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The Role of the Traditional Sciences in the Encounter of Religion and Science – An Oriental Perspective*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

S. H. Nasr
S. H. Nasr
Affiliation:
Temple University, Philadelphia
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Extract

Whenever the discussion of the relation between religion and science or science and faith arises in circles imbued with various trends of modern thought, immediately the history of the confrontation of the Church with Galileo or of Protestant theology with Darwinianism comes to mind and the problem is viewed from the particular vantage point of the West. Those who have kept pace with the most current speculations of certain scientists in quest of a new world view may point to the fact that there are more recent works which compare the movement of electrons with the Dance of Shiva or speak of the search for the Tao of modern science. But even in such works which are becoming popular, although reference is made to Oriental doctrines, these teachings are usually viewed in separation from the traditional universe to which they belong and the philosophical and scientific framework remain Western. In the modern world the usual background for the understanding of the relation between religion and science continues to be the Western experience from the revolt of modern science against its scholastic theological background during the Renaissance and the seventeenth century to the final abdication by religion from the domain of nature and its surrender to the scientific enterprise and the latter's particular methodology and philosophy for the study of the natural world. Even when certain works step outside the Western world view in search of a rapprochement with certain Oriental doctrines, science remains Western science and the suppositions made upon the nature of Reality do not change in an ultimate way.

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Articles
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Religious Studies , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , December 1984 , pp. 519 - 541
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

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References

page 519 note 1 We have in mind such well–known works as the Tao of Phjvsws of F. Capra and the Tao of Science of R. Sui which display some brilliance in comparing modern science with Oriental doctrines but which nevertheless accept the world view of modern science as developed in the Occident as primary and fundamental.

page 520 note 1 By tradition we mean of course not custom or simply transmitted heritage but a Divine Principle with all its manifestations and ramifications in the human order. See Nasr, , Knowledge and the Sacred (New York, 1981), ‘What is Tradition?’, pp. 65 ff.Google Scholar

page 520 note 2 As far as Egypt is concerned, the exceptional works of R. A. Schwaller de Lubicz have opened up a whole new dimension of the religious significance of ancient science and the scientific dimension of religion as far as ancient Egypt is concerned. See The Temple in Man, trans.R., and Lawlor, D. (New York, 1977)Google Scholar; and especially his major opus Le Temple de I'homme, 3 vols., Caractéres, 1957–1958.Google Scholar

page 521 note 1 The Orient represents for us more a symbol of the land of the rising supernal sun than a mere geographic location. To speak of the Orient in the metaphysical sense is to speak of tradition, of conformity to the Divine Norm, of recollection of the Divine Origin which is the Orient of every being and which a being can reach only by orienting himself properly in its direction and by following the salvific guidance of its rays which at once illuminate our darkened path and warm and unify our solidified hearts.

page 521 note 2 Cornford, F. who in his brilliant From Religion to Philosophy (Atlantic Heights, N.J., 1980)Google Scholar, outlines the process of the separation of religion, philosophy and science in antiquity, himself mentions the importance of Oriental doctrines in understanding certain important phases of this process. See especially pp. 124 ff.

page 521 note 3 Greek civilization cannot be completely identified with the West, but has aspects which unite it with the great civilizations of antiquity in Western Asia and especially Egypt. But it is precisely the humanistic and naturalistic aspect that is claimed as being the origin of the West by modern Westerners themselves and which can be referred to as the West in both a philosophical and cultural sense.

page 522 note 1 The English term ‘science’ is even more limited in meaning than the French science or the German Wissenschaft, although it still carries the resonance of the Latin term scientia, a resonance which can always be used to revive the more universal meaning of the term.

page 522 note 2 See Nasr, S. H., Man and Nature (London, 1976).Google Scholar

page 523 note 1 In Arabic in fact many of the traditional sciences are classified under the category of al–'ulūm al–khafiyyah, literally occult sciences. On the more general classification of the sciences in Islam see Nasr, , Science and Civilization in Islam (Cambridge, U.S.A., 1968), p. 63Google Scholar; and also his Islamic Science – An illustrated Study (London, 1976)Google Scholar, chapter ii. In these classifications which concern the formal curricula of teaching institutions the ‘occult sciences’ are sometimes excluded as a separate category and integrated into the scheme of the formal or ‘official’ sciences.

page 523 note 2 On the distinction between sacred and profane science see Guénon, R., ‘Sacred and profane science’, trans. by Coomaraswamy, A. K., Viśva–Bharati Quarterly, vol. 1, pp. 11–24 (1935).Google Scholar Also in Gudnon, , Crisiv of the Modern World, trans. Osborne, A. (London, 1975)Google Scholar, chapter iv. Concerning the traditional sciences Guénon writes, ‘toute science apparaissait ainsi comme un prolongement de Ia doctrine traditonnelle elle–même, comme une de ses applications… une connaissance infèrieure sil'on veut, mais pourtant encore une vèritable connaissance’, Orient et Occident (Paris, 1930), chapter 2.Google Scholar

page 523 note 3 For example in his recent Esoterism as Principle and as Way, trans. Stoddart, W. (Bedfont, 1981).Google Scholar

page 524 note 1 Numerous works of A. K. Coomaraswamy refer to the traditional doctrine of the states of being; for example, ‘The inverted tree’, Quarterly journal of the Mythic Society, XXIX (1938), 111–49Google Scholar, also in Lipsey, R. (ed.), Coomaraswamy, I: Selected Papers – Traditional Art and symbolism (Princeton, 1977), pp. 376–404Google Scholar; ‘Gradation and evolution’, I, Isis, XXXV (1944), 15–16Google Scholar, and II, Isis, XXXVIII (1947), 87–94.Google Scholar Coomaraswamy also discusses the grades of being from the point of view of the soul's journey through them in his ‘Recollection, “Indian and Platonic”’ and ‘On the one and only transmigrant’, Journal of the American Oriental Society, IXIV (Supplement no. 3, 1944)Google Scholar, also in Lipsey, (ed.), op. cit., vol. II, pp. 497–87.Google Scholar This doctrine is also summarized in Guénon, R., Les Etats multiples de l'être (Paris, 1947).Google Scholar

page 524 note 2 On the traditional doctrine of the cycles of time which has been expounded most extensively in Hinduism see Guénon, R., The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times, trans. Nathbourne, Lord (Baltimore, 1972)Google Scholar; Guénon, , Formes traditionnelles et cycles cosmiques (Paris, 1970)Google Scholar; Eliade, M., The Myth of the Eternal Return, trans. Trask, W. (New York, 1959)Google Scholar; and Zimmer, H., Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization, ed. Campbell, J. (New York, 1946).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 524 note 3 On the historical and philosophical background of this idea see Lovejoy, A., The Great Chain of Being (Cambridge, U.S.A., 1957).Google Scholar

page 525 note 1 The belief of some modern authors about the extraterrestrial origin of man from Outer space is in reality a caricature of the traditional doctrines in a world in which, as a result of the loss of intellectual intuition, the higher states of reality have become so forgotten that they have become replaced by galaxies in outer space in the same way that the inteffigences of the celestial hierarchies have given their place to supermen with super ‘intelligence’ invading the planet earth.

page 526 note 1 On astronomy in mythological form see Santillana, G. di and von Dechend, H., Hamlet's Mill (Boston, 1969).Google Scholar

page 526 note 2 For traditional man in whom the ‘symbolist spirit’ was still alive, an object was not only symbolic of a higher reality. Rather, it was that reality on a lower level of existence. This is particularly true of those people who have been called primitive without an awareness of the primacy of intuitive power among them and their greater consciou sness of the essential and noumenal rather than the phenomenal in contrast to modern man who has chosen to give them this seemingly pejorative name. A. K. Coomaraswamy has dwelt extensively on this matter in many of his writings and especially in his well known essay ‘On the primitive mentality’.

page 526 note 3 On the cosmological perspective see Burckhardt, T., ‘Nature de Ia perspective cosmologique’, Etudes Traditionnelles, XLIX (1948), pp. 216–19.Google Scholar

page 527 note 1 ‘An archaic traditional creation myth recounts that God, the One, was sacrificed and dismembered by demons or that he offered himself up as a victim to himself. From his dead limbs sprang up the various parts of the visible world. The visible world is his dead body. ‘The word world bears witness to the myth; it comes from the Old English weorld, which probably stems from wer, “man” (still found in werewolf, “man–wolf”) and ald, “full–grown”, “big” (hence old). The world is a dead giant or god.’ Zolla, E., ‘Traditional methods of contemplation and action’ in Ibish, Y. and Marculescu, I. (eds.), Contemplation and Action in World Religions (Seattle and London, 1978), p. 117Google Scholar; also in Ibish, Y. and Wilson, P. (eds.), Traditional Modes of Contemplation and Action (London–Boulder, 1977), p. 60.Google Scholar

page 528 note 1 Quoted in Daniélou, A., Hindu Polytheism (New York, 1964), p. 334.Google Scholar

page 528 note 2 Ibid. p. 350.

page 528 note 3 On the Jewish Kabbala see Schaya, L., The Universal Meaning of the Kabbala, trans. Pearson, N. (Baltimore, 1973)Google Scholar; Scholem, G., Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, trans, Davy, M. M. (New York, 1954)Google Scholar; Vajda, G., Recherches sur la philosophie de la kabbale (Paris, 1962)Google Scholar; and Vulliaud, P., La Kabbale juive (Paris, 1964).Google Scholar The doctrine of the correspondence between the sacred alphabet and the cosmic order has been developed elaborately by many Islamic esotericists, notably Ibn'Arabī who devotes many pages to the relation between letters of the Arabic alphabet and cosmic elements in his al–Futühãt al–makkiyyah, vol. II (Cairo, 1293), pp. 426–60.Google Scholar

page 528 note 4 On the Christian Kabbala see Blau, M. J. L., The Christian Interpretation of the Cabala in the Renaissance (New York, 1944).Google Scholar

page 529 note 1 See Schuon, F., Understanding Islam, trans. Matheson, D. M. (London, 1963), ch. 2.Google Scholar

page 529 note 2 We have dealt with this question extensively in our Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines (London, 1978)Google Scholar, especially chapter 12. See also Massignon, L., Essai sur les origines du lexique technique de la mystique musulmane (Paris, 1954)Google Scholar; and his La Passion de Hosayn Ibn Mansur al–Hallaj, vol. III (Paris, 1975), pp. 91–107Google Scholar; also Schuon, , Esoterism as Principle and as Way, pp. 65 ff.Google Scholar

page 529 note 3 On the traditional conception of mathematic see d'Olivet, Fabre, The Golden Verses of Pythagoras, trans. Redfield, N. L., London, 1925Google Scholar; Introduction to Arithmetic, trans. by D'Ooge, M. L. in Great Books in the Western World, vol. II (Chicago, 1952)Google Scholar; also Nasr, , An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines, pp. 47 on.Google Scholar

page 530 note 1 Arithmetic is related to language and the alphabet but it antedates the alphabet, for as G. di Santillana and H. von Decheud have written, ‘Number gave the key. Way back in time, before writing was even invented, it was measures and counting that provided the armature, the frame on which the rich texture of real myth was to grow’, Hamlet's Mill, p. ix.Google Scholar

page 530 note 2 On the relation between traditional music and mathematics see Brumbaugh, R., Plato's Mathematical Imagination (Bloomington, Indiana, 1954)Google Scholar; von Thimus, A., Die harmonikale Symbolik des Alterthums (Koln, 1868Google Scholar and 1876), which is the source of instruction and inspiration for the many works of H. Kayser see especially his Akroasis, The Theory of World Harmonics, trans. Lilienfeld, R. (Boston, 1975)Google Scholar, and E. Levy, most of whose works have remained unpublished. M. Schneider, A. Daniélou and E. G. McClain have also made notable studies of traditional music in its relation to mathematics.

page 530 note 3 This Platonic teaching is strongly reflected in the writings of the Neopythagoreans and Neoplatonists such as Nichomachus and Proclus. It is also to be found in other traditions especially Hinduism where an elaborate science of sound is related in certain schools to its mathematical symbolism. See, for example, McClain, E. G., The Myth of Invariance (Boulder and London, 1978)Google Scholar; also de Nicolás, A., Avātara (New York, 1976)Google Scholar, where a new translation of the Bhagavad-Gita is accompanied by the study of sound-mandalas.

page 530 note 4 Keyser has applied the Pythagorean table to numeralogy, botany and zoology and shown how the major proportions of natural forms are based on musical harmony. The same is of course true of traditional architecture which some like M. Schneider have called frozen music.

page 531 note 1 The symbolic aspect of geometry is naturally related to Euclidean geometry because this particular type of geometry corresponds to the immediate experience of spatial reality to which the symbolic sciences of nature always appeal. The appearance of non-Euclidean forms of geometry do not in any way destroy the significance of the symbolic geometry associated with the name of Euclid.

page 531 note 2 On the significance of mandala see Tucci, G., The Theory and Practice of the Mandala, trans. Brodrick, A. H. (New York, 1978)Google Scholar; and Danielli, M., The Anthropology of the Maṇḍạla (Amherst, N.Y., 1974).Google Scholar As for the relation of maṇḍạla to the sacred architecture of India see Kramrish, S., The Hindu Temple (Calcutta, 1946).Google Scholar

page 531 note 3 The Egyptian temple, which displays in a remarkable fashion the application of the knowledge of traditional geometry to architecture, has been studied in this light by Lubicz, R. Schwaller de, Le Temple de l'homme.Google Scholar

page 532 note 1 See the introduction of Schuon, F. to Les rites secrets des Indiens Sioux: Textes recueillis et annotés par Joseph Epes Brown (Paris, 1953).Google Scholar

page 532 note 2 On geometric symbolism in Islamic art see Burckhardt, T., The Art of Islam (London, 1976).Google Scholar See also Critchiow, K., Islamic Patterns (London, 1976).Google Scholar The author is one of the foremost students of traditional mathematics and has made a major contribution to the rediscovery of traditional geometry especially as it applies to architecture.

page 532 note 3 In their masterly work Hamlet's Mill de Santillana and von Dechend have recorded in a unique manner this ‘proto-history’ of the science of the heavens in its relation to myth and metaphysics.

page 532 note 4 We have dealt with this theme in as much as it concerns the Islamic tradition in our Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines, ch. 15.

page 533 note 1 The monumental work of Duhem, P., Le Systéme du monde, 10 vols. (Paris, 1913–59)Google Scholar, remains still the most thorough study of this subject although numerous major studies by such men as O. Neugebauer, E. S. Kennedy, D. Pingree and others have added enormously to our knowledge of Babylonian, Greek, Indian, Islamic and medieval Latin astronomy.

page 533 note 2 On the two kinds of astrology, genethliac and judicial, in their Islamic context see Nasr, , ‘The wedding of Heaven and Earth in astrology’, in An Introduction to Islamic Cosriwlogwal Doctrines, PP. 151 ff.Google Scholar

page 533 note 3 Di Santillana has shown the extremely ancient character of the signs of the Zodiac which along with other heavenly signs were considered by traditional man to have been revealed by God to mankind.

page 533 note 4 For a profound study of the metaphysical symbolism of astrology see Burckhardt, T., Clé spirituelle de l'astrologie musulmane d'aprés Mohyiddin Ibn Arabi (Pans, 1950).Google Scholar The literature on astrology is vast although few works are from the traditional point of view. The following works concerning various schools of astrology are of scholarly interest: Lewy, H., Choidaean Oracles and Theurgy (Cairo, 1956)Google Scholar; Cumont, F., Astrology and Religion Among Greeks and Romans (New York and London, 1912)Google Scholar; Pingree, D., Census of the Exact Sciences in Sanskrit (Philadelphia, 1970)Google Scholar on; W. and Gundel, H. G., Astrologumena (Wiesbaden, 1966)Google Scholar; Nallino, C. A., Raccoltá di scritti edite e inediti, vol. I (Rome, (1994)Google Scholar; and the monumental collection of Thorndike, L., A History of Magic and Experimental Science, 8 vols. (New York, 1923–58)Google Scholar, which contains a great deal of material on many of the ‘occult’ sciences including astrology.

page 534 note 1 After the Mongol invasion the Chinese–Uighur practice entered into Islamic astrology, at least among the Turks and Persians, and is still to be found in popular astronomical and astrological works. On this cycle see Needham, J., Science and Civilization in China, vol. 3 (Cambridge, 1959)Google Scholar; and Boll, F., Kleine Schqften zur Sternkunde des Alterturns (Leipzig, 1950).Google Scholar

page 534 note 2 No work of the pre–modern period has recorded with greater care this reckoning of time among various peoples of antiquity than al–Bīrünī in his Chronology of Ancient Nations, trans. by Sachau, C. E. (London, 1879).Google Scholar

page 535 note 1 As F. Schuon has mentioned more than once, to predict future events from traditional accounts of the unfolding of various parts of the historic and cosmic cycle is like seeing an image in a broken mirror. The image is there yet not exactly as one would detect its contours in a normal situation. It is of some interest to note that Coomaraswamy was opposed to an over-literal interpretation of traditional teachings concerning the various yugas despite his affirmation of their great metaphysical significance, one which was exposed fully for the first time in the Western world by R. Guénon.

page 535 note 2 For this correspondence and in fact the principles of alchemy in general see the unrivalled work of Burckhardt, T., Alchemy: Science of the Cosmos, Science of the Soul, trans. by Stoddart, W. (London, 1967)).Google Scholar

page 535 note 3 The latter connection has turned many modern students of psychology to the study of alchemy. But although there is a profound link between the two, it must be emphasized that this link is not at all to be discovered through the Jungian interpretation of ‘archetypes’ which belong more to the garbage can of humanity than to the luminous world of the spirit. Jung's work on this subject, despite its interesting illustrations, is completely devoid of the metaphysical foundations necessary for the understanding of the subject.

page 535 note 4 See Eliade, M., The Forge and the Crucible, trans. by Corrin, S. (New York, 1962).Google Scholar

page 536 note 1 On Chinese alchemy see Sivin, N., Chinese Alchemy: Preliminary Studies (Cambridge, 1968).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 536 note 2 See Nasr, , Science and Civilization in Islam, ch. 9 and 10.Google Scholar

page 536 note 3 On this as well as the cosmological and medical facets of alchemy see Zolla, E., La meraviglie della natura: introduzione all'alchimia (Milan, 1975).Google Scholar See also the works of Canseliet and Fulcanelli.

page 537 note 1 Older standard histories of medicine such as those of Neuburger, M., Handbuch der Geschichte der Medizin, vol. I (Jena, 1902)Google Scholar; and the history of J. L. Pagel and K. Sudhoff contain major sections on Egyptian medicine as do the extensive histories of H. E. Sigerist and M. Laignel-Lavastine. For more recent works see the monumental work of Grapow, H., Grundriss der Medizin der alten Aegypter, 8 vols. (Berlin, 1954–62).Google Scholar

page 537 note 2 See Sarton, G., A History of Science, vol. I (1952)Google Scholar; vol. II (1959); Kerenyi, C., Ask1e Arche Image of the Physician's Existence (London, 1960)Google Scholar; Lund, F. B., Greek Medicine, (New York, 1936)Google Scholar; Muri, W., Der Arzt im Altertum (Munich, 1962)Google Scholar; and Schumacher, J., Antike Medizin (Berlin, 1963).Google Scholar

page 537 note 3 On Indian medicine see Mukhopãdhyāya, Giridranāth, History of Indian Medicine 3 vols. (Calcutta, 1923–9)Google Scholar; Zimmer, H., Hindu Medicine (Baltimore, 1948)Google Scholar; Jolly, J., Hindu Medicine (Poona, 1951)Google Scholar; Hoernle, A. F. R., Studies in the Medicine of Ancient India (Oxford, 1907)Google Scholar; Karambelkar, V. W., The Atharvavedic Civilizaion (Nagpur, 1959).Google Scholar

page 538 note 1 Chinese cosmology and physics based on the theory of Yin and Yang and the five elements was developed especially by the Neo–Confucian philosophers of medieval China such as Chou Tun–i, but always on the earlier foundations of Taoism and Confucianism. See Chang, C., The Development of Neo–Confucian Thought (New York, 1954)Google Scholar; Needham, J., Science and Civilization in China, vol. 2 (Cambridge, 1956)Google Scholar, especially section 13, ‘The fundamental ideas of Chinese science’; and Granet, M., La pensée chinoise (Paris, 1934).Google Scholar

page 538 note 2 On Chinese and Japanese medicine see Mann, F., Acupuncture: Cure of Many Diseases (London, 1971)Google Scholar; Hashimoto, M., Japanese Acupuncture (New York, 1968)Google Scholar; Chamfrault, A. and Sam, Ung Kang, Traité de médecine chinoise, 4 vols. (Angouléme, 1954–1961)Google Scholar; Fugikawa, Y., Japanese Medicine (New York, 1934)Google Scholar; Hume, E. H., The Chinese Way in Medicine (Baltimore, 1940)Google Scholar; and Wong, K. Chunin and Lien–Teh, Wu, History of Chinese Medicine (Shanghai, 1936).Google Scholar

page 539 note 1 A fine bibliography of works on various branches of Islamic medicine can be found in Ullmann, M., Die Medizin im Islam (Leiden, 1970).Google Scholar

On the ‘philosophy’ of this medicine see Gruner, O., A Treatise on the Canon of Medicine (London, 1930)Google Scholar; also Nasr, , Islamic Science – An illustrated Study, pp. 159 ff.Google Scholar Also Theories and Philosophies of Medicine (New Dehli, 1962).Google Scholar

page 539 note 2 On geomancy as sacred geography see Needham, , Science and Civilization in China, vol. II (Cambridge, 1969), PP. 359–63.Google Scholar Geomancy as understood in this sense should not be confused with the divinatory art of the same name which Muslims call al-raml and associate with the Prophet Daniel. In fact, the use of geomancy in this second sense entered the West through Hugo Sanclilliensis by means of Muslim sources. On Islamic geomancy see Jaulin, R., La géomantie, analyse formelle (Paris, 1966)Google Scholar, in which the author tries to show that the sixteen geomantic figures form a mathematical group known as the Abelian group in modem mathematics. His study has been taken to task by Smith, M. B. in ‘the nature of Islamic geomancy’, Studia Islamica, XLIX (1979), 5–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 539 note 3 See Corbin, H., Spiritual Body and Celestial Earth: from Mazdean Iran to Shi'ite Iran, trans. by Pearson, N. (Princeton), where this theme is elaborated extensively.Google Scholar

page 539 note 4 See Renou, L. and Filliozat, J., L'Inde classique; manuels des études indiennes, vol. 2 (Paris, 1953), PP. 377 on.Google Scholar This cosmography is described fully in the third book of Abhindharmakośa.

page 539 note 5 See Needham, , op cit., vol. III (1959), p. 565Google Scholar; Rossbach, S., Feng Shui, The Chinese Art of Placement (New York, 1983)Google Scholar; Eitel, E., Feng Shui: or the Rudiments of Natural Science in China (Hong Kong, 1873)Google Scholar; Wilhelm, H., Heaven, Earth and Man (Seattle, 1922).Google Scholar

page 541 note 1 Of course Muslims also believe in Mt. Qāf, where the mythical Sīmurgh, the symbol of the Divine Intellect, resides. Many Sufi treatises such as the Manţig al-ţavr of ‘Aţţãr are based on this symbolic geography. See Nasr, ,‘The flight of the birds to union’, in his Islamic Art and Spirituality (in the press).Google Scholar