K.L 1994
Prof. Dr. Muhammad Kamal Hasan, The

Islamic Worldview Towards a Positive

Islamic Worldview.pp 11-33

Definition

1.
2.
3.

Literally : view of the world

To answer basic cosmological questions;
Where did this life and universe came from,
and to where is it going?
What is the purpose of this being of space
and time?
What is the position of man within the
totality of this being?
technically: the way how man answers the
basic question explain the world and
interpret the life

Basic Characteristics of Worldview

Capable to answer the basic

cosmological questions of relevance
to the universe as whole, not only to
some certain parts of the life
Provides a well grounded, reliable
and eternally valid comprehension
and not a provisional and transient

Provides some theoretical

basis of cosmological truth,
not only purely practical
and technical values
It promotes commitment
and responsibility.

KINDS OF WORLDVIEW
Scientific

worldview
Philosophical worldview
Religious worldview

SCIENTIFIC WORLDVIEW

Three important foundations

- Empiricism

- Rationalism
- Skepticism

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF SCIENTIFIC

WORLDVIEW

Identify the problems

Propose hypotheses and assumption
Collecting data and information
Test the hypotheses - if wrong reject
or modified or replace it with the
correct one
Verification of the data and
information

If correct then provide it with full

explanation
- Repeat the test in similar situations if the result is equal then construct
scientific theory
- Stand to resistance - a scientific law
Become scientific facts
Remain in tact for a long time but it
can be questioned again

ADVANTAGE

Science is based on the

experiment, empirical
research, verification
through mathematic,
statistics and
measurement, so, they are
exact and authentic.

We get a lot of information through

science
Understand nature and colonize it and
make use of it resources
Science allows human reason to
exercise its ability
Science produces knowledge of many
fields
Discover many laws and patterns of God
in the universe

DISADVANTAGE
Science is not a complete way to
interpret the life and universe, only
applicable to certain parts of our
existence
It Confined to a physical world
The purpose of existence (universe
and life) is not known by scientific
viewpoint, thus SWV is knowledge of
part not the whole

 Science

theoretically unstable
and not-enduring (ghairi
thabit), so it is not capable to
provide a firm, eternal and
unshakable foundations of faith
that demands of Worldview.
Failed to protect
nature/environment, human
dignity and justice

Science and technology becoming

tools against humanity;
- care more on power, mastering nature
but undermining spiritual, moral and
religious elements e.g Green house,
caring so much on air pollution and
contamination of water or nuclear
power
Science tries to go beyond its limit by
allowing other sources to be authentic
source od knowledge as revelation.

PHILOSOPHICAL WORLDVIEW
Relies on philosophy and its means to
deal with the questions of LIFE
The means of philosophical worldview

logic/logical reasoning
Deduction (general to specific)
Induction (specific to general)
Mathematic
speculation

Simple logic, example;

All

human are animal

Ahmad is a human
Ahmad is an animal

deduction

induction

 It

relies on certain self-evidence

(undeniable principle) of mind
and the nature to answer the
human question.
The philosophical worldview is
more richer in its scope than
the scientific worldview because
it deals with the issues of
physical and metaphysical world

 PWV

attempts to give a meaning to

creation and live
It instill in ourselves a sense of
meaning
Its results and findings are not
precise and measurable like science
but they open up new way for
human to think beyond his physical
world

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF PWV

More comprehensive than scientific worldview
because it deals with physical and
metaphysical world
If SWV deals with certain parts of the
universe only, the PWV deals with the entire
existence and the Universe
The PWV give meaning to our lives and
assumed that life has a meaning
The PWV able to give us a perception of the
WV of the existence

HOW IT DIFFERS FROM SWV

The

SWv conduces to action by

giving man the power and
capacity to control the nature,
but PWv conduces to action by
giving the reason for action and
the criteria for human choice in
this life.

 PWV

is depending on reason,
which tests on a series of evident
principles that undeniable to the
mind.
- the PWV answers those ideological
questions
- Philosophical thought discerns
(yubayyin) mien (mazhar) of the
universe as whole

The PWV is influential in the

way man encounters and
responds to the Universe.
- It guides man to shape his
attitude and his outlook
towards being and universe,
giving him meaning to his life,
or drowse him away
-

DISDAVANTAGE
It

is a product of human
mind that could lead to
another philosophical
problem which is
HUMANISME

RELIGIOUS WORLDVIEW
- WORLDVIEW OF ISLAM The

vision of reality and truth

that appears before our minds
eye revealing what existence is
all about; for it is the world of
existence in its totality that
Islam is projecting.

The current definition Nazrat al-Islam li

al-Kawn is not the proper definition to
define Islamic WV.
WV of Islam encompasses both alDunya and akhrah.
The term to define reality is haqqah
and not waqiyyah.
The WV of Islam is the vision of
reality and truth that appears
before our minds eye revealing
what existence is all about.

 The

worldview of Islam
encompasses both dunya
and al-akhirah in which the
dunya aspect must be
related in a profound and
inseparable way to the
akhirah-aspect, in which the
later has the ultimate and
final significance

dunya aspect is seen as a

preparation for the akhirah-

The

aspect.
Everything in Islam is ultimately
focused on the akhirah-aspect
without thereby implying any
attitude of neglect or being
unmindful of the dunya aspect.

THE CHARACTER AND PERSONALITY OF

ISLAMIC WORLDVIEW

IWV is unlike WV projected by the

Western Culture and Civilization
because;
It is a metaphysical survey of the
visible as well as the invisible
worlds including the perspective of
life as a whole.

NOT

a WV that is
formed merely by the
gathering together of
various cultural object,
values and phenomena
into artificial coherance

 NOT

a WV that is formed gradually

through a historical and
developmental process of
philosophical speculation and
scientific discovery, which must of
necessity be left vague and open ended for future change and
alteration in line with paradigms
that change in correspondence with
changing circumstances

NOT a WV that undergoes a dialectical

process of transformation repeated
through the ages, from thesis to
antithesis, with elements of each of
these stages in the process being
assimilated into the other, such as a Wv
based upon a system of thought that
was originally god-centered, and is now
world-centered and perhaps and
perhaps shifting again to form a new
thesis in the dialectical process

NOT a Wv that change in line with the

dominant ideology of the day
It has never been characterized of
influenced by opposing systems of
thought advocating different
interpretations of Wv and value
systems like that which have occurred
and will continue to occur in the
history of the cultural, religious and
intellectual tradition of the West

WEEK
THREE

WEEK 3
SELECTIVE
CONTEMPORARY
IDEOLOGIES:
a. Secularism
b. Post-modernism
c. materialism

THE CHARACTER AND

PERSONALITY OF
WESTERN CULTURE
AND CIVILIZATION
(WCC)

WESTERN CIVILIZATION IS ;

.. The civilization that has evolved

out of historical fusion of cultures,
philosophies, values and aspirations
of ancient Greece and Rome; their
amalgamation with Judaism and
Christianity, and their further
development and formation by the
Latin, Germanic, Celtic and Nordic
peoples.

SPIRIT OF WCC
SECULAR
- Inspired by secular PHILOSOPHY, devoid of
CERTAINTY, subject to CONSTANT REVIEW
and CHANGE
- Its WV formulation not upon REVEALED
KNOWLEDGE and RELIGIOUS BELIEF but
rather upon CULTURAL TRADITION,
SPECULATIONS TO SECULAR LIFE centered
upon MAN AS PHYSICAL ENTITY

HUMANISTIC
- reliance upon the
powers of human
reason alone to guide
man through life

DUALISTIC
- adherence to the validity of
the dualistic vision of reality
and truth
- Affirmation of the reality of
the evanescent-aspect of
existence projecting a
secular WV

TRAGIC
- emulation of the allegedly
universal reality of drama and
tragedy in the spiritual, or
transcendental , or inner life of
man, making drama and
tragedy real and dominant
elements in human nature and
existence

SECULARIZATION AND ITS

IMPLICATION ON THE WV
OF CONTEMPORARY
MUSLIMS

Any foreign Key concepts must be

translated profoundly by understanding
its symbolic forms that which WV is
projected.
The intellectual confusion and anarchy
emerged due to the CHANGES and
RESTRICTIONS on KEY TERMS that
influenced the thinking of those
scholars, journalists, politicians whose
heart and mind awe with secularism

EARLY LATINIZED WESTERN CHURCH

Referred secular to people who are unable
to read and write, therefore not learned in
the arts and sciences, also called laity non
professional
Also conveys a general meaning of being
concerned with the affairs of the world
Translated by Christian Arabs as almaniy
(laysa min arbb al-fann aw al-hirfah) and
secularity as (al-ihtimm bi umr aldunya) and to secularize (as hawwal il
ghara alamiy ay dunyawiy)

ISLAM AND THE CONCEPT OF SECULAR

No equivalent term in Islam, just like

term church and clergy, since Islam
does not concede with the dichotomy
of the sacred and the profane
The closest might be term al-hayat
al-Dunya or the worldly life
Dunya means brought near that is
being brought near to the experience
and consciousness of man

Overwhelmed by the world and life in

it, distracted man from consciousness
of the final destination (al-akhirah).
Islam does not derogate the world
itself rather asking us to reflect its
wonders
One must alert on the distracting and
ephemeral nature of hayat al-dunya
The world is already perfect according
to its own FITRAH but life in the world
still can develop.

Secularization as
Understood and
Experienced in Western
Culture and Civilization

Term seaculum in the real sense relates

to the doctrinal formulations of the
Western Christian religious tradition
whose true meanings couched in it
asserted their intentions in their
consciousness more than 7 centuries
Term secular conveyed a SPATIOTEMPORAL connotation has now
undergone a change emphasizing the
temporal rather than a spatial aspect

SPATIO-TEMPORAL CONNOTATION
Is derived out of the experience and
consciousness of the fusion of the
Greco Roman and judaic Traditions in
Western Christianity
fusionthat mutually conflicting
elements of the Hellenic and Hebrew
worldviews is considered problematic by
the modern Christian intellectuals and
theologians

The HELLENIC view is spatial whereas the

HEBREW is temporal
The arising confusions of worldviews becomes
the root of WCC epistemological and
theological problems
In modern times, the emphasis on the
temporal aspect which is the Hebrew vision of
existence becoming more meaningful
Thus, secular conveys markedly dual
connotation of time and location now or
present sense of it and the location to the
world or worldly sense of it.

SEACULUM is interpreted to mean

this age or the present time which
refer to events in this world or
contemporary events
The emphasis of meaning is set on a
particular time in the world, viewed as
a historical process
The concept secular refers to the
condition of this world at this
particular time or period or age.

The germ of meaning easily develops

itself naturally into the existential
context of an-ever changing world in
which there occurs the relativity of
human values
Now this natural and logical
development of the concept secular is
taking place in contemporary modern
western civilization which is
propagating throughout the world

CONTEMPORARY MUSLIMS
AND THE THREAT OF
SECULARIZATION

 Secularization

is not merely
confined to the Western world,
that their experience of it and
their attitude toward it is most
instructive for Muslims
Secularization IS HAPPENING in
the Muslim world, does effect
our beliefs and way of life.

Problems arising out of secularization,

though not quite the same as those
besetting the West, have caused much
confusion in our midst
These problems are caused due to the
introduction of Western ways of
thinking, judging and believing
emulated by some MODERNISTS as
well as TRADITIONALISTS Muslim
scholars who have been influenced by
the modern West .

 They

also awed by its scientific and

technological achievements that
they could so readily be thus
influenced betray their lack of true
understanding and full grasp of
both the worldviews of Islam and
the modern West and the essential
beliefs and modes of thought that
project them.

 They

have become
disseminators of unnecessary
confusion that is founded upon
a crisis of identity.
This situation is critical when
we consider the fact that
Muslims are generally unaware
of what the secularization
process implies

Secularization means.
.. The deliverance of man first from religious
then from metaphisical control over his
reason and his language.
It is the setting free of the close
worldviews
Breaking of all supernatural myths and
sacred symbols
The defatalization of history

The discovery of man that he has been left

with the world on his hands, that he can no
longer blame fortune or the furies for what
he does with it
It is man turning his attention away from the
worlds beyond toward this world and this
time
Encompasses not only political and social
aspects but also cultural for it denotes the
disappearance of religious determination of
the symbols of cultural integration.

It implies an irreversible historical

process in which culture and society
are delivered from tutelage to
religious control and close
metaphysical worldviews.
It is considered a liberating
development and the end product of
secularization is historical relativism.
Hence, HISTORY is a process of
secularization

THE INTEGRAL COMPONENTS IN THE

DIMENSIONS OF SECULARIZATION ARE

Disenchantment of Nature
freeing of nature from its religious
overtones
Desacrilization of Politics
abolition of sacral legitimation of political
power and authority
Deconsecration of Values
rendering transient and relative all
cultural creations and every value system

 Secularization

in the modern
sense which is actually
happening is a process that
definitely opposed to religion,
it is a philosophical program
or an ideology that seeks to
destroy the very foundation
of religion.

POST-MODERNISM

Definition

Postmodernism

transcends from
the word modernity which itself
surpasses tradition. It is post
modernity
Modernity is about the mental and
intellectual occupation of noneuropean cultures through such
notions by the name of
development and progress

 It

was framed and shaped by

the technical jargon of cultural
studies and grand narratives
The idea of modernity give
sense and direction to life,
thought, truth, reason, morality,
tradition and history

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF
POSTMODERNISM
The

ideas of colonialism and

modernism prepared the ground
for the final assault, actual
consumption and total absorption
of the non-west liberalism,
secularism and western
consumerism through
postmodernism

SEVEN PRINCIPLES AND

CHARACTERISTICS OF
POSTMODERNISM
1. No truth
2. No reality
3. Imagination and speculation
4. Meaningless and valueless
5. Equal representation
6. Total doubt

MATERIALISM

It is a philosophical position that states that

everything is material, or a state of matter.

The word comes from the Latin materia,

meaning matter.

Materialists particularly deny that the human

self is a spiritual--or in any way nonmaterial-entity.

They interpret beliefs, thoughts, desires,

sensations, and other mental states as
properties of material systems.

Materialism is often considered a "scientific"

philosophy because it is closely associated
with the view that everything that occurs
can be explained by scientific laws--perhaps
even by the laws of physics alone.

The Greek philosophers Leucippus and

Democritus developed an early form of
materialism called atomism in the 400's B.C.

They believed that invisible, indivisible

material particles, called atoms, of various
sizes and shapes make up everything that
exists.

According to atomism, the mind itself is

made up of small, round, material
atoms.

Later atomists included the Greek

philosopher Epicurus and the Roman
poet Lucretius.

The growth of Christianity, with its

emphasis on spiritual concerns, led to a
decline in materialism for many
centuries.

Materialism reemerged as a significant

intellectual force during the rise of modern
science in the 1600's. In France, Pierre
Gassendi, a philosopher and scientist,
revived some of the doctrines of ancient
atomism.

The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes

developed an uncompromisingly materialist
philosophy.

The French philosophers Denis Diderot and

Julien de la Mettrie also were among the
best-known materialists of the 1700's.

A version of materialism known as

dialectical materialism emerged in the late
1800's with the works of the German
philosopher Karl Marx and the German
social scientist Friedrich Engels.

The German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel had

used the term dialectic to indicate a
necessary transition from one phase of the
world or society or thought to another
phase.

This transition occurs as a result of

inadequacies or "contradictions" in the
earlier phase.

Hegel identified dialectical processes

with the development of reason or
spirit, but Marx and Engels combined
the notion of dialectic with the view
that the forces underlying historical
development are always material.

Marx and Engels particularly believed

that economic factors determine social
structure and change.

Dialectical materialism provides the

philosophical basis for Communism, a
political and economic movement.

Since the 1950's, many scientifically oriented

philosophers have defended materialist
positions in metaphysics, a branch of
philosophy that is concerned with the basic
nature of reality (see METAPHYSICS).

These philosophers uphold materialist

positions independent of any political
ideology or theory of social development.

WEEK
FOUR

WEEK 4
OVERVIEW OF ISLAM
AND ITS MAIN
CHARECTARISTICS
-Iman, Islam, Taqwa and Ihsan

THE RELIGION OF ISLAM

Primary

signification of the term

DIN
- Indebtedness
- Submissiveness
- Judicious power
- Natural Inclination or
Tendency

 There

have not been in the

history of the cultural, religious
and intellectual tradition of
Islam distinct ages
characterized by a
preponderance of a system of
thought based upon
materialism or idealism

 supported

by attendant
methodological approaches and
positions like empiricism,
rationalism, realism, nominalism,
pragmatism, positivism, logical
positivism, criticism, oscillating
between centuries and emerging
one after another right down to our
time.

 The

representatives of Islamic
thought-theologians, philosophers,
metaphysicians- have all and
individually applied various
methods in their investigations of
the nature of reality without
preponderating on any one
particular method.

 They

combined in the
investigations, and at the same
time in their persons, the empirical
and the rational, the deductive and
the inductive methods, and
affirmed no dichotomy between the
subjective and the objective, so
they all affected what we would
call the tawhid method of
knowledge.

 There

have never been in Islam

historical periods that can be
characterized as classical, then
medieval, then modern and
now purportedly shifting again
post-modern; nor have there
been critical events between the
medieval and the modern
experienced as a renaissance's
and an enlightenment

 Proponents

of shifts in systems of
thought involving changes in the
fundamental elements of the Wv
and value system may say that all
forms of cultures must experience
such shifts, otherwise in the
process of interaction with
changing circumstances they
exhaust themselves and become
uncreative and petrified.

 But

this is true only in the

experience and
consciousness of civilization
whose systems of thought
and value have been derived
from cultural and
philosophical elements aided
by the science of their time.

 Islam

is not a form of culture, and

its system of thought projecting its
vision of reality and truth and the
system of value derived from it are
not merely derived from cultural
and philosophical elements aided
by science, but one whose original
source is revelation, confirmed by
religion, affirmed by intellectual
and intuitive principles

 Islam

ascribes to itself the truth

of being a truly revealed religion,
which has been perfected from
the very beginning.
Therefore, it requires no historical
explanation and evaluation in
terms of the place it occupied and
the role it played within a process
of development.

 All

the essentials of the religion;

the name, the faith and practice,
the rituals, the creed and system
of belief were given by revelation
and interpreted and demonstrated
by the Prophet in his words and
model actions, not from cultural
tradition, which necessarily must
flow in the stream of historicism

THEREFORE,THE
RELIGION OF ISLAM
Is conscious of its own identity from the time
of its revelation
When it appeared on the stage of world
history Islam was already mature needing
no process of growing up to maturity.
A truly revealed religion can only be that
which knows itself from the very beginning;
and that self-knowledge comes from the
revelation itself, not from history.

 is

not a form of culture, and its

system of thought projecting WV
whose original source is
REVELATION
is perfected from the very
beginning
Developmental process in Islam is
only a process of interpretation and
elaboration which refer back to the
unchanging source

The so called development in the

religious traditions of mankind cannot be
applied to Islam, for what is assumed to
be a developmental process is in the
case of Islam only a process of
interpretation and elaboration which
must necessity occur in alternating
generations of believers of different
nations, which refer back to the
unchanging source.

 The

worldview of Islam is
characterized by an authenticity
and finality that points to what
is ultimate and it projects a
view of reality and truth that
encompasses existence and life
altogether in total perspective.

THE FUNDAMENTAL ELEMENTS OF

WV OF ISLAM, AMONG WHICH ARE;

The

nature of GOD
The nature of
REVELATION
The nature of CREATION
The nature of RELIGION
The nature of
KNOWLEDGE

 The

nature of MAN AND THE

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE
HUMAN SOUL
The nature of FREEDOM
The nature of VALUES and
VIRTUES and
The nature of HAPPINESS

 These

fundamental elements that

we call WV of ISLM, together with
the KEY TERMS and concepts
that they unfold
These elements act as
INTEGRATING PRINCIPLES that
place all our systems of meaning
and standard of life and values in
coherent order as a unified system
forming the WV

 The

supreme PRINCIPLE of
true reality that is
articulated by these
elements is focused on
KNOWLEDGE of the
NATURE OF GOD as
revealed in the Quran