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Islamic Views on the Shape of the Earth: Difference between revisions
Islamic Views on the Shape of the Earth (view source)
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[[File:Flat Earth The Wonders of Creation.jpg|right|thumb|175px|Taken from Zekeriya Kazvinî's "Acaib-ül Mahlûkat" (The Wonders of Creation). Translated into Turkish from Arabic. Istanbul: ca. 1553. <BR>This map depicts "a traditional Islamic projection of the world as a flat disk surrounded by the sundering seas which are restrained by the encircling mountains of Qaf".<ref>[http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/world/earth.html Views of the Earth] - World Treasures of the Library of Congress, July 29, 2010</ref> ]] | [[File:Flat Earth The Wonders of Creation.jpg|right|thumb|175px|Taken from Zekeriya Kazvinî's "Acaib-ül Mahlûkat" (The Wonders of Creation). Translated into Turkish from Arabic. Istanbul: ca. 1553. <BR>This map depicts "a traditional Islamic projection of the world as a flat disk surrounded by the sundering seas which are restrained by the encircling mountains of Qaf".<ref>[http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/world/earth.html Views of the Earth] - World Treasures of the Library of Congress, July 29, 2010</ref> ]] | ||
Islamic [[scriptures]] | Islamic [[scriptures]] imply and adhere to a flat-Earth cosmography ([[Geocentrism and the Quran|arranged in a geocentric system]]), which conceives of the earth as existing in the form of a large plane or disk. While some early Islamic authorities maintained that the earth existed in the shape of a "ball", such notions are entirely absent in the earliest Islamic scriptures. | ||
Nonetheless, as knowledge of the Earth's spherical form has existed to greater or lesser degree since at least classical Greek (4th Century BCE) - even rising to the level of common knowledge among early medieval Europeans<ref>{{cite web|url= http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Myth_of_the_Flat_Earth&oldid=556807448|title= Myth of the Flat Earth|publisher= Wikipedia|author= |date= accessed June 12, 2013|archiveurl= http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FMyth_of_the_Flat_Earth&date=2013-06-12|deadurl=no}}</ref> and with the Holy Roman Empire opting to use an orb to represent the spherical Earth from as early as 395 CE<ref>[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Globus_cruciger&oldid=312872920 Globus cruciger] - Wikipedia, accessed September 9, 2009</ref> - it has been frequently argued in recent times that early Islamic scholars and indeed scripture itself supported the spherical-earth model, although evidence for these claims is lacking. | Nonetheless, as knowledge of the Earth's spherical form has existed to greater or lesser degree since at least classical Greek (4th Century BCE) - even rising to the level of common knowledge among early medieval Europeans<ref>{{cite web|url= http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Myth_of_the_Flat_Earth&oldid=556807448|title= Myth of the Flat Earth|publisher= Wikipedia|author= |date= accessed June 12, 2013|archiveurl= http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FMyth_of_the_Flat_Earth&date=2013-06-12|deadurl=no}}</ref> and with the Holy Roman Empire opting to use an orb to represent the spherical Earth from as early as 395 CE<ref>[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Globus_cruciger&oldid=312872920 Globus cruciger] - Wikipedia, accessed September 9, 2009</ref> - it has been frequently argued in recent times that early Islamic scholars and indeed scripture itself supported the spherical-earth model, although evidence for these claims is lacking. | ||
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{{quote || These Ayat indicate that Allah started creation by creating earth, then He made heaven into seven heavens. This is how building usually starts, with the lower floors first and then the top floors, <ref>[http://tafsir.com/default.asp?sid=2&tid=1494 Tafsir 'ibn Kathir]</ref> }} | {{quote || These Ayat indicate that Allah started creation by creating earth, then He made heaven into seven heavens. This is how building usually starts, with the lower floors first and then the top floors, <ref>[http://tafsir.com/default.asp?sid=2&tid=1494 Tafsir 'ibn Kathir]</ref> }} | ||
== Flat Earth in the Hadiths == | ==Flat Earth in the Hadiths== | ||
The quotes below are relevant to commonplace beliefs about the shape of the Earth among the earliest Muslims. For the same reason, it matters little whether the hadiths are authentic or not; either way they demonstrate beliefs of early Muslims. | The quotes below are relevant to commonplace beliefs about the shape of the Earth among the earliest Muslims. For the same reason, it matters little whether the hadiths are authentic or not; either way they demonstrate beliefs of early Muslims. | ||