Chapter 2

The Signs In The Heavens And On The Earth

Assume that you set up a big city by bringing millions of Legos together. Let there be in this city skyscrapers, twisting roads, railway stations, airports, shopping malls, subways and also rivers, lakes, forests and a beach. Let there also be living in it thousands of people wandering in its streets, sitting in their homes and working in their offices. Take every detail into account. Even the traffic lights, box offices, and the signboards at the bus stations. If someone came up to you and said that all the Legos of this city, which you had founded by planning it right down to the smallest detail, and each piece of which you had picked up with great pains, had been brought together by coincidence to produce this city, what would you think of the mental state of that person?

Now, go back to the city you have built and consider that the whole city would be levelled to the ground if you had forgotten to put into place even a single Lego, or changed its place. Can you imagine what great balance and order you have had to establish?

Life in the world where we live is also made possible by the accumulation of such a great number of details incomprehensible to the human mind. The absence of even one of these details might mean the end of life on the earth.

Everything, every detail from the atom, the smallest unit of matter, to the galaxies harboring billions of stars, from the moon, an inseparable adjunct of the world, to the solar system, all work in a perfect harmony. This well-organized system runs flawlessly, just like a watch. People are so confident that this billions-of-years-old system will go on functioning without leaving out even the smallest detail that they can freely make plans about something they think will be realized in the next 10 years. No one is worried about whether the sun will rise the next day. A great majority of people do not think about ‘whether the world may ever chance to break free from the gravitation of the sun and start to move towards the unknown in the pitch-dark space’; or ask ‘What keeps this from happening?’

In the same manner, when people are about to sleep, they are very confident that their hearts or respiratory systems will not relax as their brains do. However, even a few seconds’ halt in any one of these two vital systems may well cause results that will cost one's life. 

When the ‘glasses of familiarity’ which surround the whole of life and cause every event to be assessed as if ‘it is taking place in its natural course’ are taken off, one is free to see that everything is made up of such closely interdependent, meticulously planned systems that it is as if we were hanging on to life by the skin of our teeth. You notice an excellent order prevailing in every spot you turn your eyes on. Certainly, there is a great power that creates such an order and harmony. The possessor of this great power is Allah, Who created everything out of nothing. In a verse of the Qur'an, it is said:

He Who has created seven heavens in full harmony with one another: no incongruity will you see in the creation of the Most Gracious. And turn your vision (upon it) once more: can you see any flaw? Yea, turn your vision (upon it) again and yet again: (and every time) your vision will fall back upon you, dazzled and truly defeated. (Surat al-Mulk, 3-4)

When we look at the living beings in the heavens, on the earth and in all that lies between them, we see that they all prove the existence of their Creator in their own right. In this chapter, we are going to dwell on the natural phenomena and living beings that every one sees, yet never thinks about, and how they have come into being and continue their existence. If we were to write down all the signs of Allah in the universe, they would fill many thousands of volumes of encyclopaedias. Therefore, in this chapter, we will only deal briefly with some subjects that deserve to be pondered upon at length.

However, even these brief mentions will help the conscientious ‘men of understanding’ to notice the most important fact of their lives or at least will help them remember it once again.

For Allah Exists.

To Him is due the primal origin of the heavens and the earth and He is known through reason.

THE MIRACLES IN OUR BODY

 

ANIMALS AND PLANTS

Millions of plant and animal types present in the world stand out as evidence that prove the existence and might of our Creator.

All of these living beings, a limited number of which will be described as examples here, deserve to be examined individually. They all have different body systems, diverse defence tactics, unique ways of feeding, and interesting reproduction methods. Unfortunately, it is not possible to describe all living beings with all their features in a single book. Encyclopaedias of many volumes would not be enough for this task.

However, even the few examples we will discuss here will be sufficient to prove that life on earth can in no way be explained by coincidences or accidental happenings.

CONCLUSION

Can the wind form an airplane by coincidence?

The famous physicist Sir Fred Hoyle makes a very striking observation about the origin of life. In his book The Intelligent Universe he writes:

The chance that higher life forms might have emerged in this way (by coincidence) is comparable with the chance that a tornado sweeping through a junk-yard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.22 This comparison of Hoyle's is quite inspiring. The examples that we have discussed above also reveal that both the existence of life and the perfection of its present systems force us to look for the great power making these come into being. Just as a hurricane cannot produce an airplane as a result of coincidences, neither is it possible for the universe to have come into being as a result of unanticipated happenings and moreover to harbour extremely complex structures therein. In truth, the universe is furnished with myriad systems of an infinitely greater complexity than those of an airplane

Everything we have said in this chapter confronts us with the evidence of the flawless planning not only in our immediate surroundings but also in the depths of space. One who assesses these signs which are so evident as to be undeniable by both reason and conscience can come to only one conclusion: there is no room for coincidence in the universe; the universe was CREATED with all the minutiae contained in it.

And Allah, the Creator of this flawless system, is He Who has infinite might and knowledge.

 

13. Bilim ve Teknik magazine, vol. 203, p. 25
14. Larousse Dictionary and Encyclopaedia, Vol. II, p. 5734
15. Maurice Burton, C.B.P.C. Publishing Limited, Encyclopaedia of Animals, Reptiles, p. 120
16. Ibid, p. 120
17. Michael J. Behe, Darwin’s Black Box, New York: Free Press, 1996, p. 232-233
18. Grzimeks Tierleben Vögel 3, Deutscher Taschen Buch Verlag, Oktober 1993, p. 92
19. Ibid, p. 89
20. Ibid, p. 87-88
21. David Attenborough, The Private Life of Plants, Princeton University Press, 1995, p. 29
22. Nature, 12 November, 1981.