Dawkins on Islamic creationism

My attention's been drawn to an article by Richard Dawkins on his website, where he amusingly takes apart the "evidence" presented in the Atlas of Creation, the 700-page tome of Turkish creationist Harun Yahya, AKA Adnan Oktar. Read Dawkins' piece to discover sea snakes posing as eels, Starfish disguised as Brittlestar and, best of all, a fishing lure (steel hook included) cast as a caddis fly.

We covered this new European creationism with an article by Peter C Kjaergaard in our May/June issue. He warns of rising creationism across the continent, fuelled by the work of Oktar who, as our picture shows, looks more like a B-rate Bond villain than the "scientist" he seems to claim to be. And a quick read of his Wikipedia page shows he's implicated in enough shadowy activity to keep 007 busy if he happened to enter a quiet period...

Bad week for secular Britain - now Lord Chief Justice says sharia law could have a place in UK

First we have the news that at least 40 faith schools are teaching creationism in science lessons (via a report on More4 news) and now we wake up to discover that Lord Phillips, the Lord Chief Justice, thinks that sharia law could have a place in the UK legal system.

Phillips, who is the most senior judge in England and Wales, told an audience at the East London Muslim Centre that sharia could play a part in settling divorce cases and other family disputes:

"There is no reason why sharia principles, or any other religious code, should not be the basis for mediation or other forms of alternative dispute resolution. It must be recognised, however, that any sanctions for a failure to comply with the agreed terms of mediation would be drawn from the laws of England and Wales."

While Phillips wasn't advocating the establishment of sharia courts in the UK, it seems his comments will reignite a debate that many hoped had gone away following the furore over the Archbishop of Canterbury's comments earlier this year.

Thoughts?

Ultra-orthodox Islamic seminary issues fatwa against terrorism

The Darul-Uloom Deoband, the Islamic madrassa in rural India where Taliban leader Mullah Omar studied, this weekend issued a fatwa against terror during a peace conference in Delhi, with Grand Mufti Habibur Rehman declaring:

"The religion of Islam has come to wipe out all kinds of terrorism and to spread the message of global peace. Islam rejects all kinds of unjust violence, breach of peace, bloodshed, murder and plunder and does not allow it in any form."

The fatwa is a significant move for an institution that has been widely viewed as the inspiration behind many Islamic extremists. In the Nov/Dec 2007 issue of New Humanist Edna Fernandes told how she gained unique access to the madrassa while researching her book on Indian fundamentalism. In light of this latest development, it's an article well worth revisiting.

Things atheists could do without...

You could probably devise quite a long list, but one thing would surely be anti-religious video games. A graduate of the University of Virginia has designed a game where the object is to prevent the spread of Christianity and Islam by travelling through history killing those religions' key prophets. As if that wasn't inflammatory enough, the ultimate aim of the game is to behead the prophet Muhammad.

Perhaps unsurprisingly the developer has chosen to keep his identity secret though, given the fact that publishers are fairly unlikely to be queuing up for the rights to his game, he's probably pretty low on al-Qaeda's hitlist right now.

Still, as the report from Virginia news channel WSLS10 shows, silly ideas like this give people a good excuse to have a go at atheism in general. The game's creator seems to think he's doing non-believers a huge favour – "Atheists have never really had anything to speak for them like this" – but with any luck few people will agree. If this game does actually exist, it sounds just as bad as the fundamentalist Christian title Left Behind: Eternal Forces (aim: convert or kill the infidels) and we think we'll give it a miss.

Dutch cartoonist arrested

The controversial Dutch cartoonist who publishes under the pseudonym Gregorious Nekschot was arrested in a raid on his home by Dutch police last Tuesday. Nekschot is renowned for publishing satirical cartoons about Islam, some of which make the Danish cartoons look like Peanuts (blowjobs and pigs!). The arrest came about because of a complaint against the cartoonist by a convert to Islam Abdul Jabbar Van de Ven, made back in 2005 (why have they only acted on it now?). The Dutch justice ministry has issued a statement saying they found seven cartoons' that are 'illegal'. The cartoonist has been forced to remove these images from his website though they can be seen here. The case continues.

Since I can't read Dutch I can't judge these images on the only basis on which cartoons should be judged in my view- that is whether they are funny- but the whole thing, including a reportedly 30-hour interrogation, seems ridiculously heavy-handed and counter-productive. I thought the Danish cartoons were mostly rubbish (except the 'agent provocateur' one) and the reason given for publishing them disingenuous (is that how you start a debate?); and Geert Wilders Fitna film is just the worst kind of racist propaganda. I also value the freedom to say so. But if it comes down to a battle with the authorities about it we have to stand with Gregorious Nekschot, Jyllands-Posten and Wilders. These debates are nothing to do with the law which should preserve all of our rights to say, write and draw what we think.

Cartooning is not a crime!

RSA debate agrees – a secular state is best for Islam

Broad agreement was the order of the day this lunchtime at the Royal Society of Arts, where four leading commentators on the role of Islam in Britain gathered to debate the question: "The Secular State – the best option for British Muslims?" The debate was chaired by the Muslim peer Baroness Kishwer Falkner.

Speaking first was Dr Usama Hasan, director of the City Circle, an organisation that seeks to promote the development of distinct British Muslim identity. Hasan opened by stressing that political secularism is desirable for all, but that many Muslims, himself included, would find it difficult to accept a state of "metaphysical secularism" – one that operates on the assumption that there is no god.

Hasan was followed by Inayat Bunglawala of the Muslim Council of Britain, who suggested that the question taken on by the debate was something of a red herring. He stated that among the majority of Muslims in Western democracies there was no problem with secularism, and that the real debate concerns the roles of Islam or secularism in the governments of countries with majority Muslim populations. Bunglawala suggested that some Muslim countries have had negative experiences with secularism, for example in Turkey where the hugely popular governing Islamic AK Party has come under attack from a militant secular minority well entrenched in the state apparatus.

Next up was the Independent columnist Yasmin Alibhai Brown, Chair of the organisation British Muslims for Secular Democracy, who began by stressing that secularism should not be seen as a "backdoor way of privileging atheism", and claiming that she finds "the fundamentalism of Richard Dawkins and Islamic fundamentalism" to be "two sides of the same coin". Brown added that she opposes the French style of secularism - which in her view has been used in "racist ways" and has given secularism a bad name. She stated that there is the greatest potential when the state is religiously neutral, pointing out that this is not yet the case in Britain. As an example of how a secular state can succeed in comparison to an Islamic one, Brown asked the audience to consider the relative stability and development in India since independence when compared to neighbouring Pakistan.

Ed Husain, author of The Islamist and founder of the counter-extremism think tank the Quilliam Foundation, was last to speak and, along with the others, came down in defence of secularism, stressing that it is the reason Muslims are able to live in the UK today. To highlight this he used the example of Abdullah William Quilliam, the British covert to Islam after whom the Foundation is named, who in the far less secular 1890s was stoned along with his followers for leading Muslim prayers in Liverpool.

Husain advanced three reasons why some Muslims have a "psychological block" against secularism. Firstly, the words for secularism in some languages, such as Urdu, have meanings equivalent to "atheism", which can prove off-putting. Second he blames the rising influence of Islamism, whose proponents have been more effective than others in making themselves heard, and lastly the reluctance of the liberal intelligentsia in the UK to stand up for secularism and liberal democracy. He thinks that the answer may lie in better teaching of the values of secularism and democracy in schools, particularly in history lessons where students need to learn about the conflicts and obstacles we had to overcome to establish the secular, liberal democracy we have today.

The debate was rounded off by Kishwer Falkner, who described her own experiences with religious groups lobbying the House of Lords. She praised groups, such as Muslims and Catholics, for being well-organised and ensuring they have a say in public affairs, but warned that at times the religious demands for exceptions from the law can go beyond belief in democracy and reach very exceptional levels.

So, that's my quick-fire rundown of the debate this lunchtime. It would have been interesting to have someone on the panel who wasn't backing secularism, but it's still fair to say there's plenty to chew on here. It's clear that while the speakers all support a secular state, there was uneasiness among them about the role of atheism (see Usama Hasan's problem with "metaphysical secularism"), and Yasmin Alibhai Brown's suggestion that the likes of Richard Dawkins are "fundamentalists" on a par with Islamic fundamentalists is sure to raise a few eyebrows. Brown also had strong opinions on the merits of French secularism (in her view it's "racist"), an issue covered by Joan W Scott in the March/April New Humanist.

Join this debate by leaving some comments on this post...

Catholics lose lead in religious league table

It's been widely reported that for the first time in its history the Catholic Church has lost it's position as the religion with the most adherents worldwide.

While for accuracy's sake it's worth pointing out that these (Vatican-produced) figures don't seem to distinguish between different branches of Islam (while making the distinction between Protestantism, Catholicism etc), they reveal that 19.2% of the world's population are Muslim compared to 17.4% Catholic.

Now, I'm not sure this story in itself is that surprising given the regions of the world where various religions are stronger and so on, but what really struck me were the comments by Monsignor Vittorio Formenti, editor of 'the Vatican's new statistics yearbook'. First let's point out that this doesn't seem to be a joke – this yearbook actually does exist, like a kind of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for Catholicism. And secondly, let's have a look at what Monsignor Formenti had to say: "For the first time in history we are no longer at the top: the Muslims have overtaken us."

My first instinct here was to say "well, it's not a competition", but then I realised it kind of is, what with the race to convert heathens and so on. But I do like how he sounded like a football manager who'd just been overtaken at the top of the league. And like any good gaffer (it's a shame the Pope didn't make these comments), Formenti's backing the Church of Rome to bounce back in the population race, describing Africa as a "grand resource" for Catholicism. Wise words, as if they keep telling their adherents there not to use contraception, they might just get back in the game.

Geert Wilders' anti-Islam film released online

After months of anticipation, criticism, threats and counter-threats, right-wing Dutch MP Geert Wilder's controversial short film, Fitna, warning of the perceived "Islamisation of Europe" has finally been released online at video site LiveLeak.

You can read about its release in this story on the BBC website, which for anyone who doesn't want to watch the video provides a summary of what it contains.

Now the release has actually happened, it remains to be seen what the fallout might be. Wilders lives under constant police protection, and ever since he announced his intention to make Fitna the Dutch government has been taking measures to protect its offices overseas.

Opinion is greatly divided over Wilders and his film, so we're running a poll to gain an idea of what readers of this blog think. Here's the question, followed by the choice of responses. Vote at the top right of this page:

What is your opinion on the controversial Dutch MP Geert Wilders and his decision to release the short film Fitna, which warns of the perceived "Islamisation of Europe"?

• In releasing his film, Wilders is making a brave stand against Islamisation and mounting a necessary defence of Western values
  

• Wilders is acting in a deliberately provocative manner and should be condemned for his actions. Free speech must be exercised with a degree of responsibility, which Wilders has failed to demonstrate
  

• While I do not agree with the message of the film, I believe that free speech is paramount and so defend Wilders' right to release it

As always, your comments are encouraged - please leave them on this post.

Iraqi youth becoming less religious

The International Herald Tribune reports that, disillusioned by the daily violence that surrounds them, young people in Iraq are becoming less religious.

Over a period of two months 40 young people from five cities were interviewed, and their responses showed "a pattern of disenchantment ... in which young Iraqis, both poor and middle class, blamed clerics for the violence and the restrictions that have narrowed their lives."

Of course, this is anecdotal evidence and, as the Herald Tribune points out, "it is far from clear whether the shift means a wholesale turn away from religion. A tremendous piety still predominates in the private lives of young Iraqis, and religious leaders, despite the increased skepticism, still wield tremendous power."

Nevertheless, the study suggests that young people are far from impressed by the violent extremism that is often seen to prevail in today's Iraq. Many of the responses echoed the sentiments of Sara Sami, a high school student from Basra, who said "I hate Islam and all the clerics because they limit our freedom every day and their instruction became heavy over us. Most of the girls in my high school hate that Islamic people control the authority because they don't deserve to be rulers."

Geert Wilders: Troublemaker or defender of free speech?

A great deal has been written in the past few months about Geert Wilders, the right wing Dutch MP who is preparing to release a ten minute film on what he believes to be the "terrible things" contained within the Koran – a text he regularly refers to as "fascist" and thinks should be banned in the Netherlands.

Despite various death threats and warnings from the Dutch government, who have already made plans for evacuating their foreign embassies if it all goes the way of the Danish cartoon controversy, Wilders has insisted on releasing his film and will do so in March.

The latest news is that a death threat has been made against him on a website with links to al-Qaeda, reported by a Dutch newspaper as reading: “In the name of Allah, we ask you to bring us the head of this infidel who insults Islam and Muslims and ridicules the Prophet Mohammed.”

The reason I'm blogging about him is I've just seen a video of a TV interview with him in English, which was the first chance I've had to see him in action, if you will. Personally I found it hard to sympathise with someone acting in such a deliberately provocative, even dangerous manner in order to further his own political agenda (he's anti-immigration). It also seems like he's presenting a very simplistic view on Islam, somehow believing he can convincingly write-off the world's second largest religion in ten minutes.

Yet again it raises important questions about freedom of speech (it seems to be free speech week on the blog). What do people think about him? Is he a dangerous troublemaker or a hero of free speech? Have a look at this interview and leave some comments...

Steve Jones on creationism

As part of the debate over the Islamic creationist event at UCL (see post below), the Telegraph also had a piece by Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at UCL (who participated in our recent Dinner with Darwin feature).

He writes how, while he objected to the lecture being held in the Darwin lecture theatre, he could not object to the event itself taking place: "UCL, the Godless College of Gower Street, insists (just as all religions do) on freedom of speech, so they are welcome to their meeting. We biologists choke, though, on the idea of such buffoonery in the Darwin Building; instead, it has been moved to a theatre used to teach medieval history."

[Note his labelling of UCL as "the Godless College of Gower Street". Since we, along with the British Humanist Association, are also situated on Gower Street, I hereby declare it to be "Godless Street"]

For anyone in search of an excellent put-down to use against creationism, it may be worth remembering Prof Jones's closing statement: "The idea that life began by magic a few thousand years ago is entirely absurd - yet believers, of whatever persuasion, insist on its truth. This does no harm to science, but to my secular eyes seems to do immense damage to religion itself."

Indeed.

Islamic creationists lecture at UCL

Last night, University College London played host to a lecture by Dr Oktar Babuna and Ali Sadun Engin, who may be more familiar to readers of this blog as two of the people behind Harun Yahya, a catch-all pen name for the writings of the "Science Research Foundation", a Turkish Islamic creationist group.

The lecture, organised as part of the university's student Islamic society's Islam Awareness Week, was originally destined to take place in UCL's Darwin Lecture Theatre, but was moved following protests from students and academics.

As Damian Thompson, author of Counterknowledge, pointed out on a Telegraph blog yesterday, the student society had marketed the lecture as providing "an insightful view into the reality of evolution and the shaky grounds upon which several of the theories are based.”

He then showed just how "insightful" the folks at Harun Yahya can be by quoting from one of their books, The Dark Clan, which explains that evolutionary science is inspired by “a dark clan behind all kids of corruption and perversion, that controls drug trafficking, prostitution rings”. Evolution is the “greatest deception in the history of science”.

Now, many readers will no doubt be shocked that such counter-intellectual nonsense could be allowed to be expressed within the walls of one of our finest educational establishments. But should it have been banned? It's not as if the university was actively sanctioning the lecture – it was merely providing one of it's student societies with a venue to host an event. As free thinkers we can quite rightly oppose the encroachment of creationism into our education system, but can we really condone denying its advocates a platform altogether?

I'm not quite sure what my own view is on this, and I'd be fascinated to hear what the blog readers think – please leave your comments on this post.

Also, I've been unable to find any reports of what actually happened last night at the lecture – if there's anyone who went to it please get in touch (either by comment or email) and let us know what was said, whether there was an open forum for questions etc...

Turkey to undertake revision of key Islamic text

A Turkish governmental department is carrying out a radical revision of the Hadith, Islam's second most sacred text, the BBC reports.

The Department of Religious Affairs has commissioned theologians at Ankara University to reinterpret the collection of sayings – believed to have come from the Prophet Muhammad – to bring them more in line with modern society.

Some Muslim theologians believe certain sayings in the Hadith – the key source for Sharia law – were never uttered by Muhammad, but rather introduced hundreds of years later, and feel that others need to be viewed in the context of their time. They are also concerned that some can be used to justify more fundamentalist elements of Islam, such as the oppression of women.

Felix Koerner, an advisor to the project, explained these concerns to the BBC: "Unfortunately you can even justify through alleged hadiths, the Muslim - or pseudo-Muslim - practice of female genital mutilation. You can find messages which say 'that is what the Prophet ordered us to do'. But you can show historically how they came into being, as influences from other cultures, that were then projected onto Islamic tradition."

Meanwhile, Professor Mehmet Gormez of the Department of Religious Affairs gives an example of a hadith that must be viewed according to contemporary circumstances: "There are some messages that ban women from travelling for three days or more without their husband's permission and they are genuine. But this isn't a religious ban. It came about because in the Prophet's time it simply wasn't safe for a woman to travel alone like that. But as time has passed, people have made permanent what was only supposed to be a temporary ban for safety reasons."

This move by the Turkish government is unprecedented, and some commentators are comparing it to the Protestant Reformation – a view that Fadi Hakura, an expert on Turkey from the Chatham House think tank, presented to the BBC:

"This is kind of akin to the Christian Reformation. Not exactly the same, but if you think, it's changing the theological foundations of [the] religion. ... They are trying to fashion a new Islam. ... I cannot impress enough how fundamental [this change] is."

Alcohol content of crisps shocks Muslims

If you're wondering why it's been so quiet on the blog this week, we've been hard at work producing the March/April issue of New Humanist, which comes out the first week in March. There's loads of great stuff in there, details of which will be revealed in due course.

In the meantime, prepare yourselves for the shock story of the day – senior British Muslims are deeply troubled to learn that Walkers' crisps contain traces of alcohol. According to The Times a small amount of alcohol is used in the production process "as a chemical agent to extract flavour".

Shuja Shafi, chair of the Muslim Council of Britain's food standards committee, was quick to express his discomfort at the news: “Certainly we would find it very offensive to have eaten food with alcohol.”

Despite the outrage, Walkers were unmoved by demands to include a warning on crisp packets, with a spokesperson saying “There is not enough room on the packaging to list things beyond allergy-causing ingredients that can make people ill. A minimal amount of alcohol is used to extract the flavour of some crisps.”

[Thanks Christina]

Rowan Williams: Adapting to survive

Our friend Andrew Copson at the British Humanist Association has a piece on the Archbishop of Canterbury on the Guardian's Comment is Free site. It was published on Darwin Day yesterday, so the Guardian's web editors gave it an evolutionary slant – fearing the irrelevancy of his own Church in modern Britain, Rowan Williams has adapted to speak up for the rights of all religions, in order to protect the special status of the Church of England in British law.

Archbishop stands by his position on Sharia

Today saw the latest development in the Rowan Williams/Sharia law row, as the Archbishop of Canterbury defended last week's statement that the introduction of some aspects of Sharia law into the UK is "unavoidable".

Addressing a biannual gathering of the Church of England's general synod, Williams said he felt his comments had been exaggerated and taken out of context but also admitted that he must "take responsibility for any unclarity in either that text or in the radio interview and for any misleading choice of words that's helped to cause distress or misunderstanding among the public at large, and especially among my fellow Christians.''

However, he refused to express regret for raising the issue, saying that he does not believe it is "inappropriate for a pastor of the Church of England to address issues about the perceived concerns of other religious communities, and to try and bring them into better public focus."

The speech seems to suggest that, in his position as the head of the established church, Williams sees himself as a de facto spokesperson for all religious groups in the UK: "Part of both the burden and the privilege of being the church we are in the nation we're in is that we are often looked to for some coherent voice on behalf of all the faith communities living here. And that is a considerable privilege, and I hope we can use it well - however clumsily it may have been deployed in this instance. If we can attempt to speak for the liberties and consciences of others in this country as well as our own, we shall I believe be doing something we as a Church are called to do in Christ's name, witnessing to his Lordship and not compromising it."

Williams once again reiterated that he was not advocating "parallel jurisdictions" in Britain, but was rather looking to open up a debate around the issue.

I invited comments on this issue last week and received plenty, so I'll send out the call again – thoughts, people...

Archbishop of Canterbury advocates Sharia law for UK

For reasons known only unto himself, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, today decided to state live on Radio 4 that he would support the introduction of Sharia law into the UK for issues such as divorce and financial affairs.

He believes that giving British Muslims the option to use Sharia law to settle such matters is "unavoidable" and would help social cohesion, meaning Muslims no longer have to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty".

Williams wasn't advocating the wholesale introduction of Sharia into Britain, but rather expressing his view that it could prove beneficial to Muslims in certain legal areas: "It would be quite wrong to say that we could ever license a system of law for some community which gave people no right of appeal, no way of exercising the rights that are guaranteed to them as citizens in general. But there are ways of looking at marital disputes, for example, which provide an alternative to the divorce courts as we understand them. In some cultural and religious settings they would seem more appropriate."

The government and other political parties moved quickly to distance themselves from Williams' comments, with Gordon Brown's spokesman saying the prime minister "believes that British laws should be based on British values".

Humanists and secularists have also responded critically to the comments. Hanne Stinson, chief executive of the British Humanist Association, said: "Fundamental to the principle of equality before the law that the same rights and processes of law be available to all and this automatically rules out any possibility of delegating the rights of some citizens to unaccountable religious authorities. Singling out certain groups for separate treatment will also surely undermine work towards good relations and social cohesion rather than assist it."

While it's obvious Williams isn't suggesting that Britain suddenly drops its centuries-old legal tradition in favour of Sharia, it seems he really should have thought twice before coming out with this live on national radio. Quite why he decided to make these comments, with all the backlash and far-right cries "told you so" he must have known they would provoke is anybody's guess. Just another example of why bishops should stay out of politics really...

Thoughts people?

Saudi police arrest American businesswoman for drinking coffee with a man

Today's Times reports on the arrest of a 37-year-old American businesswoman in Saudi Arabia for the heinous crime of sitting in a Riyadh branch of Starbucks with a male colleague.

The woman, who lives in Jeddah with her husband, was visiting her company's Riyadh offices when a power cut forced her and her colleagues to visit Starbucks to use wireless internet. She was sat in a curtained booth with her male business partner when officers from Saudi Arabia's Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice arrived and arrested her, accusing her of committing a "great sin".

She was then taken to a nearby prison where, according to the Times, she was "interrogated, strip-searched and forced to sign and fingerprint a series of confessions pleading guilty to her 'crime'."

Eventually appearing before a judge she was told "You are sinful and you are going to burn in hell". Her husband, a prominent businessman, was able to secure her quick release through his political contacts and the woman has now pledged to stay in Saudi and challenge its repressive laws.

Recognising the part played by her husband in her release, she acknowledged that other female victims of the Saudi regime are not so fortunate, saying “I was lucky. I met other women in that prison who don't have the connections I did.”

Muslims protest Wikipedia entry

Wikipedia has become the subject of an online petition from Muslims, who are unhappy with images included in the entry for the Prophet Muhammad.

Some Muslim users have taken offence to the inclusion of images from medieval manuscripts, which feature representations of Muhammad. The online petition has received more than 80,000 signatures and emails have been sent to Wikipedia demanding the images be removed. The call for users to sign the petition puts the case as follows:

"In Islam picture of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and other Humans are not allowed. But Wikipedia editors are showing illustrations with face illustrated and face is veiled or white washed. But still they are offensive to Muslims. I request all brothers and sisters to sign this petitions so we can tell Wikipedia to respect the religion and remove the illustrations. "

Despite the protests, Wikipedia has refused to remove the images. A message in the site's FAQs section explains its stance: “Since Wikipedia is an encyclopedia with the goal of representing all topics from a neutral point of view, Wikipedia is not censored for the benefit of any particular group.”

Islam's scientific golden age

Today's Daily Telegraph has a nice piece by Jim Al-Khalili on the forgotten scientific geniuses from the early centuries of Islam. It looks at how, while Christian Europe languished in what some historians view as the "Dark Ages", the Islamic world, with Baghdad at its centre, became the driving force behind advances in philosophy, astronomy, medicine and mathematics.

One figure mentioned is abu Uthman al-Jahith who, between 781-869AD may have preceded Darwin in speculating that environment influences the development of species. In his Book of Animals al-Jahith wrote: "Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their successful characteristics to offspring."

The article tells how this period of Islamic scientific discovery began around 813 when the caliph of Baghdad, al-Ma'mun was instructed by Aristiotle, in a dream, to "seek knowledge and enlightenment", and offers possible explanations for why this golden age drew to a close from the 13th century onwards.

This reminds me of an article we had this time last year by Abdelwahab Meddeb, who wondered why the openness and intellectual dynamism of the early years of Islam did not end up influencing the politics and culture of the Islamic world in the same way the Enlightenment did centuries later in Europe.