Londoniyyah - Part 27 - Qadr | Mohammed Hijab (2022-04-15) #

0:00:13 very important session and very much
0:00:16 asked about by muslims and non-muslims
0:00:17 alike it's about the issue of
0:00:20 determinism or godly determinism of
0:00:22 human free will in fact this constitutes
0:00:24 one of the pillars of islamic faith
0:00:27 obviously you know that there are five
0:00:28 pillars of islam but there are six
0:00:30 pillars of iman
0:00:36 that you that you believe in allah and
0:00:38 the messiah the alliance angels
0:00:41 in the books
0:00:42 and his messengers and the last day and
0:00:44 the
0:00:45 which is the
0:00:47 divine predestination
0:00:50 the good of it and the part of it and
0:00:52 today we're going to be answering or a
0:00:54 lot of our efforts will be directed to
0:00:56 one question central question which is
0:00:58 the question
0:01:00 that i put in the first slide which is
0:01:02 where is there space for human free will
0:01:03 with an omnipotent god who knows and
0:01:05 wills the future
0:01:07 so we as muslims believe in two
0:01:10 different actually four levels of qatar
0:01:11 it's not just one level we believe that
0:01:13 allah he knows the future number one
0:01:17 we believe that allah has willed the
0:01:19 future
0:01:20 we believe that allah has written the
0:01:22 future number three
0:01:24 and number four we believe that allah
0:01:27 he has created
0:01:30 it it does hulk of the things of the
0:01:32 future as well created creation
0:01:35 so there are four distinct layers of
0:01:37 qatar
0:01:38 so just to repeat who who wants to
0:01:41 to
0:01:42 repeat what i just said
0:01:44 um say there's four layers of so one
0:01:46 that allah he knows the future
0:01:48 two that allah has built the future
0:01:50 three that allah has written the future
0:01:52 and for the allah he creates the future
0:01:55 okay why is he created what is he sorry
0:01:57 uh where has he written the future
0:02:00 um in the preserve table in the
0:02:02 president
0:02:03 okay and where is that what's that
0:02:05 um
0:02:07 that was like one of the first creations
0:02:09 so allah he created the pen
0:02:11 um
0:02:12 and i think three other things so the
0:02:14 pen darsh
0:02:15 um
0:02:16 the preserved tablet
0:02:18 and was it the was it the sea i mean the
0:02:21 there's different opinions i think
0:02:23 you're learning a different opinion as
0:02:24 to what was the first thing that was
0:02:24 created but it's certainly one of the
0:02:26 first things
0:02:27 the
0:02:29 history of everything was written
0:02:31 if you think about it technologically
0:02:33 for the sake of argument right
0:02:35 the preserved tablet is a bit like a sim
0:02:37 card
0:02:38 okay i know this is tashbee
0:02:40 uh but it's clear
0:02:43 and this is allowed even muhammad
0:02:44 mentions this in his
0:02:46 which is basically and this is for allah
0:02:51 which is if you if you think of a card
0:02:53 that you have you know
0:02:55 a bank card or something you know you
0:02:56 put in a machine and it tells you
0:02:59 this preserved tablet is like the
0:03:01 technological equivalent of some kind of
0:03:04 sim card that has all the information
0:03:06 the dna of the future if you like as the
0:03:09 dna of the world the universe everything
0:03:10 inside of it allah has
0:03:12 uh
0:03:13 has put that he's put that in place for
0:03:15 us everything that's ever be that ever
0:03:18 was
0:03:19 is will be is in that tablet
0:03:22 uh what does that tablet look like is it
0:03:24 physical like you know can you imagine
0:03:25 you're probably thinking of some kind of
0:03:26 a stone here but really we don't know
0:03:28 what this thing looks like
0:03:30 this is something which
0:03:31 goes beyond the scope of human
0:03:33 imagination but it's referred to as
0:03:36 and um
0:03:37 allah created it
0:03:38 and it acts like some kind of a
0:03:41 nucleus
0:03:42 of all the things like dna
0:03:45 sim card type situation
0:03:47 so allah
0:03:49 has done all those things and obviously
0:03:51 the question is how can that be the case
0:03:53 and
0:03:54 human being at the same time has this
0:03:56 free will
0:03:58 has this free will
0:04:00 now this is a question which has
0:04:02 troubled uh human beings for force for
0:04:05 millennia actually not for not for
0:04:07 centuries but for millennia
0:04:09 as long as human beings have lived on
0:04:10 planet earth this is a problem that has
0:04:13 troubled human beings
0:04:14 and what you'll find interesting is that
0:04:16 it's a problem that troubled human
0:04:17 beings not just within obviously the
0:04:18 islamic paradigms it's troubled human
0:04:21 beings within almost every paradigm
0:04:24 or every
0:04:26 intellectual tradition that has ever
0:04:27 existed
0:04:28 that aims to explain human behavior
0:04:30 and or
0:04:32 has a meta narrative about the human
0:04:33 condition
0:04:35 and we'll start with and this is
0:04:37 interesting
0:04:38 what kind of
0:04:41 philosophers
0:04:42 of today how they break it down
0:04:45 so we're talking about secular
0:04:46 philosophers of the west
0:04:49 and in secular philosophy there are
0:04:51 three schools of thought
0:04:53 there are three schools of distinct
0:04:55 schools of thought
0:04:56 and um the first one is libertarianism
0:04:59 okay so this idea and we're not talking
0:05:01 about liberal
0:05:02 theory or political liberalism we're
0:05:03 talking about this idea that human
0:05:05 beings
0:05:06 have
0:05:08 free will unencumbered free will which
0:05:12 uh and there is no determinism
0:05:14 okay
0:05:15 determinism is the idea that look this
0:05:18 is how they put it
0:05:19 there is an uninterrupted causal chain
0:05:23 of events
0:05:24 which which forces human beings to do
0:05:26 the things that they are doing
0:05:28 it's like a domino situation if you push
0:05:31 a domino you'll see dominoes hit each
0:05:33 other
0:05:34 and if you were to reverse the sequence
0:05:36 you'll see why each domino was knocked
0:05:38 down by the previous domino
0:05:39 such that really everything that i am
0:05:42 saying now and in fact all the thoughts
0:05:44 that i have in my mind
0:05:46 and in fact everything that i'm doing as
0:05:47 well
0:05:49 is
0:05:50 being controlled by a set of pre prior
0:05:52 events which forced me to do what i'm
0:05:54 doing
0:05:56 so i might drink this uh this capri sun
0:05:59 okay and then after 20 minutes i might
0:06:01 feel the urge to go to the toilet
0:06:04 this capri sun therefore caused me to go
0:06:06 to the in a sense
0:06:08 and it was and it's like that was
0:06:10 everything and if we know the pre-prior
0:06:12 conditions then we will know the future
0:06:14 but because not everyone knows the
0:06:15 mechanics of
0:06:16 the universe and the prior conditions
0:06:18 not anyone can just sell the future
0:06:20 the determinist position is very
0:06:22 compelling and in fact one of the most
0:06:24 powerful
0:06:25 philosophical positions that is adopted
0:06:28 in secular philosophy in the modern age
0:06:32 why because if you believe in cause and
0:06:34 effect
0:06:36 if you believe one thing causes another
0:06:38 thing
0:06:39 and
0:06:40 a causes b
0:06:42 okay
0:06:43 and if you believe
0:06:46 that things happen because of their
0:06:48 causes then that's basically the
0:06:50 conclusion therefore anything that is
0:06:52 happening now
0:06:53 is eventually happening because of uh
0:06:56 self events of the future of the past we
0:06:59 are controlled by our past we are up we
0:07:01 are
0:07:02 uh the puppets this is a cosmic
0:07:04 ventriloquism what you're seeing now is
0:07:06 a puppet being moved i'm a puppet
0:07:08 i am being moved around okay there's no
0:07:11 strings but i am being moved around by
0:07:13 the strings of my part the past the past
0:07:16 is moving me around
0:07:18 what past the past conditions the causes
0:07:20 of the past they are moving me around
0:07:22 you can't see no strings but i am moving
0:07:24 i'm thinking i'm speaking i'm talking
0:07:26 now all of all of my actions and
0:07:28 cognitions and thoughts and process all
0:07:30 of that
0:07:31 is because of something that's happened
0:07:33 in the past that's causing me to do
0:07:34 meaning really the hard deterministic
0:07:36 position says we have no free will
0:07:39 if free will is unincumbered ability to
0:07:41 choose a over
0:07:42 b libertarian free will there is no free
0:07:46 will because everything that i am doing
0:07:48 i'm being forced to do it compelled to
0:07:50 do it by that which has come before me
0:07:53 and this is a very strong and powerful
0:07:54 position
0:07:56 because if we believe in cause and
0:07:57 effect
0:07:58 then that's it's a very strong power
0:08:00 however there is a third school of law
0:08:03 which is that i would say the school of
0:08:04 thought
0:08:05 of the majority the vast majority of
0:08:07 muslim
0:08:08 non-muslim uh
0:08:12 people which is it's called the
0:08:13 compatibilist position
0:08:15 now the thing is this is where it gets a
0:08:17 bit murky
0:08:20 because we i have a first person
0:08:22 subjective experience that i'm in
0:08:23 control of my own actions
0:08:26 i feel
0:08:28 i feel as if
0:08:30 i am in control of me picking up this
0:08:32 capri sun right now it's me that's doing
0:08:33 it it's not it's not
0:08:36 a cause of antecedent events or
0:08:38 uninterrupted causal chain that's doing
0:08:40 this it's me that's doing i feel that
0:08:43 now you might think that's very
0:08:44 subjective
0:08:45 but they would say exactly that is very
0:08:47 subjective but so is kojito ergosan so
0:08:49 is the idea that i think therefore i am
0:08:51 which is the foundation of rationalism
0:08:53 in the west it starts as a first person
0:08:55 experience you remember when we talked
0:08:57 about
0:08:57 the thing the bedrock of western
0:09:00 rationalism is descartes when he said
0:09:02 when he went into the systematic doubt
0:09:04 and at the end of it he said i think
0:09:05 therefore i am
0:09:06 and he said this is the most powerful
0:09:08 thing and we said actually more powerful
0:09:09 than it would be to say that exists
0:09:11 there is existence there's no doubt that
0:09:12 but the idea is
0:09:14 you only know these things subjectively
0:09:17 you see
0:09:18 it it's subjective that i am in control
0:09:21 of my own
0:09:22 words emotion and we we operate on that
0:09:24 basis in fact the justice system is
0:09:27 predicated on that basis that we are in
0:09:29 control of our of our actions and that
0:09:32 other people are in control of their
0:09:33 actions which is why by the way you'll
0:09:35 find that liberal philosophers like
0:09:36 thomas hobbes
0:09:37 he was a compatibilist js mill was a
0:09:39 compatibilist because they saw the they
0:09:42 saw the problem
0:09:43 in
0:09:44 uh
0:09:45 first of all because they rationed
0:09:47 rationalized it
0:09:48 in the ways that we've just spoken about
0:09:49 but secondly because they saw the
0:09:51 problem in blaming people when they're
0:09:52 not in charge of any of their actions
0:09:55 if you have a philosophy which is a
0:09:56 moral philosophy or any of the ethical
0:09:58 philosophies we went through or indeed
0:10:00 any religion that says that you have to
0:10:01 do things and don't do things it's hard
0:10:03 to have that position and say actually
0:10:04 you're not controlling any reactions
0:10:06 how were you responsible for then
0:10:09 you see so these are the three main
0:10:11 positions and obviously as you know
0:10:13 the sunni position is
0:10:16 a compatibilist position so it says
0:10:18 there is an existence of all those four
0:10:20 things that we've spoken about which is
0:10:21 god's knowledge of the future god's
0:10:23 writing of the future god's willing of
0:10:25 the future god
0:10:26 creating the future but that at the same
0:10:29 time
0:10:30 there is human free will how those two
0:10:32 things come together we're going to
0:10:33 speak about
0:10:34 in the course of this discussion but
0:10:36 that you will not be fully satisfied and
0:10:37 i have to
0:10:39 tell you this straight away
0:10:41 just like most compatibilists are not
0:10:43 fully just like people in the secular
0:10:45 philosophical tradition i'm going to be
0:10:46 fully satisfied
0:10:48 when if
0:10:50 satisfaction for you is knowing the
0:10:51 mechanics of this
0:10:53 because knowing the mechanics of this is
0:10:55 unknowable
0:10:57 how these two things exist at the same
0:10:58 time it's unknowable
0:11:00 and people have tried and grappled then
0:11:03 but i tell you now after
0:11:05 looking at all of the traditions that
0:11:07 nothing is satisfactory in terms of
0:11:09 understanding the mechanics of it
0:11:10 but there are some things which we can
0:11:12 explain which we will explain right
0:11:15 so
0:11:17 in fact uh
0:11:18 i think the closest
0:11:20 in terms of the secular tradition
0:11:22 there's a man called harry frankfurt
0:11:24 who i think in 1969 or potentially 1971
0:11:29 he had something called frankfurt cases
0:11:32 and he was he revived compatibilism
0:11:36 and i don't want to go deeply into what
0:11:38 frankfurt cases
0:11:39 are
0:11:40 but they are basically situations where
0:11:45 you
0:11:46 seemingly
0:11:49 are making a decision of of your own
0:11:52 but that decision was predetermined all
0:11:54 along
0:11:57 and he has this uh example of i think
0:11:59 his name is black and jones
0:12:01 so jones is one person black is and and
0:12:03 one of them says to the other one that
0:12:05 if you don't kill this person
0:12:07 that you are
0:12:09 that xyz
0:12:11 and um
0:12:14 so if you don't kill this person i'm
0:12:16 gonna kill him for example so the the
0:12:18 killing of said person was always gonna
0:12:20 happen
0:12:22 but that jones has a choice whether to
0:12:24 kill him or not and he kills him
0:12:26 think things like that which which show
0:12:29 if you really think about it the
0:12:30 possibility of there being something
0:12:32 which is previous always going to happen
0:12:34 i.e the killing of person x
0:12:36 but at the same time
0:12:38 uh
0:12:40 by the same time the person has some
0:12:41 kind of a choice
0:12:43 but when this when this reaches the
0:12:44 realm of theology there are some serious
0:12:47 difficulties with these kinds of
0:12:49 cases
0:12:50 i'll give you another example
0:12:53 for example if i were to say
0:12:56 someone's going to jump into a simple
0:12:58 yeah
0:13:00 some jumping zoo
0:13:02 but as they're jumping into the swimming
0:13:04 pool
0:13:04 they're jumping with a certain force of
0:13:06 velocity yeah
0:13:08 but they are being pushed
0:13:11 at the same force and velocity
0:13:14 that is required for them to go into the
0:13:15 swim pool with exactly the same motion
0:13:19 now if they don't do anything they'll go
0:13:21 into singapore anyway because they're
0:13:22 being pushed
0:13:23 but they are deciding to jump at the
0:13:24 same time as they are being pushed
0:13:28 you see this and it seems like a very
0:13:30 good example so actually this shows you
0:13:32 how you can have free will and
0:13:33 determinism at the same time but what
0:13:35 are the problems with this example
0:13:38 making that decision
0:13:39 must have also been determined yeah so
0:13:41 the pushing
0:13:43 or him him jumping him jumping itself
0:13:45 yeah if if if determined if determinism
0:13:48 is true that him jumping in the zoom
0:13:50 pool itself
0:13:51 right him jumping not being pushed but
0:13:53 him jumping is also not under his own
0:13:56 control
0:13:58 do you see the point so it sounds like a
0:13:59 fantastic uh
0:14:01 way out compatible
0:14:03 compatibilistic way out
0:14:04 but when you when you analyze it and you
0:14:07 think about it you realize actually
0:14:08 there's a flaw in this
0:14:11 do you see the point
0:14:12 and we'll come to it he tries to do
0:14:14 something similar he wrote a book called
0:14:18 and he gives an example quite similar to
0:14:19 this
0:14:20 but we'll see together what the floor is
0:14:23 and who are we to say no why not
0:14:25 as a human being just like anyone else
0:14:27 right but you'll see what the floor is
0:14:28 in a way he gives an example
0:14:31 you know and which there is a floor
0:14:32 there is a knucks in it there is a
0:14:34 deficiency in it
0:14:35 but obviously he doesn't like
0:14:37 which is to bring it
0:14:39 to bring the situation closer to your
0:14:41 within your understanding
0:14:43 and his his contribution his book is
0:14:45 very very very important because she
0:14:46 felt like i don't think it's been
0:14:47 translated parts of it have been though
0:14:50 yeah
0:14:53 parts of it have been but in all of it
0:14:54 has been
0:14:56 and in christianity
0:14:59 they have the same conundrum so they
0:15:01 have uh calvinism
0:15:04 now calvinism
0:15:08 and we'll come to islam because we
0:15:09 haven't we haven't really covered what
0:15:10 the islamic schools of thought are but
0:15:12 calvinism
0:15:13 uh
0:15:14 so called because of john calvin okay
0:15:20 it stresses god's sovereignty
0:15:22 over human action to the point where the
0:15:25 the um detractors of calvinism let's
0:15:27 just say for the sake of
0:15:29 argument they say that
0:15:32 this is a deterministic position
0:15:35 they say this is what they say that god
0:15:37 is in control of everything
0:15:40 and um
0:15:41 rp sproul who was one of the calvinists
0:15:44 of like the last hundred years once seen
0:15:46 as one of the top covenants
0:15:48 he he now redefines
0:15:50 what they have to redefine what free
0:15:52 will is or it's not really redefining it
0:15:55 it's defining it a certain way
0:15:57 um
0:15:59 but once again calvinism
0:16:02 as we'll see is close to asharazan it's
0:16:04 very close socialism in the islamic
0:16:06 paradigm these these two so the the the
0:16:10 focus is and the stresses on
0:16:12 godly sovereignty over human free will
0:16:15 whereas
0:16:17 arminianism
0:16:19 so called because of armenius i'm not
0:16:21 sure if you've heard of this uh person
0:16:24 who basically we have protestantism okay
0:16:27 and then you had these different you had
0:16:28 these different proponents of
0:16:29 protestantism in the mid like say 16th
0:16:32 century et cetera john obviously martin
0:16:34 luther as you know but john calvin and
0:16:35 this armenius yeah
0:16:37 and they opposed one another when it
0:16:39 came to this matter of free will and
0:16:40 that's why the schools of thought are
0:16:42 distinct from one of them because they
0:16:43 have different ideas when it comes to
0:16:44 free will and godly determinism so
0:16:46 calvinism if it focused more on god's
0:16:49 sovereignty and it saw that anything
0:16:51 that emphasized human free will agency
0:16:53 over and above godly sovereignty would
0:16:55 be um
0:16:57 depreciating from the sovereignty of god
0:16:58 because if god is in power is in control
0:17:00 of everything they say
0:17:02 if god is in control of everything
0:17:04 then how can you how can you be in
0:17:06 control of anything if you want to put
0:17:08 it that way right if god is in control
0:17:09 of everything then how can you be in
0:17:11 control of anything
0:17:13 if god is all powerful so let's see this
0:17:15 is as a problem but the armenians
0:17:17 actually say
0:17:18 they go they go as far as to say that
0:17:20 god is not in control of everything
0:17:22 and the and this is you'll see the
0:17:24 martessilis kind of maybe lean in their
0:17:27 direction
0:17:28 so the martezilis and armenians are
0:17:30 quite similar the calvinists and the
0:17:32 ashari's are quite similar
0:17:34 now molinism i'm not sure for molina if
0:17:37 you've heard of this person and now
0:17:38 william lane craig is advocating this uh
0:17:40 position
0:17:41 which is called middle knowledge
0:17:43 but it leans i would say more to the
0:17:45 armenian position which is
0:17:47 the you know you'll find some of the
0:17:49 proponents of modernism actually saying
0:17:51 that well god doesn't know the full
0:17:52 future or there's some things which god
0:17:54 doesn't know which is more like
0:17:54 martialism
0:17:56 so you'll see that it's in every
0:17:59 school of thought whether it's atheistic
0:18:01 secular christian muslim we can say the
0:18:03 same thing about judaism
0:18:04 but you'll find that they're struggling
0:18:06 with this
0:18:07 and when they go in one direction they
0:18:09 compromise one thing and when they go in
0:18:10 the other direction they compromise
0:18:11 another thing and it's very difficult
0:18:14 not to go in either of the two
0:18:15 directions and not make any compromises
0:18:18 unless one is making willing to make
0:18:20 certain concessions which we are going
0:18:22 to make today which is
0:18:24 concessions of ignorance
0:18:27 and this is this basically it um
0:18:30 in islam
0:18:31 you had groups
0:18:34 as you know now is they refer to them as
0:18:36 hadaria and jabaria okay but these
0:18:38 people didn't exist like no one called
0:18:39 themselves
0:18:40 no one themselves like that once again
0:18:42 you know
0:18:43 um
0:18:44 this these are terms that are used
0:18:46 pejoratively against these groups
0:18:49 but these groups themselves they call
0:18:50 themselves different things so the
0:18:52 kadaria
0:18:53 are really the martesla they're probably
0:18:55 the best proponents of them and the
0:18:57 martezilla
0:19:00 it's difficult to know what they
0:19:01 actually believed in because we do have
0:19:03 some of their books definitely like
0:19:05 who is like some kind of a genius this
0:19:07 guy yeah
0:19:09 you know he's written books he doesn't
0:19:11 actually when i've looked i've tried my
0:19:12 best to do these people because they're
0:19:14 extinct now almost you know they don't
0:19:16 exist these particularly like they don't
0:19:18 demographically
0:19:19 there's there's no martial mosque in
0:19:21 london put it that way and there may be
0:19:22 no one uh
0:19:24 in the whole of europe or martelly
0:19:26 mosque martesellis really are confined
0:19:28 to the uh to the academy like liberal
0:19:31 muslims who consider themselves like
0:19:33 martized inclined or whatever
0:19:35 that's that's where they are
0:19:36 you know you don't find like martezilis
0:19:40 and that's a lot of it's political
0:19:42 reasons
0:19:42 to be honest with you it's because you
0:19:44 know the ashari's and the hamburgers had
0:19:46 more political power than the mua teslas
0:19:48 and they were driven out and all these
0:19:49 kind of things a lot of it is maybe
0:19:51 because of the weakness of their
0:19:51 arguments but it's
0:19:53 not as i would say
0:19:55 although it's difficult to make this
0:19:56 case as the main reason
0:19:58 because
0:19:59 i would say the main reasons of politics
0:20:02 why this group became
0:20:04 extinct but basically they
0:20:07 they don't believe allah definitely we
0:20:08 said that qatar is four things
0:20:10 they don't believe allah created the
0:20:12 future that's definite 100
0:20:14 like he created our actions
0:20:17 now the quran says
0:20:20 he created you and your actions
0:20:23 okay
0:20:26 but they they have a wheel for that
0:20:28 they have a particular interpretation of
0:20:30 that
0:20:31 they don't agree with that
0:20:34 so don't believe allah has created our
0:20:37 actions like that
0:20:39 they also don't believe
0:20:42 i mean some this is i think a
0:20:43 misconception
0:20:44 so this is if you read the books of
0:20:47 salafis and ashadis they will say that
0:20:49 they don't believe that allah knows the
0:20:50 future
0:20:51 but when i looked into their own books
0:20:53 to be completely fair i didn't see that
0:20:56 like
0:20:57 i don't think he said that
0:21:00 that allah does not know the future or
0:21:02 at least they didn't put it that clearly
0:21:05 and this is just to be completely honest
0:21:06 even though our guys say that they said
0:21:08 that some of them said that it doesn't
0:21:10 mean that just because our guy said that
0:21:12 that's actually what they said i would
0:21:14 like to see the evidence of where they
0:21:15 say well like someone like
0:21:17 jabbar said that i know there were some
0:21:19 more attendees that did say that
0:21:21 that allah does not know the future
0:21:23 which is similar to the modernist
0:21:24 position
0:21:26 but the heads of them like al-qaeda
0:21:30 didn't say that
0:21:32 from what i know and i'm not saying i've
0:21:33 read everything he's written but it's a
0:21:35 shallow pool like you can read two or
0:21:36 three books and you can see where what
0:21:37 he's kind of saying about the situation
0:21:40 yeah why did they go to that
0:21:43 why did they say that allah doesn't know
0:21:44 the future
0:21:46 because it was
0:21:47 it's the issue of qatar right so it's
0:21:49 the issue of if he knows the future then
0:21:50 he's written it for he knows the future
0:21:52 then
0:21:53 they saw that as uh
0:21:55 impeding on human free will what about
0:21:58 the preserved tablet how do they explain
0:22:01 that then
0:22:03 that's that's a good one they'll they'll
0:22:05 make their own wheel one but the ones
0:22:06 who say that allah does not know the
0:22:07 future are not the prominent my teslas
0:22:10 they are the
0:22:11 minority ones which their books are not
0:22:13 really out there
0:22:15 do you know what i mean
0:22:17 if allah knows what you're going to do
0:22:19 doesn't mean that you can't then choose
0:22:20 what you're going to do yeah that's true
0:22:22 the the main tension by the way is not
0:22:24 to do with knowledge
0:22:26 the main tension is to do with creation
0:22:28 i think that's
0:22:30 you can say willing willing and creation
0:22:32 these are two
0:22:33 like the fact that allah knows what's
0:22:34 going to happen in the future is not
0:22:36 it's not really a contradiction
0:22:38 it's not a tension also it cannot be
0:22:39 proposed as one but the fact that he's
0:22:42 now we're saying he wills it as well
0:22:44 what does he mean what do we mean by he
0:22:46 will say and we're going further and
0:22:47 saying no he creates it as well
0:22:49 now if we say creation and willing this
0:22:51 is a serious issue
0:22:53 yeah so did the authorities like
0:22:56 is this their attempt at compatible
0:22:58 compatibilism were they more inclined
0:23:00 towards free will
0:23:02 no no
0:23:03 everyone's trying to affirm qatar
0:23:06 yeah yeah but
0:23:07 they were more inclined towards through
0:23:08 well definitely that one not one million
0:23:09 percent
0:23:10 in fact this is really interesting okay
0:23:12 and i've mentioned you see before but
0:23:14 i'll mention to you again
0:23:15 in major photo volume eight where um
0:23:18 tamiya speaks about this matters
0:23:20 there were three people that had a very
0:23:22 similar kind of argumentation
0:23:25 but they all went in three different
0:23:26 directions
0:23:27 so you had you had ibn tamiya number one
0:23:30 you had this guy called abu hassan
0:23:32 al-basri who was a marteselli right
0:23:35 and you had fakhruddin
0:23:37 who was a ashari as you know
0:23:40 and all of all three of them they
0:23:42 started off by talking about qatar free
0:23:44 will the importance of both et cetera et
0:23:46 cetera
0:23:48 abul hassan he went more in the free
0:23:50 will direction
0:23:51 okay
0:23:53 and he mentioned his key tabi keeps
0:23:54 mentioning this character
0:23:58 he went into a deterministic direction
0:24:00 now someone will say he's not a
0:24:01 determinist he is a determinist al-razi
0:24:04 was a fully-fledged hard determinist and
0:24:07 he in the end of his book
0:24:11 which one of them but i remember reading
0:24:13 pages and pages and pages and pages and
0:24:15 at the end of it it says insane
0:24:20 the human being is compelled in the
0:24:23 image
0:24:24 of being
0:24:25 a choice a choice creature
0:24:27 that he's he's is
0:24:29 there's an illusion of choice but he's
0:24:30 actually compelled that's hard
0:24:32 determinism
0:24:33 that is that is exactly double
0:24:35 but that's not to say that all asha has
0:24:37 had his opinion
0:24:40 because one gazelle talks about the same
0:24:42 issues he doesn't have the same
0:24:43 conclusions
0:24:44 you see um so he was he went in the hard
0:24:47 determinist direction
0:24:49 al-basri went more in the kind of uh
0:24:51 libertarian direction if you like and
0:24:53 even tamiya genuinely tried the middle
0:24:55 ground
0:24:56 genuinely tried the middle ground
0:24:57 although he he there was some
0:24:59 methodological issues and he had to do
0:25:01 tawaf which we'll come to uh
0:25:04 in more followers
0:25:05 so the ashari's
0:25:06 they have an issue they have a concept
0:25:09 called
0:25:10 kasp
0:25:12 where it's referred to as acquisition
0:25:14 so they say that when the person like
0:25:17 and this is something which most other
0:25:18 groups do not understand this
0:25:20 and it doesn't really
0:25:22 solve much i have to be honest and say
0:25:24 they say that
0:25:25 when the person is uh
0:25:27 allah is in control of everything but
0:25:29 there are points
0:25:34 when the person makes like for example
0:25:35 do i or he makes petition
0:25:38 and
0:25:39 at that point it's not
0:25:41 because of his quadra but in the
0:25:43 quadratic whatever that is meant to mean
0:25:45 at the point of his
0:25:48 ability
0:25:49 he gives him permission or acquisition
0:25:51 or casp
0:25:53 which i don't know what that means i
0:25:55 looked at it i thought about it but
0:25:57 to me it didn't make much i don't know
0:25:58 if it makes sense to you
0:26:00 uh
0:26:01 to me that does not solve any issues and
0:26:03 most people outside of the airship
0:26:04 tradition don't accept this
0:26:06 because it's not very uh satisfying uh
0:26:09 intellectually to be honest with you
0:26:12 anyway so this is the ashari position
0:26:18 as we said he did solve some problems
0:26:20 and i'll tell you what problems he
0:26:21 solved
0:26:23 but he could not solve other or he could
0:26:24 not answer other questions
0:26:28 as you recall i said
0:26:31 that
0:26:32 is of four types or four different uh
0:26:34 stages or we said
0:26:40 the will of god and then we said the the
0:26:42 the
0:26:43 kitaba which is the writing and then we
0:26:45 said
0:26:47 we said one of the one of the big issues
0:26:49 was hulk
0:26:50 because how can allah create something
0:26:55 and that thing has free will
0:26:57 so he said and and by the way this is a
0:26:59 serious problem for an occasionalist
0:27:01 remember ashadis are for the most part
0:27:03 occasionalist meaning
0:27:05 an occasionalist believes that there's
0:27:07 no such thing
0:27:08 as secondary cause and effect all that
0:27:11 let me be very specific here
0:27:13 because i don't want to misrepresent
0:27:14 yeah
0:27:16 al ghazali believes there's no necessary
0:27:19 link between cause and effect
0:27:22 he either it doesn't it doesn't mean
0:27:23 that it doesn't mean there's no cause
0:27:25 and effect it just means there's no
0:27:26 necessary link between cause and effect
0:27:29 which was the same opinion of liveness
0:27:31 by the way
0:27:32 yeah
0:27:34 what do we mean necessary link between
0:27:35 cause and effect okay so this this is uh
0:27:38 uh capri sun okay if i drop it
0:27:41 that that's the effect okay now am i
0:27:44 dropping it am i the one that's dropping
0:27:46 it
0:27:46 so the ashley will say listen i say look
0:27:50 there are
0:27:54 if you you know this kind of um what's
0:27:56 that called you know the uh
0:27:58 the black and white movies they used to
0:27:59 put on their thing and then they used to
0:28:00 be like different slides of uh photos
0:28:04 the film yeah you know those old ones
0:28:06 the old films
0:28:07 is that what's good
0:28:08 yeah pictograph so it's like it's like
0:28:11 different um
0:28:13 different uh
0:28:15 images frames different frames yeah
0:28:17 different
0:28:18 so
0:28:19 they will say each frame does not have a
0:28:21 link to the previous one
0:28:23 so you have a generator which is the the
0:28:25 generator and one frame and the next
0:28:28 frame the first let's say there's five
0:28:30 frames
0:28:31 and they're all showing one thing and
0:28:32 the next thing and the next thing and
0:28:33 next thing and it looks like a full
0:28:34 movie and it looks like they're all
0:28:36 causing each other all the previous
0:28:37 things are being caused by the prior
0:28:39 things
0:28:40 asha's say actually occasion
0:28:43 occasionalism says
0:28:44 that each one is being directly caused
0:28:46 ultimately by god
0:28:48 so although it looks like one is causing
0:28:50 two and two is causing three and three
0:28:52 is causing four and four according five
0:28:54 what's actually happening is allah is
0:28:55 causing one a last causing two allah
0:28:57 schools in three allah isn't causing
0:28:58 four allah
0:29:00 does that make sense
0:29:01 this is what occasionalism means
0:29:04 okay
0:29:05 now if you believe in occasionalism the
0:29:07 problem is what do you think the problem
0:29:08 is
0:29:10 what's the major issue with
0:29:11 occasionalism it solves one issue what
0:29:13 issue does it solve and what issue does
0:29:14 it create speak for two minutes because
0:29:16 i think we need to digest this a little
0:29:18 bit
0:29:19 two minutes and we'll come back and uh
0:29:20 answer this question
0:29:23 okay um so now we're back
0:29:26 we're back on the uh the occasionalist
0:29:28 uh
0:29:29 discussion
0:29:30 so the advantages of occasionism or what
0:29:32 does occasionalism preserve or aim to
0:29:34 preserve let's put it that way what does
0:29:36 occasionalism aim to preserve
0:29:41 the sovereignty of god how so
0:29:44 by uh asserting you know fully that he's
0:29:48 in control of everything
0:29:50 and on the other whilst you're still
0:29:51 there
0:29:52 on the other hand what kind of
0:29:53 compromise
0:29:54 human free will why is that
0:29:56 because
0:29:58 there is no
0:30:00 scope or domain for
0:30:02 human beings to will if god is
0:30:05 there's not even any secondary causation
0:30:07 at all
0:30:08 at least not necessarily right right
0:30:10 good good so so the issue here is
0:30:12 it goes back to uh
0:30:14 cosmic ventriloquism
0:30:16 you know the idea is that okay if god is
0:30:18 causing everything i want he's causing
0:30:20 me to do everything i'm doing right now
0:30:21 i'm a puppet
0:30:23 so some would accuse a k of
0:30:25 occasionalism of being
0:30:26 occasionalism and determinism being two
0:30:28 sides of the same coin
0:30:30 some would accuse that being the case
0:30:32 there's no free will what are you
0:30:33 talking about basically
0:30:34 this is and this is the opinion
0:30:37 of emu
0:30:38 in fact so what he talks about jabri's
0:30:41 in his sheffield
0:30:42 which is his uh
0:30:44 magnum on what was the imaginable his
0:30:46 main book on the subject right
0:30:48 when he says when ilokay mentions
0:30:50 jabari's he's talking about asha's
0:30:52 because he considers their position
0:30:55 to be a position of determinism
0:30:58 but then he he attempts himself
0:31:01 to answer this question and i looked at
0:31:03 the eighth chapter of his work
0:31:05 obviously i looked at all of his work
0:31:06 but the eighth chapter in particular
0:31:07 gave some clues
0:31:10 some very interesting clues
0:31:13 as to how he tries to solve some
0:31:14 problems
0:31:16 and i do think that they do solve some
0:31:17 issues
0:31:19 and i think we need to look at their
0:31:21 work critically because it does solve
0:31:22 some issues here
0:31:24 ibm says imagine you have a slave
0:31:27 or imagine there is a slave a slave like
0:31:29 an owned slave yeah
0:31:32 the owner gives the slaves of money
0:31:35 and this the money the slave goes into
0:31:37 the market
0:31:39 and the owner tells the slave what to
0:31:41 buy and what not to buy
0:31:44 and then he as he's doing that
0:31:48 he says if you buy x
0:31:50 this is good this is what we need but if
0:31:52 you buy the wrong thing and
0:31:54 you know
0:31:55 misuse the money misappropriate the
0:31:57 funds
0:31:58 then we will uh then i will punish you
0:32:01 okay
0:32:02 and the key word that he uses here is
0:32:04 even
0:32:05 permission
0:32:07 permission
0:32:08 so he says who is really in control
0:32:13 he says who is really in control the
0:32:16 slave owner is in control
0:32:19 he says the slave owner is really in
0:32:21 control so whereas the slave goes into
0:32:23 the marketplace
0:32:25 and buys things and all these kind of
0:32:27 things
0:32:28 if he buys the wrong thing he'll be
0:32:30 punished and he buys the right things
0:32:32 then he'll be
0:32:33 rewarded
0:32:36 so really because the money comes from
0:32:40 the slave owner
0:32:43 and he gives him permission
0:32:44 that permission can be taken away from
0:32:46 him anytime
0:32:49 therefore the slave owner is always in
0:32:51 charge and therefore he says the same
0:32:53 thing applies with us and allah
0:32:55 that allah we are the slaves of allah
0:32:58 he gives us permission to act within
0:32:59 free will
0:33:00 and if we do the right things
0:33:02 we will be
0:33:03 rewarded and if we do the wrong things
0:33:05 we'll be punished
0:33:06 what are the strengths and advan what
0:33:08 are the strengths and weaknesses of this
0:33:12 that was my question yeah
0:33:14 what are the what are the strengths and
0:33:15 limitations of this uh particular
0:33:17 parable i'll give you two three minutes
0:33:18 again because this requires thought so i
0:33:20 i believe in that
0:33:23 you mentioned the ayah in the quran that
0:33:25 god says that god created the future as
0:33:27 well
0:33:28 yeah so um i would i would believe in in
0:33:31 this i would say like
0:33:33 god gave us permission um
0:33:36 so god knows everything
0:33:38 and
0:33:40 he
0:33:41 he just in all power decided to
0:33:45 give us free will and no interference we
0:33:47 will
0:33:48 yeah
0:33:49 it doesn't mean he can't he can't he has
0:33:52 more power use
0:33:54 and
0:33:56 but you mentioned this
0:33:57 god created the
0:33:59 future
0:34:00 so that's where i uh
0:34:04 there's an issue with saying that god
0:34:05 doesn't interfere in our free will
0:34:08 if we put it in that language it's as if
0:34:10 we have a will that's outside of the
0:34:12 will of god and then in the quran states
0:34:15 explicitly
0:34:18 that you will not will accept if allah
0:34:20 wills
0:34:22 because in this example yes
0:34:24 as soon as the
0:34:26 owner's given the money to the slave
0:34:28 yeah he's kind of out of the equation so
0:34:31 he's unaware of the actions of the slave
0:34:33 therefore if we use this kind of example
0:34:36 it limits the uh the knowledge of allah
0:34:39 okay right this is an issue with
0:34:41 knowledge let's let's assume that he can
0:34:43 see and he surveils everything
0:34:46 let's assume that that's possible that
0:34:47 he can see exactly put a camera on the
0:34:49 sleeve he can see everything he's doing
0:34:50 it can stop it at any time
0:34:52 what's still the problem here there's
0:34:54 still a problem
0:34:55 the problem is so i guess the first of
0:34:57 all the strength is that
0:34:59 the responsibility is on the slave right
0:35:03 that he chooses um what um you know what
0:35:06 to buy you know good and bad however you
0:35:09 could say the limitation is that it
0:35:11 diminishes the sovereignty
0:35:14 how does it diminish because
0:35:16 um
0:35:17 the slave um if we say that
0:35:19 responsibility is on him then this means
0:35:21 that allah he's like a
0:35:24 he's not in control of what the slave
0:35:25 does
0:35:26 there's still an issue right right yeah
0:35:28 there's still an issue in control you
0:35:29 know what the slave buys
0:35:31 you know if it's good or bad right and
0:35:33 it goes back to what we were talking
0:35:34 about with the whole uh swimming pool
0:35:36 example right
0:35:38 this this the slave acting autonomously
0:35:41 yeah independently yeah this is the
0:35:43 issue well how can you have an
0:35:45 independence outside of allah
0:35:47 yeah this is this is the major
0:35:48 limitation now ibn
0:35:51 seemingly unaware quite frankly he goes
0:35:53 on to say this is the haqq which islam
0:35:55 came with and you know
0:35:56 i mean but there is there is a
0:35:58 limitation in this parable
0:36:00 just like there's a limitation with what
0:36:01 i shall i say there's even tell me is
0:36:03 much more careful
0:36:08 did you see that the same owner has some
0:36:12 kind of chain
0:36:14 that connects with the the slave
0:36:16 so
0:36:17 without the ch in this chain
0:36:19 the slave
0:36:20 you wouldn't have an um knife
0:36:23 no but if the slave decides to look left
0:36:25 look right do go up with any thought
0:36:27 that the slave has so anything he's
0:36:28 doing
0:36:29 is because of the energy that is coming
0:36:32 from this uh then it becomes a puppet
0:36:34 doesn't he yeah there's no
0:36:35 responsibility right so this is the
0:36:37 issue right
0:36:38 this is the issue now
0:36:41 so
0:36:42 this the slave operating yeah going to
0:36:45 the market deciding um like
0:36:48 thinking buying whatever
0:36:50 and having the free will
0:36:53 having free will basically
0:36:55 um
0:36:56 it's okay the problem uh what i'm trying
0:36:59 to say is
0:37:00 the fact that the slave is capable of
0:37:01 doing that
0:37:02 is because of god
0:37:06 does that make sense it's because of the
0:37:07 step owner
0:37:09 that he has some kind of
0:37:13 connection yeah he's still acting
0:37:15 independently right
0:37:18 by succeeding independently because the
0:37:21 slave owner
0:37:22 gave him the
0:37:25 gave him the um no but if he's acting
0:37:27 independently then that's it that's
0:37:29 that's all right it's not fully
0:37:30 independent it's just no i get it but
0:37:32 even anything that he does
0:37:34 anything that he does by himself
0:37:36 there's a problem there
0:37:40 there is a problem
0:37:41 and by the way i've thought about this
0:37:43 and i got headaches over this and don't
0:37:44 think about this
0:37:45 don't think about this in fact you know
0:37:46 the self to be honest with you they they
0:37:49 for good reason
0:37:50 yeah they're advised not to think too
0:37:52 much about the mechanics of this
0:37:55 for good reason yeah
0:37:57 um just thinking about that
0:37:58 because
0:37:59 because now i was thinking that the you
0:38:01 know how they mentioned customer right
0:38:03 like that sounded like convincing in
0:38:04 that situation but i guess all it does
0:38:06 is it just reduces the problem to the
0:38:07 very small point in time it's the same
0:38:09 problem but it just reduces itself it
0:38:11 doesn't even explain anything to me it
0:38:12 doesn't what are you talking about like
0:38:14 casp does not explain a thing
0:38:16 i mean they just introduced this
0:38:18 mechanic but the mechanic has the same
0:38:19 problems that we're talking about yeah
0:38:20 well the mechanic doesn't even doesn't
0:38:22 even it doesn't it has it doesn't add
0:38:23 anything it doesn't has zero explanatory
0:38:26 scope yeah
0:38:27 zero explanatory scope
0:38:29 uh and this is me being rough maybe some
0:38:31 uh some maturity sorry not even maturity
0:38:33 some ashari's or some people are gonna
0:38:35 say this guy's
0:38:36 he's ripping into everyone so was this
0:38:37 guy become a deviant or this and that oh
0:38:39 i'm just being honest at the end of the
0:38:41 day there's some things we cannot
0:38:42 explain
0:38:43 yeah
0:38:44 all i'm saying is that the analogies
0:38:46 will always be problematic
0:38:48 now ibm tamiya he stopped at the right
0:38:50 place i think
0:38:52 he did tawakov
0:38:53 he was more careful than him if you read
0:38:56 my tower volume eight versus
0:38:58 it to me
0:39:01 goes a bit further like with these
0:39:02 analogies
0:39:03 it would tell me i said the following
0:39:04 thing i think which which solves the
0:39:06 problem here it does actually solve an
0:39:07 issue
0:39:08 he says
0:39:09 going back to the whole secondary first
0:39:11 and secondary causation thing this is
0:39:13 the point you were making yeah
0:39:16 very simple examples
0:39:18 he says and this is what kids ask my
0:39:20 kids ask me this question all the time
0:39:22 who created the building
0:39:24 okay there's two answers to this
0:39:25 question right
0:39:27 okay the human beings created this
0:39:29 building
0:39:30 you know
0:39:31 bob
0:39:32 created this building you know whoever
0:39:35 but also the materials that were in
0:39:36 place for bob to create a building were
0:39:38 in place because something was great
0:39:40 from nothing which you believe came from
0:39:41 allah
0:39:42 so there's a primary causation a second
0:39:44 requisition
0:39:45 even tamiya says well look
0:39:47 you have a mother who causes a child
0:39:52 and by the way what is
0:39:55 good is to show that the quran
0:39:57 agrees with the notion of sababiyah or
0:39:59 the idea of causation
0:40:02 you know it in many different points
0:40:05 you know if there's the fair esteban
0:40:07 there
0:40:11 the letters indicating causality
0:40:14 um
0:40:15 anyway
0:40:16 many a yet like two minutes to enumerate
0:40:21 he says from one perspective the child
0:40:23 is caused by the mother
0:40:25 but from the other perspective
0:40:26 ultimately is caused by allah
0:40:28 the plant is caused by
0:40:31 so yeah by the seed
0:40:33 but from the other perspective it's
0:40:34 caused by allah so you have two
0:40:37 different perspectives you have the sec
0:40:39 the first perspective which is the
0:40:41 things that caused by
0:40:43 the
0:40:44 allah ultimately everything is caused by
0:40:46 allah
0:40:47 but second secondarily things are caused
0:40:50 by their immediate causes and allah
0:40:52 allowed that to happen
0:40:54 okay
0:40:55 now how does that happen with human free
0:40:57 will
0:40:58 and godly determinism
0:41:00 eventually rightly says we don't know
0:41:04 we don't know this and this is the
0:41:06 answer this is the answer to the
0:41:07 question i know
0:41:09 this is the right thing to say
0:41:12 and we don't know and we will never know
0:41:15 i don't think this is something we can
0:41:17 actually solve
0:41:18 because in fact the the mechanics of how
0:41:20 godly determinism works and human free
0:41:22 will any analogy that you give me i'll
0:41:24 find a problem with it even if it comes
0:41:26 from the greatest minds
0:41:28 any analogy you'd like to give me i i
0:41:30 have i have i am confident i'll find a
0:41:32 limitation with that analogy
0:41:34 and sometimes i for for many months i
0:41:37 used to be convinced with one type of
0:41:38 analogy and then i would come and
0:41:39 realize after some after really
0:41:41 pondering over it
0:41:43 while in the shower in the toilet or
0:41:45 wherever walking the street there's a
0:41:46 problem here
0:41:48 so instead of going through the toil
0:41:50 of realizing that these analogies all of
0:41:52 them none of them
0:41:54 have any ex
0:41:56 all explanatory scope of how both of
0:41:58 things come together
0:42:00 realize that this is something which is
0:42:03 cannot be uh the explanatory scope of it
0:42:05 we don't know the full extent of it what
0:42:07 we do know is this though
0:42:09 what we can argue is this
0:42:11 we can argue for its non-contradiction
0:42:14 now explain how right
0:42:16 we first have to explain we go back to
0:42:18 our categories
0:42:20 of possibility
0:42:22 yes
0:42:26 the absence of contradiction in the
0:42:28 compatibility that you're going to say
0:42:29 but can you also argue for the
0:42:32 incoherence of the deterministic or the
0:42:33 libertarian positions as well because
0:42:36 someone could say that like
0:42:37 with the determinist position or the
0:42:39 libertarian position let's say
0:42:41 i guess more so the determinist argument
0:42:43 you don't have to
0:42:44 have this sort of
0:42:45 gap of ignorance you can sort of just
0:42:47 say this is the argument it all flows
0:42:48 through and it has coherence from the
0:42:50 standpoint
0:42:51 right so the the the issue is not with
0:42:54 internal consistency when it comes to
0:42:56 determinism because it is internally
0:42:57 consistent
0:42:59 the issue is with this explanatory scope
0:43:02 there are some things it just doesn't
0:43:03 explain
0:43:04 and with that i actually want to direct
0:43:06 your attention to a thought experiment
0:43:07 that was put forward
0:43:10 by chrysippus who was a stoic
0:43:12 chrysippus
0:43:14 was a stoic and he was religious he was
0:43:16 not speaking from the christian paradigm
0:43:17 or the muslim paradigm whatever which
0:43:19 shows you how universal this issue is
0:43:21 right
0:43:22 and he gave the example of the cone and
0:43:23 the ball i'm not sure if you've ever
0:43:24 heard of this example have you heard of
0:43:26 it
0:43:28 did i mention it in the i've written it
0:43:30 down obviously i've put this in my essay
0:43:32 and obviously you can see it
0:43:34 but
0:43:35 the cone on the board is that you put it
0:43:36 you know you've got a cone and you have
0:43:37 a ball
0:43:39 and he said if you get a cone and you
0:43:41 get a ball
0:43:43 and you push either of them
0:43:46 or both of them let's say you push both
0:43:48 of them at the same time with the same
0:43:49 force same velocity and at the top of
0:43:51 the hill yeah
0:43:53 if you push the cone what's going to
0:43:54 happen to it it's got a flat surface
0:43:56 so is it going to go anywhere
0:43:58 it might go forward an inch
0:43:59 but the ball if you push it is going to
0:44:01 go rolling down right
0:44:03 what is it that causes the ball to roll
0:44:06 but the cone to stay in one direction
0:44:08 only to forward a little bit
0:44:10 he would say well it's actually the
0:44:11 intrinsic attributes of either the cone
0:44:14 of the ball
0:44:16 there is something within the cone
0:44:18 that's only making the cone move one
0:44:20 inch whilst the ball is being is rolling
0:44:22 down
0:44:22 and that is an in
0:44:24 intrinsic attribute related to either
0:44:26 the code editable
0:44:28 the rotundity of the ball you push it it
0:44:30 goes down rolls because it has roundness
0:44:33 the flatness of the cone
0:44:35 that only moves forward a little bit
0:44:37 he said likewise with human beings you
0:44:39 can put two human beings that have
0:44:40 exactly the same experiences
0:44:43 twins with you know he doesn't say this
0:44:46 well i'm putting this yeah
0:44:48 twins with exactly the same life
0:44:50 experiences but in the same
0:44:51 circumstances same life circumstances
0:44:53 and they can act differently to the same
0:44:55 extraneous variables
0:44:58 so one person he gives the example of
0:45:00 finding some money in the street
0:45:02 some people would go and try and find
0:45:04 the rightful owner and give it back to
0:45:05 them some people just take it for
0:45:06 themselves
0:45:07 but you can apply this example to other
0:45:09 things
0:45:11 there are some things which
0:45:12 if you do
0:45:14 uh if two people that have the same
0:45:16 experiences and whatever it is
0:45:18 they were active you cannot say that
0:45:20 they won't act differently you cannot
0:45:22 say they will act exactly the same way
0:45:24 and this establishes the principle of
0:45:26 difference
0:45:27 there's some intrinsic thing
0:45:30 that differentiates person a from person
0:45:31 b
0:45:32 which would make person a do something
0:45:34 otherwise
0:45:35 or differently from person b
0:45:38 just like the cone acts differently to
0:45:40 the ball
0:45:41 now this is interesting because there is
0:45:42 a hadith this effect
0:45:44 and i i of all the analogies i looked at
0:45:47 this was
0:45:48 one of the best if not
0:45:49 for me
0:45:50 the top one of the top best ones one of
0:45:52 them would keep it as one of that
0:45:54 indicates
0:45:55 the principle of difference
0:45:57 between
0:45:58 which which by the way will indicate
0:46:00 free will because if there's difference
0:46:01 in the way that two people act
0:46:03 to the same extraneous variables that
0:46:05 would indicate that they have different
0:46:08 choices to make or that they're there
0:46:10 that one person's uh unencumbered choice
0:46:13 to choose a over b is different from the
0:46:15 other person's unencumbered choice
0:46:17 well sorry um
0:46:19 even call it incumbent choice to choose
0:46:20 a over b or b of a
0:46:22 the fact that b over a is being chosen
0:46:24 by person a and a over b is being chosen
0:46:26 by person b indicates difference in
0:46:28 choice making ability between a and
0:46:30 person a and person b which indicates
0:46:32 something intrinsic within a
0:46:34 person a that's not in person b
0:46:36 or vice versa
0:46:38 which would indicate that there is some
0:46:39 choice being made being made and there's
0:46:41 a beautiful hadith which is much more
0:46:43 easy too
0:46:46 i'm going to read this word for word
0:46:48 right
0:46:52 this the similitude of guidance and
0:46:53 knowledge with which allah has sent me
0:46:55 is like a rain which has fallen on some
0:46:58 ground
0:46:59 a fertile part of earth has observed
0:47:01 sorry has absorbed water and brought
0:47:04 forth
0:47:05 much grass and herbs
0:47:06 another part which is solid held the
0:47:08 water and allah benefits men thereby who
0:47:11 drink and give others to drink and use
0:47:13 it for irrigation but for some it has
0:47:15 fallen on a portion of sandy land which
0:47:18 neither retains the water nor produces
0:47:20 herbage such as the likeness of a man
0:47:22 who understands the religion of allah
0:47:24 and who gets benefit from um and who
0:47:26 gets benefit
0:47:29 of what allah has sent me with he learns
0:47:31 and teaches others he is also the
0:47:32 likeness of a man who neither raise
0:47:34 raises his head
0:47:36 on on that account meaning he does not
0:47:38 benefit from what the prophet was sent
0:47:40 with
0:47:41 nor accept allah's guidance with which i
0:47:43 was sent meaning
0:47:45 you have this extraneous variable okay
0:47:47 you have the water coming on to
0:47:50 the earth
0:47:51 there are some parts of the earth
0:47:54 which react to it by producing herbage
0:47:58 fertile parts of the earth and other
0:47:59 parts of the earth which are dry
0:48:01 which don't react to it by not producing
0:48:03 verb herbage what this is very similar
0:48:05 to the precipice example
0:48:07 so there's intrinsic attributes within
0:48:09 those parts of the
0:48:11 earth which allow
0:48:14 herbig to be produced in one place and
0:48:17 not allow and other intrinsic attributes
0:48:19 of other parts of the ground which are
0:48:20 allah which should be produced in
0:48:22 another part
0:48:23 suggesting what
0:48:24 there's something intrinsic within some
0:48:27 people
0:48:28 that makes them respond
0:48:30 to revelation in this case this
0:48:33 external thing which is coming out
0:48:36 and makes them respond to it positively
0:48:38 or negatively
0:48:41 and that internal thing is
0:48:45 or the the mamba or the
0:48:48 point
0:48:51 of tribulation for that person
0:48:54 now how that point of tribulation for
0:48:56 that person
0:48:57 it
0:48:59 is in a compatible relationship with
0:49:01 godly determinism how the two things
0:49:04 work is impossible to know
0:49:06 but that we can establish the principle
0:49:08 of difference
0:49:09 if we can establish the principle of
0:49:10 difference
0:49:12 then a determinist must now explain
0:49:15 why is that this principle or this thing
0:49:17 exists
0:49:18 and why is it as well in addition that
0:49:20 we have this first person subjective
0:49:21 experience of of difference of um of
0:49:23 choice there are two things which a
0:49:26 determinist cannot explain
0:49:27 why is it that i feel like i'm in charge
0:49:30 why is it i feel like i could have my
0:49:32 own choices
0:49:33 it's a first it's intrinsic it's as good
0:49:35 for me as that i exist
0:49:37 that i know i can do and say what i want
0:49:38 to say and do
0:49:41 a conversation that you have with a
0:49:42 determinist
0:49:43 any conversation that you have with the
0:49:45 determinist
0:49:47 that
0:49:49 what's predicated or what's uh
0:49:51 presupposed in that conversation is that
0:49:52 i know what i'm saying and i'm choosing
0:49:54 what i'm saying and what he knows what
0:49:55 he's saying and what he's using what
0:49:56 he's saying
0:49:57 there is a pathetic irony therefore
0:50:00 in choosing to be a determinism
0:50:03 i'll put this tomorrow
0:50:05 you know there is a pathetic irony in
0:50:07 that because how could you choose to be
0:50:08 this i mean
0:50:10 the idea of being a determinist is that
0:50:12 you don't have any choice so
0:50:14 the the it's not that the sermonism
0:50:16 doesn't have internal consistency we're
0:50:17 not saying it doesn't we're saying it
0:50:19 doesn't have the full explanatory scope
0:50:22 it doesn't explain um
0:50:24 a huge part of the human experiences
0:50:26 which is to have free will or the
0:50:29 subjective first person subjective
0:50:31 experience of having free which is
0:50:33 foundational to rationalism
0:50:37 and moreover it doesn't explain the
0:50:38 principle of difference
0:50:41 being a libertarian doesn't explain why
0:50:42 things have causes and effects
0:50:47 um
0:50:48 or how how you can explain
0:50:50 how things
0:50:51 because what what libertarians will do
0:50:52 is say it will they'll claim some kind
0:50:54 of quantum reality so we don't really
0:50:56 know maybe it's a quantum field or
0:50:57 something or some kind of quantum
0:50:59 reality a function
0:51:00 that stops causes from having effects
0:51:03 therefore we are in charge you know but
0:51:05 that's again just speculation
0:51:07 um you can use quant you can use word
0:51:09 quantum to get away from anything
0:51:10 to make anything
0:51:12 unintelligible sound intangible you
0:51:14 should
0:51:14 want to be a quantum
0:51:16 you know
0:51:18 but they wouldn't use these quantum
0:51:19 explanations with everyday life i mean
0:51:21 why don't you get the milk today oh
0:51:24 because it was quantum
0:51:25 whatever
0:51:26 no one uses this kind of explanation
0:51:28 they only use it in the metaphysic
0:51:30 metaphysical
0:51:35 explaining all dialogues ideas
0:51:36 examination everything and everything
0:51:38 made sense
0:51:40 and you start to think like if
0:51:41 everything makes sense to you
0:51:43 why why you don't believe in it
0:51:46 at the end of the video you said
0:51:48 but
0:51:48 you have quantum reality
0:51:50 yeah exactly yeah so
0:51:53 we don't know exactly yeah
0:51:56 so going back to the point
0:52:01 what was i about to explain before you
0:52:02 mention again
0:52:05 non-absence of contradiction right right
0:52:08 right so we explain now why the other
0:52:10 positions the libertarian positions and
0:52:12 the uh
0:52:12 jobless positions or if you like the
0:52:14 determinants positions
0:52:16 are problematic not because they're
0:52:17 lacking internal consistency but because
0:52:19 they lack an explanatory scope
0:52:21 especially relates to
0:52:22 uh first person subjective experience of
0:52:25 choice-making ability
0:52:26 and the principle of difference and on
0:52:28 the other hand
0:52:29 the the existence of an antecedent
0:52:32 causal chain
0:52:33 uh which
0:52:35 uh which does determine at least on the
0:52:37 face of it
0:52:39 why things are the way they are
0:52:41 now in terms of what we
0:52:43 can argue for
0:52:45 is the fact that
0:52:46 it doesn't what is a what is impossible
0:52:49 so we have we go back to the categories
0:52:51 of of possibility and possibility
0:52:53 necessity
0:52:55 necessary thing is something that cannot
0:52:57 be any other way
0:52:58 an impossible thing is something which
0:53:00 cannot exist because
0:53:02 it's self-contradictory like a squared
0:53:04 circle and a possible thing is something
0:53:06 which or a contingent thing is something
0:53:07 which depends on something else
0:53:09 or the beginning it's finite it could be
0:53:11 some other way whatever yeah
0:53:14 now
0:53:15 as now the question theologically is
0:53:18 what is impossible for allah or what
0:53:21 not for allah what is impossible
0:53:24 in relation to allah
0:53:26 so things which are impossible that are
0:53:28 meaningless like for example which are
0:53:29 not a shape which are not a thing
0:53:32 so can allah create a squared circle we
0:53:34 would say such a question
0:53:36 assumes the existence of such a thing as
0:53:38 a squared circle and a squared circle is
0:53:40 not a thing it's impossible therefore
0:53:42 asking if allah can create a squared
0:53:44 circle
0:53:45 is a meaningless statement
0:53:48 now
0:53:49 in order for us to
0:53:53 say
0:53:54 that the existence of godly determinism
0:53:56 and human free will
0:53:58 is impossible
0:53:59 it would have to fit the same category
0:54:01 of asking the question whether allah can
0:54:03 create a squared circle
0:54:06 but what we know is through the
0:54:07 principle of difference
0:54:09 that not only is godly determinism
0:54:13 or even if we take the secular view any
0:54:15 determinism
0:54:17 if we accept the causal chain
0:54:20 necessary if possible but it's necessary
0:54:23 and human free will is necessary this is
0:54:25 due to these two things have become
0:54:29 we are certain that we have free will
0:54:31 because of our experience
0:54:33 we are certain that we have a free will
0:54:35 because of the principle of difference
0:54:37 but we are also certain that given the
0:54:39 causal chain that there is determinism
0:54:41 so we are certain of two things
0:54:44 which on the face of the on the face of
0:54:46 it are
0:54:47 opposite to each other
0:54:51 can allah
0:54:52 or does the existence the coexistence of
0:54:54 these two things which on the face of it
0:54:56 seem contradictory
0:54:59 does it defy any of the attributes of
0:55:01 god
0:55:04 such that it would be referred to as
0:55:05 impossible
0:55:06 so we say no
0:55:08 what what attributes of god does it
0:55:10 define
0:55:12 it's it can't be impossible because both
0:55:14 of those things are necessary
0:55:17 yeah both so the both of those things
0:55:19 are necessary so we can't say that
0:55:21 their coexistence is impossible because
0:55:24 we are we can we can we can we can
0:55:26 affirm the existence of both the free
0:55:28 will and determines
0:55:30 now the only other way
0:55:32 to say that this
0:55:34 is impossible for god is if it if it
0:55:36 contradicts one of the intrinsic
0:55:37 attributes of god
0:55:39 such to say that for example
0:55:41 um
0:55:42 you know
0:55:43 okay the question can god become a man
0:55:46 because if god is all-knowing and all
0:55:48 powerful how could he become something
0:55:49 which is limited and
0:55:51 and not powerful
0:55:53 but either the existence of either of
0:55:55 those two things
0:55:57 don't defy
0:55:59 do not defy
0:56:01 any of the attributes of god
0:56:04 the only way they can in the case of
0:56:06 human free will is if it's independent
0:56:08 it's the most
0:56:10 which we deny that so human free will
0:56:12 does not exist
0:56:13 independently
0:56:16 but how can it not exist independently
0:56:18 and we still have free will that's what
0:56:20 we don't know
0:56:21 you see the point so we believe in a
0:56:23 human free will which does not exist
0:56:25 independently but which is compatible
0:56:26 with godly
0:56:29 free determinism yeah free choice we we
0:56:31 believe in that
0:56:33 but how these two things interpenetrate
0:56:35 if you like
0:56:37 or
0:56:38 if you symbiotically exist or compatibly
0:56:41 exist
0:56:43 uh something which is um we can only be
0:56:46 speculative in this
0:56:47 we just don't have the scope for it
0:56:50 we just don't have the scope for it
0:56:52 uh and so
0:56:54 this is really
0:56:56 where where ends um
0:56:58 and so in terms of um answering the
0:57:01 question of how these two things can be
0:57:02 compatible we say that
0:57:04 they have to be compatible but we don't
0:57:06 know how
0:57:07 how do they have to be compatible
0:57:08 because both of them are necessary
0:57:10 it's quite similar to the situation with
0:57:13 um quantum mechanics
0:57:15 you've got things which contradict the
0:57:16 macro or at least on the face of them
0:57:19 seemingly but we know they most b
0:57:22 both exist this is actually stronger
0:57:23 than that
0:57:24 because this one is we can affirm it
0:57:26 through
0:57:27 rationalization not it doesn't have the
0:57:29 problem of induction actually
0:57:31 this doesn't even have the problem of
0:57:32 induction
0:57:33 so we have two necessary things which
0:57:35 must exist
0:57:39 and how they exist together we don't
0:57:40 know just like to say how allah hears
0:57:43 how allah knows how did allah
0:57:45 the question of
0:57:47 how does allah hear something we have
0:57:49 never known
0:57:50 how allah
0:57:52 but why do we why do we have a um a
0:57:54 special treatment with how allah does
0:57:56 it's one of his attributes as well
0:57:59 we've always says we've always said and
0:58:01 this is concurrent with all the schools
0:58:03 of islamic thought be like
0:58:05 that it's we don't know how when it
0:58:07 comes to the attributes of god we don't
0:58:09 know how you can ask us what they are
0:58:11 and we will tell you allah is
0:58:12 all-knowing all-hearing
0:58:16 he's the one who puts qatar
0:58:19 and all of that
0:58:21 but if you ask us how the functions are
0:58:23 this is above our pay grade completely
0:58:26 and how this works with this and oh we
0:58:28 don't sorry to say we don't know and
0:58:30 anyone who tries to know
0:58:31 to put forward as we said an analogy to
0:58:33 try and find out
0:58:34 is gonna find some some people find this
0:58:36 is problematic and i spoke to one guy in
0:58:38 canada he said i left islam because of
0:58:39 this
0:58:41 i said all right the video is actually
0:58:43 online i said you left islam because of
0:58:45 this
0:58:46 i said what have you become
0:58:48 he said i've become you know an agnostic
0:58:50 an agnostic or an atheist
0:58:52 i said tonight i said to him um so what
0:58:55 school of thought do you accept do you
0:58:56 accept compatibilism do you accept uh
0:58:58 determinism would you say libertarian
0:59:00 because you still have the same problem
0:59:02 and whatever school of thought you go
0:59:03 with
0:59:04 you're still going to have issues of
0:59:05 questions that are being asked because
0:59:06 this issue is not a muslim specific
0:59:08 issue
0:59:09 this is an issue that people from all
0:59:11 groups have been struggling with for
0:59:13 thousands of years
0:59:15 and they know the reasons why they're
0:59:16 struggling with it is because there are
0:59:18 two things which are clear as they
0:59:21 or that can be damaged demonstrated
0:59:23 which are true but we don't know how
0:59:24 they work together
0:59:27 that's why the issue is there
0:59:29 but they must work together if they
0:59:30 don't a lot of lots of things will be
0:59:33 inexplicable
0:59:35 and so he understood that and he
0:59:36 accepted that but he still uh for other
0:59:39 reasons decided not to become muslim at
0:59:40 that time hopefully he's become muslim
0:59:42 now but this is a thing
0:59:44 if you leave islam for this
0:59:46 what other world system will solve it
0:59:47 for you
0:59:48 you've got the same issues everywhere
0:59:50 and this is this is the this is the
0:59:52 problem
0:59:53 and this is why i've i've come to know
0:59:55 when i debate christians and jews and
0:59:57 atheists they don't really bring this up
0:59:59 as a contention you know ironically and
1:00:01 funny enough
1:00:02 this is always brought up as a
1:00:04 contention by muslims
1:00:06 never by anyone else because those who
1:00:08 are intellectual enough know that they
1:00:10 have the same questions that need to be
1:00:11 asked
1:00:12 and with that i conclude
1:00:18 all right so i wanted to read something
1:00:20 here from uh from the essay that i put
1:00:22 on a sapiens uh website and obviously
1:00:24 you can get that for free yeah if you
1:00:25 haven't already
1:00:27 it's on this on this very topic
1:00:29 um so i'll read the basically the last
1:00:32 paragraph that i wrote
1:00:34 it goes like this in an age of cancer
1:00:36 and coronavirus there are many things
1:00:37 are beyond our control
1:00:39 a robust theory of theological
1:00:40 determinism makes sense of otherwise
1:00:42 seemingly senseless events of needless
1:00:44 human suffering
1:00:46 according to a worldview characterized
1:00:48 by atheistic materialism there is no
1:00:50 objective reason why evil or suffering
1:00:52 happens
1:00:53 everything is merely a series of
1:00:56 arrangements and rearrangements of
1:00:57 physical atoms
1:00:59 i am ultimately no more significant than
1:01:01 a slab of me in the butcher shop
1:01:03 my physical annihilation in a car
1:01:05 accident or a plane crash is no more
1:01:08 objectively significant than the
1:01:09 destruction of a soul man snowman
1:01:12 the atheist philosopher alex rosenberg
1:01:14 admits this candidly stating that the
1:01:16 purpose
1:01:17 and uh so that purpose and his parent
1:01:20 aboutness are illusions created by
1:01:21 introspection
1:01:24 on such a view of existence i do not
1:01:25 believe that there is any number of
1:01:27 drugs one could take or distractions one
1:01:30 could pursue to make life feel
1:01:31 ultimately worth living
1:01:33 pastorally helping religious people to
1:01:35 see and acknowledge god's wisdom is half
1:01:37 of the psychological battle the other
1:01:39 half relates to giving them hope in
1:01:42 their own choices now
1:01:44 one of my favorite hadiths potentially
1:01:46 my favorite one
1:01:48 is the hadith in muslim
1:01:50 which states the following it says
1:01:53 that wondrous is the affair of the
1:01:54 believer
1:01:56 in
1:01:58 that all of his
1:02:00 um affairs are good
1:02:04 and this is not the case for anyone
1:02:05 except for the believer
1:02:08 in asaba too
1:02:10 if
1:02:11 good things happen to him he is thankful
1:02:14 when asaba to
1:02:16 sabbath
1:02:17 if bad things happen to him he's patient
1:02:19 and he's thankful
1:02:21 when you have a robust theory of
1:02:22 theological determinism combined with
1:02:25 the idea of
1:02:26 free will
1:02:28 what you can confront life with now
1:02:31 is a sense of
1:02:33 non-regret
1:02:35 you don't have to feel like you regret
1:02:36 this and i regret that because at the
1:02:37 end of the day
1:02:39 this is written
1:02:40 the feeling of oh this person died in my
1:02:42 family
1:02:43 or this person has this mental illness
1:02:46 or this particular physical illness or
1:02:48 or i have this particular illness or
1:02:50 whatever it is that has happened
1:02:52 continues to happen or will happen in
1:02:54 the future
1:02:55 all of this is god's plan
1:02:57 and he
1:02:58 puts that in your life for a particular
1:03:00 reason
1:03:02 and when you really believe in khadr and
1:03:04 you have faith in the fact that god is
1:03:06 operating according to your ability
1:03:09 and he is testing you according to your
1:03:11 ability
1:03:13 then this is probably the best
1:03:15 psychological
1:03:17 type of
1:03:18 protection that you can get from the
1:03:19 world
1:03:21 everything has meaning every single
1:03:23 thing has meaning
1:03:25 from when you wake up to when you go to
1:03:26 sleep everything has meaning everything
1:03:27 has purpose
1:03:29 you are
1:03:30 you have been given a tailored a
1:03:32 customized test
1:03:35 that fits your persona your intrinsic
1:03:37 qualities
1:03:40 this is the islamic belief and so every
1:03:42 single
1:03:44 time you feel pain
1:03:47 there's a there's a reason for that
1:03:48 every single time you feel anger or an
1:03:50 uncomfortable feeling there's a reason
1:03:52 for that it's a test
1:03:55 it's a punishment
1:03:57 potentially
1:03:59 it's potentially a punishment
1:04:01 uh for what your hands have put forward
1:04:04 and if so then it's then it's a it's a
1:04:06 cleansing of your sins
1:04:08 if you're upon the right belief
1:04:10 it's all of those things and more
1:04:13 so it's the only thing and that's why
1:04:14 the prophet saws
1:04:18 this is not for anyone except for the
1:04:19 believer because
1:04:22 on on materialist grounds all of this
1:04:25 stuff is random or haphazard
1:04:29 but from the islamic perspective it's
1:04:31 all
1:04:32 it's like a movie that you are the
1:04:33 protagonist in
1:04:34 everything is meaningful pain becomes
1:04:36 meaningful
1:04:38 and it becomes part of a greater plan
1:04:40 and so although in many ways
1:04:43 allah has tested us with
1:04:44 not being able to understand the full
1:04:46 nature of the mechanics of qatar
1:04:49 he's also gifted us with the fact that
1:04:50 if we believe in khadr
1:04:52 it acts as the the ultimate
1:04:56 antidote for life's problems
1:04:59 and life's pains
1:05:00 and so on
1:05:02 and with that we conclude with
1:05:08 you