How does predestination and free will exist in islam

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Some Muslims like the idea of Al-Qadr because they find it reassuring that if bad things happen, Allah must have planned them. The belief in free will is essential in Islam. This is because, for Muslims, life is a test from Allah. Therefore, all human beings must make their own decisions, on which they will be judged by Allah.

He is the One who, through destiny, balances the lives of humans, animals, plants, while at the same time harmonizing planets and other celestial bodies. Many people protest that if God controls everything, why does He allow massacres of innocent people, torture, disease and the worst forms of evil to exist?

Indeed, Islam does not ascribe evil to God. God allows tragedy and misery to take place in this world for reasons which often escape humans; it could be a test for those people, a form of purification, or warning for the rest of us to rehabilitate our lives.

The Quran gives us a glimpse of this in the interaction between Moses and a learned man in Chapter 18, verses 60 through See it here. In addition, God has ordained accountability for humans on the Day of Judgment, when He will reward us for obeying Him and acting righteously in this world or punish us for transgressing His limits and living a whimsical existence.

This further proves the importance of free will in our lives. God will judge us according to the choices we make in this life, not based on the destiny He has decreed for us. And your Lord is not ever unjust to [His] servants. Truly, when we accept the Divine Destiny we lead a more satisfying and productive life. We accept the tragedy as a test from God and submit to His will with patience and dignity.

And if our plans work successfully or something good happens to us, belief in divine destiny will prevent us from becoming too boastful or arrogant. Many successful people feel that their wealth and status are because they are smarter, wiser, stronger, or just more deserving of success than others. We must realize these are tools used in the hands of colonialism and exploitation and an instrument to deceitfully justify defeat and the factor which causes corruption to increase in a society.

Philosophers and divine scholars give different reasons for free will of the human being. That is, no matter what we deny, we cannot deny the reality that in all human societies, including both the worshippers of God and the materialists, East and West, ancient and modern, wealthy and poor, developed or underdeveloped, of whatever culture, all without exception, agree that a law should rule human beings and that human beings are responsible before the law and people who disobey the law must be punished.

In other words, the rule of law, the responsibility of individuals before it and the punishment of those who disobey the law are things which all intelligent people agree with and it was only primitive tribes who did not officially recognise these three things.

The fact that we explain this as the general conscience of human beings of the world is the clearest proof of the existence of free will in human beings and the fact that they have free choice. How can it be accepted that a human being be obliged in their actions and that they have no freedom of choice but are still responsible before the law? And, that when a law is broken, the person must be tried and asked why they did — or did not — commit a certain action. If proven guilt, that person is sent to prison or even, depending upon the crime, executed.

This is exactly as if we were to punish stones which slide down a mountain causing a landslide on a mountain road which results in the death of one or more human beings. It is true that a human being differs from a stone, but if we deny free will and choice in a human being, the difference between a human being and a stone will not be relevant in this instance - as both will be the victims of fate.

A stone, following the law of gravity, falls upon the roadside and a human being who murders another, is the victim of another factor of fate. Thus, the logic of those who believe in predetermination allows for no distinction to be made between a stone and a human being from the point of view of result as neither the stone nor the human acted according to their own free will.

Why should the human be tried and not the stone? We are at a crossroads. We either have to deny the existence of the common conscience of all of the people of the world and consider the courts, punishment of those who disobey the law to be ridiculous and useless and even oppressive or we have to deny the beliefs of the fatalists.

Obviously the latter is preferable. It is interesting to note that those who believe in the school of fatalism, and give reasons for their belief, when they are faced with a real life situation, they act according to free will! For instance, if a person aggresses against them, or annoys or bothers them, they take this person to court and do not rest at ease until that person is punished. Well, if it is really true that a person has no choice or free will, what is all of this commotion and court and trial about?

At any rate, this common conscience of the intelligent beings of the world is a living idea for the reality that human beings have accepted the existence of free will in the depths of their being and have always been loyal to that. They cannot live without the belief in free will for even one day. This belief has caused the wheels of social and individual programs to progress.

That which we have said above was about the contradiction between the school of predestination and the common conscience of the intelligent of the world, both from the point of view of supporters of religion and people who do not at all accept religion.

But from the point of view of religion thought, there is another sure reason for recognising the falsity of the school of fatalism. And if fatalism were to be believed, religion as we know it, would have to be altered. How can we reconcile the Justice of God which we proved in previous lessons with the school of fatalism? How is it possible that God oblige someone to do an evil deed?

Then punish him because he did it. This does not agree with any kind of logic! Because according to the school of fatalism, neither the good doers nor the evil doers have a choice. Can we tell a person whose hands involuntarily shake not to shake their hands? Or can we tell a person who is falling down a steep mountain to stand still? Those who accept this school believe that God created us and then put everything at our disposal and that, in general, He is not responsible for anything that we do and in this way, we are completely independent in choosing what we do.

Doubtlessly, this belief does not agree with monotheism because monotheism has taught us that God rules the entire world and nothing is beyond His control. Even our free will and free choice cannot be beyond His realm, otherwise duality or polytheism would, of necessity, result. In other words, we cannot believe in many gods, one, the great Creator of the universe and the others, the human beings who are free to do whatever they wish, completely free and independent - even God cannot affect what they wish to do!

What is important is that we know human beings have freedom of choice and free will at the same time we know God to be the Ruler over all persons and deeds.