INTELLECTUAL SECULARISM: THE SICKNESS OF ALL TIMES

Shahid Lone
The human nature and its knowledge is entirely and linearly entwined, overlapping each other
and inseparable from each other. With the passage of time, social evolution, in a sense, has
consummated sagaciously and hence at a same time, for every political man (is the economic
man, ethical man, juridicial man, intellectual man, esthetical man). We diagnostic ate universe as
world (of mind, life, matter) and correspondingly we study physical, biological and social
sciences to peg an understanding of this interdependent and inseparably complex phenomenon.
As far as knowledge regarding world of matter is concerned, its gasconaded, western scholars
have managed to make a stupefying and confounding anabasis. Today they describe splitting up
of an atom and how Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan, Kashmir, Hiroshima, Nagasaki et`al can
be brought into its radius. They have pierced space and pictured Venus as never before. They
have an unsatisfactory research result in biological sciences and hitherto pretense it as comme il
faut and therefore forfend them to peevish its arrant paucity. Nevertheless contrasting is the
scenario in fields of social sciences, wherein they agree by aphorism heretofore utter disorder in
social sciences, succumbing and oxidizing of western civilization if social sciences are not
systematized and developed, impediments in their development is because of beggared
perspicacity regarding human nature.
There are enough experienced authorities to support my claim but let me quote just one. In his
celebrated book world chaos, author and well known psychologist Mcdougall says our
ignorance of the nature of man has prevented and still prevents the development of all social
sciences. They are the crying need of our time; for lack of them our civilization is threatened
gravely with decay and perhaps complete collapse. What then in practical terms is the remedy?
I give my answer most concisely by suggesting what I would do if I were a dictator. I would by
every means seek to diver all our most powerful intellects from the physical sciences to research
in the human and social sciences.
There arises a question: in spite of the fact that if social sciences are not adequately developed,
western civilization will corrode and senescence, why have western scholars failed? They have
pierced the atoms invisible heart but fail to do so in the case of human mind, which essentially is
the societys atom, why? If development stages of various philosophies are minutely viewed,
then only it can be answered. Western scholars have a predominant and diacritic attitude of mind
which results in an acute chauvinism and antagonism con to every intellectual idea pertaining to
psychological, biological or physical sciences and bout of intellectual theory, explanation or
conclusion, we climactically usher towards concept of god. Learned men have termed this
predisposition or antagonistic attitude of mind as INTELLECTUAL SECULARISM and
mutually shared by all western scholars but highly manifested in a different form within atheists
(Harris, Hitchens, and Dawkins) about whom I have already made a reference in my last column.

We know every object has a definite and ultimate origin and hence knowledge pertaining to
ultimate origin becomes a part of the total knowledge regarding that object and we aim and
aspire for the same by our very nature. For a believer, a rose didnt came as bolt from the blue
but created by god out of his infinite love of beauty, wisdom, power etc but an atheist perceives
being of rose as an operation executed by natures mechanical and material forces. As human
beings we are bound to attribute penultimate origin to things known to us and when goofed
attributes are associated by very same nature, then the object and related knowledge can by no
means be right.
Certainly yes, scientists must travail to elucidate whole enchilada not beyond laws of nature
framework. However if this universe was created by god or is the source of this creation then it
implies aesthetic, moral and mental attributes of creator wriggle in the laws of universe, in the
same manner, when an artist makes a picture, all his aesthetic, moral and mental traits gain
entr`ee into that picture or for that matter a seed has the potential to exfoliate in the form of
flowers, branches and leaves. Therefore its futile to comprehend the nature of that deity and the
laws of nature in segregation. This correlation has been beautifully summed up by philosopherpoet of the East, Sir Muhammad Iqbal. He says Nature as we have seen is not a mass of pure
materiality occupying a void. Its a structure of events, a systematic mode of behavior and as
such organic to the ultimate self. Nature is to the divine self as character is to the human self in
the picturesque phrase of the Quran its the habit of Allah.
When books written by Muslim scientists and scholars where translated in Europe, there was a
frequent reference to god in texts, reflecting their indebtedness towards god who provided them
with knowledge and through these texts they wanted readers to know the creator in a better way.
They invented modern science and scientific methods on account of spiritual leaning universe. In
Briffaults book making of humanity there is an important passage which starts as it was
under their successors at the oxford school that roger bacon learned Arabic and Arabic science.
Neither Roger Bacon nor his later namesake has any little to be credited with having introduced
the experimental method. Roger bacon was no more than one of the apostles of the Muslim
science and method to Christian Europe; and he never wearied of declaring that knowledge of
Arabic and science was for his contemporaries the only way to true knowledge. Discussions as to
who was the originator of the experimental method are part of the colossal misrepresentation of
the origins of European civilization. The experimental method of Arabs was by Bacons time
widespread and eagerly cultivated throughout the Europe. The Greeks systematized, generalized
and theorized but the patient ways of investigation, accumulation of positive knowledge, minute
method of science, detailed and prolonged observation and experimental inquiry were altogether
alien to Greek temperament. The spirit and those methods were introduced into the European
world by the Arabs.
But currently what is hampering scientific growth in various essential spheres is the intellectual
secularism of western scholars who succeeded Muslim scientists. An evident chasm was created
between divine, spiritual or celestial and temporal, secular or mundane, between world of spirit

and world of matter by Jesus Christ, when he sundered dues of Caeser and god. The roots of
intellectual secularism would have been on top of the heap only in unique Christendoms
intellectual environment, since its references rest in Christianity intrinsically. Amidst
Christianity, is a contradiction between this and next world. Fruits of next world depend on
sacrifices made here. Science and religion live in separate spheres because religion in this world
becomes extraneous in the life of a man when its meant for the betterment of next world. On the
contrary, intellectual sciences are for the prosperity of this world. Belief without reason is what
religion impresses on. It is irrational, dogmatic and transacts with an invisible world but
scientific conclusions rest on experiment, observation, intellect and reason. Hence when god is
referred as part of intellectual argument annihilates the logic of rationale and debate skews in the
sphere of religion, where focus is on belief without reason instead against reason, irrationality,
prejudice and dogma.
This western intellectual secularism has been accentuated by atheists mentioned earlier and
further engendered by suppression and penalization between separation of state and church. The
moment religion lost its foothold in the polity courtyard officially; it lost its thrust on community
and individuals as well. The immediate outcome appeared as secularization of intellectual
activity, social education, economic and legal activities. The 21 ST century physicists, who
perceive matter as visible and real have now added fuel to fire and corroborated prejudice against
religion and god. Consciousness, spirit and god appear unreal due to invisibility and cant be
subjected to experiments. When the views of Darwin, a product of rigid and cold materialism and
mechanism were raised to pedestal, this prejudice enhanced and was accorded cachet of
intellectual idea. He described man as causatum of survival of the fittest, natural selection and
struggle for existence. He termed faculties of imagination, conscience and reason as mere
chance.
Describing man as a refined form of chimpanzee, Darwinism perfectly suited the western
loathing of religion and now every object and natural phenomenon is seen as outcome of chance.
Their prejudice against deity being an intellectual concept is so strong that their ignorance of
human nature which they believe to be fraught with dangerous possibilities for the entire human
race may be due to the fact that they are ignoring the possibility of notion of god being the only
key to a scientific understanding of human nature. Indeed they are not prepared to acquire a
scientific knowledge of man at the cost of their intellectual secularism. They cannot conceive the
possibility of a theory of human nature being at once spiritual and scientific. When they
complain of their ignorance of human nature they have in mind that a scientific theory of human
nature, when formulated will be secular or non-spiritual. But it can never be so, for man has
something divine in him.
In one of his letters to Charles kingsly, T.H. Huxley wrote sit down before fact as a little child,
be prepared to give up preconceived notion, follow humbly whenever and to whatever abysses
nature leads or you shall learn nothing. Following the Darwinian concept of evolution which, of
course, suits eminently their intellectual secularism, they believe that what comes first in the

sequence of the results of evolution is matter with its physical laws and then comes the animal
with his instincts and last of all there appears the human being with his gift of self-consciousness
or personality and its capacity to love ideals. The animal is a modified product of matter which
becomes alive on account of this modification. It is nothing but matter in its origin. They
conclude therefore that since the urge for an ideal in a human being has its origin in his animal
nature it can be only a modified form of one or more of his animal instincts. They derive man
from the animal and the animal from matter so that ultimately the reality of man is matter.
Thus we see Freud explaining the human urge for an ideal as a distorted and modified form of
his sex instinct the object of which is to provide man with a substitute activity in the form of
religion, morality, art, science, philosophy, and politics to compensate him for the thwarted and
obstructed activity of his sexual instinct. According to Adler man's urge for an ideal is a distorted
and modified form of his instinct of self assertion which has been operating all along in the
history of organic evolution for the protection of the life of the animal against other hostile and
aggressive animals. When an individual is unable to satisfy a particular desire for power he
creates. The desire for a relevant ideal and strives after it to compensate himself for his sense of
inferiority. Karl Marx is of the view that the urge for ideals in man is only an unconscious
distortion of his economic urge. Man strives after an ideal apparently but really his activity is
motivated by his economic conditions which he desires to improve. McDougall explains the urge
for an ideal in man as a result of the occasional reinforcement of the sentiment of self-regard
itself a peculiar compound of all his instincts by the instinct of self assertion. But all these
explanations: of the source and purpose of ideals in human nature are logically defective,
incoherent and inconsistent. Freud for example does not tell us why and how*a man's ideal
which according to him is born of his sex instinct is sometimes able to rule and control his sex
instinct to the extent of eliminating it totally from his life.
Adler is unable to explain how the instinct of self-assertion the primary object of which is the
protection of life creates an ideal for the sake of which man becomes ready sometimes to lay
down his life. Similarly the view of Karl Marx does not explain why if the, function of a man's
ideal is to improve his economic conditions which are only a means for the preservation of his
life, why does he become ready to starve himself to death for the sake of his ideal whenever his
ideal calls upon him to do so. Such questions are very, difficult to answer consistently with any
of the theories of ideals put forward by these writers. Hence none of them has even faced such
questions. The mental attitude of each of these writers is no more reasonable than that of a man
who, not knowing how and why tree grows, may insist upon telling us that what exists first of all
in the history of the growth of a tree is its stem and later on there appear its branches and leaves
and finally there is its seed embedded in a flower. He ignores the original seed of the tree out of
which the tree grows simply because it was hidden from his view below the soil and he did not
see it. He saw instead only the stalk of the young tree growing out of the soil. Just as he in his
ignorance explains the tree out of its stem and not out of its seed which is its real origin so these

writers in their ignorance explain the human being out of matter and not out of selfconsciousness which is his real origin.
As a matter of fact there is no idea of the place and role of ideals in human nature and human
activity more satisfactory and more convincing than this that "the urge for ideals is neither
derived from nor sub serves any of those human impulses known as instincts, which man shares
with the animals below him on the ladder of evolution. On the other hand it is man's natural and
independent urge for beauty and perfection which rules and controls all such impulses in spite of
their biological pressure for the sake of its own expression and satisfaction."
To be brief, the implications of the only true and the only possible explanation of the place and
role of ideals in human nature which lead irresistibly to the concept of God, are such that the
scholars of the West cannot accept it in view of their creed of intellectual secularism. So strong is
this prejudice against the idea of God that when they feel that their study of nature has brought
them very close to this idea and it may become difficult for them to avoid it they are horrified
and refrain from using the term God and use some other term instead and thereby stop following
nature further in the same direction. But since unfortunately the Western scholars are accepted by
the world as the leaders of mankind in the intellectual field their prejudice has passed for a
rational view and spread far and wide to the comers of the earth. The results have been already
very disastrous and more disastrous results are bound to follow. The world's progress in the
knowledge of human nature has come to a dead stop and the human and social sciences which
could be formulated only on the basis of a correct view of human nature are in a state of disorder.
The biological sciences too are not in a hearty state. The theory of the fundamental cause of
evolution, which if properly formulated could have made the human race hopeful of a glorious
future, has been misunderstood. Its errors are being perpetuated by a clique of influential
biologists who insist on maintaining its secular character at all costs.
If the scholars of the West had not been suffering from theophobia and had had the courage and
the good sense to accept the advice of one of them, Mr. Huxley, quoted above, that is, to "follow
nature wherever and to whatever abyss>it may lead," they would have successfully crossed the
point at which their knowledge of the human and social sciences has come to a halt and would
have accepted as true the only explanation of the role of the urge for ideals in human activity that
is rationally possible. In such a case intellectual secularism would have disappeared from all
sciences including the biological and the physical sciences automatically. For when we change
our view of man we have to change our view of the entire universe. A spiritual view of man is
incompatible with a secular view of any part of the universe and its knowledge.
Some of the most eminent physicists of the world have already come to the conclusion that the
ultimate nature of electric energy which has caused the material world to evolve to the stage of
its perfection is a conscious force which has a mathematical mind. Yet they refuse to accept the
conclusion, which is obvious to a man of religion, that this conscious force is the will or the
creative desire of God. Similarly some eminent biologists have arrived at the conclusion that

there is an internal conscious drive in an organism which regulates its growth in a chosen
direction and which is the cause of all organic evolution from its earliest stages to the last. They
call it the life-force, the elan vital or the vital' impetus and attribute to it some qualities of mind
consciousness. But they like their physicist brothers also refuse to come to the next conclusion
which is equally obvious to a man who believes in God that this life force is the will or the
creative desire of God which has expressed itself in a form that is appropriate to the animal stage
of evolution. Again all psychologists believe that man has an urge for ideals and some of them
believe also that it is an urge for beauty and perfection. But no psychologists have. cared to
arrive at the next immediate conclusion that this urge can be perfectly satisfied only by an ideal
of the highest beauty and perfection which can be no other than God and that it is the will or the
creative desire of God that is expressing itself in the historical process urging the human society
to act for the achievement of their own highest beauty and perfection.
A physicist may say, "do not know anything beyond the mathematical nature of the Reality of
matter that I have discovered. I do not know that it has moral qualities and I do not want to
compensate my lack of scientific knowledge as a physicist by the teachings of revelation
although I believe in revelation." Similarly a biologist may say that he has no scientific
knowledge of the other qualities of the life-force that it may be possessing and he has no reason
to suppose that it is God on the authority of revelation. A psychologist too may make a similar
reply. But really there is nothing to prevent the physicists, the biologists and the psychologists
from adopting the will or the creative desire of God instead of a mere mathematical mind a life
force or an instinct as a provisional conclusion or hypothesis explaining the cause of material,
biological or human evolution just to discover how far it can explain other facts of which no
satisfactory explanation is yet available. If they had done so they would have found that the
hypothesis does really explain a host of such facts and also opens the way to the knowledge of a
host of new facts of the worlds of matter, life and mind. What is more they would have been able
to coordinate and integrate their separate sciences into one Science of the Universe which would
have ultimately explained everything, would have served as the Common Weltanschauung of
humanity and would have united them as a single family of God. But what has actually stopped
the physicists, the biologists or the psychologists from doing so is nothing but prejudice aversion
from religion and an irrational secular attitude towards the universe.
My plea is that there is a point in the development of secularized scientific knowledge where the
most fundamental of all the facts of revelation common to the teachings of all the great religions
of the world, namely the idea of God and scientific knowledge, embrace each other as two
inseparable companions each merging itself in the other and giving a tremendous rational support
to the other, so that it cannot be distinguished which is science and which is revelation. When
that point is reached scientific knowledge can no longer progress without its other companion.
That point has been already reached and now scientific, knowledge cannot progress headlong
unless it is made to embrace its inseparable other companion from whom it was unfortunately
separated and whom it has been travelling through the centuries to rejoin. The idea of God is no

longer a myth. It is a scientific fact which explains, orders, enlightens, enriches and reveals other
scientific facts.
(Author is a columnist and his blurbs have promulgated in various international dailies. He is
currently working on his novel The Bleeding Bride. You can reach to author at
shahidlone5@[Link]).