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Creation vs Charles Darwin takes Muslim twist in Turkey

'Atlas of Creation' offers images comparing fossils with animals to argue that Allah created all life and evolution never took place.

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A lavishly illustrated ‘Atlas of Creation’ is mysteriously turning up at schools and libraries in Turkey, proclaiming that Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution is the real root of terrorism.   

Arriving unsolicited by post, the large-format tome offers 768 glossy pages of photographs and easy-to-read text to prove that God created the world with all its species. At first sight, it looks like it could be the work of United States creationists, the Christian fundamentalists who believe the world was created in six days as told in the Bible.  
 
But the author’s name, Harun Yahya, reveals the surprise inside. This is Islamic creationism, a richly-funded movement based in predominantly Muslim Turkey which has an influence US creationists could only dream of. Creationism is so widely accepted here that Turkey placed last in a recent survey of public acceptance of evolution in 34 countries — just behind the United States.

“Darwinism is dead,” said Kerim Balci of the Fethullah Gulen network, a moderate Islamic movement with many publications and schools.    

Scientists say pious Muslims in the government, which has its roots in political Islam, are trying to push Turkish education away from its traditionally secular approach. Aykut Kence, biology professor at the Middle East Technical University in Ankara, said time for discussing evolution had been cut out of class schedules for the eighth grade this year.   

“The students will just learn there is a theory called evolution defended by Darwin back in the 19th century,” he said. “However, views of Islamic thinkers from the Middle Ages about evolution and creation have been included.”

Like the Bible, the Koran says God made the world in six days and fashioned the first man, Adam, from dust. Other details vary but the idea is roughly the same. But unlike in the West, evolution theory has not undermined the traditional creation story for many Muslims.    

Atlas of Creation offers over 500 pages of splendid images comparing fossils with present-day animals to argue that Allah created all life as it is and evolution never took place. Then comes a book-length essay arguing that Darwinism, by stressing the “survival of the fittest,” has inspired racism, Nazism, communism and terrorism. “The root of the terrorism that plagues our planet is not any of the divine religions, but atheism, and the expression of atheism in our times (is) Darwinism and materialism,” it says.   

One Istanbul school unexpectedly received three copies recently. “It’s very well done, with magnificent photos — a very stylish tool of creationist propaganda,” said the headmaster.

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