TOLERANCE AND ECOLOGY OF CULTURE IN THE ISLAMIC TRADITION

Abstract

Environmental ethics is becoming an increasingly important factor in contemporary environmental discourse, attracting widespread interest from religious studies and environmental humanities. The Quran is widely recognised as a source rich in deep ethical and cosmological meanings that challenge anthropocentrism and lay the foundation for a respectful attitude towards the natural world. A special feature of the Quranic worldview is the recognition of all beings, both animate and inanimate, as spiritually conscious and actively participating in the divine creation. This theocentric vision challenges the hierarchical and anthropocentric interpretations that dominate contemporary Central Asia. Over the past two decades, scholars such as Sarah Tlili and Anna M. Gade have made great efforts to bring to the fore a deep ecological understanding of the Quran. Their writings emphasise the need to reassess the concept of human viceroyalty (caliph) in light of climate change and environmental degradation. However, despite a growing body of research, few studies have addressed the question of how Islamic metaphysics, particularly concepts such as tawhid (unity) and amanah (trust), can be applied in environmental ethics. This article attempts to fill this gap by combining hermeneutic analysis and ethnographic data from Central Asia to illustrate how the Quran inspires spiritually integrated ecology. The study demonstrates how justice and mercy are manifested as ethical imperatives for caring for the environment, and how understanding humanity as God's creation leads to a more sustainable interaction between humans and the natural world. In doing so, this article contributes to a theocentric paradigm that both challenges and enriches contemporary ecological discourse, which is rooted in Western secularism. The Islamic perspective on environmental ethics is grounded in environmental pluralism and inclusivity.