So this is myself speaking in speaker's corner. days
Back in the when there was not YouTube, there was no smartphones if I can remember.
Assalamu-Alaikum wa Rahmatullah.
This is Mansur with you from speaker's corner.
Presenting to you in Dawahwise, a special exclusive clip.
An argument that was presented to me many years ago, and still being presented
still today.
So let's play this clip, and let's see what this argument is all about.
One chain, you know A, B, we finish on this chain which we have seen, doesn't make sense for this
creator was created by something because that's the implication of where the question arises.
Which leads us to a chain infinite or finite.
Which is all irrational, all the possibilities are irrational.
So we are left with another possibility.
Another possibility is that this creator did not have any beginning.
And that's the only possibility which your mind can comprehend.
None others.
So that's your answer. The creator who is the ultimate cause, who has no beginning, who has no end.
Because if someone has no beginning, then his existence won't be influenced by others.
Because nothing brought him into existence. If nothing influences his existence,
his existence would have no end.
So the creator is, what? Eternal and Everlasting.
And this creator has to be one as well.
Let's stop there.
So this is myself speaking in speaker's corner.
Back in the days when there was no YouTube, there was no smartphones if I can remember.
No one had smartphones coming up in speaker's corner.
They would come and they would listen
to these speakers speaking so i was there on the ladder speaking about
a particular topic, and a questionnaire asks an interesting question, if indeed that is a question.
"Who created God?"
And this was my response.
So we will unpack this Inshallah, comprehensively today.
The question is often that you will hear, "Who created God?"
Is this really a question?
When someone poses this statement, "Who created the creator?"
Is it really a question? Because if there is a question that is asked,
then the possibility of answering exists.
But if it's not even a question, there's nothing to answer.
So you can approach this in various different ways.
Why do I say whether this is even a question or not?
Because a question by its inherent properties,
it has to have two things.
It has to have a potential answer.
And it must be free from contradictions. If I were to tell you today is Saturday.
And what am I expecting? Am I expecting an answer from you, any of you?
Because I haven't posed a question.
Even if I framed it like this still, you know, it's a statement that doesn't require an answer,
because it's not asking for an answer.
If I say something like;
"How fast does a cow fly?"
You can't answer and say: "The cow doesn't fly."
Because I did not ask you; "Do cows fly?".
That would be the answer to this question.
"Cows don't fly."
But if you say: "How fast does a cow fly?"
You can't really answer this question in a meaningful way,
because it's a rhetorical statement, it has contradictions within it.
"Cows don't fly."
By asking how fast they fly,
You are actually breaking the very principle of what a question should be.
It has inherent contradictions within it.
So it's not a question, you don't need to answer it.
So when we look at any questions that are asked, they're framed in a question,
you need to really unpack this in this way.
Is this something that has potential answers?
Is it free from contradictions?
Okay.
When these two properties are met, then perhaps we can answer these questions.
So this is like asking;
"Who created the uncreated?"
I mean, is this a meaningful question?
If you believe God the creator is uncreated,
and then you ask at the same time:
"Who created the uncreated?"
It's a meaningless statement. It doesn't have any meaning.
So it doesn't require an answer.
Because it's something a statement which is, what we call, gibberish rhetorical statement.
Right.
Not only this, if you want to even proceed further, there are several layers of assumptions
underlying assumptions built in within this rhetorical statement.
Suppose you were to proceed to answer this question:
"Who created the creator or God?"
Involves these assumptions that God exists,
and somebody wants to know, who created this God that exists?
Otherwise what's the point of asking, who created something that doesn't even exist?
Okay. So it assumes the creator exists, the God exists.
So you might as well stop there and say: "Okay fine, so you believe god exists."
That's what you're asking. You're asking the creator exists,
and you want to know who the creator is, of that creator of God.
It also assumes that this creator was created.
It also assumes that its creator was created by someone else.
Other than this creator.
And he assumes also that the one that created this creator has the ability
and the power to create this creator.
Another assumption is that there exists time in which
the creator didn't exist, and then another creator brought this creator into existence.
So even before answering this question you might as well ask the questioner:
"Would you mind proving your underlying assumptions for all of these?
Then perhaps we can answer this question."
And of course we know that they would not be able to prove any of these assumptions,
and that's why the question is in fact,
you know the intent behind this question is not that they want to know the answer to this,
there are something underlying motive behind it.
Somehow there are many atheists who pose these questions,
and they think by asking these kind of questions,
they somehow disprove the existence of God.
That's the underlying motive. But we know for sure that this is something that they
cannot demonstrate by asking this rhetorical statement.
Now if we were to go even further
we can answer this question from the prospectus of the hadith that Rasulullah [Prophet Muhammad (PUBH)]
actually taught us to respond to these kind of questions.
In fact, this is narrated in Bukhari and also in Muslim in various forms.
Where you know Shaitaan (Satan) comes along and asks people:
You know, "Who created this?" "Who created that? Who created this?"
Until he asked you this question:
"Who created your lord?" Or "Who created God?"
So this is the whispering of the Shaitaan (Satan) that comes,
because it is somehow trying to get you into these kind of questions and confuse you,
because it's not a question in the first place as we demonstrated.
Because it is filled with internal contradiction.
So Rasulullah [Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)] of course said okay you know you say,
"أعوذ بالله من الشيطان الرجيم"
And you say (Amantu Billah) that I believe in Allah, that Allah who exists.
And you get rid of the Shaitaan (Satan) you know who's whispering this.
And if you want to go even further to really unpack this in a
rational philosophical way, you can go and say: "Okay, fine..." the questioner that is asking this question,
you're assuming is able to comprehend the answer.
So if you say: "Okay, if I give you an answer,
how would you know this is the right answer or the wrong answer?"
What is your you know mechanisms to
understand the answer I provide is the correct one or the incorrect one?
Do you know what is the right answer or the wrong answer?
Would you be able to comprehend the answer?
And then you proceed from there you say: "Okay, fine look, there are possibilities either
someone else created this creator, or no one created this creator,
or someone else created this creator, who was created by someone else, who was created by someone else in turn,
and who was created by someone who's in turn, and it goes on at infinity like this,
just goes on. One creator was created by another, and it goes on forever and forever.
Now even on this one you have a possibility.
It goes on without an end, or it comes to an end, or is a cyclical
creators, one creating the other in a cycle. So you can say A was created by B who was created by C
who was created by D who was created by A and B and and goes on like this.
These are potential answers, if you want to answer it or try to attempt to answer the question.
Let's look at these possibilities in turn. Of course the one that will make sense will be the
one that we will leave for people's reflection and see whether this indeed is the answer that
this question has. So if we say it was created by another creator, does it really answer the question?
Because it brings about the same question again. "Who created this creator that created the creator?"
So if we call our creator A, and creator B created creator A, one can easily ask "Who created creator B?"
Then you can say: "Okay, creator C."
The same question can come again: "Who created creator C?"
"Creator D."
"Who created created D?"
So you see we're going back again in an infinite regress.
Either it's in a loop or it carries on like this.
Now let's take these possibilities in turn again.
If you have this possibility that one creator was created by another and
goes on and on and on forever, is it even possible that this can exist in reality?
To demonstrate this, let me give you an example.
Suppose this is what I have in my hand, a notebook.
The notebook to come to my hand from my friend over there who's there,
this is an action to take place.
So creator to be created is an action, action of creation.
Like action of getting this notebook on my hand.
Now if there are a number of people in front of my friend there sitting there,
before this book comes to me, so what it is, before my friend gives this to me,
he has to have this book given to him by someone else.
And this notebook has to be given by someone
else to that someone else, and it goes on like this.
So until we exhaust all the possibilities
in the infinite, and the infinite has no end.
So this one in the line of infinite,
it will never come to my hand, because there are infinite number of people in front of me and my friend.
So if it was like this between him and me, okay just consider this now in a different way,
between my friend and me, there are infinite number of people and he's got the book,
and it needs to come to me, but it has to traverse or transfer between hands of infinite number of people.
Would it ever come to my hand?
The answer is obviously no, because before me,
there are infinite number of people.
It will never come to my hand because the moment you say,
it comes to my hand, there's someone else in front, there's someone else in front.
So this kind of example demonstrates that you cannot have an infinite number of creators,
creating the creator, our creator.
It simply doesn't make any sense.
So what if the other possibilities actually is in a loop?
Again, the same problem exists.
When you have a loop of creators,
when you say A was created by B, and eventually it comes down to A again.
Where did it start?
Because A was dependent on B, and B was dependent on C,
C was dependent on D, and D was dependent on A.
So,
D could not have been created if A created it, and A could not have been created if B created it.
So you can see that this interdependency demonstrates, that again, none of these will create each other,
they will never be created in a cyclical fashion like this.
So infinite regress without an end doesn't make sense.
With a loop, doesn't make sense.
If you have several creators and somewhere, ends somewhere
Okay, this makes sense. But why do you need all these intermediary forms, where there are many creators?
In fact, if you have one creator created by another, that creator is more powerful.
And if that creator is created by another creator that's greater, is even more powerful.
And eventually you come to a creator who's the most powerful, and that's what we say about God,
the most powerful being.
So eventually you will have to come to a point where there is one creator,
who is not created. One creator who is not caused. The one creator who is self-existing.
So the only rational answer to this question, "Who created God?" is that
God is not created, he was always there eternally without a beginning.
He was always there in existence without any cause.
He is the first cause of everything.
So I hope this clarifies these questions when people ask: "Who created God?"
Because everything else within this doesn't make sense.
And when you look at the Quran, when you look at Surat Al-Ikhlas, when Allah described himself.
That he is Ahad (One).
It really gives you in a nutshell, this very essence of our creator, who is one and only,
who is independent and absolute, self-sufficient, who is eternal, eternally be sort of all.
But he's not dependent on anyone, he's not someone who is produced, not someone who produces anything,
in terms of lineage or in terms of offspring.
Not someone who is himself a product of another,
lineage of forefathers and parents.
And there is nothing like unto this God.
So this is a rational, this is something that your heart and your mind will appreciate
and understand and being finely tuned with in accepting the concept of the creator.
So that the creator is someone who is not created.
So I hope this answers this question with all clarity.
Until next time,
Assalamualaikum Warahmatullahi Wa Barkaatuhu.