A Muslim expounded on Evolution 800 years before Darwin?

From Letters to the Editor, Dawn.com:

JAWED Naqvi's tribute, 'The question spirit' (Feb 14) on the approaching 200th birth anniversary of Charles Darwin (1809-1882), a British scientist, who laid the foundation of modern evolutionary theory with his concept of the development of all forms of life through the slow-working process of natural selection, is well-timed and admiring.

Although the 'theory of natural selection' is so far to be proved, yet it was Ibn Miskawaya, (932-1030), a renowned Muslim philosopher and historian, who in his famous treatise Al Fawz al asghar has propounded the evolution theory.

Ibn Miskawaya, whose actual name was Abu Ali Ahmed b. Muhammad b. Yakub, was both philosopher and historian and is known to have practised the two disciplines with competence and with resolve.

With the ascendance of Buyid dynasty (961-1039), Iraq and Persia witnessed renewed intellectual activities which produced a generation of scholars such as Ibn Miskawaya (J. L. Kraemer, Humanism in the renaissance of Islam). The cultural revival during the Buyid age has admitted that intellectual activities of the Buyid period in many of its aspects contributed immensely to the humanism and Renaissance in the West.

Interestingly, Akhwan al-Safa (a book referred by Ibn Miskawaya) and Al Fawz al asghar, written by Ibn Miskawaya, where theory of evolution was discussed in detail were never confronted by anyone when these were published. Even during the subsequent period of more than 800 years both these books have remained unchallenged as claimed by Dr Muhammad Hameedullah (1908-2002), a great Islamic scholar of our times, in one of his 12 famous lectures he delivered in Bahawalpur University during 1980. These lectures contain immense knowledge on Islam and at present are available in a book form titled Khutbat-i-Bahawalpur.

According to Dr Hameedullah, Charles Darwin after completing his medical studies was inclined towards religion. He, therefore, got admission in Cambridge where 'Comparative Religion' was taught as a subject. To understand Islam, Darwin also learned the Arabic language. In his letters, which are now printed in a volume, Darwin has mentioned names of his Arabic teachers in great reverence. The above two books were on the catalogue of Cambridge University.

MANZOOR H. KURESHI
Karachi