Can religion be logical 7
Posted by: Ashfaq Ahmad
Theory of development of the embryo
Well now let’s get to the development of the embryo. According to Moore it was not possible for anyone to have this information at that time, but was it really right for Moore to think so? Use your brain here and think of ancient times, two thousand to five thousand years ago.
At that time, civilizations were flourishing in three formats — tribals living in forests, villagers doing agriculture and animal husbandry, and third, living in cities, who used to buy and sell food and other things necessary for sustenance.
In these cities, prostitution was an acceptable and respected occupation available for entertainment. Even the Bible mentions prostitution, according to the Mahabharata, there were thousands of prostitutes in Hastinapur. Cyprus, Sicily, Kingdom of Pontus, Cappadocia were the main centres of prostitution in Greek civilization.
In India, the nagarvadhus were prepared for this, in Nepal, there was a ritual for prostituting girls named deuki, in Jerusalem there used to be a temple for erotic activities, in Greek civilization, it was named as ’holy sex.’
When Pompeii, which was destroyed in Mount Vesuvius explosion 2000 years ago, was dug up in 1748, a brothel was also found with the city, with ten rooms and paintings depicting coitus. It is said that it started with the union of the king of Sumeria and the goddess of love Inanna in the Sumerian civilisation. Then sex was not a taboo in any civilization. Rati was the goddess of sex in India, whereas in Greek civilization Aphrodite was respected for it.
Most of the big cities were inhabited on the seaside, where outsiders used to come for business and these brothels strengthened the economy of the state. Now use your brain that the women who had chosen prostitution would not have gone to that profession for reproduction and the measures of contraception were also not prevalent at that time.
There were no contraceptive measures at that time
And whatever little were there were strange and dangerous. Egyptian documents show that one and a half thousand years ago, they used to fill crocodile faeces, honey, sodium bicarbonate solution to prevent the entry of sperm into the female vagina. In the medieval period, the ovary and a bone of the animal named Vezal were tied on the thigh of the woman. In China, they used to make a solution of lead and mercury in some way and used to drink it, which was life-threatening. In Greece, the woman was given the water in which the blacksmiths used to cool their tools.
what possibilities are there in the universe outside our planet
Obviously, all these measures were dangerous, unsafe and uncertain so the women would get pregnant. Now if you think that medical practices were negligible at that time, then you are wrong. In the Indian territory and Unani system of medicine in Central Asia and Europe, Ayurveda is very old. In 2600 BC there was Imhotep in Egypt, whom Sir William Osler called the real father of medicine.
So when women used to conceive, measures were also taken to abort it. It is a matter of fact that even today, in rural society, many native methods of abortion are in vogue.
Now bypassing Mr Moore, use your wisdom that if an embryo from a week to a foetus, three to four or five months is being aborted, would it not be noticed or seen by people (at least by the woman who is pregnant)?
When they stopped menstruating, could they not know about their pregnancy and then different stages of the foetus through abortion that it first takes a leech-like appearance and what forms it takes further?
If God is there then how can it be from the point of view of science
Apart from this, there is miscarriage which has been there as a normal process since the time of existence of women. Do you believe that before the eighth century there was no miscarriage and they were not aware of the different conditions of the foetus in the womb?
Understand these things in such a way that there were no flush toilets then, to flush away the foetus rather most people would go in the open for excretion or to throw such undeveloped (early stage) embryo. so it was nothing like unknown or unique that nobody knew before mentioned in the Quran in the eighth century.
It is worth noting here that the Quran itself asks to understand such things and does not claim these to be real. But ever since people like Zakir Naik have started finding science in religious books, such common things are also being proclaimed as a miracle.
Is it really a miracle that two oceans do not mix
Another miracle most talked about in the Quran is related to Surah Rahman‘s verses 19–20, referring to the meeting of two seas which do not mix with each other. This miracle has two categories — one is its state and the other is how this miracle on the ground was revealed.
First, understand the scientific reason for it not being mingled. This unique union happening at a very familiar place (propagated by Muslims) is the Gulf of Alaska, where cold, freshwater melts from the glaciers and meets the saltwater of the Pacific ocean. Now since the density, temperature, etc. of the water on both sides are different, they do not meet with each other and at its junction, the foam wall is formed.
The truth is that it does not occur in only place. In other places, where freshwater (clean) of the rivers comes into the saltwater of the sea, it maintains its own existence, but it happens on a small scale so it is not discussed. You can see it at the merging of Ganges and Yamuna. In Uttarakhand, you can see such scenes in many places. If you watch the Factomania program on BBC Earth, then you can also do such experiments at home. The other truth is that this combination is not permanent and gradually the water melts.
This occurs due to the different densities of water
This happens because of the density of water and you can take an example of the Dead Sea between Jordan and Israel where the density of water is so high that you can never drown in it. Since it is natural and the believers believe that nature is created by God, then they can say that God did it. Else there is nothing like a miracle in it and if it is a miracle then everything associated with nature is a miracle and every invention is a miracle.
Now come to another aspect that how this incident was recorded in the Quran? How the writer came to know and about it? For this, you have to go back to the past again.
Stories of mystery and adventure have always been the centre of human interest. Today, we can see ‘Pirates of the Caribbean‘, ‘Mysterious Island‘, ‘Gulliver‘ type films made on those sea voyages, but in earlier times all these stories were written and people would read them with great enthusiasm. ’Gulliver’ and ‘Sindbad‘ are perfect examples of this.
If you are above forty, you must be remembering the stories you heard from your grandmother in your childhood, because then there were limited means of entertainment and storytelling was an ancient and important art, which has been going on since the early days of civilization.
Storytelling was a common art in those days
It was the practice of this storytelling that created the folk tails, the most important of which were the stories of the ships. You can take Sindbad the sailor as an example. In those times, when there were very limited means of entertainment, people who had long sea voyages by ships were full of hundreds of stories. Some of which were based on their imagination (Arabian Nights type), some on personal experiences and some might be folk tales of other countries or simply, the exchange of cultures.
They used to narrate those stories in gatherings, in taverns, in hotels and in private get-togethers and thus the stories from distant countries, seas and islands used to reach people. Nine and a half hundred years before Christ, there were some harbour cities in Israel which were established by King Solomon’s (Sulayman), due to which they had commercial contacts with a large terrain.
So there can be two kinds of possibilities. First, a sailor might have seen this sight and then described it to others, other that it is not even mandatory in the context of the Gulf of Alaska, might have been seen elsewhere.
Along with this, there is a fact that Muhammed saheb had gone with his uncle to Sham (Syria) in his childhood, for business and in Sham also, harbour cities were the main trading centre. Do the rest calculation by yourself.
Originally published on WordSmith September 7, 2019.
