نشریه کتاب نقد
پیاپی 70-71 (بهار و تابستان 1393)

Witnessing the insufficiency of the natural sciences, one of the Muslim thinker's concerns in the 20th century is paying attention to religious science for obviating the insufficiencies. Ayatollah Javadi Amoli is one of these thinkers that marked the insufficiencies; he called the modern science as defected. He holds that the way out of this problem is to making science as to be religious. He actually considers science as to be religious in the state of affirmation; because from his opinion it is the subject and datum of the science that make it religious, and because the datum and the subject of the science is the act or the word of God and science discover and explore it, so all the sciences are religious in the state of affirmation, whether the scientist be theist or atheistor whether regarding or not paying attention to it. Hence, there is no nonreligious science and the solution from his opinion is as follows: First, turning and facing to the Divine philosophy and explaining the system of being and the world of creation as the system of creation, because the system of creation has concomitance with possessing a all-known, powerful and wise creator and with its purposefulness and regulation of the whole system of being; Second, regarding to the fact that the real teacher of human being is only God, so the source of all human knowledge and science is God; Third, religion must not considered as limited to the narration (the book and tradition) but also beside the narration, the intellect must be formally considered as a source and explorer of religion, because the source of ontology is only the Divine Will and the source of epistemology is reason and narration; Fourth, it Is possible to extract the scientific principles with the Ijtihad methods and referring to religious texts, and methodologically and expertly organizing science through referring the derivative principle to fundamental principles.

In the discussion on the religious science, six semantic aspects are considerable. Ayatollah Javadi Amoli holds that all sciences in terms of subject are religious and divine; because any phenomenon that would be studied in science is the word, sign and act of the God almighty. All the true and truthful scientific propositions are also divine and religious in terms of the content; because any truth is divine, even it is resulted by the experience and reason or the content of the proofs based on the narrations. Beside these two descriptive aspects, there are four imperative and prescriptive aspects as follows:1. Making the attitude of the scientist or scholar to be religious on thesubjects, that is the scientist may study the world with a creationbelieving approach not the attitude of supposing the nature as the source.2. The method of deduction that is to utilize the capacities of all valid sourcesof knowledge (proof, experience, intuition and narration) justly and maximally.3. The value system of education that is the endeavor for the knowledge that assures theoretical and practical intellect of human being.4. The motivation of the scientist and researcher that is related to the root meaning of science.

The discussion about religious science is one of the challenges that have both pros and cons. One of the proponents of religious science theory is Ayatollah Javadi Amoli. In this regard, he considers religion as the colloquial and comprehensive religion; and put all series of sciences under the category of religion. Accepting the possibility of religious science, he believes in the presence of religion in all aspects of humanities and natural sciences. Accordingly, the scope of religion covers all sciences; all sciences are religious and there is no non-religious science. Ayatollah Javadi Amoli proves the quality of religious science with two interpretational and philosophical methods. It is worth pointing out that this attitude has problems and criticisms as: the definition of comprehensive religion and its criticisms; criticism on the scope of religious knowledge; confusion between considering the scientific propositions as being religious and considering the authority of acting that propositions as being religious; not segregating the intellect and intellectuality.

One of the epistemic motivations for presenting the notion of religious science is to remove the conflict between science and religion. After discussing on the meaning, possibility, necessity, desirability and morality of religious science the proponents of the notion of religious science argue on the methods of producing religious science. In his works, Ayatollah Javadi Amoli refers to three strategies for producing religious science (the science in accordance with religious teachings):1. Considering achievements of reason as being religious2. Producing science based on divine philosophy3. Producing science based on the generalities taken from religion After a brief introduction and analysis of these three strategies, this article represents that the second and third strategies are not self-sufficient for producing religious science; in some circumstances they need the first strategy. Then the article refers to some semantic and methodological ambiguities which exist in the first strategy. It seems that without obviating these ambiguities, the theory of Ayatollah Javadi-Amoli has not enough power to support the production of religious science.

Ayatollah Javadi Amoli's theory of production of religious science is one of the considerable attitudes. The main structure of this theory is based on religious knowledge foundations. The abstract of his theory is as follows:A. The science is not secular essentially; faith and disbelief are not contributed in the nature of science; but the scholars are divided into religious and non-religious.B. All sciences, including humanities and basic, are to reveal the secret of act and words of God. This is the very revealing level of science that is the essential requiring of science. The condition of being Islamic is not explanatory but it is preservation condition.C. From the other hand, with the sovereignty of atheistic or Islamic absolute philosophies, the sciences are also modified as being atheistic or Islamic.D. As the whole world is God's creation, and as all understanding powers and all its findings even industry are Divine blessings- because the science is Divine creation- undoubtedly the science is also a religious matter. Although the fundamentals of this theory have ambiguities:1. According to the epistemological fundamentals based on the corresponding disclosure, the attributing sciences as being Islamic, has not determined meaning and dividing science into religious and non-religious is meaningless; and unwantedly it justifies all modern sciences as being Islamic.2. Absolute philosophy is being asked seriously whether it could be Islamic or not; while absolute philosophy is the vessel for Islamization of sciences and the "philosophies of". 3. Finally, it does not have any specific criteria for the science as being Islamic.

One of the attitudes to the quiddity of religious science is Ayatollah Javadi- Amoli’s theory. In his perception and attitude, there are two general criteria and bases on the issue of science and religious science. One base and criterion considers all perceptions and sciences, which is in accordance with the reality, as being religious; because each science that investigates the act and words of God as well as the acts and words of the infallibles (in Twelver Shia Islam include the Prophet of Islam, his daughter Fatima and The Twelve Imams) is religious science; accordingly, all the sciences even humanities and natural sciences could be considered as religious science. However, according to the other criterion, science, in itself, is neither religious nor secular, but rather science as being secular is related to absolute philosophy. Two aforementioned criteria are based on special bases, including the bases relating to the religious studies and science studies. These bases and criteria have different consequents and results on the issue of religious science; some of these results are considered as ambiguities and objections of this theory. There are different criticisms on these viewpoints. This article criticizes and investigates the bases and criteria of science as being religious in this theory.