{"id":1319,"date":"2021-04-07T23:11:18","date_gmt":"2021-04-07T20:11:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/belief-in-divine-decree\/"},"modified":"2021-04-07T23:11:18","modified_gmt":"2021-04-07T20:11:18","slug":"belief-in-divine-decree","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/belief-in-divine-decree\/","title":{"rendered":"Belief in the Divine Decree"},"content":{"rendered":"

The sixth and last article of Islamic faith is belief in divine decree which means that everything good or bad, all moments of happiness or sorrow, pleasure or pain, come from God<\/a>.<\/p>\n

First<\/strong>, God\u2019s foreknowledge is infallible.\u00a0 God is not indifferent to this world or its people.\u00a0 He is Wise and Loving, but this should not make us fatalists, throwing up our hands and saying, \u2018what\u2019s the point of making any effort?\u2019 \u00a0God\u2019s foreknowledge does not compromise human responsibility.<\/p>\n

God holds us accountable for what we can do, what is within our capability, but\u00a0 He does not hold us accountable for things we cannot do.\u00a0 He is Just and, as He has given us only limited responsibility, judges us accordingly.\u00a0 We should think, plan and make the right choices, but, if sometimes things do not turn out the way we want, we need not lose hope or get depressed.\u00a0 We should pray to God and try again.\u00a0 If in the end we still do not achieve what we wanted, we should know we have tried our best and are not responsible for the results.<\/p>\n

God knows what the creatures will do, encompassing everything by His knowledge.\u00a0 He knows all that exists, in entirety and totality, by virtue of His eternal foreknowledge.<\/p>\n

Truly, nothing is hidden from God, in the earth or in the heavens. <\/strong>(Aal `Imran<\/a> 3:5)<\/p>\n

Whoever refuses this denies God\u2019s perfection, because the opposite of knowledge is either ignorance or forgetfulness.\u00a0 It would mean God would have been mistaken in his foreknowledge of future events; He would no longer be omniscient.\u00a0 Both are deficiencies which God is free of.<\/p>\n

Second<\/strong>, God has recorded everything that will occur until the Day of Judgment in the Preserved Tablet (al-Lauh al-Mahfuz<\/em> in Arabic).\u00a0 The life spans of all human beings are written and the amount of their sustenance apportioned.\u00a0 Everything that is created or occurs in the universe is according to what is recorded there.\u00a0 God has said:<\/p>\n

Did you not know that God knows (all) that is in the heavens and the earth?\u00a0 It is (all) in a record.\u00a0 Surely that is easy for God. <\/strong>(Al-Hajj<\/a> 22:70)<\/p>\n

Third<\/strong>, whatever God wills to happen happens, and whatever God does not will does not happen.\u00a0 Nothing occurs in the heavens or on earth without the Will of God.<\/p>\n

Fourth<\/strong>, God is the Creator of everything.<\/p>\n

\u2026He has created everything, and has ordained for it a measure. <\/strong>(Al-Furqan<\/a> 25:2)<\/p>\n

In Islamic doctrine every human act both in material and spiritual life is predestined, yet it is incorrect to believe the action of fate is blind, arbitrary, and relentless. Without denying divine interference in human affairs, human liberty is kept intact.\u00a0 It does not discount the principle of man\u2019s moral freedom and responsibility.\u00a0 All is known, but freedom is also granted.<\/p>\n

Man is not a helpless creature borne along by destiny. Rather, each person is responsible for his acts.\u00a0 Lethargic nations and individuals indolent to ordinary affairs of life are to blame themselves, not God.<\/p>\n

Man is bound to obey the moral law; and he will receive merited punishment or reward as he violates or observes that law.\u00a0 However, if such is so, man must have within his power the ability to break or keep the law.\u00a0 God would not hold us responsible for something unless we were capable of doing it:<\/p>\n

God does not burden any human being with more than he is well able to bear.<\/strong>\u00a0(Al-Baqarah<\/a> 2:286)<\/p>\n

Belief in divine decree strengthens one\u2019s belief in God. \u00a0A person realizes that God alone controls everything, so he trusts and relies on Him.\u00a0 Even though a person tries his best, at the same time he relies on God for the final outcome.\u00a0 His hard work or intelligence does not make him arrogant, for God is the source of all that comes his way.<\/p>\n

Finally, a person attains peace of mind in the realization that God is the Wise and His Actions are dictated by wisdom.\u00a0 Things don\u2019t happen without a purpose.\u00a0 If something reached him, he realizes it could never have escaped him.\u00a0 If something misses him, he realizes it was never meant to be.\u00a0 A man achieves an inner peace, inwardly at rest with this realization.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[ica_orginalurl]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Allah\u2019s foreknowledge is infallible. He is not indifferent to this world or its people. He is Wise and Loving, but this should not make us fatalists, throwing up our hands and saying, \u201cwhat\u2019s the point of making any effort?\u201d His foreknowledge does not compromise human responsibility\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1320,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[465,2],"tags":[1222,234,6213,2510,6214,2529,1656,6215,6216,1223,1497,6217,6218,265,6219,6220,145,2531,6221],"class_list":["post-1319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-of-faith","category-new-muslims","tag-allah","tag-articles-of-faith","tag-belief-in-qadar","tag-believers","tag-choice","tag-destiny","tag-divine-decree","tag-fatalist","tag-foreknowledge-of-god","tag-god","tag-islam","tag-make-the-necessary-effort","tag-man-is-not-forced","tag-pillars-of-islam","tag-predestination","tag-predetermined-by-god","tag-prophet-muhammad","tag-qadar","tag-rely-on-god"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/prayer-and-sickness.jpg?fit=500%2C332&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2ZvKT-lh","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1319\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quran-for-all.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}