ORTHODOX scientism and dogmatic Sufism have a sectional view of reality.

While the former deems this universe as autocratic, the latter takes it as illusory.

Both fail to grasp complete reality. Thus, whereas scientific reason rendered the existence of God untenable in the West, Sufi intuition consigned the reality of the world to oblivion in the East. So, while Descartes was trying to establish rationally God`s existence, his contemporary Mujaddid Alf Sani Sheikh Ahmad Sirhindi was attempting to establish the real existence of the world which was being doubted by Sufi-Vedantic monism.

Descartes` pure reason unravels the `what and how` of natural phenomena.

However, it appears unaware about the question of the `why, wherefrom and whereto` of the universe, since understanding the moral whispers of the cosmos requires the `eyes and ears` of the heart. Hence, he plainly acknowledged that he does not intend to talk about faith and conduct, but about the speculative truth which can be realised in the light of natural truth. Therefore, everyone must yield only to real irrefutable evidence.

Henceforward, natural philosophy, which to Oswald Spengler is a mathematical representation of the universe, reigns supreme in the West. It led to human order under human reason, which instead of being a giant leap forward as is mistakenly construed, was a Hellenistic idea through and through.

So, the development sealed the triumph of science against religion, turning the Christian West into Prometheus` civilisation.

Ahmad Sirhindi addressed the issue through the epistemology of the Quran.

Islam had weathered the storm of Hellenism, which brought reason at par with revelation, challenging the authority and meaning of the latter, denied the physical resurrection and equated the prophets with the philosophers. Had there not been Imam Ghazali on the scene, Islamic thought would have been turned into a carbon copy of Greek worldview. He built a thorough edifice of religious philosophy which not only provided Islam a `safe prop`, but also gave a firm basis to Judaism and Christianity through Latin translations.

Man is endowed with faculties of hearing, sight and fuad, ie, mental-cum-spiritual attitude. Hence, to examine the reality perfectly, in addition to pure reason a vetted intuitive faculty is required which neither swerves to the right or left, nor below or above the subject. This oozes out of the depths of the heartwhereon man`s normative nature is engraved. Thus, it is the combined act of pure reason and intuition which the Quran, in reference to Hazrat Musa`s quest for real knowledge (18:60) terms `junction of the two seas` wherefrom the actual truth flows out. The `two seas` here arguably represent the two streams of knowledge the one obtainable through observation and intellectual coordination of outward phenomena, and the other through intuitive, mystic insight.

Hence, to `really hear`, to `really see` and `really understand`, the Quran demands the capacity of faith, so the reality of God is as subjective to the faithless as the sun is subjective to the animals habituated to darkness. In a nutshell, the truth lies where reason of the heart and mind concur.

Thus, whereas Descartes` scientism failed to establish the existence of God, as per Mujaddid Alf Sani reason works in such a logical harmony with faith thatthe reality of God and the world comes alive in his seamless mysticintellectual thought.

He termed mystic fact a `relative truth` subject to the scrutiny of reason like rational knowledge. It was a radical departure from Ibn al-Arabi`s doctrine of the infallibility of intuition. Herehabilitated intuition to reason and in his own words emerged as an `innovator of the millennium` in the history of mystic thought in Islam, a claim which Dr Fazlur Rahman says has been vindicated by the enormity of his work.

The finality of prophecy in Islam manifests divine trust in man to decipher the meaning of God for the world from the study of nature, history and the human self. It illustrates that mystic experience is a perfectly natural experience, open to critical scrutiny like other aspects of human experience. Now, man has sufficient resources at his disposal, ie, the scripture, cumulative experience and untapped mental funds and fecundity to redeem the balance of history.

We are passing through the `Dark Age` of Muslim history. Serving the history of the imperial West or expecting borrowed glory by parasitic alignment with Confucian China is not a remedy. The panacea lies in embracing the rigorous and timeless positivism of the Quran. • The wúter is an academic.