Prior to its explosive expansion from the Arabian Peninsula, Islam itself had no substantive body of scientific learning. The Arabic term for knowledge or science, c ilm, had a developing history steeped in religious reflection and writing as a consequence of the extensive use of its Semitic root c ‐l‐m in the Qur’ân. In contrast to the pre‐Islamic “Time of Ignorance” (jâhilîyah), the advent of Muhammad as Prophet conveying the words of God in the Qur’ân marked the presence of a new, and frequently detailed and legalistic, understanding of how human beings are to submit (islâm) to the will of God in all aspects of their lives. Knowledge on the part of humans was viewed as having its source without exception in the Divine, though signs of the presence of Creator were understood to be evident in the created world. For Muslims, as a result, the place of primacy goes to religious sciences directly (the Qur’ân, the Hadîth, etc.) or indirectly (grammatical studies, law, etc.) which deal...
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Taylor, R.C. (2008). East and West: Islam in the Transmission of Knowledge East to West. In: Selin, H. (eds) Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4425-0_8553
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