And as in these other traditions, some writers believe that one need only return to the texts to find an early and authentic environmental message, whereas others search for comparatively marginalized elements and see the need for genuine theological creativity. The Qur’an, a Pakistani geographer and early ecotheologian tells us, makes it “abundantly clear that God has created the earth for the service of man, but at the same time man is also constantly reminded that the earth . . . belongs to Almighty Allah. Ibrahim Ozdemir argues that any serious reading of the Qur’an reveals a perspective in which the earth is a gift from God with its own independent value, and in which people, as God’s “viceregents” on earth, have the responsibility to care for the rest of life and make their own patterns of desire and consumption temperate.
Numerous passages from Islamic scripture reveal how compatible its theology is with Judaism and Christianity in this regard, from the idea of the earth belonging to God to descriptions of nature celebrating its Creator: “The seven heavens and the earth, and all beings therein,” says the Qur’an (17:46), sounding exactly like Psalm 19, “declare His glory.”
Although an Islamic ethic of environmental responsibility toward God’s creation can be rooted in extensive quotations from the Qur’an and other important sources, Islam, no less than Christianity or Judaism, faces the dilemma that such sources have been, for the most part, neglected. Like Christianity, Islam has been predominantly anthropocentric in practice, and thus, many contemporary Islamic writers tell us, requires at the very least a reorientation toward its own founding texts.
Islamic Prophecy and the Active Intellect
