Islam Creator of the Modern Age
1. Islam: Creator of the Modern Age
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religious sense, but is also a blessing in many other
ways (6:157). One very important way in which it
was a blessing was that it brought human history
out of the age of darkness, and caused it to enter
into the age of light. This was a revolution in
thought which unlocked the doors to innumerable
worldly benefits. It is this second, worldly, aspect of
the Islamic revolution, which the well-known
western historian, Henri Pirenne, describes in terms
of Islam having “changed the face of the globe. The
traditional order of history was overthrown.
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The present era, which we think of as modern and
advanced—the age of science and industry, of
freedom and equality—is a direct consequence of
this aspect of the Islamic revolution which is called
a blessing in the Qur’an. This period, like most
other major historical developments, came about
gradually, taking almost a thousand years to reach
its culmination.
This gradual process may be broadly divided into
four stages, the first three of which are directly
connected with the Islamic revolution. The fourth
stage is indirectly related.
