Islam and Modern Life — Page 8
ISLAM AND MODE RN LIFE 8 exercised over thought, which is the source of all speculation, experimentation, research, and therefore of progress in the fields that I have mentioned. As we know, whether the incident is actually historically accurate or not, one does not know. But when in the end Galileo had to face the Holy Office and he retracted what he had written, he admitted that it was contrary to scripture, that he was wrong in making this statement, that he would not repeat it, and that he humbly retracted it with regard to particularly the motion of the earth around its axis, it is added, I personally consider the story rather doubtful, but it is illustrated, it is added, he sa id, my statement that the earth goes around its axis is wrong, utterly wrong, and I retract it humbly, wish to be forgiven for it, and then he said, but it moves just the same. Now, that is illustrative of the conflict. If a man’s observation, if such expe rience, experiment as he could carry out, as such research as he could make, led him inevitably to a certain conclusion, but he was prohibited from proclaiming that conclusion, let us say, openly, well then, a conflict was set up and somehow it had to be r esolved. But whatever, anybody of men, with whatever authority or lack of authority they might pronounce their views, whatever they may say, the phenomena of nature will go on occurring. Now, it was this attitude which had given rise to what we have called this conflict between science and religion. Power in itself, however vast, is not a problem. In itself, power is neither good nor bad. It’s a matter for pride, for man, that he is, by th e application of his mind and intellect, and learning from what he has already discovered with regard to the operation of the laws of nature,