Qur’anic Cosmology in the Works of Fakhr Al-Dīn Al-Rāzī, Ibn Al-ʿArabī, and Sayyid Quṭb: Towards a Moral Reading

Today cosmology is increasingly identified as a hard science that studies the physical make-up of the universe. This approach significantly differs from the traditional understanding of cosmology, which presupposes the inseparable connection between human beings and the cosmos, and in which the cosmos contains a moral dimension. Contemporary research in the Islamic tradition does not often analyse the concept of cosmology in its traditional sense; instead, it concentrates on the comparison between scientific and Qur’anic views on cosmology and the influence of other traditions on Islamic cosmology, or it mentions the moral dimension briefly without providing details. The present study addresses this gap by examining Qur’anic cosmology as it has been interpreted by different authors in the Islamic tradition (Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī, Ibn al-ʿArabī, and Sayyid Quṭb) to find out how important morality is in their cosmological reflections. These particular figures who belong to different trends and time periods in Islamic thought have been selected in an attempt to represent the multifaceted nature of the Islamic tradition so that the conclusions of this research are representative, without claiming to be exhaustive.

Three areas are addressed in the thought of the authors:

•the role and weight of science in interpreting Qur’anic verses on cosmology

•the moral aspects of the Qur’anic view on the cosmos

•the practical implications of the moral reading of Qur’anic cosmology.

This comparative study adopts a thematic approach to analyse how al-Rāzī, Ibn al-ʿArabī, and Quṭb conceptualise morality in Qur’anic discourse by selecting eight ethically-charged themes recurrent in the cosmological deliberations of all the authors: purpose, mercy, natural theology, beauty and wonder, brotherhood in the cosmos, the cosmic role of human beings, the question of evil in the world, and inseparability between natural and spiritual realities.

The research concludes that the three representatives of the Islamic tradition, in spite of the marked differences in their worldviews, are in full agreement on the following points:

•Qur’anic cosmology is non-scientific, as scientific description of the universe is not its goal,

•it provides a holistic vision of the cosmos,

•it revolves around human beings, and their connection to and place in the cosmos,

•it includes a moral dimension which plays a prominent, if not a central, role in the Qur’an’s view on the cosmos,

•this moral dimension is necessarily linked to practical actions, encouraging readers to adopt a certain moral attitude and behaviour.