Conceptualizing science as a source of truth is at the heart of secularist thought. To replace Christianity as the main ordering principle of the West, it was necessary to have some ideology with a more credible claim to the truth than Christianity. Science could only be viewed as a source of truth once it attained a relatively high level of explanatory power.

Achieving this level of power was necessarily a very resource intensive process. Contemplating natural phenomena, developing observational instruments like telescopes and microscopes, analyzing observations, formalizing observations into theories, and so forth, are all activities that can only be undertaken by individuals who are not busy with the basic needs of day to day survival. This is why scientific revolutions can take place more or less anywhere where there is sufficient surplus wealth.

Although accumulation of capital is possible without injustice, there is no question that a higher degree of capital accumulation is possible with injustice, than without. It’s very clear that the accumulation of wealth in Europe beginning in the colonial era was based upon a large amount of injustice around the world.

In fact, that was part of the incentive for Europe to abandon Christianity in favor of secularism. Religion was holding them back from “progress,” because Christian morality was hampering the concentration of wealth necessary for accelerating technological development. For example, the scientific and industrial revolution in Europe only really began after interest banking was fully legalized and integrated into European law. Secularists among the Muslims today have the same view of Islam as a force holding them back from “progress.”

Political power is necessarily linked to claims of truth. Even traditional nomadic tribes would not accept a leader they did not believe to be favored by their gods. It was understood that victory in battle and the availability of food depended on forces beyond their perception, which they described as gods or spirits. If a leader was not favored by these forces, then it would result in the defeat, starvation, or destruction of the group.

This was also the case under Christianity. This is why Christians were so active about burning heretics. Heresy was not just a difference of opinion. Heresy was a direct threat to the ruler’s claim to power and thereby the stability of society. Denying the legitimacy of the priests meant denying that the ruler was favored by or appointed by God, thus by implication denying the obligation to obey the ruler.

This is why the killing of heretics only stopped with the rise of secularism. Claims to truth were thereafter based in science— but there’s a conundrum here. Political legitimacy is now conferred by the scientific establishment, who have come to take the place of the priest class. Scientists analyze data and devise solutions to problems, and politicians then act upon this research. If a belief is favored by “the science,” it communicates to the masses that the invisible forces governing our world favor those in power.

In this mode of deriving political legitimacy, continuous increases in standard of living are proof that the leaders (or the dominant political system) are worthy of leadership. So this system stands as long as it is growing, because standard of living (life expectancy, income, etc.) is seen to be the measure of right guidance. In fact, this is a system where the people have taken their desires as gods, so the ability to fulfill desires is seen as the equivalent of divine blessings or approval.

أَرَءَیۡتَ مَنِ ٱتَّخَذَ إِلَـٰهَهُۥ هَوَىٰهُ أَفَأَنتَ تَكُونُ عَلَیۡهِ وَكِیلًا

Have you seen the one who takes as his god his own desire? Then would you be responsible for him?

25:43

If science is unable to deliver continued results, the people will begin to lose faith in the high priests and political leaders. It’s also important to understand that the relationship between the decline in resource availability and the decline in science and technology is not linear. That is to say, a reduction in available resources does not equal a proportional reduction in scientific progress and technological capacity. Rather, the Western scientific-industrial world order is susceptible to systemic collapse.

Since political legitimacy is directly linked to material conditions in this belief system, there is a tremendous pressure to consume resources in order to maintain peace and order in the heartlands of secularism. If executing heretics was the price of maintaining stability in medieval Europe, the destruction of indigenous communities and environmental devastation is the price of maintaining stability under the secular world order.

Technological methods of resource extraction result in a significant “debt” of deferred consequences. For example, heavy use of antibiotics in industrialized meat production not only increases the antibiotic resistance of bacteria, it also makes bacteria more aggressive and virulent. At the same time, antibiotics reduce natural immunity, meaning there is a wave of plague waiting to be unleashed upon humanity in the event that antibiotic production ever shuts down.

Genetically modified crops, engineered pesticides, and synthetic fertilizers result in higher crop yields, but they have also left crops with almost no natural resistance to diseases. Agriculture is now dependent on a far more limited variety of crops than in the past, meaning there is an acute danger of catastrophic crop failures as soon if access to the chemical inputs of industrial agriculture is interrupted.

Likewise, the injustices involved with developing this secular-scientific regime continue to mount. The concentration of wealth necessary for maintaining extensive research and development infrastructure is dependent upon international borders which function as a sort of international apartheid, and which enable extraction of wealth from former colonies and transferring it to the centers of technological development and production.

Wealth inequality is now greater than ever, driven by the total domination of society by riba. Zakat, which has the opposite effect of riba in terms of distributing wealth and preventing excessive concentration of wealth, is no longer enforced by law, but is understood as a personal choice for a few practicing Muslims. Injustice drives social tension, and social tension results in mounting instability. This instability threatens to break out into open conflict, and this conflict is only held back by advanced military, law enforcement and surveillance technology.

All of these factors, along with many others, threaten to erupt in plague, famine, and war. If the production and maintenance of medical technology breaks down, it will lead to the outbreak of epidemics. If the production and maintenance of agricultural technology breaks down, it will lead to famines. If the production and maintenance of military and law enforcement technology breaks down, it will lead to violence and criminality.

Every one of these crises will intensify all of the others by disrupting technological production and maintenance networks. Scientific secularism as a governing paradigm has set itself up to fail spectacularly. And when it does, what will the organizing principle of society be?

I suspect there will be no choice but to return to executing heretics in order to preserve the social order, because this will be preferable to the alternative of total anarchy. In Europe, the rise of Christian ethnic nationalism indicates that this shift is already beginning.

The suspension of the rights of Muslims following the destruction of the towers of New York may also indicate the beginning of this trend. For most of the history of Christendom, being a Muslim in a Christian country was regarded as a heresy punishable by death. As the secular, technological world order disintegrates and alternate methods of maintaining social order continue to gain popularity, it is likely we will see a return to a similar situation.

Truly practicing Muslims are already heretics even within the secular order, because we do not accept the idea that scientific truth is the highest ideal. If a Muslim genuinely insists that the Quran and sunnah, rather than Western science, be the basis of the law and political legitimacy, and they actually make moves to establish sharia as the governing principle of society, they are persecuted, imprisoned, or killed, as was the case with Muslims in medieval Europe.

Proponents of the secular-scientific world order try to claim that it is more peaceful than other systems such as Christian feudalism, but this is not the case. There are still public executions of those who refuse to submit to this system, but they are carried out by high technology like drones and guided missiles and broadcast by the international media, rather than being carried out in the public square in front of the church.