Chapter Two
From Cosmos to Chaos
Order → Deviation → Disorder
THE NATURAL ORDER OR TAQUA OF CREATION
“Who has created the seven heavens one above another; can you see any fault
in the creation of the Most Gracious, then look again: “Can you see any rifts?”
Then look again and yet again: your sight will return to you in a state of
humiliation and worn out.” (Q, 67: 3-4)The Greek word, cosmos , literally means 'an orderly arrangement'.^15 This
‘Creation’ of Allah is universally understood by the wise to be a divinely
'ordered' unicity that expresses a concord of interrelated phenomena of
incalculable diversity. The singularity of its created order is evidence that
reflects God’s transcendent magnificence and imponderability and is referred
to as al’tawhid in Islam. The Universe containing this created order
encompasses a surpassing excellence that humans experience and call good
(beneficial) as well as a ‘potential for disorder’ (chaos), which we also
experience and may call 'bad' (harmful), and in some cases, ‘evil’. Barring
natural catastrophe, if the variance of any of its system exceeds their normal
range of temporally limited form and function, the deviation tends towards
entropic chaos (disorder)^16 in proportion to the degree of deviation. This
chaos^17 is usually, but not always, a departure from the normal range of the
15
Cosmos ( Kosmos , Gr.): the universe, esp. as a well-ordered whole. an ordered system of ideas
etc., a sum total of experience..
(^16) A thermodynamic quantity representing the unavailability of a system's thermal energy for
conversion into mechanical work, often interpreted as the degree of disorder or randomness
in the system. (Symbol: S ) figurative lack of order or predictability; gradual decline into
disorder: a marketplace where entropy reigns supreme.^
(^17) The Greek term ‘Chaos’ is commonly thought to refer to disorder or even anarchy. The
archaic Greek refers to a ‘fullness of potential’ as reflected in the Hermetic mythos by the
Egyptian god ‘Nun’ who they conceived as the “vast ocean of formless magma including the