Is it not true that man has gone through a process of evolution in all aspects of his life. There has been a gradual improvement in understanding and useful employment of Science and Technology and likewise in Social Sciences. We also find a similar improvement in moral performance and religious thought and practice. In religious matters we therefore find that the message brought by the last messenger, alaihissalaam, was better than the one brought by earlier messengers.
Answer
I partly agree with your views on evolutionary improvement in ideas and practice of humans. I think humans have certainly shown positive improvement in the understanding of Science and in scientific progress; they have achieved gradual progress in social sciences too. But the trend isn’t similarly true in matters of morality and religion.
Many ancient societies were far better morally compared to most of the modern societies. The society of Muslims of earlier generations was morally far better than most of the modern-day Muslims and non-Muslims.
I also have my reservations on the view that the message brought by the prophet of Islam was superior to the ones brought by the earlier prophets, thereby confirming evolutionary trend in religion too. All God-sent religions were the same in the moral and spiritual quality. The only difference was in the details of their implementation to take care of the evolving nature of the later societies. The message was identical in emphasising beliefs and morals. It was slightly different in the case of Shari’ah injunctions because of the peculiar needs of the society were changing with time.