Distinguishing Between Will and Love

The Shaykh : Excuse me, keep this in mind, O professor: you must distinguish between will and love. Allah loves faith and righteous deeds from His servants. As for will, its linguistic meaning is broader than love; so whatever Allah wills is not necessarily loved by Him, but whatever Allah loves is desired by Him. There is generality and specificity here. This is, of course, in the Arabic language. That is why I said this requires a lecture, for example, on the words "human" and "animal." Every human is an animal, but not every animal is a human. Do you see how it is? So everything loved by Allah is desired by Him, but not everything Allah desires is loved by Him. Do you see the difference? The verses that come to establish will are only to clarify that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, is the Disposer and the Doer of what He wills, and that no one, regardless of his status, can stand between Allah and His will. So His saying, the Exalted: This is not interpreted as love, because not everything a person loves does Allah love, right or wrong? But here it is interpreted as will, which encompasses good and evil. Therefore, among the beliefs that Muslims have inherited from generation to generation is faith in the divine decree, its good and its evil. Do you see how it is? So the matter in which this man argued needs to be explained to him, and he needs to understand that it is true that everything is by the will of Allah, Mighty and Majestic, but our Lord, Mighty and Majestic, has given humans, by His power, a will in which they choose the path they wish to walk, as He said: Likewise, But any action of a human being is not outside the will of Allah and His desire.

The questioner : The action of a human being, the will of a human being...

The Shaykh : The obligation is lifted.