seven years, it necessarily follows that the individual too ceases to
exist as often as his body does so. However improbable it may be, if
man is equated with his body the conclusion is inescapable that he
changes into a new individual every three or seven years. The
practical consequences of such a view can be easily imagined.
Suppose A lends £ 10 to B. A, being a friend of B, waits patiently for
several years, hoping that B will pay back the money as soon as it is
convenient for him to do so. When A thinks that he had waited long
enough, he demands payment. B, however, tells him that the two
individuals between whom the said transaction took place have
ceased to exist. A may insist that he remembers the transaction and
that B is the same person who borrowed the money, but B may
emphatically maintain that he himself is not the person who
borrowed the money and so is under no obligation to pay it back.
Again, suppose a lady tells her husband one fine morning that the
woman he had married ten or twelve years back has now changed
into an entirely new woman and, therefore, the marriage contract
does not stand and she is no longer his wife. It is obvious that if by
“self” we mean the physical self, such absurd conclusions are
inescapable. However seriously the scientist may assert that the
physical self is transformed in a short period of time and hence we
are not responsible for what we did before that period, nobody, not
even the scientist himself, can accept this as a right principle of
conduct. For, however the body may change, our personal identity is
not affected thereby. We continue to be same till the time of our
death. The physical self, the body, might change but not the real self,
the ego or the “I” which make me what I am. To quote Brightman:
If a person is not a true identical unity through all the changes in his
experience, then spiritual development is impossible. Moral growth,
for example, rests on the postulate that I am responsible to myself for
the past purposes and contracts; yet if I am not the one who
entertained those purposes and made those contracts, I experience
neither responsibility nor continuous growth.(1)
To this the scientist may retort that science is the disinterested
pursuit of knowledge, and truth must be accepted even if it entails
unpleasant consequences. He may point out that his interest is in
science, not in ethical conduct and social relationships. But is the
scientist prepared to admit that, according to his theory, he has
changed six or seven times into quite a different individual? Will he
Islam: A Challenge to Religion 71