Surat Nasr

Terima kaseh pada seorang teman dari Mazhab Bangi yang perkenalkan makalah Seyyed Hossein Nasr di MAAS J. Islamic Sci, Vol 4. No. 1 Jan-June 1988/1408AH.

Memang, makalah "Islam and the problem of modern science" tersebut ada sari menarik. Biarpun temanya mengungkap kelemahan sains barat--subjek yang boleh menyeronokkan--tetapi tinggalan catatan kakinya barangkali lebih mengujakan.

Ini kerana, ada kemusykilan terhadap kegemaran kalangan al-Attasiwan--yang sering mendakwa perkataan islamization adalah pertama kali dikemukakan oleh Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas.

Justeru, bila bertemu dengan makalah ini, rupa-rupanya ada catatan yang menunjukkan sebaleknya. Tapi, sudah tentu takkan ada kepuasan hanya sekadar menadah, memetik dan menerima semata.

Lalu, saya mengutus e-partha pada Nasr untuk menyemak lanjut. Kemudian, inilah balasannya untuk sama-sama kita kongsi:

"Mr. Fithri,

The word Islamization and the process are not the same. Already in my Science and Civilization in Islam written in 1958 and printed in 1964, I speak of the necessity of the integration of the sciences into the Islamic world view and this idea is also to be found in some of my early essays. But I did not and do no like the term Islamization of knowledge used later by al-Faruqi and al-Attas. Over a decade before they began to speak of this subject, I began to write on this process without using this rather awkward term. Al-Faruqi was fully aware of this matter since he confirmed it while we were both teaching at Temple University from 1979 onwards. Al-Attas had also read my several works on the meaning of “Islamic science” before shifting from Fansuri and similar figures to this subject.

Sincerely yours,
S.H.N."