Islamic Views on the Shape of the Earth: Difference between revisions

{{Quote||When the worldview of educated Muslims after the establishment of the Arab Empire came to incorporate principles of astrology including the geocentric, spherical, Aristotelian-Ptolemaic world picture – particularly after the advent of the ‘Abbāsid dynasty in 750 – the meaning of these passages came to be interpreted in later Islamic tradition not according to the biblical-quranic cosmology, which became obsolete, but according to the Ptolemaic model, according to which the Quran itself came to be interpreted.<ref>{{citation | last = Van Bladel| first =Kevin| title=Heavenly cords and prophetic authority in the Quran and its Late Antique context| date=July 11th, 2007| publisher=Cambridge University Press| periodical=Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies| volume=70| issue=2| pages=223-246, p. 241| url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/heavenly-cords-and-prophetic-authority-in-the-quran-and-its-late-antique-context/DDF890784AD2034CAE98DC46561204F5| archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20201226172221if_/https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/heavenly-cords-and-prophetic-authority-in-the-quran-and-its-late-antique-context/DDF890784AD2034CAE98DC46561204F5}}</ref>}}

{{Quote||The Arabs of the Arabian peninsula before Islam possessed a simple yet developed astronomical folklore of a practical nature. This involved a knowledge of the risings and settings of stars, associated in particular with the cosmical setting of groups of stars and simultaneous heliacal risings of others, which marked the beginning of periods called naw’, plural anwā’. […] Ptolemy’s Almagest was translated at least five times in the late eighth and ninth centuries. The first was a translation into Syriac and the others into Arabic, the first two under Caliph al-Ma’mūn in the middle of the first half of the ninth century, and the other two (the second an improvement of the first) towards the end of that century […] In this way Greek planetary models, uranometry and mathematical methods came to the attention of the Muslims.<ref>{{citation| chapter=Islamic Astronomy| title=Astronomy before the Telescope| first=David A.| last=King| pages=143-174| location=London| publisher=British Museum Press| year=1996| url=https://muslimheritage.com/islamic-astronomy/| archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20201222044602/https://muslimheritage.com/islamic-astronomy/| editor-last=Walker| editor-first=Christopher| ISBN=978-0714127330}}</ref>}}

{{Quote||In 762 [Muhammad’s] successors in the Middle East founded a new capital, Baghdad, by the river Tigris at the point of nearest approach of the Euphrates, and within reach of the Christian physicians of Jundishapur. Members of the Baghdad court called on them for advice, and these encounters opened the eyes of prominent Muslims to the existence of a legacy of intellectual treasures from Antiquity - most of which were preserved in manuscripts lying in distant libraries and written in a foreign tongue. Harun al-Rashid (caliph from 786) and his successors sent agents to the Byzantine empire to buy Greek manuscripts, and early in the ninth century a translation centre, the House of Wisdom, was established in Baghdad by the Caliph al-Ma’mun. […] Long before translations began, a rich tradition of folk astronomy already existed in the Arabian peninsula. This merged with the view of the heavens in Islamic commentaries and treatises, to create a simple cosmology based on the actual appearances of the sky and unsupported by any underlying theory.<ref>{{citation| last=Hoskin| first=Michael| last2=Gingerich| first2=Owen| chapter=Islamic Astronomy| title=The Cambridge Concise History of Astronomy| ISBN=9780521576000| url=https://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/physics/history-philosophy-and-foundations-physics/cambridge-concise-history-astronomy?format=PB&isbn=9780521576000| pages=50-52| year=1999| publisher=Cambridge University press| location: Cambridge| archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20201226174539/https://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/physics/history-philosophy-and-foundations-physics/cambridge-concise-history-astronomy?format=PB&isbn=9780521576000}}</ref>}}

{{Quote|{{cite web quotebox | url=https://tafsir.app/jalalayn/88/20 | title=Tafsir al-Jalalayn| author=al-Mahalli & al-Suyuti| publisher=الباحث القرآني | date= | archiveurl= | deadurl=no}}|And the earth how it was laid out flat? and thus infer from this the power of God exalted be He and His Oneness? The commencing with the mention of camels is because they are closer in contact with it the earth than any other animal. '''As for His words sutihat ‘laid out flat’ this on a literal reading suggests that the earth is flat which is the opinion of''' most [the word "most" is not included in the original Arabic: "وعليه علماء الشرع"; see citation for full text] '''of the scholars of the revealed Law and not a sphere as astronomers ahl al-hay’a have it''' even if this latter does not contradict any of the pillars of the Law.

{{Quote|{{cite web quotebox| url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010427234331/http://www.binbaz.org.sa/RecDisplay.asp?f=n-04-1407-0300007.htm#| title=هل الأرض كروية أم سطحية؟| publisher=Bin Baz official website| author=Abd al-Aziz ibn Baz| trans_title=Is the Earth spherical or flat?}}|'''Translation of audio:''' According to the people of knowledge the Earth is round. Indeed, Ibn Hazm and other scholars have declared that there is consensus on this matter among the people of knowledge This means that all of the surface of the Earth is connected together so that the form of the planet is like a sphere.