Allah’s 5000+ Signs Of Possible Exoplanet Life – OpEd

In the 20 years before NASA launched the Kepler Space Telescope in 2009, about 325 exoplanets were discovered. Kepler was a full-time planet hunter that revolutionized astronomers’ understanding of exoplanets. It was particularly interested in finding Earth-sized planets orbiting sun-like stars at a distance where water on the surface could be stable in liquid form — the so-called habitable zone.

The James Webb telescope can collect about 10 times as much light as the Hubble Space Telescope and is much more sensitive at redder, longer wavelengths in the infrared spectrum. 

Thus, in the 14 years since 2009 almost 5000 confirmed exoplanets have been found and we now know  that there could be more planets than stars in the Milky Way. Many of them are in multiple-planet systems like our solar system, and a large share of the exoplanets appear to be super-Earths — a class that’s bigger than our planet but smaller than Neptune.

I do not believe that the evolution of life or intelligent life is solely due to luck because I am a Reform Rabbi and an Islamic Jew. Actually I am an Islamic Jew i.e. a faithful Jew submitting to the will of God, because I am a Reform Rabbi. As a Rabbi I am faithful to the covenant that God made with Abraham and Sarah, the first Hebrews (Genesis 14:13) to be Hanif Muslims, and I submit to the commandments that God made with the people of Israel at Mount Sinai. 

As a Reform Rabbi I believe that Jewish spiritual leaders should modify Jewish tradition as social and historical circumstances change and develop. I also believe we should not make religion difficult for people to practice. These are lessons that prophet Muhammad taught 12 centuries before the rise of Reform Judaism in the early 19th century. 

Reform Jews are the largest of the Jewish denominations in the U.S. In the U.K..Reform Judaism is called Liberal  Judaism. 

As a Reform Rabbi and an Islamic Jew I would say to all scientists that random luck has nothing to do with the evolution of life on this or any other planet. There is more and more evidence that nature is not random. Nature, including randomness, has been formed by Allah’s laws of physics to create life.

Both the Qur’an and the Hebrew Bible teach that God created the whole universe to be conducive to the universal evolution of life. The Qur’an says, “We have not sent you but as a blessing for all the worlds.” (Al-Anbiya 107) Commentators say this refers to the 18.000 worlds {with living creatures} created by Allah. Our world is one of them. (Mir’at-e-Kainat, vol.1, p.77). 

The Hebrew Bible says in the Zabur of Prophet David, King of Israel; ” Your kingdom is a kingdom of all worlds; and Your dominion is for all generations.” (Psalms 145:13)

Concerning how often intelligent life develops and how long it lasts; we will have to wait for more evidence. Even if intelligent life does evolve eventually on most planets, we may never be in contact with them. It takes millions of years for a species to become intelligent culturally and technologically. If due to war or pollution, intelligent technologically advanced life does not last for at least hundreds of thousands of years; the chances of two advanced civilizations living within a hundred thousand years of each other are very small. 

So any intelligent lifeforms that we may encounter will be peaceful because if their highly advanced technology was not offset by even more advanced and effective religions they would have destroyed themselves long before they could contact us. Thus, every intelligent, spiritually aware, ethical, life-form must successfully pass through a Messianic Age and emerge as a peaceful spiritually advanced civilization. 

This is not a matter of luck, nor is it a matter of science. If all of us follow the directions of our God given religions to live good and holy lives our society will survive. If not; perhaps visitors from other worlds who have followed God’s messengers will visit our civilization’s ruins.