The Shaykh spoke about matters concerning the divine decree.

The Shaykh : We understand something related to this report or this narration attributed to Musa (peace be upon him) A noble verse by which the Jabriyyah argue, or rather, by which those who claim affiliation with the Asha'irah and who oppose the Maturidiyyah in the issue of whether the human being is a chooser or is compelled argue. This is a matter in which the debate has been prolonged among the scholars of the Muslims, differing as they do in their schools of jurisprudence, let alone the ancient philosophers: Is the human being a chooser or is he compelled? For this reason, I said, perhaps what went through your mind when you read this report or this narration was that you are asking: Does Musa feel as we feel, such that he was moved to ask this question of his Lord, Blessed and Exalted is He, if the narration about him is authentic? Therefore, I said, let us pass over this narration, whether it is authentic or not. But what is the position of the Muslim toward the dialogue that took place from Musa to his Lord, and the answer of the Lord of Musa to Musa, that I am not asked? Those who hold that the human being is compelled are, without a doubt, the furthest from both the Shari'ah and reason. This is because responsibility cannot meet with compulsion. There must be a choice for it to be valid to say to the just judge regarding the criminal: Why did you do this? If he were compelled, he would say, I am compelled and I am not responsible. This is a self-evident truth settled in the fitrah (the innate natural disposition) of all people. Therefore, not only did the Islamic Shari'ah and the heavenly laws before it distinguish between the one who chooses and the one who is compelled to sin, but even the rational, man-made laws that do not rely on the heavenly laws also distinguish between the compelled and the chooser. We do not need to give examples of this reality, whether from the legal or the judicial aspect. It is sufficient for us to mention the issue of intentional killing and accidental killing. Why is there this detail and distinction in the outcome between the one who kills by mistake and the one who kills intentionally? The intentional killer is a chooser, and the one who kills by mistake is not a chooser, just as we said in the laws. Military regulations, for example, distinguish between a soldier whose foot slipped and he killed a person; the commander does not say to him, Why did you kill him? On the contrary, he asks him and holds him accountable. Now, there are two schools in Islamic theology: the school of the Mu'tazilah, who say that the human being is not only a chooser but that he creates his own actions, and the opposing school is the school of the Asha'irah, who say that the human being is compelled and possesses nothing. In fact, one of those who adopted the view of compulsion described the relationship between the servant and the Lord by saying about Allah, Mighty and Majestic, and His servant:
"He threw him into the well bound, then said to him: Beware, beware, lest you be wet by the water."
If a sane person wanted to describe the most unjust of the unjust and the most coercive of the coercive by his coercion, he would not be able to describe it with more than what this person described his Lord with when he said about the servant that Allah threw him into the sea bound, then said to him: Beware, beware, lest you be wet by the water. This is the ultimate injustice according to the first school, the school of the Mu'tazilah, who say in absolute choice on the one hand, and then they explicitly state what contradicts the Shari'ah, namely that the human being creates his own actions. There is a middle school, which is the school of the people of Hadith, and the Maturidiyyah agreed with them in this, representing the Hanafi creed in the Hanafi school, because the Hanafis have two schools: a school in rulings, where they follow the school of Abu Hanifa and his two companions, Abu Yusuf and Muhammad. As for the creed, they follow the school of Abu Mansur al-Maturidi. So Abu Mansur al-Maturidi opposed the Mu'tazilah on one hand and opposed the Asha'irah on the other hand. He affirmed choice, contrary to the Asha'irah, and did not say that the human being creates his own actions, as the Mu'tazilah said. This is the school of the people of Hadith. From here, the reasonableness of the obligation of the servants, Blessed and Exalted is He, to obey and their prohibition from sinning becomes apparent, because Allah created them prepared and able to carry out the commands and avoid the prohibitions. Otherwise, if the matter were as the Asha'irah or the Ash'ariyyah said, that the human being is compelled, what is the meaning of the saying of the Lord of the Worlds: Do this and do not do that, when He is addressing a person who is bound? This is an impossible command. Now, after this introduction, we come to the verse. Allah, Mighty and Majestic, says: The Jabriyyah interpreted this verse, meaning our Lord is saying: O servants, you have no right to ask Me why I created and did so and so, and so on. You are the ones who are asked by Me. As if they are interpreting the verse to mean that Allah does what He wills with right, and as He said, Exalted is He: But they separate wisdom from the divine will and justice from the divine will, and He does what He wills. From here came a great catastrophe in the Ash'ari school, where they explicitly stated that it is possible for Allah to punish the obedient and reward the disobedient. If I were to explain this great misguidance, they say it is permissible for Allah, Mighty and Majestic, to take Iblis on the Day of Resurrection and place him in the Praiseworthy Station, and to place Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) in the lowest depths, in the place of the accursed Iblis. They say this is permissible for Allah because He is the Doer of what He wills As for the scholars who say that Allah is, without a doubt, the Doer of what He wills, but He does what He does accompanied by the eternal attribute that is inseparable from Him, which a Muslim cannot imagine being separated from Allah at all, such that when He does something, we say, for example, a Muslim cannot imagine that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, if He does something, He does it without knowledge, He does it without justice.

The questioner : Peace be upon you

The Shaykh : And upon you be peace and the mercy of Allah. Please, Khalid, here is your companion Abu Ahmad. Here is Abu Ahmad. What Allah wills, Abu Ahmad, take two seats, you, what Allah wills. Abu al-Harith, come, come to me, to me, to me.

The questioner : More than this, we do not want to bother you.

The Shaykh : There is no bother.

The questioner : May Allah bless you

The Shaykh : It is impossible for a Muslim to imagine that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, when He performs an action or creates a creation, does so solely with His attribute of creation and power, without knowledge. It is impossible that He creates without knowledge; it is impossible that He creates without justice; it is impossible that He creates without wisdom. So what is the meaning of the noble verse that came in the report of Musa (peace be upon him), which is attributed to him: “I do not ask about what I do, because I do it with justice and wisdom, while you ask because you are servants, worshippers, and erring. You wrong yourselves and wrong others. As for me, as He said in the noble Qur'an: He does not wrong by the weight of an atom. And as came in the authentic hadith, the Qudsi hadith, Allah, Blessed and Exalted is He, said: And in a narration: The point of this hadith, after some of the verses I mentioned earlier, is that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, explicitly stated in this authentic hadith in Muslim that the injustice known among people—this injustice from which Allah has exalted Himself and purified Himself—I say this because of the trial of that statement I mentioned earlier, which is necessitated by the doctrine of the Asha'irah who say that man is compelled and that Allah does what He wills and is not asked, even in light of the very, very obscene example which I do not like to repeat. In light of this, they said: How do you say it is permissible for Allah, when Allah has purified Himself from injustice by the explicit text of the noble Qur'an? Their answer was: What is injustice? Injustice is for a person to dispose of the property of another. And Allah’s creation and His servants are from His creation, so He does with them what He wills. Therefore, in their claim, the injustice known among people does not apply to Allah, because the injustice known among people is for someone to dispose of the property of another. As for Allah, all ownership belongs to Him, so it is permissible for Him to dispose of them however He wills. He throws into the Fire one who does not deserve the Fire but deserves Paradise, and He puts into Paradise one who does not deserve Paradise and whose due is the Fire. This is not injustice because He is disposing of His own property. The hadith comes, as it is said today, and puts the dots on the letters, explaining injustice not with the explanation the Asha'irah gave, but it says: The injustice known to you is injustice, so Allah has purified Himself from it. “Indeed, I have forbidden injustice for Myself, so do not wrong one another.” And peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah. So when we wrong one another, when one of us disposes of the property of another, that is correct. But Allah, Mighty and Majestic, expanded the meaning of injustice to more than what the Asha'irah said. Now, two contradictions arise from the Asha'irah’s explanation of injustice, in order to escape contradicting the explicit verses. There are two harms. The first harm is their contradiction of the authentic hadith: “Indeed, I have forbidden injustice for Myself and made it forbidden among you, so do not wrong one another.” So injustice is one thing. The second thing is disposing of the property of another. Am I wronging myself now? Is it permissible for me to wrong myself? Allah says: So their saying that disposing of the property of another is the definition is a deficient, false, and legally and rationally void explanation, because a person is not allowed to dispose of himself. Is it permissible, for example, for a person to kill himself? He does not transgress against others, but it is not permissible, obviously. Rather, it is not permissible for him to commit a sin because he wrongs himself with it. So the explanation of injustice by the Asha'irah is the result of a fundamental deviation in a matter concerning man, namely whether he is a chooser or he is compelled. They said that he is compelled, and in light of this false statement, as I mentioned earlier, legally and rationally, they interpret the texts, including: Why? Because I do what I want. I can put this person in Paradise while he is deserving of the Fire, and vice versa. No. Rather, the meaning is: I do not ask about what I do, because everything I do is for a wisdom and justice that may be hidden from you, O My servants. But I am the Doer of what I will, with justice and wisdom. As for you, you are not so, and reality bears witness to this. At that point, if we wanted to discuss this question narrated from Musa, what would come out of it? It would come out that Musa was a Jabri, that he adopted the opinion of the Asha'irah who had not yet been created, but people like them had been created in every time and place. Because the belief in whether man is compelled or a chooser is not, as it is said, from the ideas of some Islamic sects. This is what the philosophers discussed before Islam, a short and long time ago. And therefore, it is not reasonable that Musa (peace be upon him) would direct such a question, because if this question is understood according to the doctrine of the Jabriyyah, it is reasonable to direct it to remove the doubt: “How is this? You command obedience and are disobeyed.” Now we move to another issue, also of extreme precision, concerning the fact that man is a chooser and not compelled. This issue is when a person does something from the deeds, whether they are from obedience or sins, does he do it by choice? Does he do it by the will of Allah or without the will of Allah? Here we conclude—and peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah—when a person does an action, whether it is obedience or disobedience, is it by the will and intention of Allah or not? According to the Mu'tazilah, it is not by the will and intention of Allah, because they said that man creates his own actions by himself, and Allah does not will that. This is a type of misguidance in which the Mu'tazilah fell, branching from that misguidance when they said that man creates his own actions by himself. Opposing this statement is the statement of the Asha'irah with interpretation, as for the statement itself, it is conceded, which is that anything a person does, obedience or disobedience, is by the will and intention of Allah. And this is the truth, because Allah, Mighty and Majestic, says: But they associate with this true statement—and here is the sensitive point that every Muslim must understand well—they associate with this true statement that he is compelled, since everything is by the will of Allah, so he is compelled. As for the people of the Sunnah, the people of hadith, and with them the Maturidiyyah, they say there is no necessary connection between the fact that when a person does something, he does it by the will and intention of Allah, and the fact that he is compelled. There is no necessary connection, but rather there is a separation. Allah, Mighty and Majestic, everything is by His will, but this will does not negate the will of the servant, nor does it remove choice from him. So the accountable person, when he does an action, regardless of whether it is obedience or disobedience, at the time he does what he does by the will and intention of Allah, he also does it by the will of this accountable person. So if we imagine a state for this person where he did what he did under compulsion, not by choice, the responsibility is lifted from Allah’s servant. And this is from the justice and wisdom of Allah in His servants. From here comes the reconstruction of the previous example. Our Lord, Mighty and Majestic, does not say to the one who kills by mistake: “Why did you kill?” because the choice was not in his hand when he killed by mistake. And on the contrary, He says to the one who kills a servant: “Why did you kill?” because he was a chooser in the killing. So we can now say that the will of Allah, Blessed and Exalted is He, first, does not contradict the fact that man is a chooser in general, and does not contradict that man is a chooser when he does an action, whether it is obedience or disobedience. This is as a rule. But if we take a detail or some details and imagine in them that choice is not realized in a certain person, at that point the accountability is lifted from him before Allah, Mighty and Majestic, because accountability is established by choice. Therefore, He addresses His servants with His saying, Mighty and Majestic: So the basis of accountability, the accountability of Allah to His servants, is linked to the existence of this choice which Allah, Mighty and Majestic, established in His servants so that it is valid to hold them accountable, to reward them, and to punish them. So if this choice is lifted, the responsibility is lifted, and the reward is also lifted, because any person who does good without intending it, doing it without wanting it, has no reward for it. As it is, if he does evil, he has no punishment for it. I gave an example earlier that is well-known, but I will give you an example that is not well-known. The intentional killer and the accidental killer. If a man commits zina with a woman against her will, the hadd is lifted from her and the hadd is established on the fornicator. And this is from the many, many examples that draw the attention of those who are deficient in their intellect and thinking, who say that man is compelled. Why did the Shari'ah differentiate between the intentional killer and the accidental killer? Why did it establish the hadd on the intentional fornicator and lift this hadd from the woman who was forced against her nose? All of this is consideration for this basis of this ruling, which is choice. At that point, we come to what is perhaps the end of the matter in this issue. If the matter is as we said, and it is as we said, that man is not accountable except with the existence of choice, the wisdom of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, necessitated that He obligated His servants to do what they are capable of and did not obligate them with what they are not capable of. So if a person, as we mentioned earlier, does an evil action by his choice, we say: Allah willed this action. So how do we combine the will of Allah for this evil action with the accountability? Because here I asked a question, and it is one of the causes of saying that man is compelled rather than a chooser. So if everything happens by the will of Allah, from these evil things, then what remains of the choice which we say accountability is linked to? The answer is that from the wisdom of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, in His creation, He obligated them to do what is in their choice. As for how we combine in our narrow, deficient intellect to understand the secret of how man is a chooser and the will of Allah is the prevailing one, we have no escape from it: Here people differ. Some said: So man is compelled, because the will of Allah is the prevailing one. Some said: No, if we want to say the will of Allah is the prevailing one, then man is compelled. We, the Mu'tazilah, say: So the will of Allah does not relate to the actions of the servants. From here came their great misguidance that they create their actions by themselves. As for the people of the Sunnah, they acknowledge first and fundamentally that an attribute of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, is one that no servant can encompass with knowledge. And he cannot say how Allah wills from His servant that he not do something, and then this servant does what Allah does not will, as came in the question of Musa. Here, it is necessary to differentiate between the love of Allah for a thing and the will of Allah for a thing. Everything that Allah loves and occurs is willed by Him, but not everything that Allah loves occurs. And this is what needs evidence. He wills from His servants faith, so some are believers and some are disbelievers. What occurred is what He wills, meaning loves. So everything that occurs, He wills it, but not everything that occurs, He loves it. Because Allah, Mighty and Majestic, does not love disbelief, and yet disbelief occurs. And He loves faith, but many people do not believe, so it did not occur. In other words, the will in the legal terminology is from the love. So every willed thing that occurs may be loved or may be disliked. And on the contrary, much of what Allah, Mighty and Majestic, loves does not occur. So if a sin occurs from a person, we say this is by the will of Allah, but it is not loved by Allah. As for if what occurs is faith and righteous deed, here the two things meet: the love from Allah and the will for it. Where do we take this generalization in the will? So if an intellect is unable to combine in its mind that this evil was willed by Allah and then occurred by the choice of this person, at that point, it is necessary to have the faith which is the basis of the test. It is necessary to submit, and I say: Allah, I was not able to combine in my mind that this one who disobeyed his Lord, Iblis, the master of the disobedient and the first of them, this one disobeyed his Lord by his choice, without doubt. But he did not disobey his Lord against the divine will and against His intention. It is not that everything that occurred from Allah was willed and loved by Him. Everything that occurs, He wills it, but He may love it if it is good, and He may not love it if it is bad. And one of the scholars of the Maturidiyyah, who are with the people of hadith in the matter of establishing choice and not attributing injustice to Allah, Mighty and Majestic, in any meaning, combined this idea. He said about Allah, Mighty and Majestic: “The Wailer of good and evil, the ugly, but He is not pleased with the impossible.” The Wailer of good and evil, the ugly. We said that He wills what occurs, whether it is good or evil. But He is not pleased with the impossible, meaning the evil, and He is not pleased with it, as He said, Mighty and Majestic: So here this sensitive, precise topic ends, and its summary is that every Muslim must believe, because he is accountable before Allah for what he does and what he leaves, because He has placed in him a will that appears in his personal actions in all his life. So besides believing that man is a chooser, if this choice is found, accountability is found, and if it is lifted, accountability is lifted. In addition to that, we believe that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, wills everything that occurs, whether it is good or evil, and that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, does not punish one who disobeys Him under compulsion and not by choice. “The Wailer of good and evil, the ugly, but He is not pleased with the impossible.” And I believe from my long experience in researching such an issue that it may occur to one of the attendees some questions related to such a topic. So I recommend it and see it as the completion of the research that if some aspect of this topic raised earlier is not clear to some of the attendees, that they raise the topic again by posing the question that reveals what may have been hidden from them.