Is anyone genuinely satisfied with this answer?

[JohnDoe]

@Bielsa Bro, it doesn't make sense as there's a fundamental contradiction. One of the attributes of an agent with free-will is that they're able to determine their own fate. Now how can Muslims say humans have this free-will when everything has already been pre-determined by Allah in Al-Lawh ul Mahfudh.

 

[Bielsa]

@Bielsa Bro, it doesn't make sense as there's a fundamental contradiction. One of the attributes of an agent with free-will is that they're able to determine their own fate. Now how can Muslims say humans have this free-will when everything has already been pre-determined by Allah in Al-Lawh ul Mahfudh.

Straight forward logic that.

Unfortunately many try to explain the contradictions and it ends up in meaningless mental gymnastics.

 

[Mckenzie]

^This is also the way i understood it. Free will is determined by your own ignorance as to what will happen. At any given situation if you are a sane and rational human being you will choose the path YOU want. Not the one that was preordained as there was never any one that was preordained that you had any knowledge of to begin with. So it's incredibly stupid to believe that because you are destined to go to either heaven or hell you can basically do what you want as your path has already been decided for you, when in reality you're bombarded with information that tells you to be good and act according to the values prescribed for you in islam. This in of itself, if you are again a sane and rational human being, should be enough to convey to you that there's more going on than what you have in mind. All men choose their destinies, and allah knows what we will do, but he does not take away free will from us as we pave our own destinies. If you decide to drink, sleep your way around town, and just straight up ngaf about your religion then YOU choose to do those things and YOU will be held accountable. Just as if you watch your tongue, stay away from intoxicants, and basically use your life to help old ladies cross the street and do other nice things, YOU will reap the rewards from this because YOU CHOSE to act on actions that were/are rational to you. The problem here is people don't understand that there is no third party out to get you, or to hurt you. All paths are known and Allah knows which ones you are to take. Allah guides those he sees are willing to learn, and there is a great deal of unwillingness to learn, just like some people have already made up their minds on here. My hope is at least one person reads this and is helped out if they are confused.
I will follow suit and place forth an addendum asking Allah for forgiveness if i've said anything incorrect as well.

I don't want to dwell on this topic too much but i feel like some folk don't like to make sense of destiny because it means they have to hold themselves to account. Like it was once said, death is the greatest killer of all pleasures. Nobody wants to ruin their fun

 

[Raamsade]

The problem is you are likening Allah to the Creation. Allah lives outside of time - he already knows the results of the test. However, we in our limited frame of reference have no knowledge of our end outcome - we must try our best in the here and now.

That's irrelevant to the discussion at hand. The issue is Allah's attributes - Omniscience and Free Will. I'm saying, for there to be true free will, a creator such as Allah cannot be both possess both omniscience and free will at the same time. I gave my reasoning why I think this is so. Your response above it totally tangential.

If your teacher lived outside of time and could see down the timeline that you would end up failing and wrote that down somewhere, it would not mean that s/he caused you to fail. It would just mean s/he had full knowledge that you would because s/he could see things from a place you could not.

You're missing the point. This is not about living inside or outside time, whatever that means. This is about a teach, who in this case is the creator, assigned a score before giving you the test. Does your test result matter at all?

 

[ChickenOriental]

That's irrelevant to the discussion at hand. The issue is Allah's attributes - Omniscience and Free Will. I'm saying, for there to be true free will, a creator such as Allah cannot be both possess both omniscience and free will at the same time. I gave my reasoning why I think this is so. Your response above it totally tangential.



You're missing the point. This is not about living inside or outside time, whatever that means. This is about a teach, who in this case is the creator, assigned a score before giving you the test. Does your test result matter at all?

No, I think you're missing the point. The fact that the creator resides outside of and is not restricted by time is a key part of understanding Qadr. It is not that you have been assigned a score and are doomed to pass/fail no matter what you do it is that the 'teacher' has full knowledge of everything - past, present and future - and knows your outcome before you even sit the test. They did not force you to pass/fail, they simply knew what would happen.

 

[angrycat]

How does it make you feel that your duas are an utter waste of time?

Speak for yourself, my duas are answered.

 

[Bielsa]

I've watched several different people try to answer the questions about Gods decree. But their answers are an enemy of logic.

The slapping example actually shows the gaping hole in his argument.

@The_Cosmos watch this mess.

 

[The_Cosmos]

@The_Cosmos watch this mess.

I've actually watched this to try and make sense of the entire supposed contradiction and all I saw was more holes. The examples he gave are utterly problematic.

I was reading an article on this topic by Dan Barker a while back and he articulated the problem perfectly (at least for me). One of the points he first clarified was the definition of choice. A choice is 2 or more options that can be avoided (that's an obvious one) meaning that if a choice cannot be avoided, it's not a choice. Every single action in which we partake are unavoidable "choices" in that they've preordained to happen. For example, Nouman Khan gave an examples of a party guest list which is highly dubious and contradicting. If you have two guest lists as the scholar presented (List A made up of people chosen and List B who include everyone who pass a few "tests") the contradiction becomes evident. The people who will enter guest list A has already been preassigned and thus if you're not on that list, you won't enter the party. Sure, one could say "b-but you don't know so you can't just not take part" but of course that argument is nonsense because not knowing your fate does not mean you decide it. Tests are done to determine outcome and if an outcomes has already been determined, it's not a test. This is one of the longest raging debates because it exposes the irony of the religious mind. Free will and fate cannot be reconciled. Heisenberg has ended the debate though with his uncertainty principle.

Funny enough, during the golden age of Islamic civilisation, two groups (can't remember their names sorry) addressed this issue and arrived at two completely different conclusions

 

[The_Cosmos]

Just because Adam didn't question God but Iblis did, doesn't negate the actual argument that is being made. Allah already knew that Adam was going to disobey him but did nothing about it. It's like someone putting a gun on a table knowing that a child will find it and potentially hurt themselves and others but then claiming that you had nothing to do with the child hurting themselves.

God is the orchestrator of everything and we're only in it for the ride.

Also, it's far more compelling to use this argument for the nonexistence of God. If God is Omniscient, can he change his own future (if he wanted to)? God cannot be both omniscience and omnipotent.

 

[Transparent]

I believe that Allah swt knows everything that we are going to do through his everlasting cilm,however it is our choice to do whatever we want ,that is what essentially distinguishes us from the angels who are void of free will.Allah knows our choices because he has created us and he knows our weaknesses.Our life is a test and and we are all tested with different things because we are all different.You cannot be like i'm gonna swear and then say it was predestined by Allah and that i shouldn't get a sin for it,It was predestined by Allah and Allah knew you were going to say it but he gave you the free will to decide whether to say it or not. There are some things which our human minds cannot comprehend,now dont get me wrong i understand what the sheikh is saying and i personally see the logic to it.The human brain is just like any other organ it has a limit,for example the eye is a remarkable organ but if i ask you can you see what is going on beyond the horizon the answer will be no because our eyes have a limit,same goes for the ears if i ask you if you can hear the yelling of a mother in Cambodia for example,you will not be able to hear it. Similarly the brain is under that same principle there are some things which our minds cannot decipher.Only Allah is the all-knowing

 

[The_Cosmos]

I believe that Allah swt knows everything that we are going to do through his everlasting cilm,however it is our choice to do whatever we want ,that is what essentially distinguishes us from the angels who are void of free will.Allah knows our choices because he has created us and he knows our weaknesses.Our life is a test and and we are all tested with different things because we are all different.You cannot be like i'm gonna swear and then say it was predestined by Allah and that i shouldn't get a sin for it,It was predestined by Allah and Allah knew you were going to say it but he gave you the free will to decide whether to say it or not. There are some things which our human minds cannot comprehend,now dont get me wrong i understand what the sheikh is saying and i personally see the logic to it.The human brain is just like any other organ it has a limit,for example the eye is a remarkable organ but if i ask you can you see what is going on beyond the horizon the answer will be no because our eyes have a limit,same goes for the ears if i ask you if you can hear the yelling of a mother in Cambodia for example,you will not be able to hear it. Similarly the brain is under that same principle there are some things which our minds cannot decipher.Only Allah is the all-knowing

You're repeating the same things that everyone else states without actually building on it. The world cannot be a test if the test has already been preassigned. If I am destined for hell, then nothing I can do will change that. Nonetheless, I will repeat I point I made earlier. A choice is defined as two or more options that can be avoided, However, we know that with Allah's omniscience, this is not the case. For example, if I go to a shop to buy a drink from a barrage of different options, am i really choosing when Allah already knows what I'm going to 'choose'? You may find this confusing so I'll elaborate. As I have already clarified the definition of a choice, it's time to apply it. Allah already knows which drink I am going to 'choose' meaning that I cannot avoid it which renders my supposed choosing void. Saying that Allah knows what you're going to do means that your life is limited to the choices that he preordained for you. If you can't avoid a choice, it's not a choice.

In order to have free will, you must have more than one option, each of which is avoidable. This means that before you make a choice, there must be a state of uncertainty during a period of potential: you cannot know the future. Even if you think you can predict your decision, if you claim to have free will, you must admit the potential (if not the desire) to change your mind before the decision is final.

Dan Barker

 

[Transparent]

You're repeating the same things that everyone else states without actually building on it. The world cannot be a test if the test has already been preassigned. If I am destined for hell, then nothing I can do will change that. Nonetheless, I will repeat I point I made earlier. A choice is defined as two or more options that can be avoided, However, we know that with Allah's omniscience, this is not the case. For example, if I go to a shop to buy a drink from a barrage of different options, am i really choosing when Allah already knows what I'm going to 'choose'? You may find this confusing so I'll elaborate. As I have already clarified the definition of a choice, it's time to apply it. Allah already knows which drink I am going to 'choose' meaning that I cannot avoid it which renders my supposed choosing void. Saying that Allah knows what you're going to do means that your life is limited to the choices that he preordained for you. If you can't avoid a choice, it's not a choice.



Dan Barker

That's the point Allah knows what you are going to choose ,the thing is you dont know what Allah has chosen for you therefore it is your own free will.For example a mother knows her son very well and she presents him with a choice,the mother knows what the son will choose but leaves it up to the son to ultimately decide.Same thing goes with Allah swt however the connection between us and Allah is even stronger because he created us ,hence he knows us better than we know ourselves.

 

[The_Cosmos]

That's the point Allah knows what you are going to choose ,the thing is you dont know what Allah has chosen for you therefore it is your own free will.For example a mother knows her son very well and she presents him with a choice,the mother knows what the son will choose but leaves it up to the son to ultimately decide.Same thing goes with Allah swt however the connection between us and Allah is even stronger because he created us ,hence he knows us better than we know ourselves.

That's a terrible analogy I often see from apologetics. A mother can only predict what her son is going to choose and even then she may be confronted with the possibility of him doing the opposite of what she predicts. That's the thing with predictions, there's the possibility of a wild card. Now, with Allah there's none of that. He knows with absolute certainty which choices you'll make which means they're unavoidable and thus you have no free will. If I can't avoid a choice, then it's not a choice. See the definition of choice.

Also, just because you don't know your future it doesn't mean you decide it. It's just an illusion.