Thursday 2 April 2015

What Islam says about Dinosaurs


Dinosaurs in Islam

Dinosaurs, they capture the imagination, and have been creatures humans have always taken a great interest to. There seems to be something fascinating about dinosaurs, from their enormous sizes, and to their behaviour.

Now from an Islamic perspective, where do dinosaurs come in? The Quran and hadiths say nothing specifically about dinosaurs, but does that mean as Muslims we reject their creation or existence? Off course not, the fossil evidence for the existence of dinosaurs is undisputable, it’s as real as the sun’s existence.

Now even though the Quran does not specifically mention dinosaurs, it does talk about how God has created and scattered several creatures throughout the creation:


"Behold! in the creation of the heavens and the earth; in the alternation of the night and the day; in the sailing of the ships through the ocean for the profit of mankind; in the rain which God Sends down from the skies, and the life which He gives therewith to an earth that is dead; in the beasts of all kinds that He scatters through the earth; in the change of the winds, and the clouds which they Trail like their slaves between the sky and the earth;- (Here) indeed are Signs for a people that are wise. (The Noble Quran, 2:164)"


"He created the heavens without any pillars that ye can see; He set on the earth mountains standing firm, lest it should shake with you; and He scattered through it beasts of all kinds. We send down rain from the sky, and produce on the earth every kind of noble creature, in pairs. (The Noble Quran, 31:10)"

So in these verses the Quran talks about God creating beasts of all kinds, some have argued that these verses are in reference to dinosaurs, as the word that’s used in Arabic is ‘dabbah’ which is translated as beast, so some argue these beasts are dinosaurs. Now obviously in a general sense, dinosaurs would be among those beasts that were created, but whether the verse is specifically referencing dinosaurs alone, well that’s something we do not know.

So in light of these verses, the existence of dinosaurs is not something problematic for Muslims, as the Quran mentions, God has created beasts of all kinds, and dinosaurs are a fact of life discovered by experts, so therefore per Islam they would fall under the category of creatures created by God per the Quranic verses we have just mentioned.

Some might ask well why didn’t the Quran specifically mention dinosaurs by name? This is an unreasonable demand, as there are literally millions upon millions of different living organisms that have inhabited this planet, if the Quran was going to name every single living being that ever walked this earth, you wouldn’t be able to go through the whole book. So instead of naming every living creature, the Quran gets to the point and in a general statement says that God has created living creatures of all kinds, and this is sufficient for us.

Now in terms of dinosaurs and humans living together side by side, something like out of the Flintstones, we as Muslims do not believe in this either. This is a belief held by some Christian creationists, and so some might lump Muslims into the same group, but as Muslims we don’t believe in such a thing. We don’t believe humans hunted dinosaurs, or that dinosaurs were around during the time of Adam.

The science has shown that dinosaurs died well before the emergence of human beings, and this has no contradiction with Islam, as Islam says nothing about humans and dinosaurs living together.

One could even argue that had dinosaurs and men lived together, it would’ve been dinosaurs hunting men, and dinosaurs becoming the victors over men who were carrying sticks and stones. The mass extinction of dinosaurs has definitely facilitated the emergence of humans as the main dominant species on this planet.

Taken from: http://www.muslimdebate.org/theological-arguments/islam/320-dinosaurs-in-islam


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