The Vistas of Knowledge in the Holy Qur'an

Compiled By: Syed Ali Shahbaz
Its timeless wisdom has withstood the test of times, and the vistas of knowledge that its ayahs contain continue to be unraveled as science and technology make progress.
Whoever studies the holy Qur'an, realizes the importance and value that God, the source of all knowledge, has attached for knowledge for the benefit of His creatures and their systematic development by using the faculties of the intellect that He has provided to the best of His creation. The holy Qur'an asks: Are those who have knowledge equal to those who have not? This clearly indicates the importance of knowledge in Islam. In the pages of the holy Qur'an, we read the words of God Almighty regarding His granting of knowledge and wisdom to the Prophets in order to guide the people to whom they have been sent.
The Qur'an invites mankind to think and ponder on the wonders of creation, by using such phrases: Do you not see? Have you not pondered? Such phrases are an invitation to seek knowledge and develop proper cognizance. The holy Qur'an considers knowledge as light and ignorance as darkness. It urges to acquire knowledge in various branches. In ayah 164 of Surah Baqarah, God says: "Most surely in the creation of the heavens and the earth and the alternation of the night and the day, and the ships that run in the sea with that which profits men, and the water that Allah sends down from the cloud, then gives life with it to the earth after its death and spreads in it all (kinds of) animals, and the changing of the winds and the clouds made subservient between the heaven and the earth, there are signs for a people who understand."
Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) has urged Muslims to seek knowledge, from the cradle to the grave, and to strive to acquire it even if it be in places of great distant, such as China was in those days from Arabia. At a time, when societies were living in the age of ignorance, whether in Arabia or in the so-called civilized cultures of the Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, Persian, Indian, and Chinese, the Qur'an unraveled to them the wonders of creation. For instance, in part of ayah 2 of Surah Ra'd, it says: "Allah is He Who raised the heavens without any pillars that you see"
According to exegetes, this ayah refers to the force of gravity of heavenly bodies which are not visible for mankind, and which none of the cultures and civilizations of those days had yet discovered.
Thus with the emergence of Islam, Muslims made brilliant discoveries in all fields of science and technology – in physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, medicine, mathematics, geology, history, literature, anthropology, geography, etc. The Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution in Europe would not have been possible except for the borrowing from the Islamic civilization. These facts have been acknowledges by western intellectuals and researchers. lim knowledge in the medieval ages, certainly it would have fallen.
French philosopher Pierre Rousseau writes in his book History of Science: In less than two centuries after the passing away of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), the city of Cordova in Islamic Spain had a population of over a million, with 80 public schools and a library containing 600 thousand volumes of books, at a time when Europe was immersed in the dark ages. The same was the case of the city of Baghdad in Iraq, as well as of Bukhara in Central Asia. This is firm proof of how Islam changed the world. This is another undeniable proof of the holy Qur'an being the Eternal Miracle.
The holy Qur'an, while inviting Muslims to seek knowledge and insight, has discouraged them from superstitious behaviour, and cautioned them against blind imitation of the illogical ways of the predecessors. It tells its readers to travel around the world and see the fate suffered by the nations of the past, whose ruins are testimony to their destruction. Therefore, in several ayahs, the holy Qur'an has reproached blind imitation without knowledge. Ayah 134 of Surah Baqarah says: "This is a people that have passed away: they shall have what they earned and you shall have what you earn, and you shall not be called upon to answer for what they did."
The holy Qur'an encourages us to ask whatever we do not know. Ayah 43 of Surah Nahl says: "Ask the People of the Reminder if you do not know"
This means those whom God has granted knowledge. Thus the holy Qur'an while cautioning human being from ignorant acts and deeds reminds the importance of thinking and pondering. According to the Late Iranian Thinker, Allamah Mohammad Taqi Ja'fari, about 730 ayahs in the holy Qur'an deal with the issue of acquiring proper cognizance.