 often times we hear things from our parents or from our teachers about destiny, we say in Farsi and in Urdu but I think that as our teachers tell us that as students of knowledge, as Mufti's, as Mawlana's, our idea is that we sort of feel the pulse of the people and that wherever their understanding is lacking with vis-a-vis any concept of the religion, vis-a-vis any understanding of the religion, vis-a-vis any mafhum, al-mafhum al-islami bi'atibar al-deen, right? Any Islamic idea must be reformed and corrected vis-a-vis the light of the Qur'an and the shaksiya of the holy prophet, As-salatu wa s-salam and in that vein I think that two things I think need to be mentioned first is this idea of how do we understand destiny vis-a-vis the Qur'an, vis-a-vis the Sunnah and most importantly when we look at our condition as an ummah, as people who follow the holy prophet, alayhi s-salatu wa s-salam, yani fil-azal wa fil-abad, how do we understand that why is Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala affecting us with so much grief and I think that these two notions al-mafhuman al-wa-ta-baran, yani yajib al-alina al-nubayyin al-amma makum and it's really critical for us to explain this, to explore this before you because we have 1400 years of history of ulama from West Africa to Hindustan who have explored this, who have analyzed this, who have tried to study this, but again because of for XYZ reasons you can say or whatever that we have lost that connection of deep knowledge, of deep Qur'anic knowledge, i.e knowledge that pulsates and blazes throughout the very fiber of our khudi and of our being, you know Mawlana Rumi said that literally ecstatically oh Muslims, oh Muslims I have to tell you something and the whole ghazal is just him shouting oh Muslims, oh Muslims that I have to tell you something, what is it? that I have this underlying grief that pulsates within me but this grief is sort of afflicting me from from the heavens like rain on my head right and so this you know I think that as Muslims as we as we reckon with our grief of the ummah as we reckon with our pain as we reckon with our ofsofs and our range I think it must really be grounded in how do we understand taqdeer and qadr and destiny in the Qur'an Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in about 10 to 15 locations uses the form of qadr Allah says you know for example inna kulla shayn khalaq naahubi qadar Allah has created everything with taqadar, we'll get to the meaning of this Allah also says in the Qur'an wallahu yuqadiru layla wa n'ahar Allah does taqdeer, Allah measures the night and the day Allah in the Qur'an also says wa khalaq kulla shayn fa qalaq naahubi qadar that Allah has created everything and in it he has created a qadar Allah also says fa qadarahu wa hadaa that he has done taqdeer of everything and guided it so what does this mean what do all these verses mean together the great Mughal theologian Shah Wulullah Mohd al-Dahlawi in his usul al-tafsir kitab al-fawz al-kabir he said al-Quranu yufasiru baaduha baada al-Quranu yufasiru baaduha baada he wrote this in the 18th century that the parts of the Qur'an explain other parts of the Qur'an but you can never have a true holistic and a paradigmatic understanding of the Qur'an unless you see all of these ayaat squared up before you right and this is why it's important you know as as we read the Qur'an to think of it in a very jama'iya manner right in a very holistic manner you know when we talk about it's al-qadar inna anzalna filayat al-qadar we often mistranslate it as a night of power but this is the same word qadar qadar does it mean power qadra in Arabic means power and we know just from one fat'ha to al-dammah the whole word can change ajala in Arabic means you know hastiness as the prophet said al-ajalatu minash shaytan alayh you know that hastiness is from shaytan ujla means a cart you know like a horse cartwheel just one dammah fat'ha change the whole word changes just qadar al-qadra qadar in Arabic it's very interesting if you look in the the shi'ar or the the poetry of the jahiliya before islam you'll see that it's a very singular meaning right and i say that umar radi allahu wa'a'am said that you can't understand the Qur'an unless you study the shi'ar of the jahiliya because the Qur'an is revealed in what Arabic right wa qadalika anzallahu huqman arabiya inna anzallahu Qur'an an arabiya la'allakum ta'aqilun and this idea of qadar um from what we see of of of this Arab civilization is that it means something like a measurement right that you're measuring something in Farsi we have something called qadar dani what does qadar dani mean someone who knows your worth who knows your value who knows your measure right and so when we when we read the Qur'an and we read this and we understand what that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has created this whole universe has created this whole cosmos and has created us with qadar with measurement that we are of a certain measure we are of a certain isti'adad we are of a certain isti'ta'a these are all you know bahar hal you know very old theological terms that the muttikalli mean would use but the idea is that just like Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has created the entire universe with a certain measure so too Allah has created us with a certain measure right and and this becomes even more important right because many people ask that question if Allah has written everything then what's the point of me doing something right if Allah is that's what they say right if Allah has written everything then why should I do any a'amal why should I do any a'amal everything is a lokh al-mahfud right fi lokh al-mahfud as Allah says in surah surah a'la right so why should we do anything or if we do have free will then where is Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala's free will if we are if we are engaging in actions then where is Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala's qadra and his iqtiyar and his irada and his mashiqa right how does all of that interlace with our own free will and this debate started in the 8th century in you know in Iraq and especially in these two countries Afghanistan and Uzbekistan 1200 years ago in the north of Afghanistan in the south of Uzbekistan these debates started between three groups the jabariya the qadariya the mu'atazila and the maturidis 1200 years ago these debates raged what is the nature of destiny how do we understand all of these a'ayat all of these verses in the Quran for a thousand years it's been debated and by the way you know anybody who has studied comparative religion will know that the tradition of destiny or the concept and the robustness of destiny in Islam is not found in any other religion you can study Hinduism you can study Judaism you can study Christianity and all of its strands you will not find the sophistication that we have of the idea of qadar of destiny and of taqdeed right and anyway these these debates are very long you know we obviously don't have too much time to engage but basically there were two groups one was the jabariya they believed that insan or human beings have no free will right they said that if Allah swt has free will and you have free will then your will is dominant over Allah swt if you commit a sin Allah doesn't want you to drink alcohol but if you drink alcohol it doesn't mean that right that your irada or your volition or if your free will has dominated over the volition of Allah so this group went one way and then you have the qadariya right the qadariya they said you know critiquing the jabariya saying that look if you say that human beings have no free will then how can Allah punish us if everything has been written right if everything is means if everything is written then how can Allah punish us that if Allah swt has written everything in the law hual ma'fu then Allah has decreed everything then how can He punish us for our sins this debate happened 1200 years ago in Mazar-e-Sharif in Samarqand in Bukhara you have hundreds of books just this one masala on this one philosophical issue right and so they went the other way they said that Allah swt has no irada over us that we create our own actions and we decide our own destiny now obviously this also undermines the irada of Allah swt what's the point of worshiping Allah swt if you're saying that Allah has no irada and this goes against many ayat in the Qur'an wa lakinna allahu yaf'alu ma yurid la yusalu amma yufalu wahum yusaloon right wa lakinna allah yakhtaar all of these ayat that talk about you know wa man yushy'illah yudulil wa lausha'a rabbuka la'amana man fil audi kulluhum jami'aa faanat tukri hunnasa man yakoonu mu'mineen right all of these verses that talk about Allah swt's irada and His volition I'm not gonna go deep into this but this is basically the two major extreme camps and then you have the third camp of which you know the majority of Muslims have been a part of namely the Ottoman Empire and the Mughal Empire made the school of thought in the Timur empire there's the school of thought mainly the maturidi theology Abu Mansoor Al Maturidi he passed away in the year 980-985 AD only 100 years after Imam Bukhari in the grave of Samarqand his tomb is still there if you go to Samarqand and he said that you know we're gonna going to take a Mu'atadil position a moderate position between these two extreme camps right wa qadalika ja'alaakum umma ta wasatah that we have made you a moderate nation and when you look at you know 1400 centuries of Islamic history you will see that every major theological issue that we have gained consensus on is really the Mu'atadil and the moderate stands on both issues you know there have been many sects in Islam there have been many you know Firaq Batila in Islam but if you see the dominant position is always is the the wasat position right the moderate position what now what did Imam Maturidi say radiallahu anhu wa arda that he said that you know I'm not going to deny Allah subhanahu ta'ala's irada nor am I going to deny the human irada right the idea is that what that Allah subhanahu ta'ala obviously has irada he has irada over everything and his irada over everything if Allah wanted he could he could put all the believers in half fire and put all the disbelievers in paradise that is the irada of Allah subhanahu ta'ala who can who can challenge Allah subhanahu ta'ala right but then he also said that I'm not going to deny the volition or the free will of the human being that we as human beings earn our own actions that we are responsible we are liable when you do something you feel bad about it right there is that fitri thing that our actions are attributed to us but out of adab right and but imam maturidi said this and this is imam ashaari and imam maturidi agree here of the you know of the two major theological camps that that Allah creates both good and evil that you are creating your good actions and your you know Allah subhanahu ta'ala is creating your good actions and your evil actions right and this is where the muhattasila went off right that you know but just because Allah subhanahu ta'ala is creating the evil actions that you're doing that doesn't mean that you yourself are not responsible for committing those actions and this is really where it sort of comes to a head you know the great indian theologians of the late 19th early 20th century also you know just like a thousand years before them insama khan took up this issue as well what does that mean what does destiny mean are we are we entitled to these actions are we are we responsible and liable to these actions if Allah creates everything then when i commit a sin is then he also creating that sin that i'm doing and if i you know if he's not then who's creating that sin am i creating that sin does that mean there are multiple creators in this world anyways coming back to the major point is that the idea of qadar and this is what imamma turidi says is that Allah subhanahu ta'ala has created everything in this world with a qadar with a measurement so just like you know a certain tree or a certain garden or or even you know Allah subhanahu ta'ala talks about you know the the sun and the moon and to do the night and day right that it's not it's not appropriate or it's not possible it's not logically possible for the sun to overtake the moon or for the moon to overtake the sun why? because because Allah has created a measurement Allah has created a qadar in the sun that means that the sun has a specific range of actions that it can engage in right so too with the moon so too with any plant right so too with any flower as you know the great scholar from north india Mawlana Shabir Ahmed Rathmani said in the late 1900s the late 1800s rather that you know if someone goes up to a mango tree and he says this you know very sarcastically can anybody say why the mango tree is not producing a pomegranate? why? right and this is he wrote this in his masala qadar that if you go up to a mango tree and you you can't ask Allah why can't this mango tree produce pomegranates? you can't go up to an apple tree you know or or a cherry blossom tree and say that you know why isn't this tree producing you know this other fruit the idea is what that و خلقنا كل شيء فقد ده له تقديره that Allah has put a measurement into everything right and that this measurement is the range of possibilities for every single human being but now that is just nature coming to human beings and this is really where it gets interesting because when we bring the life of the holy prophet sallallahu a'laihi wa a'laihi wa sallam it becomes even more fascinating one time this hadith is mentioned both in Bukhari and muslim and other sahi kutub the prophet a'laihi sallatu wa sallam is coming back from aghazwa and he stops and he has he obviously you know he has his asa'i mubarak his staff in his hand you know the afghan poet said sara'a sara jum la'alam sara'a sara jum la'alam poor zil madadas but he madaday tshum mousabaa asa'aku that this whole world is filled with men show me a man like that man with a staff a'laihi sallatu wa sallam anyways the prophet a'laihi sallatu wa sallam stops in the sand and he creates a diagram in the sand this is mentioned in Bukhari and muslim he creates he creates a diagram in the sand right and in and in that diagram he creates what they say is a rectangular box and in this rectangular box he creates what are what are you know diagonal lines And he says and he starts at one end of the rectangle and he goes to the other end with this staff And he says that this is the beginning of a human's life This is the beginning of a human's life and these intersecting, you know vertices. These are all the masai These are all the calamities of that will affect a human being and even if one man try, you know, misses one calamity He'll hit another if he misses two calamities who hit the third one, right? And this is the the sort of tafsid of the ayah and the Qur'an That two people, do people believe, right, that when they bring faith that Allah won't test them and this is this idea again That as human beings we are built with a qadr. We are built with a measurement and that with our measurement is also connected our calamities Right, and there is no missing that and this is why Mawlana Shabir Ahmed Ar-Rathmani. He says that you know people who say that You know if Allah has written everything then what's the point of doing any amal? He gives an incredible analogy He says that there is no doubt that Allah's knowledge encompasses everything Pre-eternally and post-eternally. There is no doubt about that. There is no question about that You know as Allah says in the Qur'an Allah's knowledge encompasses everything right, but then he says that let me give you an analogy He says that you know obviously this is in colonial British India and trains were a new thing then From the British and he says that let's say you have a timetable, right? And you have that timetable and the trains are also obviously supposed to make that time Right, they're supposed to let's say the train is supposed to come at 230 or the plane is supposed to come at 230 Just because you have a timetable there doesn't mean that has any impact on what you on what that train does or what That train conductor does so this is that this is the the parable and the analogy Right that for us to really understand that what does it mean for Allah? Subhanahu ta'ala to know everything for him to have written everything down in the preserved tablets But also for us to engage in deeds because just because Allah subhanahu ta'ala creates good deeds You know Allah Khalil khairi was sure just because Allah subhanahu ta'ala has created a chai and burai You know goodness and excellence doesn't mean that that you know burai is associated to him Jalla wa ala the great Alim you know from Lahore also says that If you have a garden right and you have many many sort of different kinds of flowers in one side of the garden And then the other side of the garden, you know, you don't have you know Let's say the the best of flowers or the best of you know plants or fruits and you have sunlight coming and hitting both Right or let's say the sunlight is burning one part of the garden. It's not burning the other part of the garden it's not the fault right of of each and every sort of fruit to To be responsible for what it is produced right because what's happening every human being is created with an isti ta'a Is created with a qadr with a measurement with a certain range of possibilities within their life That's why you hear stuff right when we when we sort of converse with people right that I you know I never thought I could do this but it somehow it just came to me Right you hear stuff like that that I never thought I would be in this place But somehow it happened. This is this idea of measurement right that certain things are now unfolding in in your world In your own taqdeer and that's why taqdeer. Hello. How do we translate it in Persian? Andaza, right? It's a measurement right because your whole life is measured According to what the Amar of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, but you as a human being have cusp you can acquire those actions and You know, Allah my Iqbal and you know the 1920s would say that one of the greatest calamities of the ummah and he said this and You know And payam-e-mashrik is that they have misunderstood taqdeer that Muslims have become fatalist that they don't believe That they can do anything or achieve anything with Hamid because Allah has already written everything You know the fact that Europeans had colonized 95% of the Muslim world the Muslims then at that time had said that you know Allah had decreed this what can we do but he said that you know You don't understand taqdeer and that's why you know, what what are his last lines of his job is shekwa? To taqdeer hey to tadbeer hey, you know tadbeer theory that you yourself are destiny Right that you have that power to sort of engage in all of these sort of range of possibilities, right? And this is what this is the secret of the hadith when the Prophet Ali salat wasalam said when Sayyidina Uman converted to Islam khiyaruhum fil jahiliya khiyaruhum fil islami idha faquhuh At the best in jahiliya are the best in Islam when they get fiqh when they get an understanding of the religion Because that range of possibilities when it comes into Islam That unfolds that for them and for the ummah Right and so we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to help us understand You know Iqbal also has an incredible poem where he sets up between himself and Maulana Rumi And he asked that how explain to me oh Maulana, oh Pirirum. What is the mystery of taqdeer? What is the mystery of destiny? And he says that you know a crow will go to a graveyard and you know Shaheen or or a hawk, you know will go to a Sultan Right and that this is this idea is that we all have a nature, right? And we all can interact with our nature as Allah says in the Qur'an Inna sa'iyakum na shatta fa'amma man a'ata wa taqa wa saddaqa bil husna fa'sa nooyasiruhu lilyusra Allah says that whoever obeys Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and fears him fa'sa nooyasiruhu lilyusra ason khardeen Fa'sa nooyasiruhu lilyusra we have made easy for him paradise Because this is this idea now his taqdeer is shifted towards that now the whole world Will sort of align to that and this is this idea, you know again that Iqbal and Rumi are saying that you know When you engage with taqdeer when you engage with the aqadar and that measurement the whole world Will align yourself, you know around you to you and before you and what more example? Can we see that then in the that in the seerah of the holy prophet? Salallahu alaihi wa sallam well the whole world bowed before him this I hope can clarify some form of taqdeer I'll say this and I ask for forgiveness of Allah for you Muslims and I ask for forgiveness of him and his forgiveness of the Merciful Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillah, we praise him and we ask for forgiveness of him and we believe in him and we rely on him And we seek refuge with Allah from the evil of our souls and from the evil of our deeds Who guides him, Allah, does not misguide him and who misguides him, Allah, does not guide him And we bear witness that there is no god but Allah and there is no partner And we bear witness that our master and our master are Muhammad, his servant and his messenger He sent him with the truth as a guide and a warner in the hands of the Hour Who obeys Allah and His messenger has lost his will and who misguides Allah and His messenger has lost his will and lost his will And the Arabic prophet, Hashemi, said to him, the best of prayers and the best of prayers and the best of prayers and the best of blessings Arhamu Ummati Bi Ummati Abu Bakr Wa Shadduhum Fi Amr Allahi Umar Wa Azdaquhum Hayaan Uthman Wa Qadahum Ali Wradwan Allahi Ta'ala Aalayhim Aajma'een Wa Fatima Sayyidah Nisa'i Ahlil Jannah Wa L'Hassan Wa L'Hussein Sayyidah Shiba'i Ahlil Jannah Wa Hamzatu Asadullah Wa Asadu Rasulih Allahum Makhfil Lila'abbas Wa Waladihi Makhfiratun Zahiratun Wa Baatina Laa Tugadir Zambaa Allaha Allaha Fi Ashabi Laa Tattakhiduhum Gharadum Min Ba'adih Fa Man A'habahum Fa Bi Hubee A'habahum Wa Man A'bghadahum Fa Bi Bughdi A'bghadahum Wa Khairu Ummati Qaruni Thumma Lathin Yaluna Hum Thumma Lathin Yaluna Hum Allahum Makhfil Lila'l Mu'mina Wa L'Mu'mina Wa L'Muslimina Wa L'Muslimaat Al-Ahya'i Minhum Wa L'Ammwaat Allahum Man Thur Man Nasr Adina Muhammadin Sallallahu Alaihe Wa Sallam Wa Jalnaa Minhum Wa Khadul Man Khadal Adina Muhammadin Sallallahu Alaihe Wa Sallam Wa Laa Tajalnaa Maa Hum Allahumma Bi Hormat Muhammed Allahumma Bi Hormat Al-Muhammed Nabbehnaa Minal Qawm Al-Ghafilin Imna Allaha Ya Amrul Adri Wul Ihsan Wa Ita Izzil Qurbaa Wa Yanhaa Anin Fahshaa I wal Munkari Wul Baghih Ya'idukum Laa Allakum Tadakkarun Udhkur Allah Yadhkurukum Wa Da'uhu Yastajib Lakum Wa La Dhkur Allah Ta'ala Akbar Maa Ta'sna'oon Tim Salah