Religion and Theology

Ever since man came into being he has been in search for answers to the questions How was I created What is my purpose in life Who is my provider In the quest for these answers, man created religion and as intellects and individualities grew more diversified and defined, religions and answers grew more varied and distinct. First it was what seemed out of reach, high above and shining that is the sun, the giver of light, who was worshipped as God. Then as ideas grew abstract, it was Mother Nature, who provided and sustained all mankind.

As culture developed, there was need for rules and regulations that Mother Nature could not provide. Prophets descended with the revealed books that stated that God is One.

Then came the dawn of science, with disregard for any concept abstract and proof less. No one could scientifically prove the existence of God. He cannot be seen by the naked eye, or heard by the, well, naked ear. With Darwins theory of evolution, the very story of Adam and Eve was questioned. Thus came the rise of atheism the product of a practical-minded generation, which did not have much time for religion anyway. With the increase in the pace of life, it became difficult to hang on to rituals and religious holidays. Politicians described religion as the opium of the people. The educated and rich noticed that throughout history it was only the poor who needed religion since they did not have much else. The age of enlightenment questioned why God did not prevent evil and suffering if he is able to. Thus active disbelief in God started gaining an active stronghold in the Western mindset.

However, if we just close our eyes and imagine the world every butterfly has two identical wings every insect has 6 pairs of legs and spiders eight eyelids were created to protect the eyes, as Socrates noticed there is a water system-glaciers melt into rivers, rivers flow into seas, seas into oceans the design of a snail shell is distinctly different from the trunk of an elephant and how can one forget the hidden g-spot. Every newborn has a distinct personality and yet is programmed to suckle and grasp.  A honeybee dies when it stings and a preying mantis eats up her partner after sex. The kangaroo has a pouch to protect her fragile young and male penguins space above their feet to house their egg in a warm ensconce. There seems to be an intelligence working here instead of random sprouting of shapeless, non-creative living objects. Every living thing on the Earth seems to have been designed with a will, with time and with love. Maybe we have become so busy that we cannot believe that anybody will have the time to pay such close attention to detail.

So there is a design. There is also a plan The glaciers melted at the end of the ice age, the Earth is getting nearer to the sun, the sun is getting bigger. The race for oil is tying up with religious philosophies of the Armageddon, with nations vying for the gold lying near the Caspian Sea. The Bible states that near the end of time all purchases will be done with the number of the devil, and the bar code does bear three sets of two thin double lines which is the code for six. These historical events do lend some credibility to the existence of theism and God. And if there is a plan, there is a will and a mind.

This is the mind that produces nature. This is the Creator, the Sustainer, (Holy Quran).
It is said in the Holy Quran that God only needs to say Be And it is. (Yasin, Holy Quran). Why is it that a cuckoo has the intellect to leaver her eggs in another birds nest Why does the owl turn his head three-sixty degrees How can ants be programmed to slave for their queen And sometimes somebody does paint the sky in the most amazing hues of peach, pink and mauve. Thus there is a mind producing nature and creating history, and that mind is God.

According to the ontological argument by St. Anselm, the Catholic archbishop of Canterbury and a Doctor of the Church, God must exist simply because the idea of God exists so conveniently in our minds. It bears no internal contradictions, we understand God to exist and if we believe in God, we also automatically attribute to him perfection and power. So if he exists so perfectly and powerfully in our imagination, then he must also be existing in reality.

The cosmological argument takes a more scientific approach. According to the law of physics, one thing cannot be put in motion without the help of another. Thus if things in to world are in motion, there must have been an originator of the first motion. Similarly, nothing can come into existence on its own, everything is dependant on something else for its existence, for example, a tree comes from a seed, the moon causes the waves, coal becomes diamond. So all things must trace themselves to a being that was originally existent, and is self-existent, that is, God.

Arguing the existence of God is actually a case of theism versus atheism. So let us look at some facts that religions have revealed to us in eras of technological backwardness and which have just been proven true now. We will study the last of the revealed books, the most recent communication from God the Holy Quran. For example, Islam states that God has created a sea in which salty and sweet water do not mix and such a body of water has been found in the Red Sea. God created man from a seed, from a piece of flesh, at the time the Quran was revealed, medical science was not as evolved to have know the state of the embryo in the womb as we know today. Islam also states that for every disease there is a cure, for example we know that the cure for a snake bite comes from a snake itself, leaves of a neem tree relieve itching from chicken pox, the banana controls daihorrea, ginger is anti-bacterial, burning a clove of garlic in mustard oil and the applying the warm oil on a childs chest melts congestion, and maybe we will even find a cure for AIDS from beneath the depths of the sea.

Leave everything aside when we lie, we feel bad. Our conscience does not allow us to eat a juicy burger in front of a hungry child. Because there is an All-Seer all knower. Islam states that when God created us, he put a bit of Himself in each one of us, and that bit is what we call conscience, that bit may very well be the soul.

Conclusion
Those who refute all these theories rely on the scientific explanation of the Big Bang for the creation and existence of all that is living. The Big Bang may well be how the universe came into existence but can the theory explain why it did There is an intrinsic fault in the Big Bang theory where did it occur There must have been a place, who created that place Where did the singular matter that created the explosion come from again the Big Bang was dependant on something else, something unknown, for its occurrence. Why is it that for Dolly, the clone sheep, you still need a DNA from the original sheep Why have they never been able to inject life into robots They always need a cell to make a clone and cannot make it from scratch, without using any seed or input whatsoever from nature.

However, those who disbelieve can be saved. According to Islam you get rewarded for good thoughts instantly but you do not get punished for bad thoughts until you manage to put them into action
Also it is always good to have a God to turn to, if your child is ill. And there is no harm in believing in God anyway, just in case one day you find yourself face to face with Him.