Universe or Multiverse: Perspective of some Earlier Muslim Scholars

Cosmology started as a common ground for philosophy، religion، and science. In the Islamic culture، cosmology was either based on creation ex nihilo (the view of theologians) or on old universe (the view of philosophers)، and the problem of multiverse was not mentioned so much. After the introduction of the so-called ‘anthropic principle’ in the early 1970’s، the idea of multiverse entered the realm of cosmology. There were two views among earlier Muslim thinkers concerning the creation of the universe. Muslim theologians believed in the temporal creation of the universe، but Muslim philosophers predominantly believed that our universe is temporally old. As far the uniqueness or multiplicity of universe of the created universe is concerned، there were different views about this among Muslim scientists، philosophers and theologians. Here we mention several views concerning the multiplicity of the universe among some well-known Muslim scholars.