What Islam teaches about Environmentalism

Islam is a monotheistic religious tradition that developed in the Middle East in the 7^th century C.E. Islam, which literally means "surrender" or "submission," was founded on the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad as an expression of surrender to the will of

partner or equal. Islam has several branches and much variety within those branches (Heribert Busse, 1998). The two divisions within the tradition are the Sunni and Shi'a, each of which claims different means of maintaining religious authority. One of the unifying characteristics of Islam is the Five Pillars, the fundamental practices of Islam.

These five practices include a ritual profession of faith, ritual prayer, the zakat (charity), fasting, and the hajj (a pilgrimage to Mecca) (Heribert Busse, 1998, 63-112). Many Muslims are characterized by their commitment to praying to Allah five times a day. One of the defining characteristics of Islam is the primacy of sacred places including Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. Muslims gather at mosques to worship Allah, pray and study scripture. There is not a sharp distinction between the religious and secular aspects of life in Islam; all aspects of a Muslim's life are to be oriented to serving Allah. Islam is very much similar to Judaism, and Christianity, and has environmental ethics that are relevant to the present environmental problems.

i. Khalifa - Trusteeship

Islam teaches that Allah created humans to be guardians of His creation. In other words, nature does not belong to us to do with it as we wish, but is entrusted to us by Allah for our safe-keeping. “The world is green and beautiful, and Allah has appointed you his guardian over it.”, taught the prophet Muhammad (Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, 1995, 01).

ii. Tawheed - Unity

The central concept of Islam is Tawheed or unity. Allah is unity and His unity is reflected in the unity of humanity and nature. We must therefore maintain the integrity of the Earth, its flora and fauna, its wildlife and environment. Our responsibility is to keep balance and harmony in Allah’s creation (Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, 1995, 01).

iii. Akrah - Accountability

Islam teaches that we will one day be judged by Allah for how we have discharged our responsibilities following the guidance of Islam. Have we been good trustees and have we kept nature in harmony? So there will be a day of reckoning (Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, 1995, 01).

iv. Avoid Waste

It is said in the Quran that Allah invites us to enjoy the fruits of the Earth but to avoid excess leading to waste, “for Allah does not love wasters” (Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, 1995, 01).

v. Shariah

All these principals have been translated into practical directions for how to live, embodied in the Shariah, the laws of Islam. For example, Shariah law protects animals from cruelty, conserves forests and limits the growth of cities (Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, 1995, 01).

5.11. Conclusion

The signs of a growing ecological crisis are becoming more and clearer: global warming, acidification of the oceans, the massive depletion of species. Weather patterns are increasingly unstable as our ecosystem falls out of balance - a direct result of our materialistic, fossil fuel driven culture. We are destroying our own ecosystem, the same finely balanced system that sustains us. And we seem unable to take the measures that are needed to slow down this accelerating disaster - our politicians putting short-term economic growth before any long-term ecological considerations. We have developed a materialistic culture that uses the Earth for its own selfish purpose.

Rather than fulfilling our traditional role as guardians of the planet, the Earth became a means to serve our ever-increasing material desires.

Our greed now walks with heavy boots across the world, with complete disregard for the sacred nature of creation, until we find ourselves living in a dying world and yet because for centuries we have been taught to live an individualistic and egotistic lifestyle that separates us from the world. Religions can teach us to find the meaning of our psychological and spiritual life. Therefore world’s religious and traditional knowledge is much more important to environmentalism and Climate Change adaptation today than ever before, because they hold the environmental knowledge source that was lost and neglected for many centuries. The role of religions is in this case is to give humanity guidance to change their hearts and souls.

Religions should provide the ethical foundation that science needs to build on.

The over-emphasis of scientific knowledge has proven to be a wrong solution to modern climate problems. Ever increasing pollution, greenhouse gases and global warming are the by-products of misusing science and technology and overusing capitalism. It is time

to reconsider a renaissance of ancient philosophical and metaphysical knowledge of world communities, and use them in right decision making as well as for the betterment of sciences. But this task cannot be done through a positivist approach of mere information replication or “knowledge extraction”. Because some knowledge on its own doesn’t have a true meaning and a right function when one doesn’t understand the essential and historical processes behind it. The role of understanding traditional knowledge means understanding traditional ethics. This means, understanding these spiritual sources of those ethics (religions). The essential knowledge or the utopias of these ethics can only be understood by empathically re-living the historical knowledge process of the ancient traditions.