Section Ya-Seen – Part 20

We are now on the last page of Section Ya-Sin which has many beneficial principles to understand belief matters. It relates to how we should benefit from the message of the Qur’an to confirm the pillars of belief, particularly the hereafter, and how we should get to know who our Creator is. Traditionally this section of the Qur’an is referred to as the “heart of the Qur’an”, “قلب القران”. When we read it, we may see that it is telling us some stories as well as some signs in creation related to God. These concepts are generally found in most of the Qur’an but here there is a special way of teaching the foundations of belief. This is referred to as the “heart of the Qur’an”, where as an analogy we can examine how our physical heart is employed to pump blood and distribute all over the body. Similarly, in the meaning of this Section, the principles we learn here can be applied to every other verse in the Qur’an. 

Let’s investigate the following verses:

أَوَلَمْ يَرَوْا۟ أَنَّا خَلَقْنَا لَهُم مِّمَّا عَمِلَتْ أَيْدِينَآ أَنْعَـٰمًۭا فَهُمْ لَهَا مَـٰلِكُونَ

36:71 Do they not see that We single handedly created for them, among other things, cattle which are under their control [employed to serve them, human beings]?

In the phrase “خَلَقْنَا لَهُم” translated as “created for them”, the Lord of the universe is speaking to make me realize that I am created and need a Conscious Absolute Creator. There are some other verses in the Qur’an which mention that there are signs in the dead earth, in night and day and in the movements of the celestial bodies such as the sun and the moon. Some verses mention the signs in the creation of sheep, camels, and transportation animals like horses, donkeys that are already created for me to benefit from. We can also benefit from the way things are created orderly where we can discover and build many other things that we use now. They are all signs to God. 

This verse is specifically mentioning in a way all these signs by describing all different events and signs pointing to the necessity of the existence of the Absolute Being so that creation of the universe will be attributed to Him only. The verse uses the phrase ” أَيْدِينَا” which is translated as “single handedly” as relating to God single handedly creating everything. How can we make sense of the usage of “Our hands” where the term “أَنَّا”, “We” is used. The construction of the term “أَيْدِينَآ” according to Arabic language does not have the article “the” literally but in (tarkeeb) form, the meaning of the article “the” is included which is why the translator is referring it directly to God. The Qur’an also uses the plural form of the term “خَلَقْنَا” translated as “We created”. This is usually referred to as the “majestic We” representing God with all His Absolute qualities. For example, the president of the United States would address the nation by using “we decided to do this” to account for the whole staff of the administration responsible to decide on this matter. They all agreed to it and thus announced the news to the nation. 

When it comes to the act of creation of God, neither the president, nor his staff and secretaries can do anything. When we say God as the Creator, we mean that this Creator cannot be described in terms of this world which is His work. The maker of the universe must have a completely different existence than that of His work. The Creator of the universe must be beyond imagination of the limitations of this universe. Our conclusion comes to that there must be someone who is Responsible for the creation of this universe; He must exist. We observe in this universe amazing work which necessitates Absolute Power, Knowledge and Will. 

The Qur’an speaks to human beings at their level using the examples that they understand. When the Qur’an uses “We did it”, I understand that in creation I will see many qualities manifested in the universe, all of them belonging to the Absolute Being. This Absolute Being represents all the qualities in my understanding. When I see qualities such as power, wisdom, art, I will see them as belonging to the Absolute Being directly, the One whose qualities include all qualities manifested in this universe. The Qur’an speaks to human capacity and heavily uses figurative speech. Therefore, when we read the Qur’an and see the first person plural pronoun “We,” the reader is expected to understand that God is emphasizing on the meaning that He created by manifesting all of His Absolute qualities, definitely not with the help of something or someone else like human president’s using royal “we”. 

What is the significance of using this term “أَيْدِينَا”, “Our hands”? We will not go into the historical argument whether God has any organs as members of His existence. We must understand God to be an Absolute Being, Who cannot be described in any shape or form of the descriptions of this created world. Definitely, this phrase “أَيْدِينَا” must be referring to something else other than anything like the human physical hands; it is figurative speech referring to the Absolute Being. For example, a mother knows that her child loves a certain dish and when he visits her, the mother joyfully says: “I made this with my own hands specially for you”. This indicates that it was a deliberate conscious act. No one else was involved but it was her own pleasure to make the dish for the child. By using “my own hands” it means not getting the help from anyone else and enjoying the activity, taking pleasure in making the dish is emphasized. 

In the same way, the term “أَيْدِينَا” refers to rejection of any other agents, actors, doers to get involved in the action of creation which is lovingly made with the manifestation of all the Owner’s Qualities.  Let’s examine the famous verse of the Throne which is like the summary of “la ilaha illallah”. It is a long verse where each word and phrase are very precious; we will focus on only the following phrase:

مَن ذَا ٱلَّذِى يَشْفَعُ عِندَهُۥٓ إِلَّا بِإِذْنِهِۦ 

2:255 “Who is there that can intercede with Him except by His leave?” 

The Qur’an is asking the question, who can make “شفاعة ”, intercede between God and the thing itself? This is a rhetorical question as there is no one who can intercede. The phrase “إِلَّا بِإِذْنِهِ”, translated as “except by His permission” where the Lord in a way says: “I will create something and allow that thing to present it to you, so that you will receive it through its intercession between Me and you. This is how I present to you my Absolute qualities manifested in this limited creation. Be careful, do not think that this intercessor is the agent but it is My creation out of My Wisdom.” We have to be careful not to take this creation form that appears to be something that is the agent of another thing. This is mistakenly described by materialist minds as a “cause and effect” relationship in the universe. This is a subject that needs to be discussed in detail.

There are some questions that one can think about:

Is there anything which can create something in the universe? Does the Creator God employ anything to help Him? How about “natural laws” or “natural forces”?

Historically, scholars argued about the popular understanding of intercession where the Prophet (pbuh) would make “intercession” for his nation (Ummah). For example, I belong to the religion that Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) brought to me, and if I accept what he presented to me, then, the prophet is going to save me by interceding between me and God. According to Christian theology, as the general public understands, Jesus is the savior and whoever believes in Jesus is saved. One can say I believe in Jesus and thus I am safe. In a way, both are saying the same thing by believing in the prophet, they are done in fulfilling the requirement. 

The problem is to know what makes his nation (Ummah) according to Islam. The prophetic intercession is simple and happens when I follow his teachings and benefit from them. As much as I benefit and apply it in my life, this is the intercession of the Prophet for me to gain the reward of my actions. God will treat me with what I have done by benefiting from His messenger. Rather than just because I believed that the Prophet Muhammad is the Messenger of God, so he will intercede with God and God will save me. Christian theology is straightaway rejected by the Qur’an which uses severe language to the concept of trinity by emphasizing the Absoluteness of God, His Lordship where nothing can intercede in His act of creation.

How about interceding between me and my Creator? It should be understood according to the teachings of the Qur’an in my relationship with His creation. For example, I need a pineapple and ask God: “please give me a pineapple.” Do I get the pineapple? I can continue: “I am your creature, I am Your worshiper, I acknowledge You, please give me a pineapple.” No matter how much I pray, I don’t get it. However, God is saying in the above verse that “I create everything with My own Hands. I create lovingly and present it to you: “You are in this created world; you must obey My order. I showed you how to get a pineapple in this orderly creation. Go study creation and find out how I directly create the pineapple as well as the fruit on it because I am the One who is the “Continuously Orderly Creator.” You are my creature and should obey My way of creating. I do not obey your desires, if you obey my way of creating, only then do I answer to your desires. You must follow my order of creation which is my way of creating. Acknowledge that I am the Creator of the pineapple tree and its fruit at the same time.”

What about the phrase “إِلَّا بِإِذْنِه”, except by His permission? What is this exception? He creates the atmosphere, sun, air, seed, water and soil that are directly created by Him. He creates them all together in such an order where the result of the plant and the pineapple together are the direct creation of God. I must obey the rules of the order in which He creates and realize that I am picking the pineapple from the Hand of the Creator, not from the hand of the pineapple tree, soil, or water. They are all created within an order at the same time, and they are the means of manifestation of His qualities. The created beings are completely contradictory in nature to the Absolute Being. I am the needy being created by Him. I can only communicate with Him through the created things in the universe. For example, a computer cannot communicate with its engineer. It is only by obeying the way the engineer made the computer to make it function where I can use it and benefit from it can I communicate with its engineer.  By obeying the order in creation, I can get the pineapple.

In the secular approach, this creation of the pineapple is referred to as being created via cause-and-effect connections. Whereas everything is an effect where God creates everything directly. To get a pineapple, I go to the pineapple plant where both are created directly by God. To get an orange, I go to an orange tree which again are both directly created by God. Can I create an orange? How about the sun or air or earth, can they create it? The answer is no. I get the orange lovingly prepared for me by its Creator, only by obeying the way God creates. This obedience is the way of asking God what I want from Him to create for me. Nothing can intercede between me and my Creator. The tree is not an intercessor between me and my Creator. As far as I am concerned, I must obey the orderly creation of planting the seed, watering it, and waiting for some time for God to create the plant  as He decides. It is only then that I benefit from the fruit. 

In the same way, I must obey the way of prophet Muhammad’s (pbuh) teachings by following his “sunnah”, the way he interacted with the universe and lived his life. That is the way I can gain the “intercession” of the Prophet (pbuh) by learning from him how to live in this world in the best way of fulfilling my obedience to God’s will. However, I must understand that the Prophet (pbuh) is not the source of his virtues, but God had educated him. Similarly, the plant is not the source of existence of the pineapple, but God employed it to be there, not as a helper but as the means in the order of creation to communicate with my Lord. When I follow the order in creation which gives me the option to choose, I can obtain the plant which is the creation of God. When I follow the way prophet Muhammad (pbuh) presented in his exemplary human life, I am obeying God; the obedience of prophet Muhammad (pbuh) is obeying God. When I follow the way things are created, I am not obeying matter, water or atmosphere but I am obeying who God teaches me how to communicate with Him. The intercession of the plant and that of prophet Muhammad (pbuh) are similar in this sense. 

When the verse says, “Who is there that can intercede except by His will” means that there is no such one. From my side, it is having intercessors where in fact there are no intercessors, but I must follow the order in creation to obtain results. In my quest to get a pineapple, I follow the order in creation by following God’s way of creation to obtain the pineapple. In the case of the Prophet (pbuh), I must follow the way the Prophet (pbuh) lived, reap the fruits of his “sunnah” life, and benefit from the best way of living. I must realize that every element of his life, his ethics, and morality were obtained from the teachings of the Qur’an, which are the instructions of the Creator of the universe. 

We must understand that the Prophet (pbuh) was trained by God as he received the message of the Qur’an and how to apply its teaching in the best way. He himself did not invent anything, i.e. one cannot hear: “According to my understanding, this is the best way to do it”. There are hadith narrations where he says “according to my understanding” which means that “God has not instructed me with anything, you do not have to obey me on that. I am using my wisdom as created by God according to my choice, it is not from God’s instructions”. His companions are famous for asking: “is this your opinion or coming from God?”  There are a couple of verses in the Qur’an describing the prophets being the best examples, trained by God for human beings. Although the universe is also a teacher, the main source of training for the prophets is the teaching of God through the Revelation He sends to them. The teacher of the Prophet (pbuh) was the Revelation, the Qur’an which he received under the instruction of God and that is what he was teaching as a Prophet. Historically we see how loyal the Prophet (pbuh) was in obeying the instructions of the Qur’an in his life with no exceptions, no hesitation in practicing.

What about my learning of the Qur’an to benefit from it?  I have been given the potential and left free to choose how to use it. I am not being directly instructed by God like the prophets. My learning is bound to my capacity, as much as I work on the message, learn, understand, and sincerely practice in my life. My free will is not under God’s instructions but mine, therefore I must be careful. If I want to learn how the Prophet (pbuh) was behaving, I must understand that all the theoretical basis of his actions are coming from the instructions of the Qur’an. The more I study to understand the Qur’an, the better I get in understanding, the more I would understand the life of the Prophet and the narrations on his (pbuh) life. I should understand the actions of the Prophet (pbuh) as having the knowledge of the teachings of the Qur’an. Reading the hadith narrations alone without the Qur’an is not the way to understand the Prophetic life. There is a consensus among the scholars that the Qur’an is the only miracle of the Prophet (pbuh) left to us now, and the life of the Prophet is the Qur’an. This means that everything miraculous in his life is from the teachings of the Qur’an. 

What can we do to benefit from his (pbuh) life? We can investigate hadith narration books from sincere people. As human beings they may fail but I have no other option, human fallacy is always with us. I must consult the experts who studied and have a scholarship. So far no one could challenge the hadith compilers as being insincere. I must understand that the backbone to understanding the hadith narrations are the teachings of the Qur’an. As much as I benefit from the Qur’an, that much I can benefit from hadith narrations. Accordingly, I can make sense of the prophetic life, I must see the universal teachings from his life and apply them to my conditions. The teachings of the Qur’an are not spacetime bound but are universal. The hadith narrations are when the universal message is practiced in a certain historical context. The way it takes place in the historical context involves the best teacher who is educated and trained by the Lord of the universe directly to be the best example for me. I must see the universal message obtained from the universal message of the Qur’an and not lose myself in the historical context. I must work on myself in understanding the universal message of the Qur’an before picking up Bukhari or al-Kāfī, to judge them. I can only make a judgment on myself, where and what am I spending my time on, what is important to me, this worldly life or the next?

No one claims to have the perfect interpretations of the hadith narrations and to point them out as “This is sunnah” for sure. There is no way to be such an expert! That is why there are many “Madhabs” in Islamic traditions which are inevitable. The reason is that every age, every community has different needs and Shari’a is presented to us by God and His Messenger in such a way that it has its own flexibility; it should be in this way because human beings are not monolithic. Every community must choose one madhab established by consensus of the Muslim community of their time and space and it should be flexible, but not arbitrary. It needs expertise and must be sincere, otherwise, we cheat ourselves. Let’s take the example of a doctor. I cannot diagnose my cure if I am not an expert in Medicine but must go to a doctor. If I am not sure about the current doctor, I can go consult another doctor, but they all must be doctors. I cannot say that I am going to read a medical book now and decide about my way of treatment, without taking a proper medical education for so many years; I will harm myself. I must be humble, not a self-claimed scholar to interpret the Hadith or the Qur’an arbitrarily according to my egoistic tendencies. There are some who claim that, but if we investigate the Qur’an, we will understand that they are nothing but “ignorant” people. They do not know how the Qur’an speaks, the delicate details in its language that one cannot imagine. One can only be amazed at the language of the Qur’an if they really study it deeply.

Continuing with the verse, the phrase “أَنْعَـٰمًۭا” is translated as “cattle” or it can be anything, freely given bounties and blessings. Animals are also blessings and favors of God to us. The phrase “أَيْدِينَآ” (single handedly) is the key to understand that everything is a lovely creation, I am getting the orange from the “Hand of God”, carefully created directly for me, and presented to me as a gift of All-Knowing, All-Powerful etc. Creator of everything. What am I doing in my life? I have been taking all the blessings from the Hand of God directly, lovingly created for me. How exciting it must be for me. May we all live with this excitement. Ameen.