How did Muhammad Iqbal’s philosophy connect Islam with the study of history and nature?

In his philosophical work, The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1934), Muhammad Iqbal argued that the Prophet Muhammad initiated a cultural shift that moved away from priesthood and hereditary kingship toward an emphasis on the empirical study of history and nature.1

Iqbal posited that a rightly focused individual should continuously generate vitality through active interaction with the purposes of the living God. By framing the study of the natural world and historical processes as essential components of the Islamic experience, he sought to move Muslim thought away from the self-negating quietism of classical mysticism and toward a life of creative action. He believed that the Muslim community should utilize ijtihād (the principle of legal advancement) to devise new social and political institutions, thereby reconciling the core values of Islam with the demands of the modern age.123