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From: mmdh@cbnewsf.cb.att.com (mazen.mokhtar)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.islam
Subject: Re: followup on "What makes one a Muslim"
Message-ID: <1991May30.151254.15706@wpi.WPI.EDU>
Date: 30 May 91 15:12:54 GMT
References: <1991May29.145428.21338@wpi.WPI.EDU>
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In article <1991May29.145428.21338@wpi.WPI.EDU> 665instr@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu (Ian) writes:
>Thank you for the info.
>I think I understand what God, the prophets, Judgement Day and maybe the Holy
>Books mean in Islam. But what do the Angels and Qad'q and Qad'r mean?

Angels are creatures of Allah (God). They have no physical needs and they
cannot disobey Allah.

Aproximate translations:

Qada' (no q) : [Judgement] Allah knows/decides what is to happen.
Qadar:       : [Power]     Allah makes His Will happen.

  Note that Muslims do not believe in predestination, we believe that we
have the freedom to act despite the fact that Allah knows the future, this
is because we do not know Allah's will. Since Allah is timeless, rather
than saying Allah knows something _before_ it happens, I like to say Allah
knows something _happened_ at time x, even if it is in the future. That
explains why the Qur'an refers to the will of Allah in the past tense most
of the time (this is not the only explanation.)
  The point is that everything happens by the Will and Knowledge of the
Creator. None can disobey, none can hide anything. When I move my
hand, it is Allah who moves it for me, even if I move it to steal. It is
only because Allah explicitly wills it that any atom moves at any
given moment. When we disobey, we disobey his command, but that is only
because He gave us that ability.
  We choose because He allowed us to choose. The concept of freedom
of choice is difficult because humans cannot construct a machine
that chooses for itself, they can only construct a machine that chooses
for our perpouses. In the end we are accountable for our acts, a burden
we do not know how to place on what we construct.

>Iman means "faith", doesn't it?

  The meaning of Iman is more like "conviction". Faith is a close enough
concept that that is the translation many people use, but it has overtones
of irrationality that 'Iman' and 'conviction' lack. One has Iman because
one has reason to have Iman, so one would not say 'I may be wrong, but
I have Iman in X'.

Mamdouh Maher