I have written upon me in the Preserved Tablet matters of which I am ignorant, whether good or evil, and I wish to present my answer to you, so I say:

The questioner : If you permit me, please... by the way, there are two questions... the students at the community college are asking a question that I have not addressed. I have written upon me in the Preserved Tablet matters, I am ignorant of them, whether good or evil, and I wish to present my answer to you. If I am correct, I will take it from him, and if I am wrong, I will turn back from it. I say to the students: that everything written in the Preserved Tablet is originally in the knowledge of Allah, but I, as a human being, have not been informed to follow this path or that path; rather, intellect has been placed for me. Intellect tells me that this path is good, so follow it, and it leads you to good; and this path is the path of evil and leads you to the Fire, so stay away from it. So if we hypothetically assume that Allah the Exalted, in His prior knowledge, has written upon me that I will do evil, then when I intended to do evil, I realized with my intellect that this is evil, so I turned back from it and did good. And I relied on the saying of the Exalted:
The Shaykh :

The questioner : What is your opinion of this answer, if you permit me? I mean, I am anxious about it.

The Shaykh : By Allah, there is some error in the answer, because we cannot conceive that it was prior in the knowledge of Allah that I would do evil, and then I would turn away from it. This is impossible. We end up with divine decree, but our ending up with divine decree is not by force and not against our will, but rather as we explained just now. And now we give an illustrative example: a school principal, and you are talking about the students. A sharp student, under his full supervision, and he has lived with them for a few years. He is able to say that so-and-so, the student or pupil, will succeed at the end of the year, and indeed he will succeed. Why? Because from his supervision of them and his practice and so on, he knows that this is a sharp, diligent student, not lazy and so on. So he gives the result before it is issued. And this is a helpless human being. And our Lord, Mighty and Majestic, whose knowledge is intrinsic and not acquired like our knowledge, so by His prior knowledge, as I explained just now, He knows so-and-so when the command to believe comes to him, whether he will believe or disbelieve. So He writes him as a believer if it was prior in His knowledge that he would believe, and He writes him as a disbeliever if it was prior in His knowledge that he would disbelieve. And therefore, the conception mentioned earlier in this example is nonsense that we cannot conceive of at all. The truth of the matter is like what came in some songs, and rarely do they speak the truth: "What is written on the forehead, the eye must see". What is this speech? Correct, even if it is in a song. As we said that day, not everything the Sufi says is false; he may say "There is no god but Allah, Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah," and this is truth. So if everything is recorded for a person, it must happen as it was recorded. But we studied the topic of guidance, that the one guided to this guidance is not forced into it, but rather what he will do is recorded for him in advance, like this student whose teacher judged that he would succeed, and on the other hand, so-and-so will fail because he knows him day and night. From where would he succeed? So he is a failure. So this must be the answer, not on the assumption that it was written upon me that I would do evil, so I judged with my intellect that this is evil and I do not have to do it, and I turned back from it. You must assume that this discussion, this trial that you mentioned last, is written in the Preserved Tablet. For example, it is written in the Preserved Tablet that so-and-so among people it occurs to him that he will go out to celebrate this night, a red night. It occurs to him like this. He discusses the matter. What is the benefit of me going out to celebrate this red night? I spend my strength, my health, my money, I waste my family, my children, and so on. No, by Allah, I will not go out to it, and he remained in his house. All of this is written in the Preserved Tablet. As for something being written in the Preserved Tablet and something else happening, that is impossible. As for the verse, it has absolutely no relation to our topic. from the laws and rulings, and He establishes what He wills of them, namely the Preserved Tablet which contains the clear and the abrogated, that which He decided to remain and continue its ruling, and that which was lifted. So this has a relation to the laws, not to the works of divine decree and destiny.

The questioner : So the hadith: .

The Shaykh : All of this is what happens in the soul and what a person talks about. All of it is recorded. But the matter is as he (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Like this. The trial that you assumed in the soul of that person, and what is the end? He is supposed to do the evil, and before that it is written in the Preserved Tablet that he is supposed to do the evil. He does not do it, he will not do it, because deeds are by their endings.