|
Muslim call to adopt Mecca time
Muslim scientists and
clerics have called for the adoption of Mecca time to replace GMT, arguing that
the Saudi city is the true centre of the Earth.
Mecca is the direction all
Muslims face when they perform their daily prayers.
The call was issued at a
conference held in the Gulf state of Qatar under the title: Mecca, the Centre
of the Earth, Theory and Practice.
One geologist argued that
unlike other longitudes, Mecca's was in perfect alignment to magnetic north.
He said the English had
imposed GMT on the rest of the world by force when Britain was a big colonial
power, and it was about time that changed.
Mecca watch
A prominent cleric, Sheikh
Youssef al-Qaradawy, said modern science had at last provided evidence that
Mecca was the true centre of the Earth; proof, he said, of the greatness of the
Muslim "qibla" - the Arabic word for the direction Muslims turn to
when they pray.
The meeting also reviewed
what has been described as a Mecca watch, the brainchild of a French Muslim.
The watch is said to
rotate anti-clockwise and is supposed to help Muslims determine the direction
of Mecca from any point on Earth.
The meeting in Qatar is
part of a popular trend in some Muslim societies of seeking to find Koranic
precedents for modern science.
It is called "Ijaz
al-Koran", which roughly translates as the "miraculous nature of the
holy text".
The underlying belief is
that scientific truths were also revealed in the Muslim holy book, and it is
the work of scholars to unearth and publicise the textual evidence.
But
the movement is not without its critics, who say that the notion that modern
science was revealed in the Koran confuses spiritual truth, which is constant,
and empirical truth, which depends on the state of science at any given point
in time.
|