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QURAN AND ALL CREATION IN PAIRS
INTRODUCTION
It is my observation that some Islamists, particularly those who are Western-educated, strive to prove the validity of the Quran through supposed scientific miracles enclosed therein. Typically, they quote ‘vague’ verses amenable to multiple interpretations and then choose the few interpretations to suit their aims. Some of these are even quite convincing, particularly when articulated by knowledgeable Islamists and where absolute proof is impossible due to the nature of the question.
This article seeks to debunk just one of these claims, which is the claim that Allah created all creatures in pairs, male and female.
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Yusuf Ali: And it is He who spread out the earth, and set thereon mountains standing firm and (flowing) rivers: and fruit of every kind He made in pairs, two and two: He draweth the night as a veil o'er the Day. Behold, verily in these things there are signs for those who consider!
Pickthal: And He it is Who spread out the earth and placed therein firm hills and flowing streams, and of all fruits He placed therein two spouses (male and female). He covereth the night with the day. Lo! herein verily are portents for people who take thought.
Shakir: And He it is Who spread the earth and made in it firm mountains and rivers, and of all fruits He has made in it two kinds; He makes the night cover the day; most surely there are signs in this for a people who reflect.
Sher Ali: And HE it is Who spread out the earth and made therein mountains and rivers, and of fruits of every kind HE made therein two sexes. HE causes the night to cover the day. Therein, verily, are Signs for a people who reflect.
Wahuwa allathee madda al-arda wajaAAala feeha rawasiya waanharan wamin kulli alththamarati jaAAala feeha zawjayni ithnayni yughshee allayla alnnahara inna fee thalika laayatin liqawmin yatafakkaroona
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Yusuf Ali: Glory to God, Who created in pairs all things that the earth produces, as well as their own (human) kind and (other) things of which they have no knowledge.
Pickthal: Glory be to Him Who created all the sexual pairs, of that which the earth groweth, and of themselves, and of that which they know not!
Shakir: Glory be to Him Who created pairs of all things, of what the earth grows, and of their kind and of what they do not know.
Sher Ali: Holy is HE Who created all things in pairs, of what the earth grows and of themselves, and of what they know not.
Subhana allathee khalaqa al-azwaja kullaha mimma tunbitu al-ardu wamin anfusihim wamimma la yaAAlamoona
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Yusuf Ali: That has created pairs in all things, and has made for you ships and cattle on which ye ride,
Pickthal: He Who created all the pairs, and appointed for you ships and cattle whereupon ye ride.
Shakir: And He Who created pairs of all things, and made for you of the ships and the cattle what you ride on,
Sher Ali: And Who has created pairs of all things, and has made for you ships and cattle whereon you ride,
Waallathee khalaqa al-azwaja kullaha wajaAAala lakum mina alfulki waal-anAAami ma tarkaboona
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Yusuf Ali: And of every thing We have created pairs: That ye may receive instruction.
Pickthal: And all things We have created by pairs, that haply ye may reflect.
Shakir: And of everything We have created pairs that you may be mindful.
Sher Ali: And of everything have WE created pairs that you may reflect.
Wamin kulli shay-in khalaqna zawjayni laAAallakum tathakkaroona
Please note that due to the ‘richness of the Arabic language’ and because Allah made the Quran 'clear and easy to understand', some Islamists may try to argue that at least some of these verses do not convey the message that ‘ALL CREATURES’ are created in pairs, taking the literal or metaphorical sense whichever and whenever suits them best.
For example, a disingenuous Islamist may claim that verse 13:3 refers only to FRUITS, or that verse 36:36 refers only to things grown from the Earth (i.e. plants). However verses 43:12 and 51:49 make it absolutely clear that Allah created ALL CREATURES in pairs. There is no ambiguity.
I will ignore the following verses, recognizing the possibility of relevance solely to humans. Further, their inclusion does not detract from my arguments.
"That He did create in pairs,- male and female, (The Noble Quran, 53:45)"
"And of him He made two sexes, male and female. (The Noble Quran, 75:39)"
"By (the mystery of) the creation of male and female; (The Noble Quran, 92:3)"
The Islamists Case
http://www.irfi.org/articles/articles_1_50/all_things_in_pair.htm PAIRS IN LIVING THINGS
One of the most recent of all scientific discoveries is that everything in the universe exists in pairs such as male and female among living things. Now we find that rock crystals also have pairs.
The Qur'an says: And of everything We have created pairs: That ye may receive Instruction.
Surah Zariyat, 51: 49 A. Yusuf All in note 5025 item (3) says " All things are in twos: sex in plants and animals, by which one individual is complementary to another; in the subtle forces of nature. Day and Night, positive and negative electricity, forces of attraction and repulsion: and numerous other opposites, each fulfilling its purpose, and contributing to the working of God's Universe; and in the moral and spiritual world. Love and Aversion, Mercy and Justice, Striving and Rest, and so on;-all fulfilling their functions according to the Artistry and wonderful Purpose of God. Everything has its counterpart, or pair, or complement. God alone is One, with none like Him, or needed to complement Him. These are noble things to contemplate. And they lead us to a true understanding of God's Purpose and Message."
http://www.science4islam.com/html/sci-04e.html…we find in the following verse more generalizations where Allah Says; (And of everything we have created pairs, that ye may receive instruction). The word “thing we together with the people who preceded us have understood it to be inclusive to contain humans, plants and animals. Since the Quran has included them all in this verse and told us that all creatures were made up of males and females.
http://www.sunnahonline.com/ilm/quran/qms.pdf PLANTS CREATED IN PAIRS, MALE AND FEMALE
Previously humans did not know that plants too have male and female gender distinctions. Botany states that every plant has a male and female gender. Even the plants that are unisexual have distinct elements of both male and female. “‘And has sent Down water from the sky.’ With it have We produced Diverse pairs of plants Each separate from the others.” [Al- Qur’aan 20:53]
FRUITS CREATED IN PAIRS, MALE AND FEMALE
“And fruit Of every kind He made In pairs, two and two.” [Al-Qur’aan
13:3]
Fruit is the end product of reproduction of the superior plants. The stage
preceding fruit is the flower, which has male and female organs (stamens and ovules). Once pollen has been carried to the flower, they bear fruit, which in turn matures and frees its seed. All fruits therefore imply the existence of male and female organs; a fact that is mentioned in the Qur’aan.
In certain species, fruit can come from non-fertilized flowers (parthenocarpic fruit) e.g. bananas, certain types of pineapple, fig, orange, vine, etc. They also have definite sexual characteristics.
EVERYTHING MADE IN PAIRS
“And of everything We have created pairs.” [Al-Qur’aan 51:49]
This refers to things other than humans, animals, plants and fruits. It may also be referring to a phenomenon like electricity in which the atoms consist of negatively – and positively – charged electrons and protons.
“Glory to Allah, Who created In pairs all things that The earth produces,
as well as Their own (human) kind And (other) things of which They
have no knowledge.” [Al-Qur’aan 36:36]
The Qur’aan here says that everything is created in pairs, including things that the humans do not know at present and may discover later.
MATTER AND ANTIMATTER
Some Islamists claim the mere existence of antimatter complements to matter, without regard to their relative abundance (matter dominates in our universe after the first second post the Big Bang) proves the validity of the ‘creation in pairs’ verses, particularly 43:12, 51:49, and especially 36:36 (as in “pairs of things unknown to them”). The ‘things unknown to them’ part supposedly refers to our modern understanding of particle physics.
The British physicist Paul Dirac, who discovered that matter was created in pairs, won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1933. This finding, known as "parity," revealed the duality known as matter and antimatter. Antimatter bears the opposite characteristics to matter. For instance, contrary to matter, antimatter electrons are positive and protons negative.
An Islamist making this sort of claim is Osama Abdallah of Answering-Christianity.
http://www.answering-christianity.com/quran/john_wuurt.htm Rebutting the Islamists Case
The case against the Quran and the Islamists is really very simple. All one has to do is to show that not all creatures are ‘created’ in pairs. My opinion is that Muhammad, didn’t have access to a microscope or a good Level 1 biology textbook. Therefore, he couldn’t have known about asexual organisms, parthenogenetic organisms, or hermaphrodites.
It was all too easy for Muhammad to observe male and female humans, camels, dogs, and even devils, jinns, and angels. But as he had no idea about micro-organisms and herpetology he was unaware that he was mistaken in his belief that all creatures came in males and females.
The alternative theses are also interesting: either Allah forgot He created asexual, parthenogenetic, and hermaphroditic organisms; Allah forgot to tell Jibreel; Jibreel didn’t listen to Allah; or Jibreel forgot to tell Muhammad.
Given this glaring mistake that all creatures are created in (male-female) pairs it is clear that Muhammad made up the Quran.
1. The Quran leaves out asexual organisms.
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/sex1.htm Asexual reproduction is found in the majority of living organisms, including most plants, protists (e.g. bacteria, protozoans, and unicellular algae and fungi), and many lower invertebrates such as tapeworms.
Other examples of asexual reproductive organisms are hydrae and many lower plants (e.g. ferns). Some organisms are also capable of regeneration, a specialized form of asexual reproduction, for example starfish, polyps, zebrafish, flatworms, newts, and salamanders. Many plants are capable of total regeneration. Among animals, the lower the form, the more capable it is of total regeneration; no vertebrates have this power (except artificially in the lab). Regeneration is closely allied to vegetative reproduction, the formation of a new individual by various parts of the organism not specialized for reproduction. The highest animals that exhibit vegetative reproduction are the colonial tunicates (e.g. sea squirts), which, much like plants, send out runners in the form of stolons, small parts of which form buds that develop into new individuals.
(Note that hydra and jellyfish and many primarily asexual organisms are also capable of sexual reproduction – however many simple organisms like bacterial, yeasts and Fungi Imperfecti are totally asexual).
2. The Quran leaves out hermaphrodites.
Some creatures, including plants, are totally hermaphrodites. For example, sponges, snails, the slug-like sea hare, and some kinds of deep-sea arrow worms are hermaphrodites, that is, they have both sexes in one body.
Some creatures also change their sex during their life-cycles: Quahogs (hard-shell clams) are born and grow up male, but later half of them turn female. Slipper shells and cup and saucer shells do this too; they commence every season as males, but nearly all of them later pass through a phase of ambisexuality and turn into adult females. Some species change sex depending on their environment, such as the marine worm Ophryotrocha, if the portly young females are later underfed they revert back into males again. Some fish can also change sex spontaneously, for example some groupers and guppies.
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dp5/sex2.htm#s5 Some Islamists may try to claim that hermaphrodites are actually a male-female pair as both sexes are included in the one organism. It may be that in a population some hermaphrodites act as males while others act as females. This Islamist claim, of course, would be totally dishonest as a hermaphrodite, by definition, is both male and female at once, even if performing one of its sexual functions at the one time.
3. The Quran leaves out parthenogenetic organisms.
Parthenogenesis is a form of reproduction in which the ovum develops into a new individual without fertilization. Natural parthenogenesis has been observed in many lower animals (it is characteristic of the rotifers), especially insects, e.g., the aphid. In many social insects, such as the honeybee and the ant, the unfertilized eggs give rise to the male drones and the fertilized eggs to the female workers and queens.
Note that the aphids, bees and ants are not true parthenogenetic organisms as they are also capable of sexual reproduction.
However, Muhammad apparently didn’t know about the 15 species of whiptail lizard (genus Cnemidophorus) that are wholly parthenogenetic, for example Cnemidophorus tigris (Western whiptail) and C. neomexicanus, nor did he know about the Ambystomids, the unisexual hybrid salamanders.
http://members.aol.com/Attic21/CreatureofDay/whip.html He also didn’t know about the Island or Brahminy Blind Snake, Ramphotyphlops braminus, the only parthenogenetic snake in the world which happens to originate from the Pacific Islands (lands unknown to Arabs in Muhammad’s time).
4. The Chinese Yin-Yang duality concept.
Islamists claim the Quran’s ‘creation in pairs’ verses, especially 36:36 refers to our modern understanding of matter antimatter complements. Some critics respond by highlighting the relative paucity of antimatter compared to matter, particularly as most antimatter was destroyed in the first second after the Big Bang.
http://www.answer-islam.org/earth_in_islam.htm Nevertheless, some Islamist might claim that the mere fact that antimatter exists proves the Quranic ‘creation in pairs’ verses to be miraculous as how could a seventh century bandit know about matter antimatter?
Unfortunately for the Islamist polemicists, the ancient Chinese already believed in the duality of all creation. This duality principle is known as ‘Yin and Yang’, part of the Taoist belief system. The date of origin of the Yin-Yang duality principle is unknown, however all reasonable estimates predate Islam by at least two thousand five hundred years. {Note the Yin-Yang symbol dates back to at least 400BC and was present in ancient Shang Dynasty Bronze but the Yin-Yang principle dated much earlier.}
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The Yellow Emperor, legendary Chinese emperor and cultural hero ruling from 2698 BC to 2598 BC and considered to be the ancestor of the Han Chinese, said “The principle of Ying and Yang is the foundation of the entire universe. It underlies everything in creation. It brings about the development of parenthood; it is the root and source of life and death…
http://www.soton.ac.uk/~maa1/chi/philos/yinyangsymbol.htm These quotes about Yin-Yang show that it may be extended to matter antimatter complements:
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Counterparts and conflicting opposites, they complemented each other in the formation of a creative force whose products were heaven and earth with its fruits.
http://religion-cults.com/Eastern/Taoism/taoism.htm Quote:
According to the theoretical physics developed in the twentieth century the principle of Yin Yang and the use of paradox persist; when there is matter there must also be antimatter.
http://home.iprimus.com.au/btheos/articles/AncientChineseWisdom-1.htm Thus, it is hardly miraculous for the Quran to claim ‘creation in pairs’ of all things known and unknown when the ancient Chinese already believed in a remarkably similar duality principle at least two thousand years before Islam.
4. The Rig Veda.
Islamists are not unique among religious polemicists who reinterpret ancient scriptures in the light of modern science. Dr Raja Ram Mohan Roy, a physical scientist, in “VEDIC PHYSICS: Scientific Origin of Hinduism; Golden Egg Publishing” makes such a claim that the Rig Veda already presaged the modern scientific understanding of matter antimatter complements.
http://www.rameshnrao.com/religion-philosophy-re-reading-the-rig-veda.html http://www.indiastar.com/closepet5.html Quote:
Thus the contracting universe is "Martanda", the living universe Vivasvana, the first pair of particle and anti-particle (matter and antimatter) are "Yama" and "Manu", the early part of the universe when the surface tension was the most important force constraining the expansion of the universe the battle between these two forces is the immortalized epic battle of Indra and Vrtra.
It is also claimed that the Purusha sukta from Yajuraranayaka (3:13, 33& 34) alluded to antimatter, dark matter and black holes.
http://www.sulekha.com/blogs/blogdisplay.aspx?cid=2908 CONCLUSION
Therefore, based on the existence of asexual, hermaphroditic and parthenogenetic organisms, the Quranic verses about Allah creating ALL CREATURES in pairs (male and female) is debunked. The ancient Chinese Yin-Yang duality principle proves that the any spurious Islamist claim of ‘creation in pairs’ to mean matter antimatter complements to be unremarkable. Besides, some Hindus make similar claims about the Rig-Veda as the Islamists make about the Quran about scriptural allusions to matter and antimatter.
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