What is EVOLUTION and CREATIONISM?

These discoveries in themselves are not harmful to a healthy belief in Allah's creative power to make whatever He wills in whatever way He wishes. But some scientists have tried to say that everything in the universe, even life itself, happened all by chance and accident, without any Divine intervention.

The name of this theory is Evolution and its most famouse advocate was a man named Charles Darwin (1809-1882). He was an Englishman who lived during the nineteenth century when Britain ruled most of the world.

He was keenly interested in the origin of life and took a journey around the world to study plants and animals on Earth. The ship he sailed on was named the HMS Beagle. He spent a particularly long amount of time in the Galapagos Islands, located in Pacific ocean, examining birds, lizards and giant turtles.

He came to believe that the variety of life in our world was due to what he called "Natural Selection" and "Survival of the Fittes." He wrote his findings in a book entitled, "On the Origin of Species" which he published in 1859.

The book immadiately caused a controversy in the Christian world because Christianity taught that God made life in an instant and the Earth was the center of importance in the universe. Christians also felt threatened by Darwin's teachings because they knew it meant that he was saying everything happened without needing God. To this day, many Christians still oppose and do battle in court over whether or not these theories should be taught in school.

These Christians advance the counter - idea of Creationism, or God making things all at once, while modern scientists still promote Evolution, or things happening by themselves accidentally, gradually and naturally. The two sides are as far apart as ever.