Fate

Dear Martha,

I will try my best to elaborate on this subject Fate.

You wrote - I call this faith, not administered fate. Is there a difference? Depending how we exercise faith then that decides our fate

Waiting for the apple to fall onto your lap is faith. You know it will drop sometime. Yes indeed it will fall onto your lap, but most probably, you have to wait for hours and hours for your �faith� to materialize. We are given the will to determine our fate, why not use it by employing some kinds of mean for this faith to manifest. In this case, get a ladder and climb up to taste the sweetness of the apple.

Apply this to our everyday life. We believe in Allah, we believe in Islam. Is it sufficient? Allah had given us the will, the power to increase our knowledge by seeking it and after acquiring these knowledge, it is not enough, we have to practice it. In other words, knowledge and action or in Islam ilm and aml must go hand in hand.

This again is faith, surely. And obedience to Allah. HOw is that fate?

When you supplicate to Allah for long life, that is faith. Because you know that He is As-Sami� - All Hearing. When you follow Allah�s commands for example fasting is good physically and spiritually, you are obedient to Allah. When you follow these commands with faith, you are setting your fate in a positive manner.

Faith? And , as you say,using those wonderful attributes of a human body Allah has given us. If we don't use them correctly then we insult Allah

Qudrah, Iradhah, Ilm, hayah, Sama�, Basar, Qalam - these are attributes of The Ruh or spirits/souls not the human body. Applying this wisely in our everyday life, will increase our Faith as well as our Fate. Use it wrongly we are only doing harm to no one but ourselves. We are only insulting our ourselves but not Allah.

Good deeds are a source of increase in ones sustenance, and avert calamities. Not necessarily- they can be.   

These are meant spiritually, not necessary physically. The feeling of peace and calm are felt not by any of our physical parts, but felt by our heart/souls.

Oh dear....people sin and have a great time and IGNORE  these feelings you describe.....HOWEVER I believe ONE day the sins will disturb them. Shaytan makes the sinners feel they are doing ok at sinning, so it will be pleasurable for a time.

Martha, we all were born in the state of Fitrah - Pure. It is how we were brought up. If we were brought up the evil way, we are suppressing the Fitrah that is in us. The Evil is not compatible with the Fitrah, The Fitrah will stay dormant. They indeed IGNORE the tuggings of the conscience, because they do not worship The Creator instead they worship Shaythan. But there is a possibility that The Dormant Fitrah may surface one day. That is why you see lots of people embracing Islam willingly because the Fitrah in them starts to surface and they cannot lie to themselves anymore.

This is called exercising faith  Really I am confused. Help me out here.

No this is exercising Fate. Administered Fate is in our own hands.  Faith means you know Allah is out there giving each and everyone an opportunity regardless of race or religion. It is how we make use of these opportunities that is called Fate.
 
This is the reward for exercising your faith.   Allah knows our destiny(fate) long before we do, but Allah  still needs to test us. I give you an example. For those who are parents. We see our children grow and develop. You give them rules to follow. SOmetimes they obey, sometimes they don't. But the majority of parents will STILL allow the child to err...as a growing lesson. Lets face it...I am sure we know our kids well enough to know how they will react to a certain situation. Bingo! Allah is the same.
Am I making sense here? Or am I way off line somewhere

The Love of Allah is similar to the love of a mother. But of course not as great as Allah�s Love. We as parents, had given our best ,physically, spiritually, mentally to our children to follow. Yet they err. As a mother myself, everyday after solah, I will pray to Allah to forgive my children for any error that they made, because we are human beings after all. Because I love my children very much, I do not want anything to befall them. I forgive them for whatever sins that they had done towards me, and I want Allah too to forgive them. This is Faith. Because we know that Allah is Ar-Rahman - Most Gracious, Ar-Raheem, Most Merciful, Al-Ghafur - Most Forgiving, At-Tawwab - Accepter of Repentance.

This kind of faith may change our fate.

[QUOTE=Nur_Ilahi]Waalaikum Salam Sis Hidayah.

I don't say that the life of a person completely depends on efforts of man, or completely is controlled  by fate. What you called as administered fate, i call it striving for the cause to reach natural fate. -Your striving is an act that you put an effort to administer your fate. For example there is apples hanging on the tree courtesy of the natural fate that Allah had given, If the farmer did not put an effort to water the plant, put in fertilizers, would the apple tree grow with abundance for the farmer to sell? If you do not put an effort to get a ladder to climb and get the apple, would the apples drop onto your lap just with your dua?

I call this faith, not administered fate. Is there a difference? Depending how we exercise faith then that decides our fate

As Salamu Alaikum

Finally, we are on similar lines . JazakiAllahu khayr for the discussions. I learnt more about fate.

As Salamu Alaikum

Sister, the ayah you quoted, "Verily, never will Allah change the condition of a people until they change what is within themselves" (Holy Quran 13:11)." is in reference to a group / nation. Else word, "Person" would have been used.

I don't say that the life of a person completely depends on efforts of man, or completely is controlled  by fate. What you called as administered fate, i call it striving for the cause to reach natural fate. However there are some areas of our fate that do change by our duas made.

I do agree that its wrong to accuse or blame Allah swt for any loss of our life .Its not just in Tasawwuf, Islam teaches us not to accuse Allah swt. The cases you discussed for instance a divorce - whats wrong if one says that, it was destined by Allah swt ? Take the case of Zaid bin Harith and Zainab bint Jahsh RA, they were divorced and wished to be separated. It was destined ! However most of the sites share these views of scholars

Scholars derive  that destiny is of two types:

a) Muallaq (revocable):

This destiny is written on �The Preserved Tablet� (al Lawh al Mahfoodh), and is subject to change and alteration through the omission or commission of certain deeds. For example: the lifespan of a person is originally 50 years, but may increase to 60 years if he performs the ritual of Hajj, or a certain calamity is to befall him unless he averts it by spending in charity. This is the destiny refereed to in the aforementioned narration.

b) Mubram (irrevocable):

This destiny denotes the eternal knowledge of Allah. It encompasses the final result of the Muallaq destiny i.e. our choice of actions, their consequences and every precise detail of our lives. This definite knowledge of Allah is not subject to change or alter even slightly and is exclusive to Allah only.

In the light of the above the following may be derived:

Our supplications do change destiny and are of much avail.

Good deeds are a source of increase in ones sustenance, and avert calamities.

Sins result in a decrease in ones sustenance, and invite calamities.

We cannot know what is Muallaq and Mubram of a person. It varies. For instance, to get a job may be Mubram for me and Muallaq for you.

I give my 100% of efforts {these efforts also include my prayers {duas} and strive, finally i get what am destined. I accept any decision of Allah swt that gives me full satisfaction.

64:11. No calamity befalls, but with the Leave [i.e. decision and Qadar (Divine Preordainments) ] of All�h, and whosoever believes in All�h, He guides his heart [to the true Faith with certainty, i.e. what has befallen him was already written for him by All�h from the Qadar (Divine Preordainments) ], and All�h is the All-Knower of everything. "

This ayah would give a muslim lots of support when calamity befalls.

 Else, if i look thru your views,  i may think it was only because of my wrong efforts/approach. While if i take the result as will of Allah swt, am free of any kind of stress. Ofcourse, we need to check our approach, but not all are always wrong !






Edited by seekshidayath - 14 July 2009 at 6:44pm