In The Footsteps Of The Prophets – Part 10

“Then when he beheld the sun rising, he said: ‘This is my Lord! This one is the greatest [of all]’, but when it [too] went down, he exclaimed: “O my people! Behold, far be it from me to ascribe divinity as you do to anything which does not sustain the universe!” An’am (6):78

Recap: CreatorLord. Abraham found the Creator, now he is looking for the One that sustains his being. (refer to notes from 09/16/15)

What is the greatest possible cause of existence for us?

• Science (nature, energy…) is the common belief of this age.
• We mostly hear that science is going to find out the cause of existence of creation in the universe.

Human logic: a particle cannot be the cause of its own existence.

• In order for particle x to give existence to itself, it must have been in existence before to give existence to itself. That does not make sense.
• Another option is that particle y causes the existence of particle x. In this case, again: In order to give existence to particle x, particle y must be the cause of its own existence.

The existence of particle y needs to be explained.

• Particle y is already included in the universe.
• What is the cause of particle y?
• This leads to an infinite regression, the logical possibility of which has NOT been proven thus far.
• No one can find out the cause of existence of the particle within itself. Neither is it possible to demonstrate that a particle has the quality to give existence to another particle.
• The order cannot be the cause of its own existence.
• We cannot find out the cause of existence of order a within order b. That is a logical leap.
• When we discover something, this discovery is part of the order.
• Nothing is a causal chain.

Ask yourself:

• Can my DNA give existence to my biological being?
• Is the tree growing fruits?
• Is the plant producing oxygen?
• Can the cell be the Creator of anything?
• Is the order given existence by the one who gives existence to the universe?

Analogy: Keyboard of a laptop display letters. When you press a letter, the letter appears on the screen. Can the key be the Creator of the letter printed on the screen? No. The key is part of the set order of the laptop established by the engineer.

• Similarly, the particles are part of the order of the universe set by its Creator.
• We have to reason and come to a logical conclusion.

When we question the cause of existence of the laptop, the cause is already in the question. We have to study the laptop, its qualities and everything that makes it a laptop. Science never explains the existence of anything. It tries to find out the cause of existence within the matter itself. There is inconsistency with this logic as it leads us to conclude:

1. We cannot look for the cause of existence of this laptop within the laptop itself because we cannot go out of this laptop.
2. The laptop exists by itself.
3. There must be a cause giving existence to the whole body of the laptop because in the laptop we cannot find the cause.

We need to work with the third conclusion and expand our reasoning going outside of the laptop itself. There must be an intelligent cause giving existence to the matter. That is why the Quran defines belief in the Creator in terms of ghaib i.e. outside the constituent of this universe. We cannot find the cause of creation within matter itself. It seems like an end point but it is not. There is only one solution i.e. question what can be the source of existence of the universe?

• As a result, we shall logically come to a conclusion i.e. there must be a Creator.
• Due to the nature of matter, we cannot find the Creator in the matter itself.
• Through matter, human beings must see the signs of the Creator.
• We can confirm the existence of the Creator; we cannot define its essence.

In order to come to a logical conclusion, we have to use all our human qualities. The evidence is here in the universe, in my search and questioning. The conclusion should satisfy me and lead to imaan/belief. Without evidence, imaan is not valid.

When we observe an art, we can only confirm that there must be an artist at play. All the qualities in the art are signs pointing to the skills of the artist. These qualities do not describe the persona of the artist. My logical conclusion is that I am sure of the existence of the artist, although I have not seen him.

Belief is not an abstract notion but it is my firm conviction, logical conclusion. No one can inherit belief from forefathers. It is said in a narration that the Prophet (PBUH) said to his daughter Fatima that she can inherit his wealth but he cannot save her from her responsibility that means she cannot inherit belief from her father even he was the Prophet. Everyone has to use their human qualities to confirm the existence of the Creator. Discovering the essence/nature of the Creator is not within my power of observation. I am a part of the creation, cannot be external to it so that I will know the nature of the One Who is not a part of the creation.

Utilizing his human qualities, Abraham proved that the sun is not the cause of existence of matter. Any matter that is part of the universe can easily be demonstrated as not being the cause of its own existence. Let us take object A and object B as AB. The methodology in the Quran is such that it describes the qualities of object B and then prompts human beings to question whether object A is the cause of the qualities of object B. If object A is part of the universe, it itself needs to be created. Whatever is the cause of existence of the matter must have absolute knowledge and by studying we can conclude that the matter does not have any knowledge. There must be an Absolute Creator and it cannot be described within the created matter in this universe. That we can logically confirm.

We need to train ourselves and study any matter thoroughly to come to a logical conclusion. Within this process, we may find the universe to be complicated but with studying it, we will eventually discover that there is a perfect order to everything. Universe is created with zauj (compatible but opposite qualities). Example: day and night, negative and positive, men and women… While dealing with hard to solve problems, we discover the qualities that point to the Absoluteness of the Creator. That is called God consciousness i.e. becoming aware of the Creator.

Just as a designer of a pillar in a building has to know the whole building, similarly, in order to create one atom and put it in its place, one has to know the whole universe. Just as Abraham came to a conclusion, I too should conclude not to ascribe Absolute quality to anything in the universe that cannot sustain itself let alone the order of the universe.