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So why did you enrol into Islamic Studies?
You're non-Muslim, right?
Oh yeah.
I'm not a Muslim, but I'll be honest, I’m very interested in religions
and different worldviews.
So you're thinking of becoming a Muslim?
No, not at all.
But very honestly, I think I'm just a curious person,
and I've always wanted to know the meaning behind all of this.
Yeah. Something bad happened to you, didn't it?
I know something bad happened.
That's why you're so curious about life.
Did your friend die?
Your friend died.
Is that why you want to know the questions of life you're becoming?
Discovering your inner self.
I know I'm right. Just tell me.
Man, I'll be very honest.
Something big did happen in my life.
I knew it.
A couple of years ago I got into a really bad car accident.
SubhanAllah. Sorry what?
Never mind, continue.
I was in the hospital for months
and when I was in hospital there was no wi fi.
“No wifi”.
So the patient in the bed next to me, he was a Muslim.
He started talking to me about life and meaning behind things,
and he gave me a Quran and he gave me other books.
And I started reading them.
I guess it just all made sense to me.
That's why I took up this course to learn more about Islam.
Well, if you have any questions, you got me now
and you can ask the Professor as well.
Yeah. Thanks, man.
Sounds good.
Well, good morning and welcome again.
Good to have you again
In this class today, I will be discussing the question of Qadar or divine decree.
From the Islamic perspective,
divine decree or Qadar means everything that happens in this world,
be it good or be bad, is from Allah, from God Himself.
Professor, I'm just a little bit confused.
Did God create evil?
I always thought that evil came from the devil.
Does evil come from God Himself?
From an Islamic perspective, everything that happens in this world,
be it good or bad or evil is from the decree of Allah or God.
He created good and he created bad or evil.
But that does not mean God is evil Himself.
It is interesting that none of God's attributes in Islam is evil.
The Quran captures this beautifully in a narrative
or a discussion between God, the Angels, and Adam in the verse of the Quran.
Allah says إِنِّي جَاعِلٌ فِي الأرْضِ خَلِيفَةً,
I shall make a Khalifa or a representative on this Earth.
And the Angels said, أَتَجْعَلُ فِيهَا مَنْ يُفْسِدُ فِيهَا
وَيَسْفِكُ الدِّمَاءَ Shall you create somebody who is going to shed blood
and create mischief or corruption on earth, which is evil?
And then God responds by saying
إِنِّي أَعْلَمُ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ I know what you don't know.
And so behind the decree of Allah,
there is a wisdom that the human intellect may not necessarily always comprehend.
Professor, if I may, how can a God who is all powerful
and all good allow so much suffering and evil to exist
to the point that some people even lose their lives?
Where is the wisdom in humanity for all the earthquakes and floods that occur?
Excellent. Thank you for that.
I think the first important point to realize and I'm sure you would agree
with me, that the human intellect cannot comprehend all reality.
And it is very limited.
Just like our eyesight is limited, our hearing is limited.
The human intellect is very limited.
So that which we may perceive to be bad or evil
may in fact be good or there is good in it that we don't see.
But from an Islamic perspective, evil or bad or natural disasters
or calamities or trials and tribulations happen in this world for several reasons.
One of those reasons could be that this is a world of test.
This is a world of trial trials and tribulations.
If this world, after all, was to be perfect,
then it would not be a world of trial and tribulation.
Secondly, but also being a place of trials
and tribulations, a test is some good can emerge from that.
So for example, we have a advance in science and technology.
We have advanced we have advanced so much in medicine because of the
some of the challenges that we as human human beings face.
But also, thirdly, sometimes
Allah or God
tests people with some of these challenges, like death.
He may take somebody that you love so dearly,
and it reminds me of a beautiful tradition by the Prophet who says when he took
the child of a person,
and Allah said to the angels, you've taken the seed of his heart
or the seed of her heart, a massive test, a massive trial.
And they and they said, yes, The angel said, “Yes, ya Allah.
We took the seed of his heart or her heart.
He said ”How did he or she respond?
The angel said.
They responded.
He responded, or she responded by saying, “Alhamdulillah, إِنَّا لِلَّٰهِ وَإِنَّا
إِلَيْهِ رَاجِعُونَ
we praise God and to Allah we belong and to allow we shall return.”
And so Allah said, this is how he responded,
or she responded when they were tested, they said “Yes”.
Then He said, “Build for them
a palace in paradise and call it the Palace of Praise”.
So you could see, you could see for the loss of a child,
in this case, the huge reward in the hereafter.
And I think this is important to keep in mind that our understanding of the world
should not be confined to this material world,
but to the metaphysical reality or the hereafter.
Thank you so much.
Now, that actually has a lot of clarity to that I think as well, knowing
that whatever happened will be corrected. So thanks.
Thank you. Absolutely.
Professor, one last question.
So God is all powerful and God is in control of everything.
And according to your understanding, Islam is the true religion of God.
So why doesn't He just make everybody Muslim?
Because this is what else is in the Quran.
He guides whom He wills and misguides whom He wills.
This is what we believe and we accept this fully.
Excellent point.
Also in Islam, we believe that humans have a free will.
And if God was to impose on them
to become all Muslims, then what's the point of that free will?
Free will means they have the right to choose.
And so two things.
He's given you free will,
but he's giving you the intellect to use, so that you can research,
you can study, you can find out, and so that you convincingly
decide to choose whether to believe in God and worship
God and accept and submit to him or choose otherwise.
And this is where perhaps it brings me back to the earlier point about Qadar,
and that Qadar is not being fatalistic.
That is just accept what it is and and don't do anything about it.
No. In this case, He's given you free will and He's giving you the intellect.
So you use that free will to choose and you use that intellect to research,
to study, to explore and come to your own conclusions
so that when you believe it comes from deep, from your heart with conviction.
Thank you, Professor.
Pleasure.